Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

Men can be blanks. Not just Culexus, but Gunner Ferrik Jurgen (though he’s in-universe one of the best kept secrets).

Sisters of Silence?

Not only is a fighting force comprised entirely of Blanks frankly remarkable given their rarity? But being all female, in terms of their origins and recruitment is downright suspicious.

We know they existed pre-Unification of Terra, and swore fealty to The Emperor. And since then, nobody has questioned “hey what’s with all the chicks?”

Given what we know of the peak of mankind’s abilities, it seems pretty certain their number don’t arise naturally. No chance mutation going on. I suspect, but can’t prove, that they’re manufactured in some way. Possibly Clones, possibly Cloneskeins as the Votann design each generation of Kin.

Then add in the general loss of knowledge? And it could be whatever that process is, through design or ignorance can’t be used to create male blanks.

Tiberias wrote:
Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

I mean you could, but why? SoS are already so niche do they really need it? Psychic powers aren’t as widespread as they were previously.

Their concept has no reason to be limited. They're just blank assassins and honestly just a unit at this point. Whatever sense of a larger organization has just never been supported and could be retooled into anything trivially. Give it a new name or keep the name and make a new unit under the Null banner. Pull them into the Inquisition more or expand the Custodies to incorporate more "Forces of Terra". At this point they're far more of a talking point than anything GW has put real effort into beyond likely serving as prototypes for the plastic Sororitas resculpts.

DeathKorp_Rider wrote:

Tiberias wrote:
Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

I mean you could, but why? SoS are already so niche do they really need it? Psychic powers aren’t as widespread as they were previously.

Representation.

 Lord Damocles wrote:

DeathKorp_Rider wrote:

Tiberias wrote:
Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

I mean you could, but why? SoS are already so niche do they really need it? Psychic powers aren’t as widespread as they were previously.

Representation.

No I get that, I didn’t mean that they shouldn’t make make models, but that the sub faction seems good only in rare circumstances so why make new data sheets and models for it

That would not be a bad idea since the Sister of Silence are so niche, but interesting nevertheless to many players. Yes, you could expand the faction and yes there are male blanks, but from my understanding, the Sisters of Silence were a religious order of some sort and thus all female much like the Sisters of Battle. Note though that it would not be impossible for them to have a distaff counterpart much like the Sisters of Battle have the Crusaders which are literally them, but masculine. They could also be integrated within a wider Schola Psykana Codex, but I feel it more likely the Sister of Silence will be dropped from the Custodes codex in the future and shoved into the "imperial agent" section.

If you remove everything distinct and exclusive. It will diminish the stories.

Exclusivity creates uniqueness.

conscriptboris wrote:If you remove everything distinct and exclusive. It will diminish the stories.

Exclusivity creates uniqueness.

If Custodes get big muscle mommys, the Sisters can have some dudes aswell I reckon.

epronovost wrote:That would not be a bad idea since the Sister of Silence are so niche, but interesting nevertheless to many players. Yes, you could expand the faction and yes there are male blanks, but from my understanding, the Sisters of Silence were a religious order of some sort and thus all female much like the Sisters of Battle. Note though that it would not be impossible for them to have a distaff counterpart much like the Sisters of Battle have the Crusaders which are literally them, but masculine. They could also be integrated within a wider Schola Psykana Codex, but I feel it more likely the Sister of Silence will be dropped from the Custodes codex in the future and shoved into the "imperial agent" section.

The Sisters of Silence are among the least religious groups in the entire galaxy, they are among the very, very few who were able to see through the emperors psychic appearance during the heresy.

I made a Sisters of Battle army but modeled them male... I love the idea of normal everyday people in power armor equipped with bolters. I had mainly male soldiers but also used normal SOB miniatures because converting became a hassle. I used Van Saar miniatures, guard bits, and some SM bits here and there. I want to put myself in my army, I wanted to familiarize with them. I had 1000 points made up and went to a GW in Maryland to play. I was promptly told I could not play with my army because they were offensive. It was such a beautiful army too. I still have some miniatures if anyone is interested in what they looked like.

The reason I bring this up is because, I am highly in favor of modeling your plastic army soldiers however you want. Be respectful and nice to everyone. The hobby is for EVERYONE. And more people need to practice what they preach. Because I found out quickly, that some people dont think that way. At the end of the day its just a game and a scifi universe. So what, just have fun.

Edit* I attached a picture of my dudes I converted if anyone is interested.

I don’t see why only women should be seen and not heard.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Those are cool conversions. I’m not seeing how they are offensive.

