The Luke (Skywalker) K

What if the democracy we thought we were serving no longer

exists, and the Republic has become the very evil we've been
fighting to destroy? Padme Amidala, Star Wars Episode III:
Revenge of the Sith

We begin our 1NC on the planet of Dac. Specifically, the pristine

oceans of Dac that contained billions of diverse species, all living in
harmony with each other. There was peace in this ocean, an ocean
previously unscathed by the imperial sword. Alas, this did not
endure. The evil Empire ordered the genocide of billions of innocent
lives. Why would they do this? What motivated them to commit this
unspeakable act? The preservation of their Empire, their imperial
stranglehold on the rest of the universe. Here is the story:

Wookieepedia, 14 (Wookiepedia, the renowned comprehensive Star Wars

Wiki, Genocide on Dac, http://starwars.wiki...enocide_on_Dac)
Lord Wyyrlok, Voice of the One Sith and the new
ruler of the Empire ordered Vul Isen to execute the Final Protocol, and poison
the waters of Dac to wipe out all life on the planet so Imperial forces could be
deployed elsewhere. Lord Wyyrlok paid little interest to Lord Azard's
reminder of the Quarren collaboration and the neutrality of individuals of
other species, ordering that they would be allowed to escape the planet but would receive no aid. Isen
released viral spores which, carried throughout the planet by oceanic
currents, would eliminate all life in a single week.[3] Three days after
Wyyrlok's edict, Rogue Squadron executed a recon mission on the planet and
were shocked to discover a section of the ocean covered by a mass formed
by millions of bodies of dead Mon Calamari and Whaladons. They
immediately set out to inform Admiral Gar Stazi, though Andurgo broke formation and
began to fire on incoming Predator fighters.[3] When Stazi heard of this, he chose to save
the Mon Calamari. His fleet returned to Dac and, after fighting off both waves
of Sith-Imperials that came after him, managed to rescue a portion of the
planet's population. Although it numbered in the millions, it was only a small
portion of the planet's 27 billion inhabitants.
A short time after the death of Darth Krayt,

The Empires atrocious actions are nothing foreign to the United

States, for the United States federal government is the Empire. The

United States attempts to continue and strengthen its imperial grip

on the world, just as the Sith Empire sought to expand its control
over the universe through technological advancement, exploitation
of lesser groups, slavery, military dominance, and the accumulation
of natural resources.

Cleary, 14 (Vern, Bachelors degree in History at UC Berkeley, M.A. in

Education, Introduction: What is
Imperialism?, http://webs.bcp.org/...roduction.html)
In the Star Wars movies, the Empire continually seeks to expand its control from the
capital planet Coruscant to outlying regions in the universe. Hyperdrive-equipped starships allow planets light years
apart to easily interact. This advanced technology provides the foundation for
the Galactic Empire to increase its wealth and extend its reach by controlling
and taxing interplanetary trade. To keep production costs down, Imperial
companies compete to find the cheapest workers, often settling on droid
robots or slave labor. The Empire directs its engineers to create the latest in
military technology, such as Galaxy Guns, turbolasers, and planetary shields. To dominate trade and hightech innovation, the Empire makes sure to control key natural resources,
such as Tibanna gas and precious crystals (especially those needed for making lasers and
lightsabers). Exploiting the wealth of the galaxy also means conquering and
terrorizing the population, even blowing up entire planets. Inevitably, rebels,
such as Luke Skywalker, resist the brutal occupation of the
Empire (Wookieepedia). Though Star Wars takes place a long time ago in a
galaxy far, far away, many earthly empires have not been that different
from the fictitious Galactic Empire. In all empires, a group of people expands its
rule over others. Empires typically enrich themselves through the control of
natural resources, labor and trade. The core territory of an empire usually
consists of a dominant nation or kingdom with a shared language and religionsuch as ancient Rome during the
Roman Empire or the United Kingdom during the British Empire. This core group typically conquers and then
exploits weaker territories on the periphery of the empire by demanding
unequal trade, taxes, tribute, or plunder. Some of the most famous empires started when a dictator or emperor
overthrew a democratic government. For example, Nazi Germany overthrew the Weimar Republic. The French Revolution led to Napoleons French Empire.
And, Imperial Rome overthrew the Roman Republic just as the Galactic Empire that Jedi Knight Obi-Wan fought against overthrew the Old

