40k reconsidered?

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**Macabre Galatic**

The Imperium. Basically every human that thinks of the emperor in a good way is a brain washed nazi and the space marines are the worst of them. Here's an example - a random space marine chapter invades a new world, they are here to spread the word of the emperor. For the emperor! It goes something like this, join me and believe in my way of thinking or die. Simple as that, that's how they operate. It's the same way the Nazis tried world domination. The Imperium will set up death camps, all sorts.

What's the point of this thread? After some thought just to change your prospective a bit, I don't want to say most people but I'd say a lot of people think the imperium are the good guys...umm because they are human? Well humans are fething gak in general. Have you watched the news lately? Other countries trying to stop other countries owning there own laws etc. I could go on but it's not the forum for it.

You and I love it tho, because it's a galaxy full of weird, wonderful, interesting characters, things revolve around killing other things. Even a planet is a character. I mean Catachan the death world can't stop killing things. 40k is based around war and war is killing.

When you put some proper thought in to it you might realize the lore hasn't got much room for empathy and proper justice. In less your Tau.

**Daedalus81**

Nah, I'm totally onto the fascist leanings of the False Emperor. I just wanted to read some god damn books and he ruins my planet.

**deotrims 16th**

Macabre Galatic wrote:
The title is funny but this is no joke, everyone's got a hard on for them. The Imperium. Basically every human that thinks of the emperor in a good way is a brain washed nazi and the space marines are the worst of them. Here's an example - a random space marine chapter invades a new world, they are here to spread the word of the emperor. For the emperor! It goes something like this, join me and believe in my way of thinking or die. Simple as that, that's how they operate. It's the same way the Nazis tried world domination. The Imperium will set up death camps, all sorts.

What's the point of this thread? After some thought just to change your prospective a bit, I don't want to say most people but I'd say a lot of people think the imperium are the good guys...umm because they are human? Well humans are fething gak in general. Have you watched the news lately? Other countries trying to stop other countries owning there own laws etc. I could go on but it's not the forum for it.

You and I love it tho, because it's a galaxy full of weird, wonderful, interesting characters, things revolve around killing other things. Even a planet is a character. I mean Catachan the death world can't stop killing things. 40k is based around war and war is killing.

When put some proper thought in to it you might realize the lore hasn't got much room for empathy and proper justice. In less your Tau.

Everyone has realised this already, but the imperium doesn't go out of its way to do some bad things, its just the only way to survive, like the allies killing one of their own squads, with artillery to destroy 3 German divisions in WWII.

Also tau aren't good. they re like the imperium, just don't always go violence first. They are like the Ottomans, crazy phsycos, just realised that if your empire doesn't mind you they don't rebel.

**Sgt. Cortez**

If you thought the Imperium were good guys you missed the point of 40K entirely.
That being said though the whole premise of 40K is that this inquisition-redkhmer-fascism-dictatorship seems to be the only "hope" of humanity to survive. Or at least all the crap going on in the 40K galaxy shaped humanitys government to be the most ruthless one we can imagine.
It is a bad place, there aren't really good guys in 40K.
Aside from Nurglings of course. They're cute. Everybody loves them.

**Desubot**

I dont think anyone here though the imperium was the good guy.

Also the idea that the Tau are space Persia made me crack up.

**YeOldSaltPotato**

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
If you thought the Imperium were good guys you missed the point of 40K entirely.

Yes, and those now so disillusioned should join me and embrace the inevitable arrival of the star gods and true equality they will grant us. Admittedly while sucking us through orbital elevator sized straws, but equality none the less.

Don't trust that guy who talks about how loving his grandfather is, I don't want any of those rashes.

**Moriarty**

Sorry, was there some part of 'grim dark' that you missed? If it helps, you can always look upon it as a comment on the duality of Man? As always, YMMV, T&CA, May contain traces of nuts.

**Asmodios**

Desubot wrote:
I dont think anyone here though the imperium was the good guy.

