#but also my empathy tells me to understand anakin's upbringing

[darth-kote]

no offense but i'm just left so unimpressed with anakin and padme each time i watch the prequels. maybe it's me but still

[padawanlost]

Sorry to keep ranting about this, but here's another page in the Jedi Council's book of hypocrisy: In Legends, it's said that Ki Adi Mundi was pretty powerful even by Jedi standards and had problems controlling said power when he was a kid. What's more is that they accepted him even though he was about 4 years too old to start his training. So tell me why the Council welcomes Mundi with open arms into the order while completely alienating Anakin for this same reason? (1/2)

Like just take away the whole “Anakin’s emotions put him over to the Dark Side” BS and you’ll see that the other two arguments against Anakin are that he’s A: too old, and B: too powerful. (2/2)            

Rant away, my friend. Look at me, I really can’t judge anyone for ranting about SW lol

The short answer is that many EU writers do this with their favs/OCs. They all have a background somehow similar to Anakin’s. They arrive at the Temple older than most, they remember their families, they have been traumatized by poverty and/slavery, they are the best fighters, the most powerful Jedi, etc. Whether it was intentional or not, this ended up making the Jedi Order look incredibly biased against Anakin. Judging by the Council’s introduction in TPM and how they treated Anakin, I’m inclined to believe it was, at least partially, done on purpose.

I mean, we could dismiss it as inconsistent writing, but the fact this theme resurfaces again and again all over the EU makes it hard to brush the whole thing off as a mistake. Especially when the same character is later described as this:

Like Anakin, I was well past infancy when I began my training at the Jedi Temple. There was much concern about whether I was too old to learn the ways of the Force, that my Cerean childhood might cloud my judgments, but … I am not certain of how to express myself. My mind tells me I should feel empathy for Anakin, but my instinct tells me something else. [Ki-Adi-Mundi in Ryder’s Windham’s Jedi vs. Sith: The Essential Guide to the Force]

What disturbs me most of all is Anakin Skywalker himself. It is not in my nature to make assumptions about anyone based on appearance, and yet I find it almost alarming that the boy looks so entirely unremarkable. If I didn’t know better, I would have dismissed him as a harmless raga-muffin. [Ki-Adi-Mundi in Ryder’s Windham’s Jedi vs. Sith: The Essential Guide to the Force]

This is tells me it’s more than an inconsistency, it’s a deliberate attempt to show the Council’s shortsightedness that would later doom them all. They refused Anakin after everything they went through because as the years went by they lost track of what was really important. They became so attached to their code and their rules they were blinded by the fact a 9 years old child in desperate need of help was standing in front at them. It also helps the audience understand why Luke & Leia succeeded where Anakin, Yoda and Obi-wan failed. Your upbringing matter. How you are raised, how you are treated and what you are taught matters. A 900 years old man telling a bunch of adults to beware of a child doomed the galaxy, a 20 years old man who refused to give up on his father saved it. which, of course, take us back to the indoctrination issue. When you are raised to believe in the infallible wisdom of your master obey it without question, your experiences won’t matter as much. Mundi had similar exercise but after a lifetime being told Yoda knew better, of course his initial reaction to Anakin would mimic Yoda’s.

So, in the end, it’s not that the Jedi Council were bad people, they were simply raised to ignore their own experiences in favor of Yoda’s. I’m sure that with a different upbringing they would’ve been accepting of Anakin and even relate to his difficulties.