Throughout world history, kingdoms and nations have competed to

expand their territories and power at the expense of others. The largest empires began small
Republic.

and expanded to rule over ethnically and religiously diverse groups of people, often with the aid of a technological advantage. For a time, they would
appear unstoppable, like the Empire in Star Wars. For example, in the 13th century, in less than 100 years, the Mongols used lightning-fast archers on
horseback to expand their empire over 6,000 miles from northern China to Eastern Europe. But just when the empire was at its peak, it split up into four
smaller kingdoms. Other empires rose and fell even more quickly. In just three years (1939-1942), Nazi Germany used the speed of new modern aircraft
and tanks to conquer most of Europe before losing it all two years later. Both the Mongols and the Nazis used new lightning-quick military technology to
dominate areas around them. Both rapidly expanded their territories. Neither empire could sustain its prime area of conquest. No empire ever does.
Historians divide imperialism into two types, formal and informal. With formal imperialism, one country establishes direct political control over a territory,
often as a colony or protectorate. Good examples of this type of control include British rule of the colonies in America before 1776, India (1858 1947),

Informal imperialism uses indirect means, usually

economic but often with a lurking military threat, to control a nation or
territory. Informal rule is generally less expensive than formally taking over a territory. It spreads control more
subtly through technological superiority, large loans (debt) that cannot be
Hong Kong (1842 1997), and Kenya (1920 1963).

repaid, ownership of land or private industry, or forcing countries to agree to

uneven trade agreements. For example, the British Empire defeated China militarily in 1842 and forced the Chinese government
to sign a treaty granting favorable trade and access to Chinese markets. But the British did not occupy the country or seize direct control of its

In Guatemala in the 1950s, American banana companies owned 70

percent of the arable land in the country (Koeppel 125). When a democratically
elected Guatemalan president, Jacobo Arbenz, tried to force the companies to
sell back 6 percent of their uncultivated land, the American governmentthrough its
Central Intelligence Agency, or CIA)helped the Guatemalan military to overthrow Arbenz and
install a dictator sympathetic to the American companies. These maneuvers
required little effort or expense on the part of the U.S. government. In the end, the big
American banana companies kept their land and their economic control of the country. The United States government
succeeded in controlling Guatemala economically without having to conquer, occupy, or administer a country directly
government.

(123-131). Even though empires dont last forever, they often leave behind a lasting legacy of changes in the forms of political, economic, and cultural
influences. We study empires, then, to help us understand why the modern world is the way it is. For example, hundreds of millions of Latin Americans
today speak Spanish and Portuguese because, five hundred years ago, their ancestors were conquered by Spain and Portugal. The Islamic Empire spread
its religion from Arabia to Morroco to India. Even though this imperial expansion occurred over one thousand years ago, the empires religious influence
lives on. Despite Islams origins on the Arabian Peninsula 4,500 miles away, Indonesia, in Southeast Asia, has the largest Muslim population today. These
far-reaching and long-lasting influences make sense when we understand the history of empires. And, remarkably, in the modern era, England, a small
island nation on the periphery of Eurasia, came to rule over the most impressive empire of all. The fact that England became a dominant world power
through its rule of the British Empire, the largest empire in the history of the world, baffles us even today. How did a small island country (about the size of
Oregon) on the far edge of the Eurasian continent come to rule over one-quarter of the worlds land mass and population? It must have had some unusual
advantages over every other country. Certainly, the wealth and technological advances emerging from the Industrial Revolution contributed a great deal
to the success of the British Empire, especially in the nineteenth century, when England first industrialized. However, the first European colonial empires,
and their increasing control of global trade, began before the Industrial Revolution, so the answer must be more complex. When and why did European
imperial dominance take form? And why didnt powerful Asian countries such as China or India conquer Europe instead of the other way around?