Also the idea that the Tau are space Persia made me crack up.

I for one definitely think the Imperium is the good guy of the 40k setting..... but that's the important part the setting.
If you're a human your options are
>space elves that will kill you
>space orks that will kill you
>space skeletons that will kill you
>space demons that will kill you
>space bugs that will eat you
>space aliens that will integrate you into their society/ use you for whatever your worth and sterilize you so that your race ceases to exist.

At the end of the day the Imperium does what it has to do to secure the survival of the human race. Sometimes you have to put a population to death to make sure that space demons don't kill an entire sector. Sometimes you have to force men and women to do lives of hard slave labor to have the tools you need to fight these threats. It's grimdark and over the top the way it should be but if you are a human then the Imperium is definitely the good guys

**Elbows**

This thread sucks.

**Inquisitor Lord Katherine**

deotrims 16th wrote:

Everyone has realised this already, but the imperium doesn't go out of its way to do some bad things, its just the only way to survive, like the allies killing one of their own squads, with artillery to destroy 3 German divisions in WWII.

Also tau aren't good. they re like the imperium, just don't always go violence first. They are like the Ottomans, crazy phsycos, just realised that if your empire doesn't mind you they don't rebel.

It's arguably not the only way to survive, but instead a consequence of the policies enacted at the Imperium's foundation. The Imperium was an already an awful place before the Horus Heresy, it's just more awful now because everything is also on fire. And it, at the time, was actively making the universe a more awful place for everybody with it's policies, and such tendencies have then become entrenched and perpetuated in the modern day by tradition and bureaucratic momentum.

That's kind of one of the things I feel is off about the "new fluff". At some point I feel it's started to unwittingly cross a line from "fascists are stupid and funny and make everything grim-and-dark" to "fascist are cool". Part of this is because of a focus on the Imperium's leaders as "good" and "heroic" [as opposed to distant and uncaring and kind of irrelevant compared to a bureaucracy that sustained by inertia], part of this is because of the construction of a "good vs. evil" narrative as opposed to "everybody sucks, your dudes exist and fight in this awful place".

**BaconCatBug**

Asmodios wrote:
Desubot wrote:
I dont think anyone here though the imperium was the good guy.

Also the idea that the Tau are space Persia made me crack up.

I for one definitely think the Imperium is the good guy of the 40k setting..... but that's the important part the setting.
If you're a human your options are
>space elves that will kill you
>space orks that will kill you
>space skeletons that will kill you
>space demons that will kill you
>space bugs that will eat you
>space aliens that will integrate you into their society/ use you for whatever your worth and sterilize you so that your race ceases to exist.

At the end of the day the Imperium does what it has to do to secure the survival of the human race. Sometimes you have to put a population to death to make sure that space demons don't kill an entire sector. Sometimes you have to force men and women to do lives of hard slave labor to have the tools you need to fight these threats. It's grimdark and over the top the way it should be but if you are a human then the Imperium is definitely the good guys

>space elves that will kill you with mind bullets.
>space elves that will kill you with dongs of the cyber and non-cyber variety.
>space elves that will kill you with bad stand-up routines and recycled jokes.
>space elves that will kill you with dinosaurs with frikin lazer beems on their heads.

**Crimson**

Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

That's kind of one of the things I feel is off about the "new fluff". At some point I feel it's started to unwittingly cross a line from "fascists are stupid and funny and make everything grim-and-dark" to "fascist are cool". Part of this is because of a focus on the Imperium's leaders as "good" and "heroic" [as opposed to distant and uncaring and kind of irrelevant compared to a bureaucracy that sustained by inertia], part of this is because of the construction of a "good vs. evil" narrative as opposed to "everybody sucks, your dudes exist and fight in this awful place".

Well said, I couldn't agree more!

**Desubot**

But is it really fascism?

There are definitely parallels consider 40k was probably based on irl.

my understanding of it was that its a society based entirely on the fanatic worship of mankind it self which got twisted by the ultimate gak poster to becoming the worship of the man god emperor of man kind with a side worship of the machine spirit by a bunch of robe wearing robosexuals.

if anything its a brutal theocracy and yet mostly justified considering in this universe, all xenos are out to get you besides the monkeys. Psykers are absolutely dangerous, and even your thoughts can bring the death of an entire system.

The new stuff is sort of moving things forward but i havent been really keeping track of it. how is it really glorifying the imperium any more than it used too?

**Crimson**

Asmodios wrote:

I for one definitely think the Imperium is the good guy of the 40k setting..... but that's the important part the setting.
If you're a human your options are
>space elves that will kill you
>space orks that will kill you
>space skeletons that will kill you
>space demons that will kill you
>space bugs that will eat you
>space aliens that will integrate you into their society/ use you for whatever your worth and sterilize you so that your race ceases to exist.

And if you're not a human, the humans will most definitely kill you! Half of the xenos species are actually nicer towards humans (while still being utterly terrible) than the humans are towards the xenos.

And let's not forget that by joining the Chaos you actually have a chance to eventually earn immortality as a Daemon Prince. Cosmically slim chance, sure, but a chance nevertheless! And the life in the Imperium sucks anyway, so it is definitely worth the gamble, right!

**Vaktathi**

Macabre Galatic wrote:
The Imperium. Basically every human that thinks of the emperor in a good way is a brain washed nazi and the space marines are the worst of them. Here's an example - a random space marine chapter invades a new world, they are here to spread the word of the emperor. For the emperor! It goes something like this, join me and believe in my way of thinking or die. Simple as that, that's how they operate. It's the same way the Nazis tried world domination. The Imperium will set up death camps, all sorts.

What's the point of this thread? After some thought just to change your prospective a bit, I don't want to say most people but I'd say a lot of people think the imperium are the good guys...umm because they are human? Well humans are fething gak in general. Have you watched the news lately? Other countries trying to stop other countries owning there own laws etc. I could go on but it's not the forum for it.

You and I love it tho, because it's a galaxy full of weird, wonderful, interesting characters, things revolve around killing other things. Even a planet is a character. I mean Catachan the death world can't stop killing things. 40k is based around war and war is killing.

When you put some proper thought in to it you might realize the lore hasn't got much room for empathy and proper justice. In less your Tau.

The game has always made this a selling point, theres never really beeen any subtlety here, in fact, the introduction to every edition of the game has opened with the following passage for a reason

Warhammer 40,000 wrote:To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruelest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting gods

Nothing about the 40k setting should be seen as a good place to live

Even with the Tau, they're only "reasonable" within the 40k universe, when they show up in orbit, you will bow to the greater good, or the Tau air caste will bombard your world until it does, and they do not yet know the full panoply of dangers that drive the Imperium to do what it does.

**JNAProductions**

Yeah, the Tau are, despite being the nicest guys in 40k, horrible people.

**Asmodios**

Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
deotrims 16th wrote:

Everyone has realised this already, but the imperium doesn't go out of its way to do some bad things, its just the only way to survive, like the allies killing one of their own squads, with artillery to destroy 3 German divisions in WWII.

Also tau aren't good. they re like the imperium, just don't always go violence first. They are like the Ottomans, crazy phsycos, just realised that if your empire doesn't mind you they don't rebel.

It's arguably not the only way to survive, but instead a consequence of the policies enacted at the Imperium's foundation. The Imperium was an already an awful place before the Horus Heresy, it's just more awful now because everything is also on fire. And it, at the time, was actively making the universe a more awful place for everybody with it's policies, and such tendencies have then become entrenched and perpetuated in the modern day by tradition and bureaucratic momentum.

