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Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:Define depravity.

An action ( rape, murder, robbery to name just some extreme forms ) which violates the universal morals and values on which all civilisation, independent of any specific culture, depend on.
You will find no culture on earth which condones the mentioned crimes outside of extreme situations ( mostly war ) because those who do would quickly fall apart.
If you are willing to eat cats, dogs, or ants is largely dependent on your cultural background. But the idea that you shouldn't murder/rape/rob your neighbour because you feel like it is pretty much universal.

Henners91 wrote:The Imperium is evil by necessity, it acts according to realism and can't really be judged when compared to its peers.


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A lot of the suffering it creates is not needless and I'd say much 'evil' that is perpetrated by the Imperium can be justified; few die needlessly.

Chenkov.

"What's that? Creating strategies? Naw, too much work, I'm going to be remarkably inefficient and throw men at it until the problem goes away, and probably get a bunch of medals for it."

Though that is admittedly but one case.

Henners91 wrote:The Imperium is evil by necessity, it acts according to realism and can't really be judged when compared to its peers.


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A lot of the suffering it creates is not needless and I'd say much 'evil' that is perpetrated by the Imperium can be justified; few die needlessly.

I actualy deny the necessity of many of the Imperium's policies, especialy those born out of ignorance. Restricting knowledge and science to a small and highly conservative cast for example is detrimental to humanity's survival simply because this cast has not only failed to truly advance Imperial Technology in 10000 years ( with the exception of some minor "breaktroughs" like new ammo or a new tank variant or even a new warship design, if it isn't scrapped because some of it's kind were nicked by the forces of Chaos, which are without a doubt useful) but also, thanks to it's inherent jealousy and failure to spread knowledge so that it may never be lost, because it is not even able to protect the entirety of human knowledge as it was during the Emprah's rule.

Keeping entire populations in perpetual poverty with very little chance of any advancement does not make your society more efficient or stable. On the contrary, in a world where pretty seductive gods with a very real promises of very real power exist it will only create the foundation for unrest, civil war and, in the worst case, total destruction, which is bad for your production quotas.

I am going to say that evil wins some battles, but never wins the war.

Taking the Battle of the Fang into account. The plot by Magnus succeeds, the vengeance of the Thousand Sons is not. The Thousand Sons are so badly mauled afterwards, they never recover from their expenditure of manpower and equipment.

So win a battle but lose the war.

Still subjective.

Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.

Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:Still subjective.

Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.

The only reason why you could ever argue that subjective is because kittens are, frankly, inferior creatures to humans.

To kill/rape/whatever a human, an "equal," is more objectively evil. Although, sometimes killing is arguably justified (Though not a good deed), rape never is.

Void__Dragon wrote:

Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:Still subjective.

Let me rephrase my example to make it less a cultural issue and more of a clear definition of conceptual morality. I have cats as pets. Other people enjoy smashing kittens with large mallets as musical expression. Is it evil? I think so, but does my opinion make it so? No.

The only reason why you could ever argue that subjective is because kittens are, frankly, inferior creatures to humans.

To kill/rape/whatever a human, an "equal," is more objectively evil. Although, sometimes killing is arguably justified (Though not a good deed), rape never is.

Aztecs routinely murdered captured members of other tribes, with the 'greater good' being that the blood sacrifice made the sun rise everyday.

Rape has, generally, always being viewed as a bad thing, but not always because it violated a woman's rights. Sometimes it was more concerned with how another man's "property" was treated.


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And killing kittens, or any creature, could be seen as universally evil. I can't recall any civilisation throughout history where inflicting pain for the joy of inflicting pain, rather than justice/revenge/greed/information/purgation was ever accepted.

KingDeath wrote:

Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:Define depravity.

An action ( rape, murder, robbery to name just some extreme forms ) which violates the universal morals and values on which all civilisation, independent of any specific culture, depend on.
You will find no culture on earth which condones the mentioned crimes outside of extreme situations ( mostly war ) because those who do would quickly fall apart.
If you are willing to eat cats, dogs, or ants is largely dependent on your cultural background. But the idea that you shouldn't murder/rape/rob your neighbour because you feel like it is pretty much universal.

