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

[Xaric]

Ok I have been looking over countless forums other then this one regarding the possibility of female space marines and I must say the possibility is 80% but being allowed is about 20%.

The reason for this lets take a step back in the past in human past time where males are dominate and women was not no this is not a sexist attack this is just how history Is and was. There are other reason a female was not allowed to go to war due to distraction of seeing the opposite sex being killed outright could be more horrifying then someone of the same sex and the horrors of a woman being captured that. Or most men back then justified there manliness by saying woman are weak and such this could be the very reason women are not allowed to be space marines hence look at IG no real speaking of female IG as they are all male even in the fluff there is very little on female IG command and such.

This can also apply to why space marines are extremely xenophobic in history those of a different race to some cultures was deemed lesser then there cultures and the only way to deal with them was slavery or put to death.

Now the biological sense with tech this high in the 40k having the ability to use geneseeds on a human regardless of sex should not be a problem after all were in the year 2014 and we have sex change's I think in 37986 years they will be able to implement geneseeds regardless of gender.

What is everyone else take on this please try to keep things civil.

[ElectricPaladin]

Ok...

So, first of all, I don't mean to be a jerk but... could you try putting some punctuation in your post? Like maybe a period or two? Some commas? It's kind of hard to read.

On to the point of the conversation: I'm not really sure what you're trying to say here. The fluff is quite clear - Astartes are made from young boys at a certain age, and some of the genes used to create Astartes are sex-linked, so you can't do the same thing to a young girl. There are ladies in power armor - an entire faction of them, in fact, as well as the occasional lady inquisitor or extremely fortunate lady bounty hunter - and many of them are quite badass, but no lady Space Marines. Fine. I think that everyone is, by now, quite clear that this is what GW is going for. I don't see a lot of room for debate.

It seems that you object, but I can't tell where or why.

I think it's well within an author's purview to declare that certain things shall be so and other things shan't entirely on a whim. They don't have to explain themselves to you any further than being internally consistent. Whatever I or anyone else thinks about the "right" or the "wrong" of writing this particular universe, it's the universe they've created, and it's internally consistent. No female Space Marines. Why? Because super-science, that's why? But... logic? No, says super-science. No. The Warp hasn't got to follow your rules, psykers don't got to follow your rules - nothing's got to follow your rules. It's all got to follow its own rules, and it does.

Those rules, as I understand it, is that transforming a person into a Space Marine requires some genetic similarity between the person and the Primarch. Genes are finicky and weird, and it probably isn't just a matter of % similarity. As long as there are genetic diseases - diseases with nothing to do with your actual boy or girl bits - that only boys or girls can get, it makes sense that there can be transhuman implants that are similarly sex-linked.

Now, if what you want to talk about is "is it the best choice - the most interesting, creative, forward-thinking idea - to have Space Marines all be dudes?" In that case the answer is no. It's absolutely BS, macho nonsense.

[rogue.trader.voril]

I really don't see why this topic keeps poping up every so often...
Orks and Necrons are gender neutral, and I'm going to go out on a limb and say demons belong in here even though Slaneesh has boob(s).
Tau and Tyranids have both genders fighting side by side... probably best not to find out who is who, or what is what rather...
I have some older Imperial Guard females, few and far between, but still present.
Eldar/ Dark Eldar have both genders together.
Then there's marines and sisters. Same side, but different codex.
And Chaos marines... they are evil... equal oppertunity is the least of their problems. :)

If it's a problem for anyone, maybe marines is not the best choice. Just MHO.

[Captain Bubonicus]

In the Grim Darkness of the Far Future, it's a total sausage party.

[daboarder]

I really don't see why this topic keeps poping up every so often...
Orks and Necrons are gender neutral, and I'm going to go out on a limb and say demons belong in here even though Slaneesh has boob(s).
Tau and Tyranids have both genders fighting side by side... probably best not to find out who is who, or what is what rather...
I have some older Imperial Guard females, few and far between, but still present.
Eldar/ Dark Eldar have both genders together.
Then there's marines and sisters. Same side, but different codex.
And Chaos marines... they are evil... equal oppertunity is the least of their problems. :)

If it's a problem for anyone, maybe marines is not the best choice. Just MHO.

