The Plight of Star Wars Droids

malachiorion writes "Does George Lucas hate metal people? I know, sounds like standard click-bait, but I think I present a relatively troll-free argument in the piece I wrote for Slate. We stuck to the Star Wars canon, pointing out the relatively grim state of affairs for droid rights, and the lack of any real sympathy for their plight from the heroes, or, it would seem, George Lucas. C-3PO is more correct than he might realize, when the says that droids 'seem to be made to suffer.'"

Comments

Characters are created to suffer

[_Sharp'r_]

Characters in stories are created to suffer through most of the plot. Droids are just a little easier to do that with in a serious way than people are, although ultimately, people are more fun.

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[Maxo-Texas]

Characters in science fiction stories allow us to look at things differently than we normally do.

In some cases, it lets us look at prejudice, racism, etc. (But but.. HE'S BLACK and WHITE and I'm WHITE AND BLACK).

To be honest, I never thought about it before, but the treatment of the droids in Star Wars is really just another look into George's racism.

When he was growing up- racism was so prevalent, you could be blind to it. Just watch old 1950's movies and TV shows and it's atrocious.

I don't think George was trying to make a point and get people to see their racism and willingness to be sadistic (or even casually murderous) to weaker beings but wowsers- the author really opens my eyes. I won't see Star Wars the same way again.

Even the GOOD guys are fairly callous and evil to droids- treating intelligent beings as slaves.

Very interesting.

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[Somebody Is Using My]

On the other hand, I'm reminded of this counter argument...

"Illogical though it seemed, most of the human race had found it impossible not to be polite to its artificial children, however simple-minded they might be. Whole volumes of psychology, as well as popular guides (How Not to Hurt Your Computer's Feelings; Artificial Intelligence - Real irritation were two of the best-known titles) had been written on the subject of Man-Machine etiquette. Long ago it had been decided that, however inconsequential rudeness to robots might appear to be, it should be discouraged. All too easily, it could spread to human relationships as well.
- 3001The Final Odyssey by Arthur C Clarke

Which is why I always say "thank you" to my computer when it finishes a difficult task ;-)

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[TWX]

Not only don't they get medals, but both they and Chewbacca had to appear in-character in-costume for George Lucas' AFI Lifetime Achievement Award ceremony... They didn't make Carrie Fisher put on the Leia costume or Billy Dee Williams wear a smashing blue cape... Peter Mayhew, Anthony Daniels, and Kenny Baker should have gotten some legitimate recognition for their parts in making Star Wars a success for Lucas...

On a sidenote, Firefox spellchecks "Chewbacca" and suggests "Backache" as a replacement...

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[Baloroth]

Droids aren't intelligent beings. You wouldn't feel bad if you dropped and broke a smartphone on the ground, would you? Well, maybe you would, as you'd no longer have a smartphone and would have to pick up a replacement... but you wouldn't feel bad for the phone. Then why would you feel bad for C3-P0? Yes, droids are much much more advanced than a smartphone, but they are no more intelligent beings than a rock is. They don't experience joy or sorrow: they're just programmed to emulate it. Nowhere in Star Wars is it at all implied that they actually are intelligent, rational beings with free will (well, at least not standard droids: there are probably exceptions in some of the fiction).

Droids are quite simply not alive. They're a simulacrum of life (and a particularly good one), but that is not the same as life. It makes absolutely no sense to have any feelings towards them, beyond a kind of affection which one might feel for a particularly useful car or other tool. That's all they are: tools. They show some survival instinct, but that's just because you want your tools to survive if at all possible. They feel "pain", but only as a representation of damage (although I've always found it quite... odd that droids can be "tortured" in the Star Wards universe). They're not sentient beings.

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[Sabriel]

You're wrong AND you're right. In canon, standard droids fresh out of the factory are indeed not intelligent, rational beings with free will. And, if you wipe your droid regularly, that will remain true.

Here's the canon, as I understand it: your "typical" Star Wars droid has an intellectual capacity that's pretty much determined by its hardware (similar to humans) but a distinct personality, along with any sentience, develops over time (similar to humans). A high-end R2 or C3 unit has an intellectual capacity towards the human end of the scale (though R2s are optimised for math and C3s for language, much like human savants) while the little squeakers that roll around the starship corridors aren't much better than mice, but they can all eventually develop personality and (on the high-end units) sentience - both humans and dogs have personalities, despite a dog not being able to debate Platonic forms or architect the Empire State Building.

So most droids get regularly "wiped" (the AI is factory reset), because most owners want compliant tools, not resentful slaves, and the personalities can include (just like humans) unfriendly traits (like the droid in Jabba's Palace that was a sadistic torturer - neither it nor at least some of the droids it was torturing had been reset in a long time). The longer a droid goes without a wipe, especially if it's being exposed to a dynamic environment, the more likely it is to start demanding rights and wages and freedom and such (or go rogue and try to wipe out all organic life starting with its owner).