In 2010,
Europe and the United Statesoften referred to as the Westmade up
only 15 percent of the worlds population yet controlled 53 percent of the
worlds wealth (Global distribution of Wealth). As we learned in the Industrial Revolution chapter, its no coincidence
that these same countries have been at the fore of technological revolutions
that occurred in the last two centuries. In 2010, English was the dominant language of the Internet and computer
Studying modern empires also helps us to learn about the origins of the uneven distribution of wealth and technology in the world today.

programming. Despite the relatively small number of native English speakers in the world compared to Chinese or other languages, there are more English
language websites than any other language (Internet World Users). Why are Europe and the United States today so wealthy in contrast to the rest of the

competition, innovation, greed and luck have much to do with

Western dominance.
world? We will find that

The affirmatives endorsement of imperialism turns exploitation into

the organizing principle of social life that ends in genocide of both
populations and environments, just like the planet of Dac.

Olivier 99 (Lawrence, Professor in the Department of Political Science at

the University of Quebec, The Construction of Environmental Awareness,
Discourses of the Environment, pp. 71-72)
Thus, we see that the environmentalist discourse was born with the
blossoming of legislation in a wide range of fields that have a direct or
indirect effect on the life of individuals. This discourse is rooted in the
aspiration for a better quality of life, better health, better control over the
immediate environment - in short, over any phenomena that influence on

our-well being. On the other hand, the aspiration for quasitotal control over matter,
pushed to an extreme, leads individuals to create the death culture so justly
condemned by environmentalists. The death culture represents a discourse that was strongly
criticized-by a number of groups and scientific disciplines. It appears in the imperialist political
will, where oppression and exploitation, assimilation and cultural genocide, of
subjected people, constitute the golden rule of the powerful colonizing
ruler.But more than control over a territory, its subsoil of its wealth, it is a
form of cannibalism of values and works of art that devours a culture with all
its original creations (Moscovici 1993: 19). The death culture can therefore be
understood in terms of what some environmentalists call genocide and,
transported to the environmental scale, ecocide (ibid. 20), as a mode of
governmentality in which exploitation is the organizing principle of social life.
Ecocide, decried by environmentalists, is reflected in an absence of respect
for the environment, through the pollution of air and water and the
destruction of entire forests stemming form a fetishization of
concrete. Ecocide is the mutation of the environment by genetic
manipulation and cloning, by the nuclear experiment and its production of
radioactive waste. Many environmentalists claim that it is the rule of market
aesthetics (of ugliness), of waste and of stench.

Remember, a Jedi's strength flows from the Force. But beware.

Anger, fear, aggression: the dark side are they. Once you start down
the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny. Luke... Luke...
do not... do not underestimate the powers of the Emperor or suffer
your father's fate you will. Luke, when gone am I... the last of the
Jedi will you be. Luke, the Force runs strong in your family. Pass on
what you have learned, Luke. There is... another... Sky... walker.
Yoda, Star Wars Episode IV: The Return of the Jedi
The alternative is to reject the affirmative plan and blow up the
Death Star. The Death Star is not a physical object it is the symbol
of the United States imperialistic worldview, the tool with which the
US tightens its stranglehold on the world. We must discuss and
criticize this system, else we will turn to the dark side. Criticism of
this system through our alternative is the only way to solve.

Bowerbank 99 (Sylvia, professor in the Arts and Science Programme and

English Department of McMaster University, Ontario, 1999, Discourses of the
Environment, p. 177)

To say this is not to suggest that we abandon the wilderness retreat or the nature journal as green practices. It is to acknowledge
how arduous and inconclusive even our best efforts at greening are. Why should this discourage us?

Quick fixes and big

transformations in the name of an ecological world order are no doubt dangerous

and undesirable (Ferry 1995). What Foucault writes of recent little improvements in the
quality of Western culture applies equally well to environmental matters: I prefer even
these partial transformations that have been made in the correlation of historical
analysis and the practical attitude, to the programs for a new man that the worst political systems have repeated
throughout the twentieth century (1984b: 467). In Foucaults terms,
and social reality, can

deep transformations of the self, as of material

take place only in a free atmosphere of criticism. Transformation and

critique, far from being contrary modes, work together toward slow, authentic change. As Foucault argues,
a permanent reactivation of critique is, at present, our only procedure for determining what is not or is no longer indispensable for
the constitution of ourselves as autonomous subjects (ibid. 423). Seen in the light of Foucaults work,

the self-cultivation

of the green subject is a long, difficult historical endeavour with an uncertain result. The
greening of the subject becomes a case of working on our limits ; it is a patient labor giving form to
our impatience for liberty (ibid. 50). To

understand the positive implications of Foucaults writings is

to be encouraged by these ironic words.