American Jedi Page #3

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- Perris, what

practice do you have

that enhances your

spiritual well-being?

- Currently, the

practice that enhances

my spiritual well-being

is Shamanism.

- You left the Jedi path and

haven't been a part of it.

You had to go through

a tough ordeal, right?

What was that

ordeal specifically?

How did it make you feel?

- I kind of had a breakup

with the Jedi organization

I had been a part

of for seven years,

and it was really tough.

I came out of it depressed.

And I kinda fell out for a

year from the whole community.

- Do you feel that the

Jedi path is a sexual path?

- I'm not gonna say that

sexuality isn't a part of it,

but I don't feel

like that it is that.

- How do you reconcile your

sexuality with the Jedi path?

Your overt sexuality

with the Jedi path?

- I don't need to reconcile it.

It just is what it is, you

know, it's free love to me.

It's like a universal

love concept,

I don't believe in the tie-down.

- Does that work

with your practices

or is it a conflicting

thing within the practice

and lifestyle of the Jedi path?

- For me, it works.

- What a lot of us liked

about Princess Leia was

she didn't take

anything from anybody.

I mean, she even stood up to,

and talked back to Darth Vader,

who had everybody else

just shaking and quaking.

But here was a very,

very strong woman.

- [Perris] Being a

Jedi, and a Marine,

it's a huge conflict

of interest.

The reality is really gruesome.

It's like putting all of

your best fighting dogs

into one cage at nighttime,

and then whoever makes it out

gets put back into that

cage again the next night.

And that's what the Marine

Corps is, essentially.

It's a great organization

and they do great things,

but it's not peaceful, there's

a lot of things that happen

that are completely

contradictory.

(somber ambient music)

I don't know, I'm not

afraid to tell my story.

And besides, I mean,

people, they look at me...

Three rapes, that's pretty hefty

and it screwed me up

for a lot of years.

Recently, literally, in this

past year, have just kind of

come out of that victim

mentality, kind of thing.

They happened when

I was 18 and 19.

I'm 24, I'm almost 25, that

was a lot of years ago.

And so, people, they

look at me like...

They're either like,

"I don't believe you

"'cause you're so

cavalier about it."

Or like, "How can you

talk so about it?"

And like, "You're not very

sensitive," and I'm like,

no, I am sensitive, that's

why I'm telling you,

is because other people

have been through this,

it's a serious ordeal, it's

like a piece of your soul,

that gets ripped out and

you may never get it back.

But you need to know that.

You wanted to know me,

well, then, here you go,

a piece of my soul

was ripped out

and I probably will

never see it again.

I had to, like, duct tape

my heart back together

several times, because

it just went...

And shattered into

a million pieces.

That's the ugly reality of life.

And no, Jediism wasn't

like a magic wand.

Jediism wasn't some ultra, super

secret way to fix everything.

It was a learning process

and it was like scraping my face

against cement for

a lot of years.

- When a female has been

disempowered by a male's

misuse of power, particularly

in a warrior situation, for her

to be able to step out

of that categorization

and to rise above

and become a warrior

as the Jedi Knighting

process helps do,

then she becomes more than

she was, she becomes more than

what other people were

trying to make her be,

and she becomes an example to

other people, women and men.

- [Opie] After spending

a week with Perris,

it was hard to walk away.

And now I can't help

thinking about another girl

who I trained to become a Jedi.

We were married on the

bridge of the Enterprise.

The Starship Enterprise

from Star Trek.

At the time, the Hilton had

Star Trek:
The Experience.

What you could do is

shell out a little

money and you can be

married on the bridge.

So, she was in a Star

Trek-like wedding dress.

I was in a suit and tie but

my hair was done all funky.

And we both loved Star

Trek too, so, why not?

We had created the Jedi

Academy Online website together

through this, and through

our whole marriage, I mean,

we both worked on it

and we both ran it

and we both, you know, put

our time and effort into it.

And through that, I met a Sith.

- Being a Sith isn't

something that you learn.

I don't even know whether it's

something that you choose.

It's something that

kind of happens to you.

It's...

You find yourself in a position,

where the system failed you.

- Interesting that Lucas came up

with such Old Testament

demonic imagery for the Sith.

Here is the worst fear.

(electricity crackling)

- Your feeble skills

are no match for

the power of the Dark Side.

- I think that the

struggle that we go through

in terms of choosing

the good or the bad,

the good or the evil within us,

is not to be underestimated.

- [Interviewer] And how

do you wanna be known?

How do you want your name,

your title, or your name?

- Oh, God, just...

- [Interviewer] Just, Sith?

- Yeah, that's it,

that's good enough.

My name is Miles and I'm a Sith.

- What is the Dark Side?

Depends on who you ask.

I wrote a book about it

looking at all the

different definitions

and I still haven't found

the perfect answer for that.

- What do you say to mom and dad

when they come and say

their son is a Sith?

Find out if it's a fantasy

or if they're doing

something else.

'Cause if they're, you know,

hurting cats in the

backyard, then okay,

have a look into it.

Being a Sith is kind of

a full time, 100% thing.

Daily practices,

nothing quite so formal.

It's just every

moment of every day

you try to actively be

connected to what you're doing.

And actively be connected

to what's around you.

- [Interviewer] Would

you say that the Jedis

are more group

oriented than the Sith?

- I would say that the Jedi are

far more group

oriented than the Sith.

For them, being a Jedi is being

a member of the Jedi Order.

Being a Sith is

just, you're a Sith.

In the Return of the Jedi,

I was a fan of The Emperor.

His presence, his

mastery of his position,

and his comfort in his position.

- Your hate has

made you powerful.

Now fulfill your destiny

and take your father's

place at my side.

- Sith is as Sith does.

Makes his own choices and

takes responsibility for 'em.

My idea of good

and evil has more

to do with what do you create

and what'll you allow

entropy to take,

that's where my standing

on good and evil stands.

And on that score, Sith

are often quite good,

because they're the

ones that are done

living with the status

quo, they want change,

they want something new.

- Why are you filming Miles

and all this?

Because he wasn't involved

in all this.

- He's been involved

with the Jedi community

for a little bit, but...

- Since when?

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