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I know this has nothing to do with the board game and is probably irrelevant but there was a black inquisitor on the first dawn of war game

I know it was a long time ago, but if I recall, there was a 40K expansion back around 2nd edition called 'Dark Millennium.' It had a Dark Angel on the cover of it who looked to me like he had black skin. Anybody remember this?

There are black marines... look!

Another way to look at it is this. The Primarchs were made by the Emperor who used some of his own genetic material to create them. Since the Emp was white it stands to reason that the primarchs then would also be white (barring any mutations to the gene code). Thus since all space marines are created by using the genetic material from their primarch which supplants the person's original genetic code then they would take ater the primarchs. So the reason why all space marines are white (except those with genetic mutation) is becasue the Emp who created them all created them with his own genetic material which included being white.

Commisar Wolfie wrote:Another way to look at it is this. The Primarchs were made by the Emperor who used some of his own genetic material to create them. Since the Emp was white it stands to reason that the primarchs then would also be white (barring any mutations to the gene code). Thus since all space marines are created by using the genetic material from their primarch which supplants the person's original genetic code then they would take ater the primarchs. So the reason why all space marines are white (except those with genetic mutation) is becasue the Emp who created them all created them with his own genetic material which included being white.

Hmm. Interesting idea, but that'd require Neophytes to change colours during marination process.

Not exactly impossible, though. I could see this work in the weird pseudo-science of 40k.

@ that Inquisitor from DoW: I remember! The guy who kept ranting about his booted heel and how he wanted to stomp everyone. He was cool. Badass voice, too.

Commisar Wolfie wrote:Most futureristic sci-fi universes have little or no black people in them.

As an interesting side point, Neal Asher takes genetics seriously in his novels, which means that a largely cosmospolitan (see what I did there?) humanity ends up olive-brownish, while individual planets which have not been subsumed into the Polity have the general genetic pool of their initial colonizers. Unless they've got genetic adaptations in which case you get skin colours such as blue, yellow, scales and fur, etc.

Also, thanks for pointing out the common genetic background of all Space Marine Primarchs, saves me the trouble of asking if my memory was correct :p

Good thing to remember is that the 40k humanity is a restrictive, conservative, pile of dung (as a society considered), and that genetic exchange between planets or sectors is rather limited, and as such certain ethnicities will come to dominate different areas of the IOM "naturally" - whether enforced centrally, culturally, or simply through isolation. Also, talking of genetically dominating traits in a universe in which Tzeentch has taken an interest is sort of redundant.

Imagine727 wrote:I would paint my space marines any, as you put it, damn color I like (hint of irritation or anger). But the problem I have is, Space marines are advertised as white, yes, I have no problem with this. But, the problem I have is that the salamanders, who were originally dark skinned, are now pitch black with red eyes. This seems a tad racist to me, or at the very least, ironic. Red eyes have always been used to show evil, the fact that they go from dark skinned to demonic looking, is suspicious, at the least.

Jonah the psyker from the blood ravens in dawn of war 2 chaos rising is black and has a posh english accent !, and the librarian from that blood angel audiobook that black library is healthy shade of caramel. To be honest the issue is that when warhammer was originally designed there prime demographic was white males, hence so were most of there characters, another thing to remember is that regardless of your ethnicity once youve had geneseed transplanted you start to develop resemblances to the primarch of your chapter, hence why a lot of blood angels have blonde hair. Keep in mind all the white scars are oriental looking, and the thousand sons / word bearers have a heavy Arabian theme going on.

Well, GW most likely has their painters in Nottingham, and they probably take the simple route by painting their soldiers like themselves. I've seen marines with other skin colors; people usually just paint their own skin color.

true

Commisar Wolfie wrote:Another way to look at it is this. The Primarchs were made by the Emperor who used some of his own genetic material to create them. Since the Emp was white it stands to reason that the primarchs then would also be white (barring any mutations to the gene code). Thus since all space marines are created by using the genetic material from their primarch which supplants the person's original genetic code then they would take ater the primarchs. So the reason why all space marines are white (except those with genetic mutation) is becasue the Emp who created them all created them with his own genetic material which included being white.

The emperor is born in central Anatolia or so he tells Horus so technically hes an Arab, but Arabian people are quite genetically diverse with hair colors that go from red to blonde to black and complexions that go from fair to dark. So would make sense the Primarchs are a bit of a mixed bag.

Pasty-fat-neckbearded-nerd troll attempt from the OP, but a fun topic regardless.

Space Marines look Anglo-Saxon, which if you were making professional soldiers from a seed of people, would be the obvious choice from Earth.

Movac wrote:Pasty-fat-neckbearded-nerd troll attempt from the OP, but a fun topic regardless.

