• skulblaka@sh.itjust.works
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    20 hours ago

    During the height of the Jedi Order, there were about 10,000 Jedi across the galaxy.

    In a galaxy whose population measures about 400 quadrillion (number is an estimate, pulled from some nerds on StackExchange), yeah, the Jedi may as well be a fairy tale. Your probability of actually meeting one, if you aren’t doing something big and evil that requires direct Jedi intervention, is astronomically low.

    • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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      3 hours ago

      This argument would be greatly helped if they weren’t constantly having all the characters run into each other in all the shows. It makes the universe feel smaller. But I do get what you’re saying and it’s my explanation for the “regular people don’t believe in Jedi anymore” thing. Along with the empire actively suppressing any support of them the whole time.

      • InputZero@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        What works against that argument too is how politically active the Jedi are. Like a Jedi’s actual job up to the fall of the Republic is to be a galactic peace officer. Now I may have not ever met a KGB agent, and I have never lived while the KGB was still a thing, but I know they existed and had a huge impact on geopolitics. It’s just not possible that only 20 years after the rise of the Empire and the fall of the Jedi that everyone in the Star Wars galaxy would forget something like that.

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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          2 hours ago

          Typically they are portrayed less as “KGB” and more like diplomats/mediators/peacekeepers (prior to clone wars where things went of the rails). Look at Ep 1. They sent 1 Jedi and his apprentice to deal with the trade federation blockading an entire planet. Over the course of those events the Jedi primarily dealt with the leaders of the two factions (most of whom were dead by the end of the prequels). Regular people wouldn’t have a ton of encounters with them when they operate that way and even if they did they didn’t see a lot of them “in action”. People did know of the Jedi but not the extent of their ability because the majority of them never witnessed anything like that. There would of course be isolated incidents where a Jedi helped a town or whatever and the people saw them but the empire would have mopped those up pretty quickly so even those having witnessed them would know to stfu about it.

      • skulblaka@sh.itjust.works
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        19 hours ago

        Little skulblaka in backwater USA knew about dragons, but I had never seen one before or successfully convinced anyone that they were real despite a wealth of unrelated cultural works depicting them.

        If I were asked to make up some numbers about it, I’d expect that maybe 60% of the galaxy had probably heard of a Jedi before. But none of them had ever seen one or met one. Nor had anybody they knew, or anybody those people knew.

        People like Han Solo who frequently travel between planets and systems would probably be more likely to run into someone who had actually had dealings with a Jedi before. But also, maybe not. Han mostly runs with lowlifes, while Jedi usually interact with major story protagonists and/or antagonists, government officials and Sith and the like.

        So it’s entirely possible that ‘everybody’ knew about the story of the Jedi, but they were so rare that most systems would go generations without ever interacting with one. Unless that system was involved with the Sith directly, in which case they probably have been told in briefings that the Jedi are both real and likely incoming, and also in which case many of the citizens of said system may not live to escape and tell anyone else about being rescued by Jedi.

        • The_Decryptor@aussie.zone
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          12 hours ago

          People like Han Solo who frequently travel between planets and systems would probably be more likely to run into someone who had actually had dealings with a Jedi before.

          Jabba had direct dealings with Ahsoka and Anakin, but I can see younger people writing off the stories of force powers as just exaggerations.

          They’re like intergalactic police, imagine if people claimed interpol agents could do magic, you’d think they’re making stuff up.

          Of course, that doesn’t explain “Conan Antonio Motti” making fun of the force directly to Vader’s face, and getting force choked in return. That can’t have been the first time Vader had ever tried to murder an underling like that, yet he still acts like it’s made-up nonsense.

          • AdolfSchmitler@lemmy.world
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            2 hours ago

            Of course, that doesn’t explain “Conan Antonio Motti” making fun of the force directly to Vader’s face, and getting force choked in return.

    • ZMoney@lemmy.world
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      19 hours ago

      So if each planet has 10 billion people that’s 40 million senators. That room was big but I’m not sure it was that big. And also that’s one Jedi for every 40 trillion people? What good would that do even in the best case scenario?