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Over and over I see people taking the values and morals most of us here on earth in out time hold dear and try to compare often critically the various races in the 40k universe.
First this is the wrong way to look at any fantasy game. The morals and ethics applied to let say the Imperium are in our world indeed harsh, but if you take a step back and picture how unbelievably violent and cruel the 40k universe is it begins to make sense. After all imagine driving down the road and suddenly coming across a tyranid visiting your neighbors house, do you think after witnessing that that you might just have a change of heart about how to live your life in order to survive? Anyway just curious to see what others think.

Most of the depravity by the "forces of order" in 40k usually has some kind of cold logic behind it. The Imperium kidnaps and murders thousands of Psykers a day to keep the Astronomican going and thus the Imperium together. Exterminatus is used when it's either the death of a world or the strengthening of the enemy to destroy another. All the Imperium's repression and brutality is necessary to keep a million-world empire with little in common but religion together.

Even the less-justified stuff, like the harsh enforcement of the Imperial cult, serves a kind of greater good purpose. Religion is the only thing that unites all the worlds of the Imperium, and without it there would be no unifying factor and mankind would fall into catastrophe, as only united can mankind stand against all these enemies.

The Eldar meanwhile will destroy an entire world of humans apparently at random, but their farseers know that if they hadn't done it, the forces of Chaos could have used it to destroy an entire system and endanger everyone (Eldar included obviously). And generally, what's good for the Eldar is good for greater humanity.

The Tau meanwhile are a bit more obvious, they're spreading the most progressive and humane ideology and culture in the galaxy but can't do it without force of arms and necessary harsh measures. I think many Imperial worlds will ultimately be far better under Tau rule than Imperial.

Thus it's this that separates the "forces of order" in the 40k world: the Imperium, Eldar, and Tau, from the rest of the races. There's no "necessary evil" or "greater good" aspect in Orks, Tyranids, Necrons, Chaos, or Dark Eldar.

though most of the morals do seem justified, I feel that tery can go a bit overboard sometimes, being a little too paranoid or disagreeable. I still hate inquisitors with the phrase "innocents proves nothing", innocents proves your INNOCENT!

The WH40k universe seems to be a (sometimes downright silly) exercise in allowing the IoM to rationally justify theocratic totalitarianism.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Mr Nobody wrote:I still hate inquisitors with the phrase "innocents proves nothing", innocents proves your INNOCENT!

I think that line is about those who are unknowing dupes that (unknown to themselves) become tainted by the ruinous powers or genesteelers. They are pure in knowledge and intent, but that is irrelevant.

Your argument makes sense, the problem is it can be applied to any faction. None of the factions believe they are wrong, from their perspective they are all justified.

The difference is that the races we consider evil are harder for us to empathise with.

It's hard to see it from the orks perspective because we have different values to them, but they see the destruction they cause as worth it for the thrill of battle.

Dark Eldar appear completely evil but that's because we value human life- to them humans as worthless animals and there is no reason to not hurt them. They treat humans the same way many people treat animals. It's because we value human lives more than animals we see it as wrong for them to unneccessarily harm humans when it's ok for us to do the same to animals.

a better quote to the Innocent one is this,

"There is no such thing as innocence, only degrees of guilt"

everyone is guilty, only 'to what extent' is in question.



40k is meant to be viewed through the lense of the Imperium(and humanity in general)

for that matter, most Sci-fi is.


all Sci-fi i have seen that is not meant to be viewed through human lenses have been flops.

40k does a good job of making the alien be just that. alien. unfathomable with the human mind.


I hate Sci-fi that makes Alien races be little more then a human in a different body. it isn't right. it's one gripe i have with Star Wars, Avatar, Halo, Starcraft... they attempt to make the Alien, at one point or another, seem more human then they appear or at least have much in common.


I tell you, that if there are alien races out there, they will have no empathy for humans.


"Fear the Alien"

I think it is summed up nicely in the description of the overall 40k universe setting: Grimdark.

Or, as my gaming group says "It's a GGOPA", pronounced "goppa"... when we played the fantasy RPG, it was "It's a GWOPA" (gwoppa... in all cases, it's like how an ork would pronounced "whopper"). A "grim galaxy (world) of perilous adventure.".

The Imperium... Grim and Dark.
The Eldar... Grim and Dark.
The Ork... Grim and Dark.
Chaos... Grim and Dark.
Tau... slightly less Grim and Dark than everyone else, but still pretty Grim and Dark.
Necrons... Grim and Dark to the ultra-max extreme.
Tyranid... Face-eating bugs in space? Yep, Grim and Dark.

Tau are grim... they abduct dissenters, brainwash people and sterilise races to prevent rebellion.. caste system is rigidly adhered to and no deviation is allowed.

The imperium is more or less the darkages all over again. The ignorance and superstition is its greatest flaw and greatest strength. Without this flawed view the imperium would falter and fall apart.

The only real issue i have with the imperium is all that anti xenos crap. Anyone who ever read Fulgrim will know that the bad relations we have with the eldar are all because of Fulgrum corrupted by the slannesh sword. If it wast for him we would see humans and eldar holding hands and eating chinese food together.

I see nothing wrong with evaluating the moral stance and actions of the Imperium. Although our ethical systems have been developing, particularly over the last few centuries, and are becoming more nuanced as they are informed by the findings of science our (rational) underlying moral concerns remain largely unchanged.

Saying that we are wrong to evaluate the morality of the Imperium is moral relativism of the worst sort. "Hey! It's okay if they brutally murder and torture millions of innocents on a daily basis, 'cos y'know that's just how they roll" doesn't really cut it. The Imperium is supposed to be morally grim and dark, 'grimdark' isn't supposed to just relate to how many streetlights they have.

Of course the Imperium lives in a radically different context to us, of course they face fearsome existential threats, of course their reality and understanding of the universe is different to ours. And of course we should take these into account.

Considering aliens with a radically different psychology does throw up a number of issues, but fundamentally there should be an overlap of moral outlook when considered rationally. And of course there will be areas where this no overlap, and you would have to judge whether you would tolerate that difference or nuke it from orbit.

the Imperium is operating under a moral code that was born out of its situation.


if you were under constant attack from Alien species you would be pretty Xeno-phobic too.


another reason to fear the alien: ever watch/read War of the Worlds? how did it end? because Bacteria and Viruses from Earth took the Martians down.

now imagine the reverse. alien diseases introduced by too much contact. we have enough trouble with the diseases from our own ecosystem, let alone alien ones.

hence the Imperium's love of setting things on fire. burn away all those nasty viruses and bacteria.