Didn’t think I’d find myself agreeing with Count Dooku but here I am.
Okay but he’s honestly 100% right.
This post keeps cropping up and isn’t going away, so here’s my response:
Dooku’s wrong.
Yoda absolutely sees all of the evils and wrongs that exist in the galaxy. He sees the corruption and flaws, he has seen them for centuries–but what would someone have him do?
Yoda could have seized control of the galaxy at any time, far more ruthlessly and efficiently than Sidious ever did. He could have seized control of the Senate, whether by mind-control or the point of a lightsaber, and demanded that they stop their corruption and greed and go forth to fight and free slaves and bring all distant, lawless planets of the galaxy under the protection of the wise, powerful, and good Jedi. He could have pulled the Jedi Order away from the Republic, scattered its members to operate in back alleys and impoverished villages on remote worlds, shunning all the comforts and protection that the Jedi became accustomed to…
But he didn’t, because he is not the Sith.
What Yoda does, instead, is speak to children. He trains them from youth to help the helpless and put the needs of others before their own. He teaches adults to heed the words of youth, and ensures that the next generation will retain the wisdom that he has found. He watches them and raises them again and again–and most importantly, he grants every being around him the freedom to choose.
Not once has Yoda ever demanded that a Jedi remain in the Order. No Jedi is a prisoner–Dooku and Ahsoka were both allowed to leave, and when Anakin was considering abandoning the order as a child, Yoda gave Obi-Wan the freedom to follow his student, if he chose. Even when Luke Skywalker, the next-to-last hope of the galaxy, chose to hurry away from his unfinished training and rush into certain death, Yoda let him go. He could have picked up the ship and sunk it back into the swamp, he could have overpowered Luke and forced him to remain, but he did not–not because of complacency or corruption, but because he would never force his own will upon someone.
Dooku’s belief stems from a desire to control and find perfection. He can’t accept that people will make wrong decisions and hurt others while remaining unpunished–Dooku understands what the galaxy needs, and so it is Dooku who will determine what is right and what is wrong. His resulting actions–actions that Yoda could have taken at any time–resulted in the slaughter of trillions and a war that ripped the galaxy in two before locking it within the iron grip of Darth Sidious. He earned the name “Tyrannus” because he believed that people could be made to follow morals and ideals by force.
Yoda has smelled the stench of corruption for almost nine hundred years, but he has never ignored it. He has simply never allowed it to spread to him, and fought to keep those around him from being corrupted in turn.
I can’t believe this has to be explained but there is a world of difference between enforcing your will on someone and offering help to disenfranchised people. You can’t set the Jedi up as protectors of freedom in the galaxy, then do fuck-all to achieve that end, and after all that claim that you’re doing the right thing.
And in the case of slavery, the Jedi wouldn’t even be going against the “will of the people” or whatever if they worked to end it, because slavery has been made illegal in the Republic. Slaves’ freedom is more important than their masters’ wills! And what about the slaves’ wills to be free? What argument are you even trying to make with this line of discussion?
(And let’s not forget that Dooku did fuck-all to help the slaves of Tatooine either. Dooku wants power, he doesn’t want to help anyone but himself).
And this is exactly how a young, good-hearted young man brought about the doom of the galaxy.
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