Is there any fluff reason for them to not to include dudes? Briefly skimming lexicanum, I don't see any explanation for being exclusively female. You'd think they'd want to make use of all the nulls they can.

So barring some cool bit of lore I'm not aware of that would contradict with brothers of silence, I say go ahead and include them. The faction doesn't really lose anything by adding dudes to its ranks.

Were SoS maybe GW's way of gauging whether to support sisters as a full faction vs as just an imperial agents option?

My internal head cannon was always that blanks and nulls were divided between the Adeptus Assassinorum and the Sisters of Silence base on some ancient contract written between them. The boys are sent off to become Culexus assassins and the girls are given over to the Sisters.

I personally wouldn't be too miffed over the Sisters of Silence being mixed gender. Only because the main design just really isn't that different from the SoB. They're both sisters of the boob armour, but with slightly different headware.

I guess SoS were to SoB as custodes were to space marines? But even that just feels repetitive.

 Mr Nobody wrote:
My internal head cannon was always that blanks and nulls were divided between the Adeptus Assassinorum and the Sisters of Silence base on some ancient contract written between them. The boys are sent off to become Culexus assassins and the girls are given over to the Sisters.

Same.

I personally wouldn't be too miffed over the Sisters of Silence being mixed gender. Only because the main design just really isn't that different from the SoB. They're both sisters of the boob armour, but with slightly different headware.

Also same. "Exclusively female power armor wearers who are pretty good at resisting psychic powers" is a similar enough job that I genuinely didn't realize they weren't just a subset of sororitas when they first came out. Like I said, it kind of feels like GW was considering scrapping sisters as a faction and distilling their concept down to one or two SoS units.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Is there any fluff reason for them to not to include dudes? Briefly skimming lexicanum, I don't see any explanation for being exclusively female. You'd think they'd want to make use of all the nulls they can.

So barring some cool bit of lore I'm not aware of that would contradict with brothers of silence, I say go ahead and include them. The faction doesn't really lose anything by adding dudes to its ranks.

Were SoS maybe GW's way of gauging whether to support sisters as a full faction vs as just an imperial agents option?

GW doesn't gauge these things, let's be real here. They initially released sisters along with custodes for heresy, then expanded the custodes model range for 40k. Custodes became very popular and GW couldn't give two gaks about sisters again.

Sisters of Silence gaining any tracktion and becoming more popular in general is in my opinion thanks to black library and in particular thanks to Chris Wraight who gave them actual spotlight in the Watchers of the Throne books. And not just as some obscure sidekicks....Aleya is an awesome character and an absolute badass.
Seriously, in my opinion Valerian only really works because his obnoxiously noble character is contrasted by this jaded, battle-worn, too-angry-to-die madwoman....they make one of the, if not the best buddy-cop pair in the current setting.

 Mr Nobody wrote:
My internal head cannon was always that blanks and nulls were divided between the Adeptus Assassinorum and the Sisters of Silence base on some ancient contract written between them. The boys are sent off to become Culexus assassins and the girls are given over to the Sisters.

That seems like a plausible interpretation of the lore on this specific point.

Frankly, I think that the idea of Sisters of Silence being only women was actually just to make them like Sisters of Battle but better just like the Custodes were made to be just like Space Marines, but better. The Emperor's bodyguards were supposed to be a mirror of playable factions, but better. Of course, now that they are a playable faction with their own lore and characters they are no longer confined to this like X but better trope.

Do any of the novels delve into the lore behind the SoS? I recall their cameos in the purging of Prospero arc and the Black book that dealt with the same but do not recall much on their origin story.
Out of lore justification is surely just to have some female models in the SM dominated HH game.

If they added men you could just rebrand them Siblings of Silence.

 Truth118 wrote:
If they added men you could just rebrand them Siblings of Silence.

Children of Silence would sound better in my opinion or go for a faux latin name like Adeptus Silentium.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Is there any fluff reason for them to not to include dudes? Briefly skimming lexicanum, I don't see any explanation for being exclusively female. You'd think they'd want to make use of all the nulls they can.

So barring some cool bit of lore I'm not aware of that would contradict with brothers of silence, I say go ahead and include them. The faction doesn't really lose anything by adding dudes to its ranks.

Were SoS maybe GW's way of gauging whether to support sisters as a full faction vs as just an imperial agents option?

I would argue that despite what many claim about female custodes, the sisters were created as all female specifically for inclusion. Because at the time they were created in the mid 2000s, there were very few female models. The sisters appear to me to be a deliberate add girls to the setting opportunity.