I'd go one step further and state that tyranids are gender meaningless. reproduction is something the hive mind doesn't bother with except for vary rare circumstances. they aren't animals they are individual "cells" in the organism that is the hvie fleet

[Nabterayl]

Now, if what you want to talk about is "is it the best choice - the most interesting, creative, forward-thinking idea - to have Space Marines all be dudes?" In that case the answer is no. It's absolutely BS, macho nonsense.
I think I'd add to this point:

If what you want to talk about is, "Does the in-universe justification make sense, or is it meaningless technobabble?" the answer is that it is totally meaningless technobabble. None of the published in-universe justifications for why you can't make female space marines make sense, from a scientific point of view. But I would just throw it onto the whole mountain of in-universe justifications or observed phenomena about 40K that don't make sense from a scientific point of view.

[ElectricPaladin]

I think I'd add to this point:

If what you want to talk about is, "Does the in-universe justification make sense, or is it meaningless technobabble?" the answer is that it is totally meaningless technobabble. None of the published in-universe justifications for why you can't make female space marines make sense, from a scientific point of view. But I would just throw it onto the whole mountain of in-universe justifications or observed phenomena about 40K that don't make sense from a scientific point of view.

I'd argue that it does make sense, but it's totally arbitrary. It could happen. There are dozens of sex-linked diseases and traits, many more of you count traits that appear in animals. The point is, though, that because it's totally arbitrary the opposite is just as likely; more likely if you consider that males and females of the human species share 99.many9s% of our genetic code. But there are many things in the Warhammer 40k universe that are totally arbitrary. Why is the symbol of Chaos an eight-sided star? Why are there four Chaos gods? Why did the Emperor have twenty sons? Why are techpriests weirdos? Why why why?

So, since it's all arbitrary and came out of some Brit's butt in the 1980s, "is it reasonable and logical" is a less interesting question than "is it a good idea, is it fun, does it foster creativity and welcome more people to the hobby, or is it lame and dumb?"

[Houghten]

And the answer is "it's not fun; it stifles creativity and locks people out of the hobby."

[Deadlift]

I don't care that there are no female marines, it's GWs fluff and for the most I'm happy with it. There's plenty of strong female archetypes within other factions. Some truly badass ladies fighting for the Imperium and against. Eldar are one that springs to mind.
So there's no female marines, really who gives a **** ?

[eldargal]

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.

[David Crossley]

The reason for this lets take a step back in the past in human past time where males are dominate and women was not no this is not a sexist attack this is just how history Is and was. There are other reason a female was not allowed to go to war due to distraction of seeing the opposite sex being killed outright could be more horrifying then someone of the same sex and the horrors of a woman being captured that. Or most men back then justified there manliness by saying woman are weak and such this could be the very reason women are not allowed to be space marines hence look at IG no real speaking of female IG as they are all male even in the fluff there is very little on female IG command and such.


Wrong, firstly women are the protected sex while men are the disposable sex. Men are disposable because sperm, when compared to eggs, is cheap. A man could, in theory, quite easily impregnate a hundred different women in as many days, whereas a woman could only end up being impregnated the once in that same time period. As such our species has ever taken the death of large numbers of women more seriously than the death of large numbers of men - a shortage of men merely requires men to take on more sexual partners in order to re-populate the species whereas a shortage of women is where we start looking at the decline of our civilisation, or to put it another way, men are easily replaceable, women are not. That's why whenever a women is in pain everyone rushes about to do something about it, whereas when a man is in pain he's told to Man Up and stop whining.
So it makes sense that if becoming a Space Marine sterilizes the recruit, that you limit it to men.

Secondly women ARE physically weak in comparison to men (in general biological terms, I imagine Jodie Marsh could quite easily kick a stick-thin emo boy's arse even if he fought back with all his strength rather than holding back and taking it because it 'isn't right to hit a girl') - have you not noticed that even the Olympics to this day still maintain separate men's and women's events? Do you think women athletes would appreciate you campaigning to eliminate this 'sexism' and thus making their chances of picking up some Golds (or even being picked for the national teams) a remote possibility? Did you know that the required fitness levels for women in their early 20's joining the US army is the same for male Army pen-pushers in their 50's? They had to be reduced in order to let more women in, which is, as far as I'm concerned, an insult to those women that could match their male peer's physical requirements* and a deliberate policy of putting weak links in soldiers lines of support.
So again, if part of the Space Marine process involves massively bulking up on muscle, it makes sense to restrict it to the gender that is more prone to putting muscle on in the first place.