I think the important part of that statement is on earth. Given that there's no evidence that objective morality exists in 40k (as opposed to something like, say, D&D, where Good is something you can point to & experience), maybe it'd be worth examining the races according to their own moral codes. To the Eldar, for example, the survival of the race is the highest good (and really, that's not all that different from the people in this thread saying the Imperium's actions are justified by their circumstances), so every Eldar who picks up a gun against his Dark Eldar cousins is the worst sort of criminal. To the C'Tan, whose perspective is so removed from our own as to make them incompatible, killing (and yes, torturing) humans to feed isn't evil because, to mis-quote Dr Manhattan, the world's smartest human means no more to them than the world's smartest ant. The only faction we can really comment on the morality of is the Imperium, and in terms of making the galaxy good for humanity, they've failed for reasons articulated elsewhere in this thread. (As a thought-experiment, imagine if the Imperium weren't human - say, we were dealing with the Tau Imperium or whatever - but they acted exactly the same. There'd be no question as to whether or not they were evil.)

The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.

quote for truth. They are just as bad as us saying, "oh i will have the steak rather than the cabbage because the steak tastes better."

Skalk Bloodaxe wrote:I just read this entire thread. Wow.

I saw it approached in a few posts but no one actually came out and said it- the OP is flawed because of the subjective nature of opinion. The concepts of "good" and "evil" are created by personal values, but those definitions become invalidated when presented by opinions to the contrary. I have cats as pets. Other people eat cats. Are those people evil? I may think so, but is my opinion unequivocal? No.

Concepts of good and evil are created by social values deriving from history, religion and the weight of opinion of the great majority of the population.

It is meaningless to talk about good and evil without consideration of the existing moral and ethical framework.

LoneLictor wrote:
About Chaos being evil, I'm not an idiot. That's actually why I play as Chaos Space Marines. Evil is fun. That's also why I think I might start an Imperial army.

1. Yeah, but not every race is a fanatic. That's like saying its okay to be a murderer because there are multiple murderers.

2. Those aliens lived in peace with them and the society was democratic, therefore the governor couldn't be trying to steal power. They destroyed them because they wanted more power. That's all.

3. Yes it does. You can't ignore fluff on the grounds that "There might be a reason that someone on this forum thought of." Its clearly racist and sexist.

4. Source please. ( Grey Knight codex, Fire and Honor, Courage and Honor, Warriors of Ultramar - you can find stories about defending already lost wolrd there )

5. I'm not talking about factions, I'm talking about RACES. They believe they are racially superior and smarter and the galaxy belongs to them because of this. I hope you understand that this is not a good thing. This is a bad thing.

6. This is the one thing I was actually wrong on, I'll admit. The rest of my points are still valid. However I think I read somewhere (I believe the Tau codex, I'll have to check) that the Tau initially tried to be peaceful to humans and the Imperium responded badly, which caused the Tau to view them as enemies. Nevertheless I'm not completely sure about this so I'll have to check.

I think that this video should tell you all:




This one to:

haloreach4ever wrote:

The C'tan aren't much worse than modern day humans. They kill people for food, same as we do to other animals. Our justification is that it's natural and humans have priority because we are more intelligent/special. Exactly the same reasons will support the C'tan, they have to eat and they are superior in everyway to any other creatures we have seen in the 40k setting. The Necrons on the other hand are evil- they joined the C'tan because of jealousy and now fight because they hate life.

quote for truth. They are just as bad as us saying, "oh i will have the steak rather than the cabbage because the steak tastes better."

But a sun isn't Sentient, or even living really. There's a much larger gap between the two.

A sun gives life to all planets in its system. destroy a sun and every world near it that relies on it dies.

haloreach4ever wrote:A sun gives life to all planets in its system. destroy a sun and every world near it that relies on it dies.

True, but it doesn't really say how long it takes for a Ctan to drain a sun, or if this could be limited to unhinbited systems. What is know, is that they swapped to sentient species becuase they 'taste better'.

Plus, you know, they committed genocide on their own species.

so do we.

Your point?

Ascalam wrote:so do we.

Your point?

We have committed genocide on cultures.

In their hunger and greed they wiped out themselves, their selfishness being more important than the survival of their species to them.

