Another debate on female space marines but humor me for a second

[Anggul]

I really don't think it's 40k that causes the lower ratio of female gamers. More like the overall preference society gives men and women for certain things that they will grow up to consider 'girl things' and 'boy things'. That's what does it, you don't need to change 40k, you need to change the common outlook overall. It also doesn't help that the stereotype of many gamer males not being able to deal reasonably with a female entering the vicinity is accurate in the case of a few people, and that's enough to make it a problem which inevitably discourages them from getting involved. It only takes one to put someone off.

40k is probably one of the most gender-equal settings around. 40k isn't the problem, it's people around it from both sides of the 'screen'.

It's important to remember what 40k is based on. It's an amalgamation of various previously existing sci-fi and fantasy things which gradually grew into an entity of its own. Astartes are all male because they're meant to be a cross between monks (a monastery populated only by males) and the Saudakar, the fanatical super soldiers in service to the emperor in Dune. The Sororitas are meant to be a cross between nuns and the Fish Warriors, the fanatical all-female army in service to the god-emperor in Dune. The Militarum (let's just roll with it shall we?) are mixed as normal because they're the army. Starship Troopers style. The Arbites and Enforcers are Judges, mixed as normal.

The only reason astartes and sororitas are all-male and all-female respectively is because that's what they're based on, all-male and all-female groups from history and previous sci-fi (specifically Dune), not some misogynistic obsession. Look at the Eldar, male and female Eldar of all kinds from Craftworld to Commoragh are stated to be equal in every way including physically, with the only exception being that Dark Eldar Wyches usually only rise above the base rank if they're female. They give the reasoning that supposedly the women are capable of becoming more flexible and agile than the men, but I think it's mainly because they had called the top rank 'Succubus' and the male equivalent 'Incubus' was already a thing. Pretty much everything in 40k is gender equal. As I've said, the astartes, sororitas and wych cults are as they are for specific reasons, not outright sexism.

I will say that the way in which the female models are sculpted does bug me, they all have ridiculously oversized chests as if that was the only way to get across that they're female, but that really comes across as trying to show that the model is female and getting the proportions dodgy rather than kingdom death style model-porn. The models don't do it will, but the background does equality very well. Look at the inquisition. Most powerful organisation in the Imperium, no distinction in gender ratio.

[Deadlift]

I think the reason we see less female 40k gamers is generally down to the poor hygiene and complete lack of social etiquette displayed so readily by many of the male gamers in every store.

I am joking btw, or have I hit too close to home for some

[Denzark]

A short answer because I'm on the iPhone. Some excellent points especially Chris22 and Anggul. Deady as ever pertinent to real life. @EG you are right I am a white male anglo Saxon heterosexual from the upper middle class. I am having a hard time 'checking my privilege' when I have no problem with changing the ratios of females or ethnicities in a fictional 40k grouping that already has mixed sex or mix ethnicities in the existing canon- but have no wish to see any change to the existing canon as I see no reason why a fictional setting should reflect real life in terms of demographics.

[Jennifer Burdoo]

Has anyone ever considered that there are a number of ways for genetic males to identify socially as female? One major one is "intersexuality," in which an XY infant is born with "indeterminate" appearance. This is so common that there's a standard medical procedure for it -- do a little plastic surgery and raise the kid as a girl. At puberty, she simply takes estrogen in order to gain a mature female appearance. If her parents are uncomfortable with the topic, she may never even learn she's genetically male. There are other genetic possibilities such as XXY. Granted, these are mutations and would not appear in any Imperial world that didn't want undue attention from the Inquisition. But if the chapter was secretive enough... my own fanon is that one of the missing primarchs was subject to this and, whilst being male, was (perhaps unknowingly) raised female by the society he landed on.

I play Fighting Tigers of Veda, and generally assume this as the reasoning behind female marines. Even if not initially male, it's possible to assume that genetic science has advanced to the point that this can be changed.

Another possibility is the concept in some Asian countries where, if a family has no boys, one of the girls is raised as a male so the family can be accepted socially. It would be easy to postulate a world where the opposite is true -- parents want girls, so raise their boys to be feminine.

This is not to say that there ARE female marines or that there should be. I'm just saying it's entirely scientifically possible to do it WITHIN the fluff.

[Xaric]

oh god what have i made i belive i have made a monster of a thread

[Thornblood]

In response to the question 'why don't more girls play 40k?' Id like to offer my own experiences.