*And 40K's version of these sort of women is the Adepta Sororitas, who are usually described as being hard as nails even when out of their power armour.

[eldargal]

Wow, we've gone from an interesting debate on Space Marines to misogynist gender essentialist bull**** in less than two pages.

[YorkNecromancer]

I want female space marines because:

1.) I want to encourage female gamers to come to the school games club.
2.) I like conversions. Not having female marine heads restricts my conversion potential.
3.) That's it.

I'm just going to leave these things here. They peripherally link to the topic at hand. Especially the video.

http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/t_ku-xlarge/rqdw0xeoz0x49jub4vxh.png
http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/t_ku-xlarge/jpdenwlsonakr7jdtoue.png


https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_2Q4shr8jHU

http://www.gamespot.com/articles/fear-of-a-woman-warrior/1100-6404142/
http://groupthink.jezebel.com/every-misogynistic-argument-youve-ever-heard-about-vid-756662565
http://io9.com/the-long-list-of-successful-action-movies-starring-wome-1298632309
http://io9.com/what-kind-of-armor-did-medieval-women-really-wear-1502779338
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/commentisfree/2014/feb/19/video-games-need-more-women-female-characters?CMP=twt_gu

Read them or don't, see the connections or don't, it's up to you. Just like the racists of the 50's, the misogynists of the 2010's are on the wrong side of history, which is never a good place to be.


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...)

www.tor.com/blogs/2013/05/boob-plate-armor-would-kill-you

Oh, how we have discussed this in The Oubliette.

[Psychosplodge]

I love female armour bingo, but all the cards are the same so we always all win...

[eldargal]

One thing that does bug me is the idea that if female Space Marines were introduced, that would somehow be bad. If your appreciation of Space Marines relies on them all to be male and having some be female would ruin it all for you I think that says a lot about how you think about women.

[Wolfshade]

Perhaps the 2 missing primarchs were women :eek:

Of course teh real question is why there are no male sisters of battle...

While obviously male, the sex for marines is functionally unimportant. I think while the basic template might be male, through the gene therapy they are in essence genderless. However, they are universally, shown in as male and use male terminology. Battle "Brothers", etc.

The other thing to consider is that if the marines are pumped full of testosterone then they would be more "manly" regardless of how they started. Consider some of the testoerone doped female shot putters for instance, they looked decidedly more "butch" and in some cases even grew beards.

[eldargal]

Of course teh real question is why there are no male sisters of battle...

Explicit ruling barring the Ecclesiarchy from having men at arms.:p

[Wolfshade]

So if you replaced the males arms with robotic arms it would be fine as the arms would be genderless.

SoB-Iron hands cross

[Psychosplodge]

Perhaps the 2 missing primarchs were women :eek:


Nah, Spoiler Malcedor says he told the Big E they should have made him daughters, they'd have been less trouble. which pretty much rules that out.

- - - Updated - - -


Perhaps the 2 missing primarchs were women :eek:


Nah, Spoiler Malcedor says he told the Big E they should have made him daughters, they'd have been less trouble. which pretty much rules that out.

[daboarder]

Also means malcador never had daughters

[Psychosplodge]

That too

[DETHMOKIL]

I personally find female Space Marines, instead of more inclusive, defined by their gender even more.

In my mind 'name brand' Astartes are male, because it fits their background of being a knightly order of warrior monks, roaming the galaxy trying to follow in the foot steps of their Gene-Father Primarch in a quest for redemption ect ect.

It just doesn't seem very creative, or for that matter fun, to make female marines in an established chapter. It lacks that ring of zazz. Whats the gimmick? These Angels of Vigilance need more marines so they used ladies as-well? Or these Novamarines found a lost STC for a new Marine organ that only works in females? That just sounds like a justification of wanting Female Space Marines, not a theme that wouldn't get scoffed at the gaming table, regardless of arbitrary gender roles.

