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I agree with the comparisons to our current situations. We kill the animals right now, so that we can expand our own empires. It's not really that they go out of their way to kill harmless xenos, it's probably more like they're in the way.
And yes, I'm aware we aren't as bad to animals and the environment as we used to be. We're still the worst race on Earth, everything else adapts to it's surroundings, whereas we force our surroundings to change for us.

ZoomDakkaDakka wrote:I agree with the comparisons to our current situations. We kill the animals right now, so that we can expand our own empires. It's not really that they go out of their way to kill harmless xenos, it's probably more like they're in the way.
And yes, I'm aware we aren't as bad to animals and the environment as we used to be. We're still the worst race on Earth, everything else adapts to it's surroundings, whereas we force our surroundings to change for us.

Bit of a difference, though, between sentient xenos and animals.

And the xenos are hardly better (At least the stronger ones). There's either omnicidal robots, conquering fish, manipulative elves, insane and sadistic elves, violent greenies, or OMNOMNOMNOM.

Jimsolo wrote:The answer to this is pretty simple. (At least I think it is.)

Most cultures seem to reach their zenith when they are at their most closed-minded and oppressive. (The British Empire, the Roman Empire, the list goes on.) As their culture goes into decline, they become more accepting and open minded towards new ideas, religions, cultural beliefs, etc. I'm not saying there is a cause and effect relationship here, but there is a definite trend towards this pattern.

Not really; the fall of the Roman empire is associated with a culture that basically the same as the Imperiums': any thought of cultural and religious tolerance has been thrown out the window (and despite all the christian propaganda to the contrary, the Early Empire WAS a very religiously tolerant place, so long as you didnt cause trouble.) the Emperor became a divine figurehead (At one point the Emperor had been deified, but the 'Imperial cult' such as it was was never a replacement for the older established religions and cults; the Late Roman Empires interpretation was wrapped in a Christian context: that is, the Emperor was a vessel through which God himself acted, and the Emperors right to rule was bestowed by God himself over the world. It's this mind set that would lead to Popes in the West, and the same mentality continuing in the Eastern Empire for centuries.)

Romes might was built upon having it be advantageous to become a citizen, making it a relatively straightforward process to become a citizen, and having Roman culture be extremely adaptable to merging with locally conquered cultures to form a synthesis- This was helped by the fact that Romes most famous Romanization, that of the Celts was already the mostly closely related Ethnic and Linguistic group to the Ethnicties and languages native to the Italian peninsula. Despite that apparent culture differences, the Romans and Celts were more closely connected to each other then either was to the Greeks (who never 'Romanized' beyond adopting the name as a nationality), or the Germans (Who actually did Romanize quite well by the end of the Empire, and did so willingly - not because they had it forced down their throats.)

I'd say your thesis is way off- at least in regards to Rome. the British Empire is a different subject altogether - and trying to find commonalities between the two is actually rather hard.

40k = Australia of gaming. EVERYTHING can kill you.

Grimdark = rocks fall?

Forgive me, Carlo, I'm not a historian. I'm a lumberjack.

But any way you want to dress it up, the Romans did a fair bit of ass kicking. In point of fact, they did a fair bit of conquering. As did the Brits. And the Americans. And the...well, list any former or present dominant world power, and you will find a culture which A) stepped on their neighbors for their own gain, and B) were pretty darn unapologetic about it.

It's the way of the world. You wave a little white flag while wearing some love beads and trying to hand out flowers, and the militant jackbooted thug is going to gutterstomp you. The world in which we live is a world where real enemies exist, enemies that don't want peace with you. They want to tear down your civilization, take what resources you have, and put their own in place. The only way to protect yourself is to be stronger than them. And since tyrannical thugs aren't thoughtful enough to tattoo 'Tyrannical Thug' on their foreheads, you have to approach every new culture as if it were a potential threat. That doesn't mean you attack them religiously (and in 40k, the Imperium doesn't) but it does mean you assume they mean you harm until they prove otherwise.

It's a harsh fact of life, but a true one. The 40k universe just takes this fact to its logical extreme.

I think the Imperium has a rule where if the xenos are a threat, the exterminate them. If they appear to be useful and do not mean harm, then that fits into the "not a threat" category. That's how I see it.