Space Marines look Anglo-Saxon, which if you were making professional soldiers from a seed of people, would be the obvious choice from Earth.

Why?

Absolutely nothing about that statement is as self-evident as you seem to think it is.

It's mentioned in the HH novels (A Thousand Sons I think) that part of an astarte's biological enhancement is their skin pigment automatically adapts according to environmental conditions and ambient light, so paint them any colour you want.

Daedricbob wrote:It's mentioned in the HH novels (A Thousand Sons I think) that part of an astarte's biological enhancement is their skin pigment automatically adapts according to environmental conditions and ambient light, so paint them any colour you want.

Great point. And obvious CYA by GW.

Hmmmn...

bubbacron wrote:

Daedricbob wrote:It's mentioned in the HH novels (A Thousand Sons I think) that part of an astarte's biological enhancement is their skin pigment automatically adapts according to environmental conditions and ambient light, so paint them any colour you want.

Great point. And obvious CYA by GW.

What's CYA?

Im going to go on a limb and say cover your bum

The Unforgiven Saint wrote:Im going to go on a limb and say cover your bum

Ah yes, that makes sense.

Imagine727 wrote:I have noticed something about 40k, that all the space marines are Caucasian. I would be able to overlook this, only the only space marines of non-white origin, the salamanders, are classed as mutated. I want a discussion, not someone trying to rationalize it, and say racism is non existent. The fact that the greatest heroes of humanity are white, and the only black ones are mutated makes me feel there is some sort of institutional racism or racial preference.

All Space Marines are mutants, and one of their mutations is extremely photochromic skin that leaves them albinos in darker conditions, and jet black in direct sunlight. The Salamanders have a defective version of that mutation, and so are locked on "direct sunlight" mode permanently. No 40K character can be said to be Caucasian in origin either, as any touch of the already nebulous modern racial definitions would be long since overridden by new local selective pressures or environmental effects; after all, to my knowledge modern physical divergence is younger than the time humanity has been spread throughout the galaxy by the forty-first Millennium, so any given planet would have its own unique traits, and locales within a single planet would likely have their own traits too, regardless of the origin of the initial colonists.

Remember that some legions piont toward a certain ethnic group in their background. The white Scars are Mongolian raiders while the Thousand Sons are Egyptian, Imperial Fists based on the German Junker system and so on. As I remember it in First Heretic Colchis was described as being akin to the environment of the Cradle of Civilisation, thus the WB homeworld would be more Mesopitanian.

It's clear from the timbre of the topic creator's posts that he's not looking for actual discussion, he just wants to sling around accusations of racism. Glad to know that trolls come in all colors.

I know a few black gamers that have nothing but white guys in their Space Marine armies. I'll be sure to inform them that they're being racists.

There's a black remberancer in the first Horus Heresy, isn't there? And there's a black inquisitor in Space Wolves trilogy, can't remember exactly which book. And a black commissar in Cadian Blood. I think the daughter in the Rogue Trader novels has Hispanic skin iirc. There's a good few if you look. They're just the ones off the top of my head.

The way I've had it explained to me is it depends on the conditions of the home planet. Most are Caucasian because there's not a lot of direct sunlight when you're on a forgeworld or hive world.

My first two Cadian Regiments I use about four/five different shades of skin. I found out Cadians have pale skin with violet eyes, like the natives of Cadia had, after I'd painted those first lots. So I figure those particular regiments were mainly raised from around a starport. Or something

So yeah, paint them however you like. But if you look into the fluff, you will find diversity of ethnicity there.

Racism is a word thrown about too easily these days. Without absolute balance between every colour, it's racism.
This is the same. Without any black Space Marines, the development team is a bunch of racist nerds.
Hah. Not, they really aren't. They're all white, the majority of the player base is white. The majority of the market is in the west, predominately Caucasian in ethnicity, so naturally the characters in the media will be white as that's how the development team and the player base will paint their miniatures and describe their characters in books. That's how I do it.
Another thing as well, take this however you want. Outside of an automatic preference, I consciously prefer Space Marines to be white after I prefer helmets to be on. I'd likely never paint a black Marine. The is obviously a purely aesthetic preference, I have nothing against an actual black human.

I get it now, so quoting my original posts and replying has no effect.

Imagine727 wrote:I get it now, so quoting my original posts and replying has no effect.

Welcome to the Internet.

lol

I always thought white scars were not white, most the art work has them as Asians,
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110225101804/warhammer40k/images/c/c3/White_Scars_Marines.jpg

Depending of the chapter they could be all white, mix or any other colour. Imperial fists get people from all over the place salamanders from the same sector, White scars get their dudes from different tribes on their homeplanet,

Why do all the space wolves have such big mighty beards?!?!
in the end you make up the fluff for your own army if you carnt find one that already suits you. I think its silly to ask why their all white, im sure its not a big hidden plot to make everyone think that to be a space marine you gotta be white and there for only whites can be in an army, they put in the salamanders , White scars, so thats black and Asians and the rest are mostly mixes

I may be late, but I'd like to weigh in all the same...