That's kind of one of the things I feel is off about the "new fluff". At some point I feel it's started to unwittingly cross a line from "fascists are stupid and funny and make everything grim-and-dark" to "fascist are cool". Part of this is because of a focus on the Imperium's leaders as "good" and "heroic" [as opposed to distant and uncaring and kind of irrelevant compared to a bureaucracy that sustained by inertia], part of this is because of the construction of a "good vs. evil" narrative as opposed to "everybody sucks, your dudes exist and fight in this awful place".

how was the imperium pre-heresy making the universe a "worse place" for humans
It was eliminating every threat to humanity and the races that literally turned a real of pure energy into an ocean of murder rape spaw babies that want to come kill/rape/trick/disease/ect every living organism in the universe. The imperium's warriors are "heroic" regardless of what you think of there commanders orders. These are humans fighting monsters that want nothing more then to end humanity and they are often shoved into mass unmarked graves for their trouble.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah, the Tau are, despite being the nicest guys in 40k, horrible people.

Not sure about that the tau do forced sterilizations and a "join us or be killed policy" and that's simply for expansions.

**Macabre Galatic**

Elbows wrote:
This thread sucks.

Your comment sucks more.

**Galas**

Asmodios wrote:
Desubot wrote:
I dont think anyone here though the imperium was the good guy.

Also the idea that the Tau are space Persia made me crack up.

I for one definitely think the Imperium is the good guy of the 40k setting..... but that's the important part the setting.
If you're a human your options are
>space elves that will kill you
>space orks that will kill you
>space skeletons that will kill you
>space demons that will kill you
>space bugs that will eat you
>space aliens that will integrate you into their society/ use you for whatever your worth and sterilize you so that your race ceases to exist.

At the end of the day the Imperium does what it has to do to secure the survival of the human race. Sometimes you have to put a population to death to make sure that space demons don't kill an entire sector. Sometimes you have to force men and women to do lives of hard slave labor to have the tools you need to fight these threats. It's grimdark and over the top the way it should be but if you are a human then the Imperium is definitely the good guys

Tell that to the Diasporex and all the other human civilizations destroyed during the Great Crusade that where just fine.

Also, all the "Omg Tau sterilize populations" people grow up. That was the damm Dark Crusade, that game couldn't be less canon. Tau are as bad as our regular goverments on Earth. Using diplomacy to achieve their goals and integrate others, and brute force when that fails. And that by Warhammer 40k standard is as good as you can expect. Humans aren't used as slaves. You have fluff stating how they move people from outher worlds to inner worlds, to kept humans protected from Imperial reprisals, because the Imperium hates humans that defect to the Tau even more than the Tau's.

Of course people that want to portray Tau as some kind of maniatical and genocidal space Indians will ignore all the books, novels, and Codex of Tau or where they are mentioned and just point out the same and old 3-4 examples that you can find in 4dchan wiki.

Crimson wrote:
Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

That's kind of one of the things I feel is off about the "new fluff". At some point I feel it's started to unwittingly cross a line from "fascists are stupid and funny and make everything grim-and-dark" to "fascist are cool". Part of this is because of a focus on the Imperium's leaders as "good" and "heroic" [as opposed to distant and uncaring and kind of irrelevant compared to a bureaucracy that sustained by inertia], part of this is because of the construction of a "good vs. evil" narrative as opposed to "everybody sucks, your dudes exist and fight in this awful place".

Well said, I couldn't agree more!

Yep, the first ones to forget than the Imperium weren't supposed to be the good guys was GW.

**JNAProductions**

Asmodios wrote:
JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah, the Tau are, despite being the nicest guys in 40k, horrible people.

Not sure about that the tau do forced sterilizations and a "join us or be killed policy" and that's simply for expansions.

Compare that to what the other factions do...

I said "nicest". Not nice. Not even close to nice. But relative to the OTHER GUYS.

**Asmodios**

Galas wrote:
Asmodios wrote:
Desubot wrote:
I dont think anyone here though the imperium was the good guy.

Also the idea that the Tau are space Persia made me crack up.