Any human that did something similar to the point where only four of us remained would be the most evil, morally repugnant person to ever live.

And what is this "we" crap? Genocide is an evil act, and those that commit it, real humans, were evil to do it.

Just because someone is human does not mean they cannot be evil.

Never said otherwise. We have come to the brink of wiping ourselves out several times, over 3 or four people's egos..

We are evil. Humanity as a whole are an evil,venal and self-serving race.

Individuals, not always, and not strongly, but as a race we are a fairly unpleasant lot

Ascalam wrote:
We are evil. Humanity as a whole are an evil, venal and self-serving race.

Not true, we can do amazing things also...
Like building the most beautiful things that exist ( Great Wall of China, Great Pyramids etc... ).
We can also prevent other lesser species to go into extermination ( Panda, Great Blue Whale, Gorillas...).
We can make mistakes, like draining the oil into the sea... But we can also correct most of them ( like Recycling used things or start using renewable energies instead of gas, oil and coal ).
If you basis of "we are evil" only goes for wars, individual requests and striping this planet of recourse....let me tell you - no race is perfect. But we are the one who can repair it's mistakes. And we are not evil as a whole as you think. If we are them our race would disappear in 1963 when both Gorbachev and Kennedy hold their fingers on the big red button.
And remember Vietnam war, how many people protest against it in US alone? In the end, US retreated because they lost people support in their own land, meaning that even average American is able to stand up and to protest against evil things his country is doing. Problem with Humanity as a whole is - we are race that follows it's leaders, regardless who they are ( just see Hitler and Stalin ). So we can be good, but that depends on how moral we are and who is leading us.

They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?

Brother Coa wrote:They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?

By the logic of this thread, yeah. There are Dark Eldar out there who weren't around for the Fall and who just want to get high all day. There are World Eaters who signed up with Khorne because all their battle-brothers were doing it. There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing. My understanding of the premise of the thread is we're judging species by their worst members.

And as for achievements, so what? The Eldar & Dark Eldar have all sorts of sophisticated tech and culture, does that justify their actions?

In the grim darkness of the far future, everything is going to be fine.

There is no true threat to humanity, except it's own people, which it seems to be managing just fine.

Maybe Necrons.. maaaybe.

Tau don't want a fight.

Nids can only fail.

Abbadon... pshh.. YEAH RIGHT.

Orks don't have the tech to touch terra... ever.

All in all, there is no real scary threat to humanity, and their suddenly endless supply of 24' tall space marines.

Hogan Van Monsterband wrote:

Brother Coa wrote:They are also part of Humanity. You want to say that they are evil as a whole to?

By the logic of this thread, yeah. There are Dark Eldar out there who weren't around for the Fall and who just want to get high all day.

There actually isn't any fluff to support that, so far as I can recall. Any pleasures that the Dark Eldar take part in eventually gets old and becomes mundane, which drives them to move on and commit ever more depraved and vile acts to get their rocks off.

There are World Eaters who signed up with Khorne because all their battle-brothers were doing it.

Given that the World Eaters were mind-fethed/surgically lobotomised when they joined so that they only found pleasure in killing, I actually feel sorry for a lot of them.

There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.

The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.

Then again, no one is calling 'Humans' as an entire race evil. The proposed point was that the Imperium is evil, so it would be the Tau Empire, rather than every single Tau that would be adressed the same way. Same goes for the Chaos Legions, excluding the brothers that signed up becuase they were just going with the flow (though I still don't think that in itself is an excuse).

Emperors Faithful wrote:

Hogan Van Monsterband wrote:

There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.

The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.

I agree. Big time.

The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.

Cottonjaw wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:

Hogan Van Monsterband wrote:

There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.

The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.

I agree. Big time.

The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.

Yeah, fair enough, I was just trying to think of the worst thing we see the Tau doing.

Cottonjaw wrote:

Emperors Faithful wrote:

Hogan Van Monsterband wrote:

There are Tau who genuinely believe in the Greater Good and would be horrified if they found out about the whole widespread-mind-control thing.

The mind-control theory is not solid canon, by any real stretch, but it is a fun pet theory that does explain a fair bit.

I agree. Big time.