The only way I think It would jive with me, would be if they where genetically modified Sister of Battle that drift slowly into being close to space marines. Perhaps an advance genetically modified Skitarii, the AdMec doesn't really care about gender at all. Or a Amazonian style techno barbarians being juiced up and drafted into the army. Of course the chaos version could easily be some kind of cult or mutants or something easy like that. 40k has a huge background, the original RT version of space marines could be made by any wealthy lord as a personal army.

I believe that they could exist in 40k, but I don't think you could call them Adeptus Astartes.

[YorkNecromancer]

One thing that does bug me is the idea that if female Space Marines were introduced, that would somehow be bad. If your appreciation of Space Marines relies on them all to be male and having some be female would ruin it all for you I think that says a lot about how you think about women.

This exactly. If someone actually thinks female space marines would somehow ruin the game, that says something awful about them. Because all female space marines would actually be would be new grey plastic to glue.

And it's not like GW haven't changed massive bits of the fluff in the past. Oh hi, Necrons! What's that you say? You used to be fairly one-dimensional servants of Cthulian star-gods but now you're rather more interesting (YMMV of course)? And you say we could easily retcon Marine fluff the same way? Goodness me! It's almost as though 40K is a fictional setting where things can change!


Nah, Spoiler Malcedor says he told the Big E they should have made him daughters, they'd have been less trouble. which pretty much rules that out.

Meh, like the Emperor HAD to listen. He's the frickin' Emperor! He can do what he likes! Just retcon things so the two 'secret' Primarchs were his experiment with female marines, and he kept them secret so SPOILER: Malcador never found out.


While obviously male, the sex for marines is functionally unimportant.

Exactly. So give us female marines, and give them now, GW!

Also, there's no way to call marines 'genderless', because male is a gender, and not the default one, either.

[Psychosplodge]

Oh I'm not against the idea as such. I quite like the armoured SOB models, I'd prefer more helmets though. I just meant its in the fluff that wolfie's idea wouldn't work.
Plus I think Dorn refers to his lost brothers at somepoint as well doesn't he?

[Wolfshade]

Thoughout the HH they are referred to as masculine form.

Sorry York I probably didn't define myself adequately, what I meant, and this is probably pratriachy talking again, is that while marines are male they are so far removed from what our idea of what a male is and can be that it is amost an entirely different gender. In the same way that the marines themselves are so physically and psychologically mutated that they are not human by any rationalisation. They are transgender transhuman super soliders, who enjoy the company of their own kind exclusively .

[Gotthammer]

In my mind 'name brand' Astartes are male, because it fits their background of being a knightly order of warrior monks, roaming the galaxy trying to follow in the foot steps of their Gene-Father Primarch in a quest for redemption ect ect.

It just doesn't seem very creative, or for that matter fun, to make female marines in an established chapter. It lacks that ring of zazz. Whats the gimmick?

If the gimmick behind all male marines is the first paragraph there, it's not a mutually exclusive concept to men to follow in their father's footsteps or to seek redemption. Also why are male marines fine but if they're to be female it needs to be a gimmick? Guardians, Dire Avengers, Striking Scorpions, Wyches, Scourges, Warriors/Trueborn, Archons, Hellions, Harlequins and Seers don't need an extra gimmick to explain their femaleness. The authors/sculptors just go "here are Harlequins, some of them are women" and I don't think anyone needed it explained why it was so because they already have a gimmick - killer space clowns.

Marines have the warrior knight gimmick (often with a secondary gimmick like vikings/vampires) over the top, so they'd just be women adopting that. They're only defined by their gender because people make such a big deal about how you can't have female marines.

[eldargal]

What Gott said.

[wayne williams]

my questoin would be if you had a female space marine how would you tell the differnce ? ( bear with me here lol )
by the time they are pumped so full of muscle boosting hormones have there ribcage re modelled etc thenn have black carapace fitted. then pschologically re made to think more agressively . . youd find if following standard hormone therpy in humans that are given large doses of testesterone that the female secondery sexual traits would be so minimised ( think/ picture of those lady body builders that if they where not wearing a bikini top youd never know what sex they are )
and then that after a set of power armour youd not really be able to tell .
you would just have a bunch of very pretty space marines to me and we already have them in blood angels ( lol )
in the fluff i wouldnt mind female space marines but then i always imagine that 50 % of space marines actually are female and no one can tell. and if you suspected would you ask one ?

