" And I have no idea by what stretch of the imagination you don;t think buying a slave's freedom is not slave trafficking. It is payng money into an illegal system to procures ervices. In real life that is considered slave trafficking and it certainly would be in Star Wars as well. "
Who'se talking about buying the services of Shmi Skywalker ? I've made it perfectly clear, I do NOT mean that Padme should buy Shmi from Watto, so that Shmi has a new slave owner, i.e. Padme .... that would be slave trafficking ... I meant, paying whatever Watto wanted, to free Shmi from him, so that she STAYS free, and is a slave no longer ... that is NOT slave trafficking, that is exactly the opposite ... setting a slave free, and there is nothing remotely illegal about that. And as such, Qui Gon was NOT indulging in slave trafficking either.
" And you MUST equate Shmi with the rest of the slaves. FOr a start, she did not help the others because she expected to be freed, she helped them because it was the right thing to do. That makes her a good person. It does not give her any special rights! ALL the slaves, I repeat, deserve to be freed, whether they have helped Padme or not. "
It is precisely because she did not expect anything in return for what she did, that she deserves to be freed ... she allowed her only son to risk her life for Padme and the two jedi ... that led to a sequence of events, which made her indirectly responsible for the life and freedom of Padme, and the people of Naboo ... this sort of help does not fall into the ordinary category, it falls into the extraordinary category ... and so it would be a great fallacy to put Shmi in the same basket as all the other slaves. Padme, the people of Naboo ( which include the Gungans ), the galactic senate, the jedi council ... they are all personally indebted to Shmi and they owe her big time ... it would be moral mistake, therefore, if they DIDN'T do anything about her living in slavery ... NOT if they did.
"she woulkd attempot to improve the Republic to the point where the Tatooine slave trade would be stamped out. A far more reasonable way to work. "
I totally disagree with you, when you say either free all the slaves, or none at all ... all the slaves, are not like Shmi ... everyone is not prepared to sacrifice the life of their only son to help three total strangers, expecting nothing in return.
But even if I grant you your above point ( which I definitely don't ), Padme in the story didn't even " attempt to improve the Republic to the point where the Tatooine slave trade would be stamped out. ", a rather unneccessarily tedious and round about way to help Shmi. And the fact that Padme didn't do anthing whatsoever for her in return .. forget trying to buy her freedom, she didn't even visit her once in 10 years on Tattoine ... is totally inconsistent with her characterization. And therefore, this is a loose point in the story.
" And if you haven't noticed the extent to which Anakin and Amidala are compromising their judgment because of their love for each other, no matter what Obi-Wan says, then I am very sure that you have COMPLETELY missd the point of the script, though I note you are happy to be choosy when it comes to beleiving what the script says because the TPM script makes it very clear that Shmi is happy to stay on Tatooine and you seem to want to ignore that. "
In fact, it is you, who are " choosy when it comes to believing what the script says ". When it suits your purpose, you tell us to take the script " as is " and not complicate things by adding our own interpretations, because Star Wars is a simple story " white hats, black hats " etc .... but when it doesn't suit your purpose, you freely do your " own thing " and superimpose your own interpretation of what the script says ....
Anakin clearly tells Obi Wan that if Padme were in his place, and HE had fallen out of that ship .... she would not go back for him, but continue the chase for Dooku, because that would be her duty ... in other words, no matter how much she loved Anakin, she would not abandon her duty for that love.
So similarly, nowithstanding her love for Anakin, if the story remained true to her characterization as a person with an unshakeable sense of duty, than she WOULD have informed the jedi council about Anakin's slaughter of the Tuskens.
But in this case, taking the script as it is, and accepting it's import as it it, does not suit your purpose, so you feel free to impose your own interpretation on the script by saying that although Anakin said that Padme would not have stopped for him, she WOULD have stopped and gone back for him, and her love for him HAD clouded her sense of duty .... I'm afraid it is you who are missing the point of the script.
"There is not the remotest inconsistency here except for people who are deliberately trying to create one. "
These are definite inconsistencies in the plot, and I take strong exception to you saying that I'm deliberately trying to create them ... I have better things to do with my time, and even at this forum, better things to discuss ... I am not a wierdo guy, that would get some sort of sadistic delight out of trying to "diss" Star Wars by trying to point out faults in it, and trying to create faults where none exist.
I love Star Wars as much as anyone here, and inspite of the fact that I believe that there are a couple of loose points in the plot of the two prequel movies, ( and for that matter, such loose ends exist even in the OT ), that is not going to make me love or respect any of the movies including AOTC any less.
But if someone rightly points out a loose end, I shall honestly agree with him ... and not because I have no other use for my time that to deliberately poke holes in the Star Wars story line where there are none.
Originally posted by yerssot
if she was a bitch she would have yelled at Anakin from the start of TPM!"Are you an angel?"
"WTF are you talking about? I'm much more older then you! You just stay away from me!"
No no no. If Padme was a bitch she would've said:
"Oh yeah babe, I'm you're angel. Now come here and lick my..."
That proves Padme is NOT a bitch.