I for one definitely think the Imperium is the good guy of the 40k setting..... but that's the important part the setting.
If you're a human your options are
>space elves that will kill you
>space orks that will kill you
>space skeletons that will kill you
>space demons that will kill you
>space bugs that will eat you
>space aliens that will integrate you into their society/ use you for whatever your worth and sterilize you so that your race ceases to exist.

At the end of the day the Imperium does what it has to do to secure the survival of the human race. Sometimes you have to put a population to death to make sure that space demons don't kill an entire sector. Sometimes you have to force men and women to do lives of hard slave labor to have the tools you need to fight these threats. It's grimdark and over the top the way it should be but if you are a human then the Imperium is definitely the good guys

Tell that to the Diasporex and all the other human civilizations destroyed during the Great Crusade that where just fine.

Also, all the "Omg Tau sterilize populations" people grow up. That was the damm Dark Crusade, that game couldn't be less canon. Tau are as bad as our regular goverments on Earth. Using diplomacy to achieve their goals and integrate others, and brute force when that fails. And that by Warhammer 40k standard is as good as you can expect.

Of course people that want to portray Tau as some kind of maniatical and genocidal space Indians will ignore all the books, novels, and Codex of Tau or where they are mentioned and just point out the same and old 3-4 examples that you can find in 4dchan wiki.

All those other human civilizations were wiped out so that the imperial truth could be undertaken to defeat chaos (literal evil) yet you want to paint tau as the good guys that do a "join our cause or die" policy as well except that they aren't doing it for anything other than self-benefit..... sorry but Imperium are the good guys in this story not the aliens that will use you and seralize your specics until your race dies off all just to gain more political power not to fight an overarching evil

Automatically Appended Next Post:

JNAProductions wrote:
Asmodios wrote:
JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah, the Tau are, despite being the nicest guys in 40k, horrible people.

Not sure about that the tau do forced sterilizations and a "join us or be killed policy" and that's simply for expansions.

Compare that to what the other factions do...

I said "nicest". Not nice. Not even close to nice. But relative to the OTHER GUYS.

yeah nicest second to the Imperium

**Galas**

The Imperium literally destroyed a Human Civilization that already won agaisnt Chaos by virtue of teaching their population about it, how to NOT be corrupted by it.

Heck, it were the already Chaos Corrupted marines that had to be used by the Chaos God to destroy that civilization.

The Emperor's plan to destroy Chaos was an utter failure. Thats the fething point of the Horus Heresy and modern 40k.

**Asmodios**

Galas wrote:
The Imperium literally destroyed a Human Civilization that already won agaisnt Chaos by virtue of teaching their population about it, how to NOT be corrupted by it.

Heck, it were the already Chaos Corrupted marines that had to be used by the Chaos God to destroy that civilization.

The Emperor's plan to destroy Chaos was an utter failure. Thats the fething point of the Horus Heresy and modern 40k.

Yeah actually if you go back and read that specific human faction was about to be brought in peacefully to the Imperium by the Warmaster before getting tricked by space demons...... so the main enemy of the good guys messed it up... your not making a good case

**Galas**

Asmodios wrote:
Galas wrote:
The Imperium literally destroyed a Human Civilization that already won agaisnt Chaos by virtue of teaching their population about it, how to NOT be corrupted by it.

Heck, it were the already Chaos Corrupted marines that had to be used by the Chaos God to destroy that civilization.

The Emperor's plan to destroy Chaos was an utter failure. Thats the fething point of the Horus Heresy and modern 40k.

Yeah actually if you go back and read that specific human faction was about to be brought in peacefully to the Imperium by the Warmaster before getting tricked by space demons...... so the main enemy of the good guys messed it up... your not making a good case

Nope, it was Erebus and Khor-Pareon (If I remember correctly) the two to trick the Imperium in destroying that civilization. The Imperium isn't, and hasn't never been the good guys, and all those "Actually good guys" human civilizations they destroy in the Great Crusade are there just to make that point as clear as clean water.