[eldargal]

Why would you need to tell the difference?:)

Personally I headcanon it that in the same way that male initiates are hyper-masculinised, female initaited are hyper feminised so they end up looking like She Hulk without the green skin.
http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs38/f/2008/323/9/9/SheHulk_COVER_IN_LIVIN_COLOR_by_BroHawk.jpg

[wayne williams]

thats my point you dont need new models of space marines with boobs ( which is what we would get and probably with pices of armour missing for some reason as well ) when we can as gamers just say this chapter my chapter is mostly female .here is my back story for it .

[Psychosplodge]

my questoin would be if you had a female space marine how would you tell the differnce ?

Turn them upside down? Same as with anything...

:rolleyes:

[eldargal]

thats my point you dont need new models of space marines with boobs ( which is what we would get and probably with pices of armour missing for some reason as well ) when we can as gamers just say this chapter my chapter is mostly female .here is my back story for it .
My FSM army is just Space Marine models with a bareheaded captain, chapter master and librarian out of around 50 models now. It's not really a model thing with FSM, it's a background thing.

[YorkNecromancer]

Remembered this guy's work from a while back. He's a talented amateur:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/blog/345483.page

Now imagine that but done to current 40K standard. Those miniatures would be amazing.

Why is everyone so dead-set against me having more toys? Why can't I have my plastic?

[Wolfshade]

Why can't I have my plastic?

Because you've not painted what you've got...

[eldargal]

Ooh, wish I could buy those.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

:3 this is the picture I usually wheel out for these threads, a great female Scout conversion from this guy (http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/169942-silent-swords-wip/):
http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/uploads/1252568024/gallery_40895_3721_79194.jpg
My opinion on the matter can be boiled down to;
a) It'd be fantastic to see more female minis in 40k.
b) It's kinda disconcerting when people get intense about declaring FSM non-canon.

- - - Updated - - -

:3 this is the picture I usually wheel out for these threads, a great female Scout conversion from this guy (http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/169942-silent-swords-wip/):
http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/uploads/1252568024/gallery_40895_3721_79194.jpg
My opinion on the matter can be boiled down to;
a) It'd be fantastic to see more female minis in 40k.
b) It's kinda disconcerting when people get intense about declaring FSM non-canon.

[ElectricPaladin]

b) It's kinda disconcerting when people get intense about declaring FSM non-canon.

Really true.

I mean, we can debate the science of it all day and all night, but the fact is that when someone vociferously and intensely attacks the idea of female Space Marines as completely ridiculous, wrong, bad, evil, and dumb... you kind of have to wonder at his motives. I mean, why does he care so much? What has he got to prove?

[This Dave]

While not Space Marines (and not GW for that matter) these are quite well done and should fit right in with any Guard army:

http://victoriaminiatures.highwire.com/product/arcadian-rifles-squad-female-pre-order#&ui-state=dialog

These can add non-bimbified females to the 40k table.

[Denzark]

Oh by the Gods not this tosh again. As to the OP - 80% possible, 20% permissible.

No.

0% possible. Against extant un-retconned fluff. Yes it is old. Yes it makes no sense against the levels of technology shown in the 40k-verse. But they do not exist. NO official GW source where they do (outside of FANFIC which is 97.9% pish). Official un-retconned source where they don't.

100% permissible. You can do what you like. You can have it in your head that inside the armour (visible or not I care not) the wearer has boobs and a vagina. Hey you can think the wearer has boobs and a penis for all I care. Completely irrelevant.

BUT


They will not be Space Marines of the Adeptus Astartes. In your head maybe but not in GW's 40k-verse.

[YorkNecromancer]

you kind of have to wonder at his motives. I mean, why does he care so much? What has he got to prove?

http://www.bite.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/SPANKY.jpg

Not to mention the...

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/he-man_8674.jpg

How else will he earn his membership? They don't just take anyone... :rolleyes:


Because you've not painted what you've got...

SHUT UP YOU'RE NOT EVEN MY REAL MUM! SHE LETS ME PAINT WHATEVER I LIKE!

[Wolfshade]

:D

[Denzark]

Really true.

I mean, we can debate the science of it all day and all night, but the fact is that when someone vociferously and intensely attacks the idea of female Space Marines as completely ridiculous, wrong, bad, evil, and dumb... you kind of have to wonder at his motives. I mean, why does he care so much? What has he got to prove?

