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Issue 366: Kentucky Fried Pork · Aggressive Negotiations: A Star Wars Podcast

0:09
Welcome to the ned Palty. Hi, this is Nick Anstasu, story editor
0:16
on Star Wars, The Clone Wars and Star Wars bad Batch, and you
0:21
are listening to Aggressive Negotiations. You've wandered back into the tractor beam of Aggressive
0:30
Negotiations, the podcast where we examine Star Wars questions from a galaxy far far
0:35
away that we are the first and the bravest to ask. I am Jedi
0:39
Master John Mills, and joining me is my dear friend and Star Wars officionado
0:44
himself, Jedi Master Matthew Rushing. Matt, are you ready to delve deep
0:49
into another topic this week that nobody else is exploring in the Star Wars galaxy?
0:55
Sorry, you caught me eating some wample wings and uh oh womple wings.
1:00
Oh man, so good, baby, Womple wings are the best.
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But who you put a little Naboobian fire sauce on there? Woh delicious?
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Well you know what you got controversial right there, because I don't think that
1:14
we've ever really settled whether it's Nabubian or not. But you can vote in
1:19
one of our many polls over on Twitter at the Jedi Masters or ex Twitter
1:23
Twitter at whatever we're calling it nowadays. And you can of course find the
1:26
network at join nerd Party, and you can find the nerd Party on Facebook
1:30
and Instagram, and of course you can find Matt at Mett Rushing zero two
1:34
and me at Kessel Junkie. But I am excited because Matt, this is
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this is another sort of Kessel Junkie special here where we're going to be discussing
1:44
an unexpected topic. And the unexpected topic is this. As I was thinking
1:47
about this recently because you know, on occasion, being a fancy lad,
1:51
I like to go out to say at Chili's and get some streetcorn or something
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like that. And you know a thought that that always enters my mind whenever
2:00
I go out to eat, and then I have to keep out of my
2:01
mind because I don't like my mind to go in this area while I'm eating
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in a restaurant. But food safety laws, food safety regulation, I am
2:10
accepting the idea that that kitchen that I can't see is safe, cleanly managed,
2:16
and the food was properly prepared. All of this sort of stuff.
2:21
I get to thinking. With Star Wars, such a large galaxy, and
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we've talked about drinking laws, We've talked about different regulations, how monstrously difficult
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do you basically, do you think that they even bothered with food safety regulations
2:36
on a galactic scale, or do you think they just let every planet try
2:40
to figure it out on their own, Because how on earth would you manage
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something like a galactic food industry. I mean, the first thing I think
2:53
of is how impossible this would be with the myriads of species in the galaxy
3:00
and the amount of food allergies they might have to the things that you know
3:07
other species are fine with. I mean, what happens to all of those
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Tuscan raiders who are allergic to shellfish and you know they accidentally run into some
3:21
in the most icly canteen? I no, I wasn't even thinking about the
3:25
food allergy aspect, But in all seriousness, most sizely it's a big spaceport.
3:30
They have the canteena there. How on earth would they serve like anything
3:37
that would be edible in there because of all the species that come in.
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Is there some sort of waiver because here, let's say, for instance,
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because you and I were both in the United States of America and we know
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firsthand from our cultural awareness how litigious we can be. But how on earth
3:57
would somebody like wu Har operate the most canteena without some sort of massive insurance
4:02
policy. But even setting aside the food allergy thing, you have to be
4:08
agreeing that we when you go in there, did it look like wu Hair
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was cleaning the glasses? I didn't see a dish rag or a faucet setup
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at all, So what would that even look like? And what inspector is
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coming in there? That's why I would think on a galactic scale they would
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just say, you know what, we give up. You got to worry
4:30
about it. On a local scale, we can't even get involved in this
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because you couldn't possibly have the machinery. Yeah, my give up, My
4:40
give up. So look, I think you can discount the outer rim completely
4:48
of having any kind of law whatsoever other than what might be enforced by the
4:54
local government. Possibly you know, if your planet was maybe run by Hutt,
5:00
then I can imagine them banning anything that they might be allergic to and
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or kill them. They probably really hate things with salt, I'm just saying.
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And so so yeah, I think that that's the kind of place where
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where you would see, you know, a planet run by a syndicate or
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something like that may have specific laws, dietary restrictions or something. If the
5:26
people running that syndicate, if there was something that, you know, could
5:29
kill them. But I think the only place that you would actually see any
5:34
kind of possible regulation or anything like that would be during the time of you
5:41
know, the Republic, and that would probably be on Core worlds or you
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know, a place like Naboo that's very civilized and that kind of thing.
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But you know, it does make me wonder when you talk about food safety
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and just food in general. It's like, either this is a galaxy,
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uh with it doesn't have food allergies and pretty much everybody can eat everything on
6:03
every planet. We don't have to worry about that stuff. Or uh,
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you know, you have to have certain menus for certain types of beings,
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you know, and and so maybe uh, you know, the the quorn
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and the moncws and in those type of beings, you know, they can
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all eat similar foods because they're water creatures, you know, different from you
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know, people that are more i mean traditionally humanoid. So every time I
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talk about this end this episode, I just keep thinking of how go for
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it? Man? That's the point of this is, like I legitimately,
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I would actually say not during the Republic, I would think if there was
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any attempt at a like a food bureaucracy, like a health inspector, I'm
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not like you're coming from allergies. I'm coming from somebody making sure that the
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food is stored properly, that it doesn't make you sick. That there are
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these snap inspections. I think the Empire could use something like that as a
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perfect a perfect reason to have an undercover ISB agent get in place somewhere or
7:23
some other sort of spy to be somewhere, Oh I'm here for a food
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inspection. But additionally, I mean kind of working against that is you know,
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I'd like to say, well, also, the Empire would have mechanisms
7:35
for that, because they could see in a way for graft and personal power.
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But that was a problem for the Republic too. I mean these sort
7:45
of like you know, lower level bureaucrats in a corrupt system, they thrive
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because they you know, you either get people who are power mad. You
7:55
give some people a little bit of power, they go crazy, or you
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get people who are just in it for the for themselves and they're just walking
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around and it's like the old Roman tax collectors where it's just like, look,
8:05
just pay me directly and I'll just you know, we'll work this out
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like it was the mob basically. So yeah, but there would be no
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way, say for somebody like wu Hair or anybody else who's running a small
8:16
food establishment to stay up to date with regulations because you're talking about outer rim
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versus core worlds. They even say in the Republic, when I'll go back
8:28
to Phantom Menace, there are laws against slavery in the Republic, and Shmi
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basically says that's not here, and that's that whole thing. So yeah,
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in the outer Rim, I agree with you. You're if you drink something
8:41
at a local place, or you eat something at a local place, that's
8:46
on you. That's your own luck. Is it possible though, that people
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just didn't eat at places like that, that they would just they were watering
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holes because they knew better, like you carried your own food around with you
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sort of thing. So I no, And I get the food safety part
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too, because I mean I just I immediately thought of like Dex's Diner,
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and you know, behind that kitchen did not look clean, looks cleaner than
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some of the places I've eaten at. Honestly, it's you know, it
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looked like one of those ratty old waffle houses in a podunk town in the
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middle of nowhere, United States, where it looks like the grease on the
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floor hasn't been cleaned up since like nineteen seventy two, and so so,
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yes, that's the kind of place where it's like I feel like Dex probably
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knows a guy to pay off so that he doesn't have to worry about that.
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And that's why obi Wan goes there, because you know, people that
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don't want to get you know, a lot of attention on themselves go hang
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out there, right. So yeah, I I love your idea though,
9:56
of like the Empire utilizing that is a way to play agents in places and
10:03
you know, then be able to plant listening devices in places so they can
10:05
try and catch people, you know, and that kind of thing. I
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think that's a really interesting idea. But I mean, even just thinking of
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what can you think of the legislation it would take to regulate food safety in
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the Republic with however many plans, I would say that we could get around
10:30
that by simply writing a law that allows basically defers regulatory authority to the discretion
10:39
of the agency necessary. Yeah, it's a good point. We pass the
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law saying we don't have to regulate it, that this agency has the authority,
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and then it gets tied up in the courts, which Palpatine himself talks
10:50
about and Padme talks about the problem with that and finding that balance there.
10:58
But when you when you boil it down to some planet that's out there,
11:03
Let's stop picking on wu hair for a second. Let's go to Jetta in
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Rogue one and they're walking through that street bizarre area. There's a lot of
11:11
street food there. And my wife she told me when she was going through
11:15
Bangkok, She's like, there's street food everywhere, and she said, there's
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no way there's a health inspector walking around making sure that food is okay.
11:22
But I can also go to New York and they got the street vendor selling
11:26
hot dogs, and there's the rough patina of regulatory authority over those things where
11:35
they have certificates and stuff. But if I buy a bag of roasted cashews
11:39
in winter and New York, I understand the risk I'm taking. And so
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I think there's got to be lip service to some agency, but it's only
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it's rarely exercised. But I also think that this could be a thing to
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which the Republic and the Senate of the Republic. This is where planetory regulation
11:58
comes in. That each plant it is responsible for its own you know,
12:01
food safety because of the different populace that's on that planet and so and that
12:09
would, in some senses, I think make more sense that you know,
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Naboo has a different food safety regulation than Megido or than Outapao or you know,
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like any of these places would have different regulations because it's a it's a
12:28
different main populace that lives there. You know, we see in Star Wars
12:33
that every planet kind of seems to have a majority species living on it,
12:39
and so that would just you know, letting each planet take care of that
12:46
would make sense. And then on Corusant, you know, that's where I
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just feel like, UK, yeah, you let every other planet take care
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of that. But when the entire galaxy comes together, what's the food regulation?
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Like there, You're just like, you know what, screw it,
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just you know what you can eat, but see that can't. That's the
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only place where I see a galactic scale government able to intervene would be I
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mean, we would regard it as interstate trade. But if you know somebody
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on Naboo wants to have a delicacy from MONCW, then you have something where
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who's regulating the shipping of that food over to ensure that it's safety because planets
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will go to war over bad food that's shared. And I know that seems
13:31
like really reductive, but it's essentially the resources thing. If you send bad
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fuel to me, if you send bad food to me, that is a
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diplomatic incident right there. So maybe maybe it's something where the Republic would have,
13:46
at the very least said, listen, your diplomatic core has to work
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this out, because we don't. They didn't have a standing army. So
13:54
if the Naboo and mon Cow had a beef with each other over something that
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got shipped over, that was bad. I mean, let me extend it
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out to other goods, right just as an example. But obviously the US
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gets a lot of goods from China for sale, and I remember a kerfluffle
14:13
roughly to I guess a decade back from when we're recording this show, maybe
14:18
more or maybe less. I mean time blurs where it was discovered that in
14:26
some children's toys lead paint had been used, even though we have regulations against
14:31
it, caused a small problem. All of these sorts of things I have
14:37
you and I have absolutely no lens on whether it actually got solved. We
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know that there was a news story, We know that there was a regulatory
14:46
problem, but we relied on the two governmental bodies of in this case expanded
14:52
out to planets, had to work it out even though there were laws and
14:56
regulations in everything. If there were a global government, then which would then
15:00
be the galactic government? In this example, where bad food is shipped over,
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that's the moment at which that galactic government gets activated. But just even
15:09
a blockade of a planet required how much debate in the Senate, and then
15:16
the threat to go to the courts, and then in between the movies,
15:20
all of these things. So I think, no matter what I think,
15:24
sadly, money just determined how potentially clean or dirty your food was. And
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that gets even more depressing because when you boil it down. Whenever we have
15:35
conversations like this, maybe I'm way off base. Tell me if I'm way
15:39
off base. But whenever you have conversations like this, we seem to come
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to this point where it's like, this is why nobody would have bat an
15:46
eye when an empire takes over as bad as it is, because maybe the
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Republic just did such a bad job of ensuring people's access to everything that they
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eventually just shrunk and they were like, yeah, whatever, meet the new
16:02
boss, same as the old boss. And food regulation would that's a basic
16:04
thing that we take for granted, is that the food I eat, even
16:08
if I don't prepare it, is safe, or if I buy it to
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prepare it for myself, it's safe. It's regulated, it's monitored, and
16:17
there's a regulatory agency in place. But just on a scale like that,
16:22
how I just don't see how it would be possible. Each planet would probably
16:25
be synthesizing its own food and delicacies, never trade. What you just said
16:32
makes a lot of sense, actually, and because on top of the food
16:36
safety thing and the regulation of food and figuring out and making sure that you
16:42
know the food is well cared for, that it's food that is well prepared,
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you know that it's high quality food, all of those things which absolutely
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like you're talking about a nightmare to try and figure out on a galactic scale.