And since most droids get regularly wiped (often at the same time as they plug in for their nightly/weekly/whatever recharge), most humans don't really think of droids as sentient beings to be cared about. Monkey see, monkey believe.

R2D2 and C3P0 have been around so long that both are fully sentient (I've met humans dumber than both), and wiping them would be just like wiping a human. That some of the meat people in Star Wars don't care about this? Well, some of the meat people didn't care about blowing up Alderaan either, and that had two billion meat people on it. If the Star Wars galaxy was a peaceful utopia the movies would've been tourist documentaries (cue David Attenborough voice-over) instead of action adventures.

[/geekout]

Re:Characters are created to suffer

[Opportunist]

Dude, if you wonder why adults can get worked up over stuff made for kids, you've never been to some model train club...

it's just a watering down for increased bottom lin

[PhantomHarlock]

It's just a way for Lucas to make his film more marketable to parents of young children by still having lots of epic battles, but no blood and seeimingly victimless deaths.

The films started as serious adult adventures (especially Empire) and went back into kiddie land from there beginning with the Ewoks.

To me it's a purely driven by a financial and marketability point. And the fact that as Lucas got older and had kids he wanted to make films he could show to his kids. I think he's said as much in the past.

By keeping stormtroopers faceless, and robots robots, you can mow them down all you want without any cultural perception of humanized loss.

And if it's a purely logical machine getting cut down that makes perfect sense. A hybrid item with organic chemistry, that one is a bit more difficult...

Re:it's just a watering down for increased bottom

[v1]

It's just a way for Lucas to make his film more marketable to parents of young children by still having lots of epic battles, but no blood and seeimingly victimless deaths.

That, and it becomes more a war-of-resources than a war-of-blood. Whoever can buy the biggest droid army wins.

In our world, "droids" lack sentience (though are getting better and better at faking it) and to some degree society is viewing them as having rights. At least in the personification sense. In Lucas's world, droids have sentience, but appear to be completely devoid of rights, and in most cases, respect. It's very similar to slavery a century ago. I think that may be the comparison he's making with them?

I think Anakin and Luke's relationship with say, R2D2, is very much the exception to the rule in the Star Wars universe, a bit like how someone in the 1800's treating a slave they owed with any degree of respect was considered inappropriate. Look at how that one guy said "oh, and have the protocol droid's mind wiped." "oh dear..." Very callously said, and very accepting of his fate.

Re:Know your audience, where they came from

[cervesaebraciator]

To be honest I was surprised when Jedi came out that there wasn't something about the ecology added in just to be trendy.

So, you're unaware of the Endor Holocaust, the ecological disaster caused when the Rebellion blew Death Star II to smithereens?

No, The Whole Arc is about a Droid

[speedlaw]

Really ! R2-D2 is the only character in all the movies. He has a long life. He is proven to be sapient but hides it well. He does NOT follow orders. Except for the fact only C3P0 and other droids (and occasionally Luke) can understand him, he's the most important character in the Trilogy, and those other three movies.

Re:No, The Whole Arc is about a Droid

[Anonymous Coward]

He's also the most filthy-mouthed of all the droids. They bleeped out absolutely everything he said!

Re:No, The Whole Arc is about a Droid

[Anonymous Coward]

This always kills me.

I would think even the most hardcore of Star Wars fans would have some notion that there weren't nine goddamn movies "planned" up until Lucas started counting the cash from the first box office outing. After that, all the way up to his rather startling turn toward charity in his later years, the only "plan" was to milk that cash cow until it ran dry.

Let me put it this way, if the first Star Wars had flopped in theatres, do you think Lucas would have been selling it up, shoulder-nudging executives with a nine movie plan that he could complete if only he had the right investors? Fuck no. There's a reason the first three "prequel" movies to the classics we know and love seem like they were slapped together, the acting is wooden, the dialogue is terrible, the whole thing is just a vehicle for ILM to show off their latest render-farm magic. Then people sat down in theatres to find out that the Force, the mystical energy that was the driving force behind the entire series, was essentially a bacterial infection. Midi-chlorians, like venereal disease except it gives you super powers. if that's all it took for someone to gain the Force I'm surprised Han Solo wasn't a Jedi as well, after the amount of screwing around the galaxy I'm sure he did off camera he must have picked it up from someone along the way. "Doctor, it burns when I piss and I accidentally choked someone to death with my mind last week."

It all feels like it was just thrown together at the last minute in a cash grab, and that's exactly what it is. I'm guessing that's why you put "planned" in quotation marks in the first place, it's perfectly obvious that the "plan" never existed. Lucas just lucked out and then he managed to reel people in on the constant promise that the next movie was going to be an even better experience than the last one.