Yeah really. Why people care so much about canon/fluff is one thing. You invest in a storyline, follow it, like it, consider its merits and it become dogmatic about it. I don't want my 40K canon to change. I don't like Macguffins, deus ex machina, lazy writing or any of that. Remember the horror of some people that the Grey Kinghts cut around smearing themselves in rendered down Sisters of Battle as a cheap daemonic protection aftershave? That get a few goats?

Well there is absolutely no positives about a sudden retconning that there are now female marines. None. What is annoying is that the vast majority of people who would support this, do so to further their real-world cause of supposed equality, rather thn of any desire to enhance the game or its setting.

Its like wanting white Salamanders, or non-mongolian (whatever the politically correct term is) White Scars. Completely irrelevant.

Saying 'what has he got to prove' is some passive-aggressive BS in assuming that someone has an erroneous impression that there is an achievable objective in prolonging this debate, that there is some worth to be had and some satisfaction in 'winning' the argument. There is nothing to prove. If GW are ever sad and weak enough to add in female SM, it will be another rubbish pointless retcon.

[Psychosplodge]

I remember white salamanders...

[YorkNecromancer]

Well there is absolutely no positives about a sudden retconning that there are now female marines.

From a certain point of view.

From mine, there is absolutely no positives about keeping things as they are. None.

So, you know, this debate is going to carry on, because the truth is the lack of female marines is backwards. It's seriously outdated, it's pretty damned pathetic, and it's embarrassing to discuss when introducing new people to the hobby. It really is.


What is annoying is that the vast majority of people who would support this, do so to further their real-world cause of supposed equality, rather thn of any desire to enhance the game or its setting.

Oh my God, not equality! No! Why would we ever struggle to make the world a more equal place! That would be terrible! More people might join our hobby and having fun!

WHY DIDN'T I SEE IT BEFORE?!!!

Sarcasm aside, why is making concession to real-world equality ever bad?

I want more players. If I lose some of the more hardcore gamers because they can't handle the idea that hey, maybe compromising on an outdated, sexist setting is a good way to grow the player base and meet new, interesting people, well.

We can do without those guys.

I mean, the Necron fluff changed completely, and Necron sales increased. A few people were butthurt, but overall, the change was recieved as A Good Thing. It would be the same with female marines. The world wouldn't end, the sky would not fall in, people would continue to play games and buy models, The End. The Imperium would still be an absolutely horrible place, just one that was less embarrassing to talk about with non-gamers.

Don't get me wrong, I'm under no illusions. I know the woman haters always win, because this is the real world. They always win here. We'll never see female marines because the misogyny just runs too deep. But that doesn't mean the lack of female marines is okay.

Also, when it comes to the word 'supposed', I assume you mean that in your opinion, adding female marines would be tokenism?

To quote from the earlier article on representations of women in gaming:


Asking for more women characters will lead to tokenism and positive discrimination

In 2009, researchers at the University of Southern California carried out a comprehensive study of the 150 biggest video game releases – they discovered that less than 10% of game characters are female. Acknowledging the existence of women and reflecting that in video games is not positive discrimination. People are not asking for every single game to star a female protagonist; they are asking for more than literally one or two titles a year to star a female protagonist. They’re asking for it to be an option. In no way is it tokenism to politely request that games more accurately reflect the makeup of the game-playing public and indeed society, instead of existing in a strange alternate reality where 90% of noteworthy people are white and male and have a number two buzzcut.

It’s not just women who are fed up with always seeing the same kinds of protagonist in video games. It’s pretty much everyone. Back in 2011, IGN superimposed different game characters’ faces on each other and found them to be almost identical – a production line of young white men with cropped hair and tribal tattoos.

This didn’t used to be the case, you know. Back in the 80s and 90s, people were just making stuff – the budgets and teams were smaller, and lead protagonists varied enormously as a result. It’s only in the last console generation that marketing has developed such a tight hold on games that it defines what they are allowed to be before they’re even made. Developers are told things like, “this kind of protagonist resonates with the demographic”, “this kind of box art is best”, “games with prominent women don’t sell”. Jean-Max Morris, creative director on Capcom’s interesting sci-fi adventure Remember Me, claims to have been told by publishers that they wouldn’t sign the game because of its female lead. It’s a self-perpetuating circle that limits what games can do.

