Organization: Penn State University
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 04:04:27 EST
From: Jim <JXD132@psuvm.psu.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.starwars,rec.arts.sf.tv
Subject: Re: STAR WARS vs, vs the evilness in nazism
 <BxC93n.J47@acsu.buffalo.edu> <1992Nov7.121607.1@uwovax.uwo.ca>

In article <1992Nov7.121607.1@uwovax.uwo.ca>, 4224_5201@uwovax.uwo.ca (Dark Lord
of the Sith) says:
>
>In article <BxC93n.J47@acsu.buffalo.edu>, v115maec@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu
>(Michael L. Kohan) writes:
>> In article <1920@lysator.liu.se>, redin@lysator.liu.se (Magnus Redin) writes
>
>> Star Wars, my father the MEGA sf fan pointed out to me as a kid, was
>> inherently a story about WWII. Witness: The rebel alliance (Resistance could
>> be used just as well) the space dogfights, which were versions of dogfights
>> over the Pacific or Europe, an evil empire (Third Reich, Japan, cynics:
>> Russia), throw in a "Force", some funky swords and you've got the outline
>for
>> Star Wars. There were other things he told me, such as the good kids in
>grade
>> school being like Luke Skywalkers, and warning me not to fall in with the
>> Darth Vaders. He was one of the guys who wrote to the studios when Star Trek
>> went off the air. Yep, this guy knew his stuff. There were SF books that
>were
>> lying around the house (gone now, of course) that I now kick myself for
>> never picking up. He also was the dude who explained to me how almost every
>> Star Trek episode was actually a metaphor for a social issue in the sixties.
>> Well, this is leaving Star Wars, so I'll end the post. But just a little
>> nugget for the guy who said Star Trek wasn't thinking man's SF.
>> -Mike
>
>     Thanks Mike for pointing these things out to me. Star Trek has had many
>metaphors for issues that raised themselves up in the 60's, but there was also
>that element of "federation" racism, where their values were superior to
>those of their enemies. Klingons and Romulans, once you take off the make up,
>are very crude stereotypes of America's animosity to the Russian and Chinese
>blocs. The Vietnam episode, by the way, was excellent. As for the new show,
>a few of them have been enlightening. For instance, Who Watches the Watchers,
>where Picard beams himself down to the proto-Vulcan planet to tell them he
>is not God, is the best argument in favour of atheism I have ever seen on the
>boob tube. Darmok was pretty good (directed by Baltar's Escape's Richard
>Kolbe.)
>
>     While on the same subject of metaphors, isn't Galactica just a big
>metaphor for the Red Menace/Nazis. I find it amusing that 30's hunk Lew
>Ayres, who was admired by women everywhere but had his career destroyed
>when he opposed World War II, played the dupe president Adar who negotiated
>peace with the treacherous Cylons. Throw in all that biblical stuff (the
>40 year voyage of the 13th tribe to earth, origins of man on Egytian style
>Kobol, 12 original tribes et al.) and you have a show with lots of neat
>ideas that went unexplored as space battles and soap opera became the
>main element of the series. But I do love that commander Cain episode.
>
Speaking of the biblical stuff... I remember my father telling me how
Star Wars was a Christ allegory... with Ben Kenobi being the sacraficial
figure for the young Luke and the rest of the galaxy.  You can draw
umpteen million parallels between so many things, I really doubt it
many of them were deliberately allegories... just "realistic" plot lines?

Oh well... my $.02

-- Jim Durrell
   JXD132 @ PSUVM.PSU.EDU
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.starwars