I once had a girlfriend, who, having seen my love of hobby started collecting High Elves. From her point of view it was the easiest army to 'get behind', purely on the basis of the models. She also said she didn't think that she would ever really like 40k, and both sisters of battle and eldar were still too 'manly' for her. From her point of view there was something more relatable in her feminine side that liked fantasy and more cloth-based miniatures, rather than heavily armoured harsh edges of 40k. Natural and fantastical elements such as the dragons and griffons appeals to her over tanks and wraithlords. A real shame, but her honest opinion.

Her goth(ish) friend collected Dark elves for a very short time, because they were the opponents for her friends army, and because they married up with some goth principles pretty well. It was short lived though.

One of the girls at work exclusively plays LoTR and the Hobbit. Admittedly her and her friends are the only people I know playing that game, but she sees all other fantasy as shadows that don't live up to Tolkien- the father of the modern fantasy genre. 40k, and indeed science fiction in general dosnt appeal to her at all. Once again, the girl is obsessed with birds, and the natural world as other interests, and funnily enough her LoTR/Hobbit force is almost entirely wood elves.

I once played a game of 40k against a girl (around 16 years old), in a gw store and she said the only reason she played 40k, and indeed played orks were because they were her Dads. She didnt want to spend her own money on them.

My FLGS has probably the highest proportion of women gamers I've ever seen, however they all play Magic the gathering and havnt gone as far as miniatures.

And sadly, over fifteen years of gaming (aged 11-26) Im afraid thats all the female gamers ive ever met. Oh, and the girls dressed up as witch elves escorting Paul Sawyer around birmingham NEC at Gamesday, but im not sure if they count. I think a good point may be, if there were female marines, I dont think it would attract more women to the game.

[iandanger]

I really don't think it's 40k that causes the lower ratio of female gamers. More like the overall preference society gives men and women for certain things that they will grow up to consider 'girl things' and 'boy things'. That's what does it, you don't need to change 40k, you need to change the common outlook overall. It also doesn't help that the stereotype of many gamer males not being able to deal reasonably with a female entering the vicinity is accurate in the case of a few people, and that's enough to make it a problem which inevitably discourages them from getting involved. It only takes one to put someone off.

I agree that the 40k setting is not inherently male-centered, but the game pieces, army lists, and much of the main characters are male, and part of that is because the most prominent faction is male only. That is why this topic comes up so much.

It's important to remember what 40k is based on. It's an amalgamation of various previously existing sci-fi and fantasy things which gradually grew into an entity of its own. Astartes are all male because they're meant to be a cross between monks (a monastery populated only by males) and the Saudakar, the fanatical super soldiers in service to the emperor in Dune. The Sororitas are meant to be a cross between nuns and the Fish Warriors, the fanatical all-female army in service to the god-emperor in Dune. The Militarum (let's just roll with it shall we?) are mixed as normal because they're the army. Starship Troopers style. The Arbites and Enforcers are Judges, mixed as normal.

Of course, but we're not really discussing the game as-is, we're discussing what it can be! Most factions in 40k have evolved substantially since rogue trader, its not necessarily the case that they retain all their old connections. The Native American influence on DA aesthetics, for example. Now, we're not saying they have to retcon the old fluff, its just an academic discussion, in reality we don't have control over what GW publishes, and its unlikely after investing so much in the Horus Heresy series they'd do some grand reboot. But that also doesn't mean that female astartes aren't necessarily something that could happen. Hell, maybe Fabius Bile cracks the gene code and starts a female legion from harvested human females, its not necessary that it be female space marines from the beginning of the primarch project.

I will say that the way in which the female models are sculpted does bug me, they all have ridiculously oversized chests as if that was the only way to get across that they're female, but that really comes across as trying to show that the model is female and getting the proportions dodgy rather than kingdom death style model-porn. The models don't do it will, but the background does equality very well. Look at the inquisition. Most powerful organisation in the Imperium, no distinction in gender ratio.

Hear, hear! The DE models largely fit the theme of the army, but Sisters badly need new sculpts, and the lack of decent female models for much of the rest of the range (including Eldar HQ's etc) is very limiting. I want to do a female inquisitor for my Ordo Xenos faction, but I'm exclusively looking at 3rd party manufacturers (none of which I'm in love with) for her base model, GW simply doesn't make a female model for a non-power armored inquistor that I like.