I’ve had people tell me, look, we’ve got the newly re-humanised Lara Croft and we’ve got FemShep and maybe Faith, can’t we just be happy about that and celebrate it? Yes! Yes we can celebrate that. But we can also ask for more of it, please. That’s not positive discrimination. And what’s really frustration is the way that male gamers on Twitter and in comments sections tend to try to derail the argument by reaching ridiculous conclusions. Ask for more female characters and suddenly we’re apparently demanding for all games to include women, or for strict government guidelines on representation. There is a lot of fear and insecurity. I am fairly certain we will avoid a future in which developers are sent to special gender awareness prison camps for not meeting their quota of female antagonists.

Have a read. It won't change your mind, because you've been pretty clear that nothing ever will, but it might interest you.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/commentisfree/2014/feb/19/video-games-need-more-women-female-characters?CMP=twt_gu

[Denzark]

I separate my real life and my fiction. I don't want to see half the 12 apostles now to be re-written as female because thats fair. I don't want to see Mary Magdalene become Mike Magdalene the Rent Boy. I don't want to see female space marines becuase I don't wnt pointless changes for real life political issues.

If people would only join if their demographic are represented, balls to them. Wanting a chapter of all wheelchair bound Space Marines to appeal to disabled people is just as ridiculous to me as wanting to 'create' female space marines just to bring in more - whatever you think would come to the hobby.

Incidentally if GW did market research into a new race and made it 50% female/black/disabled/gay or whatever, I have no problem with that. I have no problem with all female IG regiments.

I just don't want to see RL interfere in good old well established fluff. Again, I'm ambivalent to GK covering themselves in Soritas gore, but some people whined like f*ck. I sympathise that an area of fluff they didn't like was forced on them, I hope people will have the same consideration for me.

[Psychosplodge]

If people would only join if their demographic are represented, balls to them. Wanting a chapter of all wheelchair bound Space Marines to appeal to disabled people is just as ridiculous to me as wanting to 'create' female space marines just to bring in more - whatever you think would come to the hobby.



The disabled are already represented in dreadnoughts.

[Denzark]

The disabled are already represented in dreadnoughts.

Well that's OK then...

I have seen at least 1 miniature with 2 bionic eyes so I suppose the blind are catered for.

[Wolfshade]

*cough* iron hands *cough*

Anyway since we are using a fighting force, those unable to fight you would expect not to be represented.

[David Crossley]

Oh my God, not equality! No! Why would we ever struggle to make the world a more equal place! That would be terrible! More people might join our hobby and having fun!


Well, that's assuming having more women miniatures who in game terms are there to potentially be gunned down or cut to ribbons on the battlefield, or be ultra-violent, is something that's going to have concerned parents rushing to buy Petunia and Mercedes a starter set anyway.
Which I understand was the main point of consternation with Sisters of Battle upon their release, rather than the boob-plate or notions of objectification.

- - - Updated - - -


Oh my God, not equality! No! Why would we ever struggle to make the world a more equal place! That would be terrible! More people might join our hobby and having fun!


Well, that's assuming having more women miniatures who in game terms are there to potentially be gunned down or cut to ribbons on the battlefield, or be ultra-violent, is something that's going to have concerned parents rushing to buy Petunia and Mercedes a starter set anyway.
Which I understand was the main point of consternation with Sisters of Battle upon their release, rather than the boob-plate or notions of objectification.

[ElectricPaladin]

Actually, when it comes to the disabled, I was really impressed by the representation of Ravenor. His disability isn't glorified - he gets a chair, not a badass robot body - but he still continues to kick *** and takes names of ***** to kick later. Like a boss.

[Psychosplodge]

He's not a space marine though, the dreadnought comment was in regards to the chapter of wheelchair using marines

[Wolfshade]

How many dangerous terrain tests?

[YorkNecromancer]

I don't want to see half the 12 apostles now to be re-written as female because thats fair. I don't want to see Mary Magdalene become Mike Magdalene the Rent Boy.

Wow. False equivelancy much?

The Bible is the core of a religious faith. 40K is a game played with toy soldiers. The Bible purports to be a historical document (however dubious in authenticity); 40K is a gameplayed with toy soldiers. The two are as comparable as biscuits and porches. If you genuinely believe they are, and the fact you have posted this madness suggests you do, then our conversation is over.


