MissouriSpartan

The Atlantis launched all the time for military missions that were not public. There would’ve been nothing out of the ordinary for Endeavour to launch unannounced. If asked they could’ve just said it was a military payload so too secret.

Could you count 3D printers as replicators of sorts? Not necessarily to produce food (yet), but other things.

Just install cloak.exe onto the main computer core.......

Being a Jedi (or Sith) isn't about "individual courses". It's a dedication to a lifestyle. It's a religion in its own right. A religion to open, emotional, raw power, or to self-controlled, clarified desire to help others and keep peace. It's not college and it's not even boarding school. It's people who openly desire to learn that lifestyle. Case in point: I doubt any of those children were there against their will. They were ready and excited to learn the ways of the Light side of the Force, and many (like Kylo Ren) might have decided to switch sides later.

That's where there are cases of this. Rey for example. She survived on her own for years as a force-sensitive and CHOSE to be a Jedi. There are "Gray" Jedi out there too, who care neither about the Dark side or the Light but accomplish things in their own way. But how effective could someone be with little to no education (your assertion of freedom in this question) at all vs someone who knows how to do many things with the Force because someone taught them? This is my base point

The Jedi were simply teaching the kids how to use their gifts for good. They were bad examples from the standpoint of their clouded arrogance of authority yes, but compare that to the Sith who teach their students to just blatantly use the force to destroy if necessary to get what you want..........I'd want to send my child to the Jedi for training if choosing between the two. Also............those weren't TRUE lightsabers. They were training-level sabers.

Why do parents send their kids to school? Why do nations mandate that kids get sent to school to be "brainwashed" to learn specific beliefs and historical information and principles? This all points back to the very basis of the OP's question. My position: the kids were sent to the Jedi to learn about how to use the Force as they were discovered to be Force-sensitive. Thus they had gifts they needed to know how to use. The Jedi had, at this point in time, become arrogant and clouded in their judgement and had forgotten the true ways of the force (unlike Qui Gonn) their predecessors taught.

The difference being, of course, America won their independence. The Separatists did not, and ended up losing their droid army and their ultimate betrayal by the Sith who were using the clone army the whole time as their ticket to establishing the Empire later.

I think we're forgetting one of the biggest examples of secession of all: The American Revolutionary War. Granted, the Separatists in the SW Universe were mainly driven by the Sith and their evil intentions, but the technical points still remain the same. A group of planets grew tired of the Republic's way of doing things and decided they wanted to be independent. So they went to battle to try and win that independence. The British Colonies grew tired of the tyrannical taxes and oppression of the British Crown, so they went to arms and declared themselves independent, then to war.

Sorry I should've mentioned that. This'll just be domestic first. From Kansas City to Orlando.