16:59
And then again I think you just come down to as well, like
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the amount of of things that people could or could not eat that they could
17:07
have come in contact with during shipping and all. I mean that's a nightmare
17:11
too. And so it also makes me wonder then if if that's the type
17:15
of thing where you know, you would see different systems have a larger network
17:25
of food sharing then necessarily on a galactic scale. And so again, like
17:32
we when we see in Solo and you get the colo clawfish, right,
17:38
that's a true delicacy that has kind of made its way across the galaxy and
17:44
seems like it would be incredibly difficult to get a hold of and would cost
17:48
a fortune to have, and therefore if you're eating it, you know,
17:52
it's akin to you know, eating the rarest Kobe beef, right, you
18:00
know that kind of thing. And so that's where I almost feel like if
18:03
we if we're trying to like figure out how this would work, it makes
18:08
more sense for different systems because we know the way the Star Wars galaxy is
18:12
set up, you have planets, they're closer together. They have these kind
18:17
of systems where you have a few different planets that we're aware of and them
18:22
trading food sources would make much more sense because too, they're much closer anyway,
18:27
so you're not having to wait you know, who knows how long to
18:30
get food shipped and so. And that's what would make I think, being
18:36
say on the outer rim with a planet like Tattooine that's like you know,
18:42
the furthest from the center of the galaxy type of thing, just an incredibly
18:48
difficult place to get different types of food at all. I mean where you
18:52
might have more of you know, we don't really know necessarily a ton about
18:56
Star Wars food, but where you might have more prepackaged or like kind of
19:03
synthesized type of food, almost in a Star Trek sense, then you would
19:08
in like real things or food that would be processed. I think that with
19:15
I love your system idea where it's like, you know, in some sectors
19:18
of the galaxy the food is more trustworthy than others sort of thing, and
19:22
so you would make an effort if you could to go out. But again
19:26
that gets back to money and access. There has to be something whereby they
19:33
had some sort of technology where they were able to remove the allergen from the
19:40
thing that could potentially cause the problem because I read somewhere, and if anybody
19:45
with a peanut allergy wants to correct me on this, please do. I
19:48
read somewhere that with a peanut there's that one little nib, you know,
19:53
when you have the whole peanut and you break it in half, because it's
19:57
always has that clean seam, and then there's that one little nib, that
20:02
one little part at one end, you know, the part that I'm talking
20:06
about where it's I've been told yeah, And I have no idea if it's
20:11
accurate or not, that that part contains the majority, if not all,
20:17
of the actual allergens, and so when they grind peanuts, that part is
20:22
what causes the problem. I could be completely wrong. I am not an
20:26
expert. I am simply using this as an example to say there would have
20:30
had to have been, if you cracked hyperspace technology, a way for you
20:34
to take the food in question and remove, whether it's by a radiation or
20:41
processing, that allergen. And therefore this leans into this idea of sectors and
20:49
access, because those areas would have been where people could experience food from all
20:59
across galaxy without fear. And again, I could be completely wrong about this
21:07
bit of peanut lore that somebody refer you know, gave me in recent times.
21:12
And if I am wrong, I hope everybody understands. I'm owning that.
21:17
Okay, I'm simply repeating back something somebody told me that I haven't verified
21:21
at this point. I need to do the research, but I say it
21:23
simply to lean into this thing whereby there would have does it follow that there
21:32
would have to be some sort of technology whereby they could make the food safe?