I don't wnt pointless changes for real life political issues.

http://i2.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/003/194/001.jpg

Okay:

1.) The changes aren't pointless to everyone, just you.
2.) Your opinion carries no more weight than mine.
3.) In my opinion, this is not a pointless issue. It's a perfectly valid one. I have been trying to recruit pupils to play 40K in our school club. All the girls are put off by how ridiculously male everything is. I believe this means they are missing out on a fun activity.

Am I wrong? Do you actually think 40K is no fun? Is it yours and yours alone, to be jealously guarded from stinky girls who might take your precious from you?

I want 40K to be for everyone. At the moment, it's not.

[Denzark]

Oh noes false equivalency. Next you'll be itching to type 'straw man' I'm sure.

Look, why is everything 'ridiculously male'? Why would a single race change make a difference?

Imperium:
IG: Mixed
Space Marines: Male
SoB: Female
Knights: Mixed
Inq: Mixed
Xenos:
Tau: Don't know(?)
Eldar: Mixed
Dark Eldar: Mixed
Tyranids: Both/Neither
Necrons: N/A
Chaos SM: Male
Daemons: Neither
Cultists: Both

Is it more female sculpts they want? Got no problem with that. 'Ridiculously Male'. WTF does that even mean? Belittling something as ridiculous on the basis of its sex is a prejudice - equally if you write male or female down afterwards.

Is it that they want a piece of the poster boys - the ultimate imperial heroes? Have you not explained that single female Inquisitor can call them to heel at whim? Have you not explained that a female Guardsman with her flashlight is far more heroic than a hulking marine bred not to feel fear?

If females are equal to male, and are equal in every way, then they are equally valid in every way. But if something is equal with one thing, the thing that it is equal with must therefore be naturally as equal.

Which means that a female character in 40K is an equal to a male character, so a male character is equal to a female. Therefore a formation with 100% of males is equal to a formation with 100% of females.

I see no reason why on this basis marines remaining all male ad infinite, is unacceptable. How the hell changing them to female is going to make 40K more inclusive to new recruits - something I think is a good thing - I have no idea. Do you ask the emo-goths at your school to wear less spikes and black clothing to make themselves more inclusive to the sporty clique?

[YorkNecromancer]

Oh noes false equivalency. Next you'll be itching to type 'straw man' I'm sure.

Nope. This is what's called an 'ad hominem': that's where you attack your opponent rather than their ideas. In this case, by intimating that using the correct word for something is in some way a negative thing. Is it because you're scared of big words? Or just an easy way to 'prove' me wrong?

I've already said, this is a purely opinion-based thing. There is no right answer, no matter how much people might want there to be. Just one that's fair to everyone, and one that's biased in favour of a social group which holds all the power.

As for Straw Man arguments, you're the one complaining the girls are coming to take away your toys.

Despite the fact that female space marines would give you MORE toys to play with.


'Ridiculously Male'. WTF does that even mean?

In-canon, 'Only males can carry the zygotes that create Space Marines'.

No.

Because it's not real. The science is made-up, and dates from the eighties, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Times have changed, but 40K hasn't.

The science is ridiculous, made-up rubbishy rubbish. Hence, 'ridiculously male'.

Next:


Is it that they want a piece of the poster boys - the ultimate imperial heroes?

Yes.

Why shouldn't they? Why do you want to make people you don't know unhappy? Why do you want to deny little girls the chance to play our game? It costs you nothing except an idea, and not a very good one.

Why are you being so mean?


Do you ask the emo-goths at your school to wear less spikes and black clothing to make themselves more inclusive to the sporty clique?

I let them choose.

Which is what I'm arguing for here. More choice. You're the one arguing for pointless limitations. I say there should be more bits to make our toys from. You want us to stick with what we've got and nothing more.

I'm all for nostalgia, but 1st edition was a LONG time ago. The sculpts have improved since then, but apparently attitudes haven't.

[Denzark]

Nope. This is what's called an 'ad hominem': that's where you attack your opponent rather than their ideas.

Oh you're not under attack, although you may feel threatened.

In this case, by intimating that using the correct word for something is in some way a negative thing. