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locarno24 wrote:
But, and here's the really crappy thing in the 41st millennium, it's usually the best option. Because the Imperium has lost cities, worlds, sectors, armies and chapters to darkness and corruption when it tried to do things the other way.

Without borrowing Anemone's axe & grindstone, I would contend that the Imperium's actions are not the result of the pursuit of the 'best' outcome, but rather the 'safest' outcome. If we want to characterize the Imperium's governing institutions in any way, I think extremely risk adverse is an easy one.

It's further worthy to note that the whole "worship only the emperor" clause, exists not because demons will start crawling out of your nose the moment you think "hey maybe he's just a guy". Technically; they could just police the Alien & Chaos cults, and be just as safe. However the Ecclesiarchy is incredibly powerful, and the other Imperial Institutions don’t want to risk a empire-shattering war (this is why the Apostasy was so important), so it gets the leeway to pursue absolute galactic conversion.

 Pendix wrote:

locarno24 wrote:
But, and here's the really crappy thing in the 41st millennium, it's usually the best option. Because the Imperium has lost cities, worlds, sectors, armies and chapters to darkness and corruption when it tried to do things the other way.

Without borrowing Anemone's axe & grindstone, I would contend that the Imperium's actions are not the result of the pursuit of the 'best' outcome, but rather the 'safest' outcome. If we want to characterize the Imperium's governing institutions in any way, I think extremely risk adverse is an easy one.

It's further worthy to note that the whole "worship only the emperor" clause, exists not because demons will start crawling out of your nose the moment you think "hey maybe he's just a guy". Technically; they could just police the Alien & Chaos cults, and be just as safe. However the Ecclesiarchy is incredibly powerful, and the other Imperial Institutions don’t want to risk a empire-shattering war (this is why the Apostasy was so important), so it gets the leeway to pursue absolute galactic conversion.

Well you could arguably police the alien cults, chaos cults by their very nature mean any chaos worship can result in demons spawning everywhere. I even have some older fluff where pskers who simply don't realise their power result in an entire worlds loss to demon and the creation of a new demon world.

However yes, the turn from Imperial truth into the Imperial Cults was not necessary nor a good thing. "However" many people would argue it's impossible to remove all religious belief from humans without a desire to believe in some higher power, you can argue it's partially human nature. I saw some studies that showed many people are genetically inclined via brain structure to be religious and believe in spiritual events (and ghost, spirits etc). By comparison some people are inclined to be atheists, depending on brain structure you can use electrical and magnetic conditions to affect the first type to believing a feeling spirits are closer, while the second type remain mostly unaffected (thus why ghost sightings crop up near power lines). Also religious people generally live longer and healthier lives (despite all the wars they start) and have more children, thus encouraging it to continue in future genetrations.

Been a while since I checked on this thread that I started. I see that it has spiralled towards the question of weither of not the Imperium is good or bad. I think we need to step back and look at some important elements before thinking about it.

- The Imperium is fractured.

-Up to this point, I think we all agreed that the Imperium was pretty much multicultural, and not only that, but a decentralized macro-society made up of many micro-societies, all of this over the span of 10k years (which mean it had several iterations).

-As such, I think it's impossible to label it as good or bad, simply because it's not a monolithic entity. Some parts of the Imperium might be more ''humanists'' than others, and some parts might be more ''bad''. For example, if I recall correcty, I think we would all agree that the worlds that are part of the Ultramar system are more advanced and humane than, said, the worlds near the Eye of Terror.

-If we are referring to the central core of the Imperium (Terra and its administrarium), one might be convinced to label it as bad or just amoral, considering how it can easily order an exterminatus or the purge of a whole world simply like one would order a coffee. But then again, one must remember that even Terra and its administration are a multi-faceted institution, with individuals and groups playing their cards to further their own agenda (some selfish, other not).

-As such, I think it might be near impossible to label it good or bad, considering how fractured and divided it is, even thought it tries to be or at least tries to appear to be united.