Now There Are Two Of Them!

Now there are two of them!

"General," Amonico Glass said as he leaned forward and placed his corpulent elbows on the table, "the Audit you are asking for is inconceivable. The overtime alone I would have to authorize would be downright criminal! What you want from my company is out of the board's range!"

Through the holoimage, General James Ironwood leaned back in his chair and said.

"Not ... for a Schnee."

Two figures flickered into view behind Ironwood. Behind Ironwood Weiss Schnee, dressed in a white blouse with its sleeves rolled up her forearms and buttons loose at her throat and chest, placed a hand on Ironwood's left shoulder and struck Amonico a glare over her thin, wire-rimmed glasses.

Whitley Schnee, his plain white business suit making the young man sharper than his age would imply, hovered by Ironwood's right shoulder and stared sharply at his older sister's intimacy with Ironwood while Ironwood said.

"May I present my auditors, Weiss and Whitley Schnee, they will audit your firm's sheets."

The holoimage then faded out and shut off.

Across from Amonico, Bram Thornmane smashed a white-gloved fist onto the table and said.

"This is getting out of hand! Now there are two of them!"

Amonico sighed and fell back against his chair, he then took off his glasses and polished them before he said.

"Jacques should not have agreed to that arrangement."

This meme is from this post by @intermundia but I didn’t want to hop on a pro-jedi post with my slightly anti-jedi take so here we go

While I agree that they don’t kidnap babies, they do show up at people’s doorsteps telling parents that their children will only achieve their full potential being trained by the order and therefore being removed from their families, putting said parents in the very uncomfortable position of being either a selfish asshole by refusing or a kind enlightened soul by agreeing to give away their beloved child possibly to never see them again.

And while sure, you are free to leave, what life are you leaving to? You have been alienated from your people and homeland for years, can you just go back? What about the shame of being a failed jedi? What about being a young adult with no formal training other than military and being a swordfighting monk?

How are you gonna get a job? The years you could’ve taken an apprenticeship in some academy were replaced by learning battle strategies and meditation - very few job opening require those skills. Do you have to return your lightsaber? Are you “allowed” to use your skills despite being a non-jedi?

They pried that well of energy inside you open and now you don’t know how to contain it, will they be there when you stumble towards the dark side? After all, if it weren’t for them you wouldn’t have all this power to begin with.

And enough about jedi that leave, what about jedi that are expelled? Ahsoka was expelled (granted, to go to jail after the Jedi did fuck-all to help the child soldier that had been risking her life for them for years), and… what?

She clearly wasn’t good on cash - her shitty speederbike made it clear, as well as her inability to pay for having it fixed;

She had nowhere to go - she wasn’t roaming around lower Coruscant instead of being back in her homeworld for a reason;

Her only tradable set of skills was mechanical engineering and she learned that ONLY by virtue of havin Anakin as her master - besides that, all she knows is fighting and feeling a debilitating need to help everyone that consistently puts her life at risk.

Sure, you’re free to leave the order.

And then what?

Points about Jedi Survivor:

The entire story is about squatters fighting each other over squatter's rights for a planet neither of the parties had any legitimate claim over;

Cal decides to act like the Prequel Era Jedi and gets almost all his friends killed;

A lot of people die because Cal wanted a planet that was of no practical use to him whatsoever;

Bode Akuna killing Cordova was an Imperial Agent killing a wanted criminal;

Cal had no authority to pursue Bode or request Bode's surrender for his killing Cordova;

Cal spends the majority of the game fighting everyone except the Empire;

Darth Vader was wasted in this game;

The High Republic Jedi was wasted in this game;

AAA games always manage to make me root for the bad guy instead of the hero;

Bode Akuna is beautiful and if I were gay ...;

Bode is a family man?! My brother in the Empire, I forgive you for not surrendering Tanelor to the Empire;

The noblest thing Cal could have done was to let Bode live with his daughter on Tanelor;

Followed closely by Cal letting the High Jedi reclaim Tanelor and leave that High Jedi to get killed by Palpatine and Darth Vader;

Cal has gotten mad sus since Fallen Order;

Q&A: Multiple Martial Arts

A lot of times in the comics/superhero stuff somebody will have this whole long laundry list of different martial arts they’ve studied. I can see how it could be beneficial to dabble a bit in different styles, but is there a point where it would be better to just stick to one style and learn that really well? Is there truth to the “knows every martial art” master, or is it mainly just the author trying to make their character sound impressive?

This the result of someone trying to make their character (or themselves) sound impressive and in the process, cuing you in to the fact that they don’t know what they’re talking about.

Achieving mastery of a single martial art is a lifelong exercise. This will take decades of hard work. Even if you were to live forever, there simply wouldn’t be time to learn every martial art, as they evolved and changed. There isn’t enough time to keep up with everything, to say nothing of catching up.

If we focus on getting a character’s martial arts to basic combat proficiency, instead of actual mastery, that’s still going to take years in most traditional schools. You learn the fundamentals, and gradually learn to apply them.

If you’ve been paying attention to the blog, you’ll know this is the exact opposite of how practical hand-to-hand training works. If you’re studying something like the modern law enforcement variant of Judo, or MAP, you’re going to be learning how to use it on someone immediately, because you need to be up to speed within eight weeks of starting the class. This is proficiency, not mastery. You’re also going to need refreshers and updates because this is not static.

To an extent, when you start learning a new martial art, you need to start over. It’s not like you master a martial art, and then you can just roll over and pick up another one. You need to go through the basics, because they will be different. In many cases this is a point of failure. You have trained your muscle memory to do things one way, and you’re now being asked to do it differently. You’re being asked to do it, “wrong.”

I was supremely lucky. In college, I took Shotokan for the phys ed credits. The class’s Sensei was an off-duty cop who taught Karate as adjunct faculty. This meant he was more understanding of the residual Judo positions in my muscle memory. For example: he was more concerned that my curled knuckles on a palm strike were in a braced position, rather than that my fingers were extended. From a Karate perspective, I was trained to do it, “wrong.”

For many martial artists who try to start a new discipline, they will not have the benefit of an instructor who shares their background. Quirks that are a result of their previous teaching may be viewed as flaws. If you have a solid foundation. If your hand to hand style has a solid identity, this is fine. It will result in conversations with your instructor, and they may, or may not, be accepting of that. If the differences are irreconcilable, it may be impossible for you to learn this martial art.

So, we’re basically left with three real groups who practice multiple martial arts.

The rarest are actual masters. They’ve mastered a martial art, and now they’re auditing others. They’re not masters of those arts. They’re not even practitioners. They’re looking for something new to learn. In some cases they may be looking to start their own martial art. This is slightly more common than you might think. Most often these new martial arts are referred to as a school or style of the original martial art. The basics are the same, but there will be distinct elements that reflect the school’s founder. In some cases, you may see entire “genealogies,” where one school resulted in another, and another.

You can find masters who have extensively studied two martial arts, with the intention of producing a unified style. An example of this would be Ginchin Funakoshi, who fused two of the Okinawan schools of Karate together to create what would become Shotokan.

I skimmed over this, but it is easier to learn multiple schools of the same martial art. The fundamentals should be compatible, and even at more advanced levels, there will be similarities that make life easier for the martial artist. In contrast if you step out of your martial art entirely, you are, at best, starting over.

The second group are practitioners who have a martial art, and are looking for any techniques they can adapt. This is similar to the masters above, but tends to occur on the practical side. These are martial artists who are looking to expand their repertoire. Being able to perform the martial art as a whole is less important than being able to replicate specific techniques for themselves.

Mixed in with this group are experienced martial artists who are looking for, “something.” I made this sound a little mercenary earlier, but it can be philosophical, or even spiritual. A martial artist can take classes in another martial art simply because they’re curious about that style’s philosophy.

The final group have no idea what they’re doing. They’ll join a school, take classes until their interest wains, wander off, and then their interest is piqued, they’ll scamper in someplace new, and repeat the process. They have no foundation, or worse, it’s an unworkable mess of a half-dozen other martial arts. These are the ones who will proudly proclaim, “I’ve studied a dozen different martial arts.” You’ve studied eight, do you have belt rankings in any of them? Of course not.

Now, in defense of the last group, it is important to find a martial art that fits you, and that means you might jump through a few before you find one that’s a good match. That’s not who I’m talking about. I’m talking about the ones who bounce the moment things stop being fun.

Learning martial arts, particularly in traditional schools is not easy. It takes time and dedication. You need to find the drive to keep going even when you feel like giving up. You will be pushed beyond the limits of what you thought you could do. That is difficult. I would argue, it is worthwhile.

The funny thing about this entire concept is, there’s no point. Okay, so martial arts have their own strengths and weaknesses. Learning a second martial art can help shore up some of those weakness, in theory. In practice, if it’s a reputable martial art, those weaknesses won’t matter much. You were trained around those weaknesses, and they probably can’t be exploited in any meaningful way. Most of the time, picking up a second martial art wouldn’t benefit you. (Yes, there are some specific edge cases, where two martial arts may compliment each other, but that gets into very technical territory.)

Learn your style. Stick to it. The value in “dabbling,” is in expanding your knowledge of how other people solve the challenges they face. It can be valuable, but don’t do it at the expense of furthering your training.

-Starke

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Q&A: Multiple Martial Arts was originally published on How to Fight Write.

"Weren't those ships used for colonizing India and the Slave Trade?"

We need to go back to using sailing ships full time like immediately. Yes it would take longer to get places but the Aesthetic is unmatched

Like there is nothing sexier hthan this

I would have to say Padme did not compromise herself, and when she chose Anakin everything had gone to Empire so I guess it was a moot point anyway.

Still, entirely agree with you on everything else.

I think the crux of the disconnect between Prequels era fans is that the Jedi supporters believe the Jedi are good and right, and it is on this that we should support, and the Jedi critical fans are like no one in this era is good and right, including the Jedi, and the fact that you won't admit the Jedi are wrong is driving us insane

Because frequently when Jedi supporters are arguing with me, they are dismissing the notion that the Jedi could ever do anything wrong and then bring up how awful Anakin is as a way to say I am wrong, because I support Anakin

Which I don't support Anakin????

I like him, he is an incredibly compelling character especially as someone who knows what it is like to repress your feelings and want so badly to hold onto the ones who care for you

But I don't support him, it's actually because I relate to him that I don't, I wish I could save him, I have compassion for him, but he killed people, he committed genocide, twice??? In the Prequels??? He is exactly the type of person who terrifies me in real life, I don't support him

My love of his character writing does not mean that I am overlooking his clear moral failings or even that agree with him, because I don't, I actually love his character more because he is written to be so flawed morally, he is an exploration of emotional repression and how wanting power, even if it is to save someone else can still make you a bad person, it is this complexity that drew me to him as a character

I am drawn to morally complex characters in spite of the fact that their actions go against my morals, because I personally find morally complex characters to be more compelling

So why then, if I like morally flawed characters do I have such an issue with the Jedi and their morals in particular

Quite simply, it's the way they aren't written (especially in the Clone Wars) with that same moral complexity, they are written as if they are moral good

And it is this framing of them that a lot of Jedi supporters have clearly sided with and made their reason to support the Jedi, they believe the Jedi are good and believe that fans should support morally good characters so they can't understand why I wouldn't support them

But the Jedi aren't morally good and I find the inability to acknowledge that alarming

The Prequels movies do a much better job of showing how their inaction leads to bad things, but even in the Prequels there isn't a full of acknowledgement of how far they have fallen

Whereas the Clone Wars just doesn't acknowledge it, at all, they flatten the story down so it has no moral complexity, they have clear cut good guys and bad guys, the Jedi are the good guys, no matter what, the bad guys are the Sith, their is the occasional attempt at making the morality of the Clone Wars more grey but it is inconsistent, and overall the approach is a binary

The issue is, in painting the Jedi as morally good, the Prequels era glosses over how they aren't, they aren't objectively good, no one in the Prequels era but in pretending that they are, you make the meta around the canon morally complex

You have people defending the Jedi's use of the clones, choice to ignore slaves and chain themselves to the Repiy, handling of Anakin and the Padawans in general, involvement in the war and everything else because the Jedi are framed as good guys

I have yet to meet anyone defending Anakin's actions because he is so clearly framed as the guy falling to the Dark Side, we are meant to mourn his fall but we aren't meant to think he was in the right

Not everything the Jedi did is bad, but enough is that placing them on a pedestal and calling them the heroes, acting like they don't deserve this slander when Jedi critical fans are just pointing out how the Jedi are morally compromised, is messed up

There is no moral high ground when it comes to the Prequels, everyone compromises themselves (including Padme, she stayed with Anakin,), but some fans want to act like there is and so we have a disconnect