There are several reasons for the preponderance of white dudes in the 41st millenium. Firstly, as has been said, GW is made up of pasty white British blokes. Unconsiously, these guys just paint up white guys. Partly because it doesn't occur to them that unless the army is specifically ethnic (White Scars) it can be a color other than white. And partly because I'm sure on some level they wish they were the guys in the power armor.

Secondly, non-white skin is a pain to paint with GW paints. I've tried it. I know people who have tried it. Most of them go back to painting white dudes cause it's easier. I'm kind of stuck because I want my Tallarn army to look fething Middle Eastern, instead of looking like the studio army, ie: a bunch of white dudes dressed like Lawrence of Arabia.

I still haven't got the skin tones to look right >.<

Thirdly, they may be overly-concerned about the possibility of a discrimination-based lawsuit. Basically, the White Scars are Mongolian Horse Raiders, because the Mongolian Horse Raiders are no longer around to sue them if they get offended by GW's portrayal of them. But black people are still around, and they might take offence at GW's portrayal of Salamanders as being a bunch of black guys, so they retcon them into beefy Drow.

Are/were black people offended by the portrayal of black people as Salamanders? I don't know any who were. I know one who picked up a Salamanders army specifically because they were black. But I don't know anyone who complained about it. That doesn't mean that GW's lawyers weren't concerned about the possibility. They make a fair chunk of money in the USA, and we tend to be a little lawsuit-crazy over here. Maybe that was their concern. Or maybe some white jackass showed up at a Grand Tourney with a Salamanders army led by O.J. Simpson, and ruined it for the rest of us.

So the retcon of Salamanders from black guys to Drow probably wasn't "We is GW and we hates us some black people, hur hur..." it was probably more "Oh crap, if somebody says the Salamders are racist, we could end up fighting off a lawsuit and bad publicity. Better make 'em Drow. Drow can't sue us! BRILLIANT!"

That addresses the preponderance of white dudes in the art and in the models. Yes, the written works and the video games are much more ethnically diverse, but the face of Warhammer that most people see is the artwork and the models. The books are for those of us that are hard-core. We read them and know that Warhammer isn't racist.

Your parents don't read the books and only look at the pictures and think "Sure are a lot of white guys in the future..." It's these people that I think would be most likely to see racism where there is none, as they are not involved in the hobby, and therefore don't know all the details, like the fact that most Marines have skin that automatically changes color depending on the amount of UV radiation (sunlight) they are exposed to (it's one of their genetic implants... check the 3rd edition SM codex). Yeah, the Salamanders and Raven Guard got stuck on the Drow and Emo settings, but that's part of their visual character now.

Is it all really racism? I don't think so. Not anymore than it's misogyny that there are so few female IG models, despite fluff stating that there are many women in the Guard, too. Yes, it can look like racism from some angles, and it certainly doesn't help when the occasional depiction of a non-white person does show up (Codex: Jungle Fighters, I'm looking at you) to highlight just how rare those depictions are. But if I thought the game was run by Neo-Nazis, the Klan, or the Aryan Brotherhood, I would drop GW like a syphilitic Daemonette, and start playing Warmahordes in an instant.

Gonna toss this wrench into the works here...

In my Dark Heresy game, I have the following players (letters only, no names given to protect the innocent):

J, a white man in his early 30s, plays the Interrogator
D#1, a black man in his mid 30s, plays the Ogryn Guardsman
D#2, a white guy in his early 40s, plays a Tech Priest
K, a white female in her early 20s, plays the female Moritat Reaper Assassin
S#1, a white female in her mid-30s, plays the cyborg Vindicare Assassin girl
S#2, a Latino/Asian/Caucasian Mutt in his late 20s, plays the Psyker
M, a white male in his mid 30s, plays another Tech-Priest
P, a white male in his mid-30s (me), plays everything and everyone else as the GM.

Interesting to note, the black male player in my group previously played an Arbiter (before his valiant sacrifice to save the others of the retinue) who, I assumed, was black because the player was black.

When D#1 brought in his miniature, you can imagine my surprise when I learned that the Arbiter was white!

I'm not going to engage on the ethnicity point, since Dakka really isn't the place for serious discussion of such things. That being said, I though to quickly address the following, and I apologize if someone already caught it.

Kanluwen wrote:And you have to admit the majority of the world's population falls under what many would consider "white guys". .

This isn't even remotely true. As has been said, the majorities of the English, American, and GW staff populations are comprised by white guys, but not the world population. It isn't even close.

Just talkin' facts...