It's far less contrived to just put women in squads of soldiers than to create a special group of all women...


The original question of course, has in the past been used in bad faith by people to as a false equivalence in the argument against female inclusion. What aboutisms. They aren't equal. 90% of the game models are male, so claiming we should make one of the few instances of female models include men is in no way equivalent to adding women to the 90% of men that already exist. It actually reduces diversity. Which is obvious if people didn't get stuck on their false equivalence fallacies as if it's some kind of aha gotcha...

 Lord Damocles wrote:

DeathKorp_Rider wrote:

Tiberias wrote:
Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

I mean you could, but why? SoS are already so niche do they really need it? Psychic powers aren’t as widespread as they were previously.

Representation.

I find that pretty disappointing really Damocles (unless you're being sarcastic). For someone well versed in 40k and capable of making reasoned arguments to fall into that false equivalence trap.



EDIT

As to the original question - when 40k reaches a 50/50 split of representation, then brothers of silence are more than welcome. There's nothing that says they can't be men.

But the disingenuous attempt at 'reversing' the female custodes argument is not a reason to have them. It IS an example of the privilege people have in not being in a minority group and failing to understand that it's not a 1:1 give and take when one side holds all the cards. If it was, then there would be no move towards equality because you're just swapping chairs, rather than providing more for the side with less. By making this argument you are effectively resetting the representation to 0.

 Hellebore wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Is there any fluff reason for them to not to include dudes? Briefly skimming lexicanum, I don't see any explanation for being exclusively female. You'd think they'd want to make use of all the nulls they can.

So barring some cool bit of lore I'm not aware of that would contradict with brothers of silence, I say go ahead and include them. The faction doesn't really lose anything by adding dudes to its ranks.

Were SoS maybe GW's way of gauging whether to support sisters as a full faction vs as just an imperial agents option?

I would argue that despite what many claim about female custodes, the sisters were created as all female specifically for inclusion. Because at the time they were created in the mid 2000s, there were very few female models. The sisters appear to me to be a deliberate add girls to the setting opportunity.

It's far less contrived to just put women in squads of soldiers than to create a special group of all women...


The original question of course, has in the past been used in bad faith by people to as a false equivalence in the argument against female inclusion. What aboutisms. They aren't equal. 90% of the game models are male, so claiming we should make one of the few instances of female models include men is in no way equivalent to adding women to the 90% of men that already exist. It actually reduces diversity. Which is obvious if people didn't get stuck on their false equivalence fallacies as if it's some kind of aha gotcha...

 Lord Damocles wrote:

DeathKorp_Rider wrote:

Tiberias wrote:
Right, so we have female Custodes confirmed. I for one am fully on board with big oiled up muscle mommys (just also please retcon the old rogue trader artwork to also include some female custodes without armor in ridiculously stupid poses....this needs a proper update). But Sisters of Silence are also a really cool, albeit neglected faction that form the other talon of the emperor.

So, why not create more diversity there as well? Expand the model range and add male Sisters of Silence models and lore while you are at it? I am pretty sure men can also be blanks in the lore...I mean I'm pretty sure that there are also male Culexus assassins. I'm dead serious here, I really like the sisters models and their lore, but why not add some more models in general and make at least some of them guys while also expanding their lore.

Don't think the name is even a problem since GW is pushing Anathema Psykana as a description for them anyway, which basically just means psychic anathema or psychic abomination if you want to be mean, which is a completely unisex description as far as I can see.

I mean you could, but why? SoS are already so niche do they really need it? Psychic powers aren’t as widespread as they were previously.

Representation.

I find that pretty disappointing really Damocles (unless you're being sarcastic). For someone well versed in 40k and capable of making reasoned arguments to fall into that false equivalence trap.



EDIT

As to the original question - when 40k reaches a 50/50 split of representation, then brothers of silence are more than welcome. There's nothing that says they can't be men.

But the disingenuous attempt at 'reversing' the female custodes argument is not a reason to have them. It IS an example of the privilege people have in not being in a minority group and failing to understand that it's not a 1:1 give and take when one side holds all the cards. If it was, then there would be no move towards equality because you're just swapping chairs, rather than providing more for the side with less. By making this argument you are effectively resetting the representation to 0.

Let's cut to the chase then: does every fiction necessarily have to have 50/50 representation, always? Is that always the absolute end goal to move towards? I don't have a definitive, objectively correct answer to that because I don't think there is one, but it feels instictively wrong.

Edit: to elaborate, I say it feels instictively wrong because I don't think you can or should force such a thing in fiction. Then again, I'd genuinely like some male Anathema Psykana.

The original question of course, has in the past been used in bad faith by people to as a false equivalence in the argument against female inclusion. What aboutisms. They aren't equal. 90% of the game models are male, so claiming we should make one of the few instances of female models include men is in no way equivalent to adding women to the 90% of men that already exist. It actually reduces diversity. Which is obvious if people didn't get stuck on their false equivalence fallacies as if it's some kind of aha gotcha...

Fair point. That said, SoS are something that I see so rarely and are so... whatever the opposite of iconic is... that I'm not sure there would really be much harm in adding brothers of silence. I've never seen someone excited to collect a SoS army or mention SoS as the first sign of fem rep in the setting.

I think your point would be stronger if we were talking about Sororitas who *are* something I see fielded fairly often, who *are* pretty iconic.

Semi-separate thought: Just as I feel that custodes are kind of a low-risk-low-impact place to add fem rep, SoS are similarly sort of low-risk-low-impact. I don't think a lot of people would feel alienated/bothered by brothers of silence, but SoS are such a low-visibility faction that I'm not sure we'd be moving any needles by adding brothers of silence.

epronovost wrote:

 Truth118 wrote:
If they added men you could just rebrand them Siblings of Silence.

Children of Silence would sound better in my opinion or go for a faux latin name like Adeptus Silentium.

Adeptus Silentium is a fething awsome name btw. I'd be totally on board for that.

Let's cut to the chase then: does every fiction necessarily have to have 50/50 representation, always? Is that always the absolute end goal to move towards? I don't have a definitive, objectively correct answer to that because I don't think there is one, but it feels instictively wrong.

50/50 rep among factions that don't have any particular reason to not be 50/50 seems pretty reasonable. If half of all tau heads had the feminine nasal slits, half of guard torsos had chesticles, half of eldar guardian torsos had boob plate, etc., that seems reasonable to me.

Personally, I'm fine with gender-locked factions existing, but marines have a big, cringey asterisk next to them because they're the most visible and most supported faction in the franchise. If guard were getting marine levels of support/visiblity and marines were getting guard levels of support/visibility, marines being all dudes would probably be fine.

The 50/50 wasn't meant as a literal requirement, more to highlight the point of the unequal approach of 1:1 sex representation when adding women in one, doesn't auto make adding men to another.

The main point is - when there is unequal representation, the focus is on evening that out, not trying to make the majority feel better when the minority gets something.

Only when there is an actual level of equal representation will questions like this actually have meaning, because then everyone is working on an even playing field.

Or at least equal-ish. I don't think the recent discussions of gender in 40k would be nearly so heated if marines weren't so visible/didn't make up half the playable factions. Nor do I think anyone would mind marines remaining a boys club if they weren't so visible/supported. No one particularly minds orks (male-coded though not technically male) remaining as they are because orks aren't the protagonists of half the video games and the faction that gets half the releases.

Tiberias wrote:
Let's cut to the chase then: does every fiction necessarily have to have 50/50 representation, always?

Just a quick mention here but it would be HIGHLY fallacious and wrongheaded to claim that because there is now a precedent for female Custodian that Custodian are thus an "equal representation faction". Having a handful of women in a overwhelmingly men dominated army doesn't make the army 50/50 equal representation. If you take Stormcast Eternals as a template, the vast majority of character (and model) in the faction are men to a factor of about 5 to 1 I would say. This is not equal representation. It does have representation for both gender, but it's not 50/50 representation at all. There is absolutely nothing in the Custodian codex that claims that half or even close to half of all Custodians are women; in fact, it appears that while there are Custodian women, they are a rarity. It would be safe to assume that female Custodian are just as rare if not even rarer than female Stormcast Eternals. I think speaking in terms of rigorous gender equality and representation when one gender is a strong minority in a group is toxic to the conversation (not that I am accusing of being toxic btw; I simply think you are approaching the conversation from a toxic angle, you sound like a nice dude). It's arguing from a caricature.

No, even now, the Custodian are not an equal representation faction like the T'au can be (or how the two eldars should be and are said to be, but are not physically represented to be in the model line). Should all factions be like that? I don't think so. I think it's fine to have factions who are mostly of one gender or another. In fact that makes the world a little more colorful if you have faction with more or less gender representation. This appears to me as fine and acceptable. I'm even fine with some factions being of exclusively one gender. They can be an interesting flavor. I would caution about such faction being the flagship faction as it does make it loose some wider appeal in my opinion; it's more of a niche thing. I think that Space Marines and 40K in general would be more popular if there was a possibility for some female marines for example just like the Stormcast Eternals do it. You could then have your exclusively male marine Chapter, a funky all female marine Chapter here and there and the lambda Marine factions who are mostly men, but with women here and there to spice things up. I think it would match better with a 21st century audience too (which is ironic since there used to be female marines until they were retconned when 40K started to pivot from satire and comedy to actual grimdark and nobledark).