21:36
But again, it would only be in these areas where you have money
21:40
and access to get the safe version of the food, and so everybody else
21:44
might even rely on, you know, to your point, like a synthesized
21:48
pace, like people lived on a roughly gruel like setting and they just lived
21:53
on synthesized rations like and that's why Yoda when he eats Luke's food case,
22:00
it looks like a little fish stick but it's obviously not, and he like
22:03
bites it and he's like, eh, how do you get so big on,
22:06
you know, eating food of this kind, And Yoda is discussed,
22:10
you know, playing along to be disgusted by it. It's not natural food
22:14
that people are eating, yes, yeah, yeah, no. I think
22:21
that's an excellent point, and it is one of the things I think that
22:25
makes you know, the idea of whether or not you know this would work,
22:33
you know, you know, really valid and you know, I think
22:40
it is one of those really interesting questions of Star Wars, which is when
22:47
you start to get down to the nitty gritty, you know, you realize
22:49
just how crazy idea of a universe like this really is. But the same
22:55
time it you and unless you're like us and you're just completely insane, you're
23:00
not ever thinking about these questions because the universe does feel real enough that that
23:07
you can just live in it and enjoy it, and if you want to,
23:10
you can go to this length and ask you know, these type of
23:14
questions. And I think that's really fun and that speaks to I think the
23:21
way in which you know, you have something like a Star Trek, which
23:29
you know, tries to answer as many of these type of questions as possible,
23:33
and then you have like a Star Wars where the way it's written,
23:37
in the way everything comes together, you don't need to ask these questions because
23:44
that's not really the point of the story, you know, the point of
23:47
the story for Star Wars has always been so much more the and this sounds
23:55
weird to say against Star Trek, but the morality tale part of it,
23:57
you know, that the thematic elements, the large mythology, the big mythology,
24:04
you know, and that's something that's very different from getting into the minutia
24:10
of how does hyperspace work? You know, how does this work? How
24:15
does that work? You know, none of that matters because it's all just
24:18
an in service of telling a outlandish and an incredibly fun and interesting and surprisingly
24:26
sometimes moving story, right, And so yeah, I was as you were
24:33
talking, and we've been talking about this, it was just left with that
24:36
It's like, yeah, we don't. It's one of those things where it's
24:38
like we don't even have to care about these things unless we want to,
24:42
and that's kind of the beauty of it. But then you can start talking
24:45
about it, it's like, oh my gosh, the reality of this would
24:48
be such a mess that I don't even I don't even know how to think
24:52
about it. Starts to break your brain. To think about it does break
24:56
your brain, and it makes you realize why it's so much more fun when
25:00
it is fun to watch Star Wars because you know, at the end of
25:04
the day, you don't need to care about this unless you need to care
25:07
about this, And it's exactly. It is a lot of fun to peel
25:11
it apart and take a look at these sorts of things. But what else
25:15
is fun to peel apart and look at is your presence online and where people
25:19
can find you, Master Rushing, So why don't you point people in the
25:23
direction of where you are online? Absolutely, you can find me all over
25:30
the place with the name Matt Rushing zor two. You can also find me
25:33
here on the network with a show called owl Post. I did that with
25:37
Draga Kaufman and we talked about every single chapter of the Harry Potter series,
25:41
one chapter at a time. You can also find me over on the TFM
25:47
network doing a bunch of different shows. One is the six oh two Club,
25:51
where we talk about all of the fantoms that we love outside of Star
25:53
Trek, and then I've got a lot of Star Trek talk over there as
25:56
well, doing Warp five, the artificial tekos out up the orb and sometimes
26:02
literary tracks. But John, if people wanted to catch up and see what
26:06
zanin as you are getting into, Oh, I'm never Zenie. I'm always
26:10
very very serious, as demonstrated by these topics that we explore. You can
26:14
find me as Cassel Junkie out there, and you can find me here on
26:17
the network, co hosting a delightful, well, I think it's delightful little
26:19
show called house Lights with Tristan Riddell and Darren Moser, where we look at
26:25
the works of directors by different timespans, categories, topics, all of those
26:30
sorts of things, and I am just delighted that we covered this. And
26:36
I actually am starting to get a little nervous, and I think I might
26:40
need to test this food that I ordered from Kentucky Fried Porg. So Master
26:45
Rushing, let's head back to the temple, and maybe it's time to close
26:48
these negotiations. Negotiations are closed. Join the Revolution, Join the Nerd Party.