Wrong thread mate. But hey, look at that. The Imperium hates Xenos...

garret wrote:I can understand chaos and tyranids and any army trying to kill ya. But why kill xenos who have nothing. Do they kill only sentient xenos or are animals killed as well.

They hate xenos for the obvious reason that xenos want to control empires just as much as humans. The great crusade had to liberate 1000s of worlds from alien control. When the galaxy is full of alien species who are willing to kill humans then you will hate them.

Extrapolate the real world: people are capable of killing and hating each other for any number of reasons, now take away any human trait from the person you hate, making them an alien with high tech weapons and no compasion for humans.

Excellent points, Bluntman. De-humanization of your enemies is never easier than when they aren't humans!

Holy thread necro. This thread is two years old.

Partly because having an external threat (and intenral) you can keep people focused on is a good way to unify them for a given purpose, whether its justified or not. IT's also partly because there are alien races out to get humanity (either competing for territory, because they llike to eat/kill/experiment on humans, or whatever various reasons seem to crop up.) Some of that humanity brought on itself, and some of it is just because some alien races are outright threats period. There's not really going to be one, single clear answer because there's no single alien race or the way they approach humanity (or in how humanity approaches them.) and it can also differe in various parts/regions of the Imperium and at varying levels (rogue traders aren't going to react to aliens the same way a religious zealot would.)

Because a Xeno once said something about the Emperor's mother. :p

Because when humanity was down during the age of strife aliens preyed upon humanity for food, slaves, or just the pleasure of killing, now humanity have the power so they like to kill xenos whenever possible, though 40k may seem grimdark it was nothing compared to the age of strife.

In my eyes it's a very simple reason why the Imperium hates Xenos. Nothing unites humans quicker than hostility & conflict - tell group A that group B intends to kill them, defile their women & take their children as slaves & they will unite to stop group B from doing this. This may then extend to pre-empting group Bs attack by doing to group B what group A have been told will happen to them if they don't 'stop' group B first. Group B, caught unawares, unite to do to Group A what Group A did to Group B. Then Group C shows up. Group A tell Group C what Group B have done & Groups A & C unite to fight Group B. Group C then decides to attack Group A to prevent Group A from dominating. New generations of these groups are born and are instilled in the hatred the various groups have built up for each other and thus it carries on for generation after generation.

...ok, it sounded better in my head, but still it's a -really- easy way to unite people & get them to do what you want. Want examples of this? Look at pretty much any war in our history prior to the advent of easily accessed global communication (internet, smart phones, satellite phones). There you will find prejudice & hatred being reasons why the common person fought - which is why you still have 'built-in' prejudice against certain nationalities. For example, a cracking example I think in Europe, France vs. England. France & England were at war, on and off, for hundreds of years and in both nationalities a hatred was forged against t'other. Ask an Englishman even now what he thinks of the French & there is still a good chance that it will be derogatory (common themes being 'frogs', 'toads' & 'snails'). I'm sure that French people answer in equal terms when asked about the English.

Thus it's quite obvious why, in a hostile universe with an Empire spanning a million planets, that hostility to outsiders is the common factor that unites the Imperium.

Sparks_Havelock wrote:In my eyes it's a very simple reason why the Imperium hates Xenos. Nothing unites humans quicker than hostility & conflict - tell group A that group B intends to kill them, defile their women & take their children as slaves & they will unite to stop group B from doing this. This may then extend to pre-empting group Bs attack by doing to group B what group A have been told will happen to them if they don't 'stop' group B first. Group B, caught unawares, unite to do to Group A what Group A did to Group B. Then Group C shows up. Group A tell Group C what Group B have done & Groups A & C unite to fight Group B. Group C then decides to attack Group A to prevent Group A from dominating. New generations of these groups are born and are instilled in the hatred the various groups have built up for each other and thus it carries on for generation after generation.

...ok, it sounded better in my head, but still it's a -really- easy way to unite people & get them to do what you want. Want examples of this? Look at pretty much any war in our history prior to the advent of easily accessed global communication (internet, smart phones, satellite phones). There you will find prejudice & hatred being reasons why the common person fought - which is why you still have 'built-in' prejudice against certain nationalities. For example, a cracking example I think in Europe, France vs. England. France & England were at war, on and off, for hundreds of years and in both nationalities a hatred was forged against t'other. Ask an Englishman even now what he thinks of the French & there is still a good chance that it will be derogatory (common themes being 'frogs', 'toads' & 'snails'). I'm sure that French people answer in equal terms when asked about the English.

