Oh, yes, I agree with you that the “common” Jedi - meaning, the majority of the indoctrinated members composing the organization, generally unaware of the underlying mechanisms of their own cult - was trapped in a similar way to Anakin, and surely they didn’t know what was like to have an identity outside the Order because they never had the chance to develop one, hence they didn’t even know what individual thinking outside a collective is like. It’s a fact, I agree. But a separate argument should be made about Yoda or other beings who have been part of the Jedi Council long enough to become part of a trusted elite in the eyes of the Grandmaster (therefore, likely, we’re talking about species who live longer than humans). When I wrote about a “purposeful, active choice” and a rational understanding of what they were doing to Anakin, I was referring to the Council/Yoda, not the Jedi in general. The average Jedi Knight/Master (let alone younglings who were often too young to even have a critical mind) behaves the way they behave because that’s what they have been taught to do. But if we take Yoda into consideration, things change. He’s not passive to mental conditioning, he’s the active conditioner, and with him the discourse of “well, he’s a conditioner because he’s been grown up and conditioned that way” doesn’t stand: he has shaped the conditioning process himself, given that he’s been in charge for 900 years—it’s not that he’s been fed behavioural patterns and ideas from the above, since that for centuries he has had no one above him. What I mean is that the Order is the way it is because of him and the stagnation of the methods he inserted little by little; maybe not even always consciously, ok, but surely to a degree he knew well how he wanted the doctrine to be, so he’s very aware. In this sense, he’s more independent and less blindly allegiant than the majority of the Jedi; not because of moral strength, simply because he was the leader. I believe that he doesn’t see himself as a disposable tool of the Republic/Senate at all. I believe he knows very well what it means to have agency and personal freedom, because, seriously, it’s centuries that he’s been experiencing power, even totalitarian power (which is the degeration, the spoiling, the twisted mirror image of personal absolute freedom, one could say—not to say that freedom must be limited, please, do not misunderstand me!). All of this to say that whatever thing he did with Anakin, it was not inadvertent because he was not as cognitive dissonant as the others. Hypocritical, for sure, but willingly and consciously hypocritical. The others were “useful idiots”, to say it bluntly, while he was responsible. More than everyone else. He knew that being a Jedi was not so different than being a slave, but to him it was fine because he was at the top of the pyramid, and he had only the so-called “Force will” above him. Now, from this argument it looks like I think he had no denial mechanisms or justifications for his actions, but no, let me specify: I do think he had them. He was no Palpatine, he would have never ever admitted to others and himself first that he wanted to keep his power (even if he actually did), and still I think that deep down he wanted to do some good, but he was so skewed he didn’t even recognize what good means. He was deeply aware of what he was doing but I’m sure he was constantly justifying it to himself with his beloved Greater Good talking point. “Yeah, I’m doing all this, but well, it’s because this type of order is the only possible path to peace” or crap like that. Obviously a convenient lie, but he was truly convinced, no doubt.
