The Imperium's Stance on Homosexuality?

[Hive Mind]

You misunderstand me. I'm saying that homophobes are idiots and that some of them use religion as a justification while some of them don't.

IMO, the underlying driver for homophobia is idiocy. That is why, in my experience, religious people who are not idiots won't be homophobic and why non-religious people who are homohobic will be idiots.

I make no claim that there is nothing that could be considered homophobic in any religious book.

[MaltonNecromancer]

It would be mere speculation to assume they have the same obsessions over sexuality as we do. Some planets may, it is also a mistake to think of the Imperium as a monoculture.

Really?

The whole 40K background is driven by evil-vs-evil. The Imperium is everything awful about us writ large in blazing letters a thousand miles high... but they're not as homophobic as our current society? Come on! What, they're fascist on literally everything except women's rights, gay pride and civil rights? I mean, I've actually got no problem with the Imperium being pure evil, as long as people accept that it is. They're not the heroes - they're just the humans.

Don't fall into the trap of protagonist-centred morality.

[url]http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ProtagonistCenteredMorality[/url]

40K isn't real. It's a fictional construct, and no book (including the RPG's) has ever mentioned a stance on homosexuality because the writers have no interest in looking at it. Because 40K is about warfare, and the people who read the books are, by and large, white heterosexual males, and they want to read about how awesome they are. They can't do that if they're reading about some gay guy. Which means they get marginalised and written out, because that's another side of what homophobia really is: fear of the other making you pretend that stuff you don't like doesn't happen.

Basically, homophobia isn't just calling gays bad names; it's pretending they don't exist.

And that's just gay people. Don't even get me started on the problems of the paucity of ethnic paintjobs / ethnic facial sculpting on official GW models photos.

(On that note: so awesome - [url]http://dragonforge.com/Painting%20service/for%20sale)/conversion_parts.htm[/url]

Back in-universe, my girlfriend posited an interestingly horrible notion. What if the Imperium had a "cure" for homosexuality? If you're gay, you're taken in by the Ecclesiarchy for repurposing and re-programming. You come out as a Servitor, all the impure, heretical sexuality purged away, now remade into a "productive" member of the Imperium, spending the rest of your life as a mindless drudge.

*Brrrr*

Horrible.

[Kawauso]

Since there is little evidence of modern issues of bigotry (i.e. racism; people in the Imperium seem to get along fine regardless of skin colour. also there are a number of non-heterosexual characters spinkled here and there in the books, Malton), I think that in general these issues are not something enforced or exacerbated by Imperial dogma or government.

I think between all of the external threats the Imperium needs humanity as united as possible, and so officially their stance on issues like race or sexuality, etc. is that it's fine as long as you're a law-abiding, Emperor-worshiping citizen (and even then, there are characters like Ciaphas Cain who take a rather...relaxed view of the Imperial Creed). All of the Imperium's energy for bigotry is expended outward in their literal xenophobia. Even when they're dealing with internal threats (heresy), it's anti-government or pro-Chaos stuff they're worried about...not who people are shacking up with.

Which, as has been pointed out, isn't to say that there wouldn't be homophobic or otherwise internally-bigoted individuals, organizations or regions in the Imperium. It sure as hell isn't a unified or wholly mono-cultural empire. But there doesn't seem to be any evidence to suggest that, as an organization, the Imperium is a homophobic institution. Whereas I've noticed a number of examples to the contrary in the Cain and Heresy series.

[MaltonNecromancer]

Since there is little evidence of modern issues of bigotry

Perhaps because then GW might get in trouble in real life?

"Tabletop wargame promotes [insert prejudice of your choice here]! Warhammer 40,000 teaches young children to be [insert epithet here]!"

Nope, can't see GW wanting those headlines...

[Hive Mind]

I don't think it's even a case of not wanting to get into trouble. I think it's more that being overtly racist/sexist/homophobic means that minorities/women/LGBT types won't spend money on your product. Hence you get the odd bit of tokenism in an effort to be inclusive. Every pound is sacred.

There's also the fact that the day-to-day politics of the Imperium simply are not important to the way that GW frames the universe and then there's the relatively-blank-slate aspect of 40k. There's room to make your Marines (or whatever) raving homophobes if you want to; there's room to make homosexual Marines if you want to and there's room for everything in between.

[Kawauso]

How does it have anything to do with them getting in 'trouble'?

If anti-gay groups wanted they could easily get GW in 'trouble' for the homosexual/bisexual characters that have appeared in a number of books.