Thus it's quite obvious why, in a hostile universe with an Empire spanning a million planets, that hostility to outsiders is the common factor that unites the Imperium.

I partially agree with your point. Yes their common foe unites them, but think about their foes. The Orks will feth up everything, and often slaughter the local populations. The Dark Eldar will make you wish you were dead. The Tau are kinda mixed, yes if you agree with them they will be nice to you. If not they still will slaughter you like everyone else. Nids will eat you. I'm not sure what the Necrons would do. Plus all of the minor xeno races which would kill you.

Not many of them seem too nice (the Tau being a partial exception )

That's rather secondary to the point that it's about uniting humanity to fight those gribbly nasty things. Without the unification, as far as that goes, of the Imperium then humanity would splinter and fall away, the shards of the Imperium easily gobbled up by the other dominant forces within the galaxy. Unifying people isn't a mere case of saying "Well, we're all in this together you know...". It's about playing on emotions & fears and there truly is no more powerful human emotion than hate. Through hate you can get humans to do almost anything so long as they feel they are venting that hatred, even if they actually are not.

(All in my opinion & interpretation of course)

At this point in the time-line, 10,000 years after the ascension of the God-Emperor, it is quite a common belief amongst the citizenry (and rather a common teaching of the Ecclesiarchy) that the God-Emperor of Mankind fashioned Man in His own image.

The Xenos are, at best, pale mockeries or corruptions of the purity of the human form, and must thusly be destroyed for this blasphemy.

Because they are all wishing to exploit, kill and steal form humanity.
Get them before they can get us.

Yori wrote:Because they are all wishing to exploit, kill and steal form humanity.
Get them before they can get us.

That's pretty much it. And never forget the Age of Strife, and the 10,000 year history post-Heresy of xenos species preying on humanity. With that kind of history, it's no wonder the Imperium has a dead-set 'no xenos tolerance' policy galaxy-wide. And you dont even have to think about the war-like orks, mindless Tyranids, perfidious Eldar or expansionist Tau. There's plenty of other xenos species that has been mentioned in the fluff that are aggressive and seek to harm the Imperium, such as the barghesi, and the Slaugth. Of course, most of those species have already been wiped out either during the Great Crusade, or through various campaigns and purges.

Sparks_Havelock wrote:For example, a cracking example I think in Europe, France vs. England. France & England were at war, on and off, for hundreds of years and in both nationalities a hatred was forged against t'other. Ask an Englishman even now what he thinks of the French & there is still a good chance that it will be derogatory (common themes being 'frogs', 'toads' & 'snails'). I'm sure that French people answer in equal terms when asked about the English.

Except not really, because the relationship between France and England constantly changed over the last millennium, the last time we fought against them was almost two hundred years ago, and they've been nothing but allies for the last century. If you want a better example, try Catholics vs Protestants & the English in Northern Ireland.

garret wrote:I can understand chaos and tyranids and any army trying to kill ya. But why kill xenos who have nothing. Do they kill only sentient xenos or are animals killed as well.

In-universe, the explanation is that the Imperial Creed states that it is mankind's destiny to rule the galaxy, and mankind's alone.

Out-of-universe, because grimdark, to invite comparisons with the worst excesses of imperialists throughout human history, and to make the setting distinct from things like Star Trek where everybody gets on, and even Klingons have feelings, etc.

Let's try this from another angle.

Your average Imperial citizen living upon a world that hasn't been attacked by xenos, or even seen a xenos, for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. They know nothing about the Heresy except for myths & the stories they were told by their parents to make sure they behaved. The Age of Strife is something they have no idea about, happenings in the galaxy in the past millennia are something they are completely ignorant of, but they might know a little about the bit of the planet they live on and its history. So where are they getting this instinctual hatred for something they don't know about, don't know the names of & don't feel threatened by*?