[DWest]

Thanks for coming out and saying it - personally, I'm with you. The thing is, the people who are against social justice... what are you for? Are you in favor of social injustice? Do you really think that 40k being just the way it's always been is worth the cost, if the cost is continuing the current system of exclusion and unfairness?

Apologies, but I'm still not getting how the only way to have social justice is to retcon in female Space Marines. The story of the Astartes, when they actually touch on it, is one of loss and brokenness. They call them "transhuman" or "post-human", but really Space Marines are *sub*-human, in that in order to become these superb warriors, they've given up much of their humanity. Right now, the Space Marines are closer to Tyranids than they are baseline Humans; a parasitic race that must take from a host in order to survive. Adding in females would make the Space Marines more complete, but their story is *about* incompleteness. If you want a female role model, again, look at the Sisters of Battle, who are able to keep pace with the Space Marines, despite not having been genetically enhanced, doing it instead just with faith and fury.

[atrox_futurus]

The problem for me isn't female space marines or even how women are presented in the background material in general (we can talk about the relative scarcity of female codex characters and novel protagonists) but the lack of models. We know most of the IG regiments do not discriminate on gender but all the model range is male. We know the Craftworld eldar do not discriminate by gender but 90% of the range is male. The Tau I believe do not discriminate and males and females look much the same but here is still only one explicitly female character model compared to a half dozen explicitly male character models. Dark Eldar are 50/50 which is good. Sisters are in desperate need of an update and could stand to have the fetish elements toned down slightly in certain areas ( no more pointy armoured bras and repentia...)

Getting back to Marines, the in universe explanation is completely bollocks from a real science perspective so I have no problem ignoring it and having my own FSM chapter. There is an interesting quote from Malcador in one of the HH books where he says he recommended the Emperor make Battle Sisters rather than Battle Brothers but Big E thought it was a joke which could suggest the possibility was available at least pre-Heresy.

I don't expect GW to change it and I don't really care, honestly. 40k is one of the least sexist scifi settings honestly, even if people are surprised to hear it and it is still far from un-problematic.

^ This

Also the quote is in Scars. " You brothers - such a nest of rivalries. I warned Him to make you sisters, that it would make things more civilized. He thought I was joking. I wasn't."

[onlyonepinman]

Thanks for coming out and saying it - personally, I'm with you. The thing is, the people who are against social justice... what are you for? Are you in favor of social injustice?

It's not so much that I'm ïn favour"of social injustice more that I don't consider the fact that 50% of games workshop's model range is not female to be an injustice. Because it isn't an injustice, changing the model range to contain roughly equivalent numbers of female mand male miniatures in the name of "social justice" is pointless. Social justice generally believes that because roughly 50% of the world is female that everything should be 50% female (politics, corporate boards... wargaming?) although proponents of this are normally very selective; i've never seen a campaign for more male teachers or more female garbage collectors. I've also never seen any campaigns to make the barbie range more accessible to boys (more male dolls with better stories than just "barbie's boyfriend). There is also growing evidence that most boys and girls show a predisposition towards certain toys at ages before socialisation could have realistically ocurred - have a look for the experiment performed with reecus monkies where juveniles were given dolls and cars to play with - the males played with the cars and the females played with the dolls. It has even been noted that babies as yooung as 3 months tend to focus their attention on what might be considered gender specific toys - mechanical in the case of boys and anatomical in the case of girls. Much of this research is in its infancy but I predict, quite comfortably, that the effects of socialisation on our interests will ultimately be proven to be minimal and that the majority of it is determined by nature, not nurture. There always going to be exceptions and cross overs and these people should be given the same opportunity of expression, but they will always be a minority and, as a minority, must accept that the world has to support the majority view - that's just democracy.

So a lack of female miniatures isn't what puts most women off wargaming, it's that three letter word in the name, "war" - war just doesn't interest women in the same way as it interests men. While it is true that there are a growing number of female wargamers and hobbyists, they are still a tiny percentage of the wargaming market and that market, like any other, caters to the majority not the minority. Should the market change to be more attractive to women, it would become potentially less attractive to men - they would lose some existing customers AND miss out on potential new male customers at the expense getting a few female customers through the door. GW is a large, established corporation (in wargaming terms) and as such is probably risk averse, updating their entire range to support gender balance is a huge risk and I think before GW made such a move, they want proof that making gender balanced forces would 1)not shrink their existing market, 2)would not affect their ability to attract new customers 3)have the desired effect of increasining their market share by bringing in additional female customers.