**Crimson**

I think this 'Imperium needs to be this brutal for the humanity to survive' viewpoint needs to die. No they don't; they think they do, but they're wrong. I am really not comfortable with thinking that basically is 'in some situations fascism is justified.' The Imperium is evil, and that's that, no need to pretend otherwise.

**Asmodios**

Galas wrote:
Asmodios wrote:
Galas wrote:
The Imperium literally destroyed a Human Civilization that already won agaisnt Chaos by virtue of teaching their population about it, how to NOT be corrupted by it.

Heck, it were the already Chaos Corrupted marines that had to be used by the Chaos God to destroy that civilization.

The Emperor's plan to destroy Chaos was an utter failure. Thats the fething point of the Horus Heresy and modern 40k.

Yeah actually if you go back and read that specific human faction was about to be brought in peacefully to the Imperium by the Warmaster before getting tricked by space demons...... so the main enemy of the good guys messed it up... your not making a good case

Nope, it was Erebus and Khor-Pareon (If I remember correctly) the two to trick the Imperium in destroying that civilization. The Imperium isn't, and hasn't never been the good guys, and all those "Actually good guys" human civilizations they destroy in the Great Crusade are there just to make that point as clear as clean water.

Yes two humans corrupted by chaos (thanks necrons and eldar) .... sorry the Imperium is the good guys of the setting. Once again unless you want humanity to go extinct (which is fine if you aren't human) the Imperium is most certainly the good guys

**BaconCatBug**

Asmodios wrote:
Yes two humans corrupted by chaos (thanks necrons and eldar) .... sorry the Imperium is the good guys of the setting. Once again unless you want humanity to go extinct (which is fine if you aren't human) the Imperium is most certainly the good guys

The ENTIRE point of the 40k setting is that no-one is the good guys and that Humans are EXTRA DOUBLE CHOCOLATE SPECIAL not the good guys.

At least it was before GW introduced Cawl Sue and his Extra Goody Gumdrop Marines.

**Galas**

Crimson wrote:
I think this 'Imperium needs to be this brutal for the humanity to survive' viewpoint needs to die. No they don't; they think they do, but they're wrong. I am really not comfortable with thinking that basically is 'in some situations fascism is justified.' The Imperium is evil, and that's that, no need to pretend otherwise.

Yeah, saying that the Imperium is doing what it is doing to survive is not only missing the point and basically making justifications for it, is also plain wrong. We are in the year 40.000, the Imperium is only 10.000 years old, and humanity was alive for far longer. And it will be alive for much longer after the Imperium collapses. As it was shown, as it has been shown. And is presently being proven by all the human civilizations that survive outside Imperial influence.

**Desubot**

Crimson wrote:
I think this 'Imperium needs to be this brutal for the humanity to survive' viewpoint needs to die. No they don't; they think they do, but they're wrong. I am really not comfortable with thinking that basically is 'in some situations fascism is justified.' The Imperium is evil, and that's that, no need to pretend otherwise.

How would you do it then, being mind full of the fact that Tzeench feeds on schemes and will pretty much ruin all your plans if it doesn't coincide with his plans. how will you kumbaya the entirety of the human race without them all thinking things that suddenly power up the powers of chaos really quickly. that and the space elves that also will probably ruin your plans. or spontainious orks. or nids. or sleepy necrons. or other "problems" [edit: in this setting]

**Asmodios**

BaconCatBug wrote:
Asmodios wrote:
Yes two humans corrupted by chaos (thanks necrons and eldar) .... sorry the Imperium is the good guys of the setting. Once again unless you want humanity to go extinct (which is fine if you aren't human) the Imperium is most certainly the good guys
The ENTIRE point of the 40k setting is that no-one is the good guys and that Humans are EXTRA DOUBLE CHOCOLATE SPECIAL not the good guys.

At least it was before GW introduced Cawl Sue and his Extra Goody Gumdrop Marines.

You can take that view if you aren't a human in the 40k setting.... but if you are human the Imperium is definitely the good guys. Hard times make hard choices