The mind control thing is based on like... 2 sentences that don't really say that, and tons upon tons of internet Tau hate shenanigans. The imperial dissection of a desceased Ethereal resolved that they have no psyker qualities, no additional pheromone glands... nothing. It may be hard to imagine to their puny human brains but... the Tau might actually like co-existing in relative peace.

Actually, the dissection did quite the opposite. The initial conclusion of the person behind the dissection, and this was only a thoery on his part as he certainly never got a chance to confirm it, was that the unidentified glands could be phermone glands that extert or influence others. The Inquisitor ran with the half-baked theory and decided it was solid fact.

I like the confusion and lack of confirmation surrounding the area, depending on your personal preference Tau can be the thin ray of hope and sunshine in the Grimdark galaxy, or just another evil empire.

Additionally, it is implied that the Vespid leaders may be influenced by the tau helmets they wear.

On that note I would also have to point out that this particular book wants you to think Tau have feet instead of hooves, when the miniatures clearly tell a different story.
BL = not really canon.

Though I'm a fan of the mind control theory myself. Why? Because grimdark. I'm not a Tau hater (quite the opposite!), I just think it's more "interesting" if the Greater Good had this rather creepy aspect to it instead of the Tau being a bunch of interstellar whiteknights in a galaxy of terror.
Also, as far as I remember those vespid control helmets are Codex stuff, lending credence to the idea that the Tau generally are not averse to this idea. It's worth noting that something like this does not exist for, say, the Kroot, though, so I guess this partnership is a bit more honest (but still based on colonialism - think Europeans in Africa raising local troops for their wars).

KingDeath wrote:Keeping entire populations in perpetual poverty with very little chance of any advancement does not make your society more efficient or stable.

Local politics. The Imperium does not care whether or not the governor of a world invests in humanitarian advancements or not. Also, I actually believe the opposite is true. The more free-thinking/educated and bored (by not having to work all day) a society is, the more likely it is to rebel against a regime they're not entirely content with. It's all about hitting that precarious balance between "keeping them busy" and "letting millions die of hunger" that prevents revolt.

Especially concerning Chaos. Look at the Horus Heresy or the Birth of Slaanesh - both events happening in a society that was far more openminded than the Imperium we know today. Because Chaos knows how to exploit such things.

"An open mind is like a fortress unguarded."

Lynata wrote:On that note I would also have to point out that this particular book wants you to think Tau have feet instead of hooves, when the miniatures clearly tell a different story.
BL = not really canon.

Though I'm a fan of the mind control theory myself. Why? Because grimdark. I'm not a Tau hater (quite the opposite!), I just think it's more "interesting" if the Greater Good had this rather creepy aspect to it instead of the Tau being a bunch of interstellar whiteknights in a galaxy of terror.
Also, as far as I remember those vespid control helmets are Codex stuff, lending credence to the idea that the Tau generally are not averse to this idea. It's worth noting that something like this does not exist for, say, the Kroot, though, so I guess this partnership is a bit more honest (but still based on colonialism - think Europeans in Africa raising local troops for their wars).

The relationship with the Kroot is a strange one, seeing that Kroot may fight for the Tau (pretty much for free) but will hire themselves out as mercenaries to pretty much everyone (that doesn't corrupt/enslave/eat/shoot on sight anyway).

Furthermore it is suggested that the pheremone glands of the Ethereals (if they do have them) may affect Tau, but are limited on their effect to other species. This explains why it was only a handful of fringe Imperial Words that defected, rather than a swathe of sectors.

Emperors Faithful wrote:The relationship with the Kroot is a strange one, seeing that Kroot may fight for the Tau (pretty much for free) but will hire themselves out as mercenaries to pretty much everyone (that doesn't corrupt/enslave/eat/shoot on sight anyway).

I think this could be explained by different tribes of the same species - some living under protection of the Tau, whilst others prefer to stay independent or have simply not been inducted into a sept yet. The ones fighting for the Tau may not do it for free as well, but rather than immediate "per mission" payment they might do it as some sort of honour debt because the Tau gave them weapons, food and other supplies?

Orks always win.

Fascinating though a thread about Tau Mind Control would be, it is clearly off topic for this thread.