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Or at least equal-ish. I don't think the recent discussions of gender in 40k would be nearly so heated if marines weren't so visible/didn't make up half the playable factions. Nor do I think anyone would mind marines remaining a boys club if they weren't so visible/supported. No one particularly minds orks (male-coded though not technically male) remaining as they are because orks aren't the protagonists of half the video games and the faction that gets half the releases.

Totally agree. Part of the challenge is that marines fulfill a power fantasy that no other faction except custodes do.

It's like saying only men can be jedi. It's a particular set of fantasy skills excluded to the reader because of their sex.

If you think about it, magic muscle juice that makes you an ubermensch would be a potentially attractive thing to women in a fantasy, given the realworld challenges they have. Yet we offer it only to the side of the population that already have physical advantages over the other half - so nerds can have a power fantasy to be better than all the other MEN, which is pretty telling (this is all relatively unconscious).


The irony though that GW's milking of the marine cow at the expense of their other lines has bitten them here is pretty great though. If only they were more even handed with their approach maybe this would not happen.

I do think though that excluding one particular skill/power set to the reader/consumer because of their sex is going to be bad regardless. all female marine chapters or sisters getting their own geneseed would have allowed both to exist in the universe while retaining that divide.

 Hellebore wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Or at least equal-ish. I don't think the recent discussions of gender in 40k would be nearly so heated if marines weren't so visible/didn't make up half the playable factions. Nor do I think anyone would mind marines remaining a boys club if they weren't so visible/supported. No one particularly minds orks (male-coded though not technically male) remaining as they are because orks aren't the protagonists of half the video games and the faction that gets half the releases.

Totally agree. Part of the challenge is that marines fulfill a power fantasy that no other faction except custodes do.

It's like saying only men can be jedi. It's a particular set of fantasy skills excluded to the reader because of their sex.

If you think about it, magic muscle juice that makes you an ubermensch would be a potentially attractive thing to women in a fantasy, given the realworld challenges they have. Yet we offer it only to the side of the population that already have physical advantages over the other half - so nerds can have a power fantasy to be better than all the other MEN, which is pretty telling (this is all relatively unconscious).


The irony though that GW's milking of the marine cow at the expense of their other lines has bitten them here is pretty great though. If only they were more even handed with their approach maybe this would not happen.

I do think though that excluding one particular skill/power set to the reader/consumer because of their sex is going to be bad regardless. all female marine chapters or sisters getting their own geneseed would have allowed both to exist in the universe while retaining that divide.

Ok, I'm gonna get flamed for this, but this is what I meant earlier: you used the example that if all jedi could hypothetically only be men as a bad case of representation. Fair enough, and I'm by no means saying that all jedi should only be men, BUT since we are talking about fiction here, I can't for the life of me find anything morally wrong in any sense if george lucas had imagined jedi to only be male always.
It would have been a terribly bad business move, since girls obviously also think jedi are cool and you want them as viewers/customers as well, but would I can't see how it can be called wrong from a moral standpoint since it's a product of his imagination.

Or let's do the even more extreme example that is going to get me flamed even more: let's say hypothetically you create a fantasy/sci-fi setting for the insecure nerds that you think get drawn to 40k: a pure 80s style male power fantasy -> all the heroes are like juiced up 80s action hero dudes with cheesey one liners. That setting becomes more popular and more mainstream. Would it then be morally wrong not to change/add something to that setting to increase representation? I honestly can't see a reason of how it could be morally wrong not to add these things since it is a piece of fiction.

Keep in mind I am absolutely fine with female custodes, I am bringing this up more as a point of principle about a writers freedom of expression in the genre of fiction.

If you explicitly tell your audience that this is not for women and that it will deliberately cater to stereotypical male tastes then sure.

But GW is not doing that with 40k.

It is pretty offensive to try and encourage women to join a fandom that explicitly condones for 'thematic' reasons the othering women.

It would be like encouraging black africans to join in on your apartheid RPG with all the white players and acting suprised when they reject it. It's super accurate and true to the lore is not an argument for supporting bigotry.