It doesn't come up often in the fluff for the reason Hive Mind mentioned; day-to-day politics, etc. are never the focus of 40k stories.

The Imperium is already a xenophobic, genocidal regime motivated by religious zealotry - and it even started out as the same except it was vehemently -anti-religious-, to the point of violence. I don't think there's any overall concern at GW that they might offend people by portraying the Imperium in a negative light. That sounds ridiculous.

[Grenadier]

I wouldn't say they'd get in "trouble" in the sense of lawsuits and the like.

But what with the cancerous and hypocritical nature of America's politically correct garbage you don't have to do anything to really get in trouble. The PC rules can be used as a bullying weapon. Any minority can use the PC nonsense to turn a mountain into a mole hill. Where there may not have been a spark they can set a thing ablaze. All it takes is one minority (take your pick of them) to find something about our game that offends them. And then they can hurl accusations and labels. How far this goes is entirely up to them of course.

Often this just requires accusations without any actual evidence.

Let's look to that article that Greek "journalist" wrote awhile back about our hobby. She essentially labeled all of us right wingers. She insinuated that there may be some **** element simply based on the colors of the Black Templars. If any of you folks read the article I'm sure you were rightly offended.

Now, luckily nobody really read her article beyond the narrow readership of that publication. But it could have easily garnered a lot of attention. There's plenty of things in our game that could be used against it by people with an agenda.

It's like when I was a kid. Some of the local bible thumpers took exception to a lot of the stuff we kids in the 80's enjoyed. For example: He Man was "devil worship." Why? Because the preachers didn't like the name: He Man and the Masters of the Universe. They insisted there was only one Master of the Universe. And so they preached against He Man in the churches. And consequently not many kids in my area had He Man Toys. They did the same thing with G.I. Joe, Transformers, and more. Dungeons and Dragons? Again the Satanism accusations.

Today it still happens with Harry Potter. I know a guy who's wife reads Harry Potter but they won't let the kids play with Yu-Gi-Oh cards. Because in their minds the cards espouse black magic!?!

This is how 40k can get in "trouble" I think. It's just a game. We all know it is. And most of us don't consider it to make some statement about our ideological and social values. But outsiders who do not participate in it don't know that. They just see something and some aspect of it bothers them. Then can hurl accusations and labels. And then the burden of proof is on all of us and the game. If some minority decided Warhammer 40,000 has somehow offended them they can turn around and use the PC rules and media to demonize the game and the players. Without actually needing to prove a thing since all you need today is the accusation.

So I'm a little concerned with how 40k "appears" to those who don't play it.

How does it have anything to do with them getting in 'trouble'?

If anti-gay groups wanted they could easily get GW in 'trouble' for the homosexual/bisexual characters that have appeared in a number of books.

It doesn't come up often in the fluff for the reason Hive Mind mentioned; day-to-day politics, etc. are never the focus of 40k stories.

The Imperium is already a xenophobic, genocidal regime motivated by religious zealotry - and it even started out as the same except it was vehemently -anti-religious-, to the point of violence. I don't think there's any overall concern at GW that they might offend people by portraying the Imperium in a negative light. That sounds ridiculous.

[Kawauso]

All it takes is one minority (take your pick of them) to find something about our game that offends them. And then they can hurl accusations and labels. How far this goes is entirely up to them of course.

Any religion in Western society:
Meet the Horus Heresy/Great Crusade-era Imperium of man which systemically dismantles and destroys (through violence) all religion(s), on the basis that superstitious belief in deities is detrimental to humanity.

Done.

I'm not sure where the topic got derailed onto this getting 'in trouble' argument, though. All I was saying is that there's no canonical evidence that the Imperium or its agents care about a person's sexual identity or orientation (that I know of), but there are a number of examples to the contrary (i.e. that they don't care) in at least 2 of the novel series.

[Hive Mind]

Often this just requires accusations without any actual evidence.

Like calling abortion the murder of children? But who would do such a thing?

[Grenadier]

For someone so intelligent that was pretty lame. That is not about evidence and accusations. That is about two opposing views having two different interpretations of the issue. If you side with life then killing a baby in the womb is the same thing as murder. And if you support abortion then killing the fetus in the womb is simply termination or other sanitized and neutral term. Your side doesn't consider it a life. My side does. Only your side gets to be the one to dictate what life is or isn't to everyone else. Either way, its an entirely separate issue from the one being discussed in this thread.