Creating hate amongst people is all about making them fear what 'it' can do to them, how 'it' can do it to them, what 'it' would do to them. If your only source of information is an Ecclesiarchy priest, as in c13 Europe, telling you that what is out there will kill you, destroy your home, defile your women & enslave your children and you've been told that every day of your life as your parents were and their parents were and their parents were and their parents... you're not going to have much doubt about what you're being told are you? It's indoctrination, creating fear of a threat, that in the case of 40k is damned true because a lot of the xenos out there will obliterate humans, but your average Imperial citizen doesn't know that. That mixture of fear & hatred brings people together & keeps the Imperium intact, running & ready to face threats. What the xenos will & will not do is beside the point, both the hostile & peaceful xenos, it's about the indoctrination of humanity in fear & hatred so that they will violently resist if xenos do ever invade their home.

*Well if a xenos hasn't been seen for hundreds of years you wouldn't feel threatened by them would you? S'not going to happen in your life if it didn't happen in your parents & grandparents, so why worry?

Sturmtruppen wrote:

Sparks_Havelock wrote:For example, a cracking example I think in Europe, France vs. England. France & England were at war, on and off, for hundreds of years and in both nationalities a hatred was forged against t'other. Ask an Englishman even now what he thinks of the French & there is still a good chance that it will be derogatory (common themes being 'frogs', 'toads' & 'snails'). I'm sure that French people answer in equal terms when asked about the English.

Except not really, because the relationship between France and England constantly changed over the last millennium, the last time we fought against them was almost two hundred years ago, and they've been nothing but allies for the last century. If you want a better example, try Catholics vs Protestants & the English in Northern Ireland.

I'd hardly say fighting from c11-c19 doesn't count - 800 years of various conflicts, in my mind, certainly counts. That's a damned long time you know. It's ingrained, even if it is not so serious now as it used to be, that we make derogatory jokes about the French because they're the French & we've always fought them. What about the jokes about "One French rifle for sale. Never fired, only dropped once"? or French tanks only having reverse gears? Yes we have the same jokes for the Italians (unfairly in the case of their navy but that's a different case), but it's instinctive to tell them about the French.
There are, across the world, hundreds of examples of this, of hatreds deeply ingrained through centuries of conflict over various things that no matter where you live in the world there will be examples you can look at. African tribes who waged war on each other continually because it was the other tribe & that's what they always did. As you said, Catholics vs Protestants, two religions with similar beliefs beating the hells out of each other to prove whose religion was right (30 Years War, for example).

Because Xenos are lesser races, and deserves notting more than death and extermination by any means necesary

Well its really for 3 reasons

1. Most Xenos attack the Imps

2. The Imps are racist

3. Because they think everyone except for humans are unworthy to live (Kind of like the Hitler-Hate-Jews stuff)

There's also two other perspectives from which you can answer this question:

First, given that the 40K universe is designed for a particular goal (i.e., a wargame), the writers of that background need to construct a narrative where war is a constant presence. You can't have the background needed for the game to function unless violent, armed conflicts between forces are the norm, rather than an exception. From this perspective, asking why the Imperium hates xenos races is rather like asking "How did Luke survive his childhood on Tattooine?" It's a given of the narrative.

The writers just need to supply you with enough information so that it's not terribly implausible to accept.



Sadly, another reason why the Imperium is so xenophobic is based in actual human psychology. To a greater or lesser extent, we all identify more with those who resemble us, or are in close proximity to us, and less with those who look different or live farther away. I'm not claiming that "everyone is a closet racist" or anything, but psychological biases towards "in-group" selection are pretty well established. Given that we, as a species, react differently to a drought, famine, or natural disaster in a different country than in our own backyard, it's not too implausible that humans would react rather differently to other intelligent species with which we share no evolutionary history.

Even given the hints of common creation in the Xenology book, we share more genetic similarities, biological history, and cultural history with CABBAGE than we do with Orks or Tau. We literally have more in common with MOSQUITOES than any alien species. Despite any high-minded ideals or rhetoric about understanding, it's not too hard to imagine that we would have strongly negative, prejudicial feelings towards aliens. I'd like to believe that we would overcome those tendencies, but I think that would be unlikely at best.

Da Butcha wrote:we share more genetic similarities, biological history, and cultural history with CABBAGE than we do with Orks or Tau.

And be proud of it son, VENERATE THY CABBAGE!!! It is His holy will.

Why kill the Xeno?
It is better to ask "why not"?

in real life , the only empire that folled other path ( "like other people" staff) is the Great Alexander. he mixed his people whith forein. after his dead all the Empire splited.
a wise reason why not follow that if you want to build an Empire

Anshal wrote:Because said filth are xenos, enough said

This...now PURGE THEM.