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Science fiction, fantasy fiction, stories that imagine a different world, with different rules than the world in which we live—this kind of storytelling has always been a counter-oppressive effort. As long as there have been groups of human beings who are disenfranchised and marginalized, these groups of people have been creating worlds in which they have more freedom and more power.
To paraphrase Duchess Margaret Cavendish’s introduction to her 1666 novel The Blazing World: I do not have the means by which to conquer worlds, so I have created a world instead.
Science fiction, in that way, is always an act of faith. It is an act of faith to imagine a world where oppression is either gone, or where—as is the case of Star Wars—oppression is challenged and ultimately defeated.
The brilliance of Star Wars, then, is not only that it portrays an evil empire, but that it also portrays resistance. It shows heroic people, marginalized people, poor farm kids and scoundrels and outcasts and weirdos, showing up powerfully in the face of a totalitarian regime that seems impossible to resist. Star Wars gives us a vision of hope that oppression and empire can be resisted, and that they can be resisted by the likes of us.
Adapted with permission from a homily presented during “One with the Force: Love, Justice, and Resistance” at General Assembly on June 19, 2025.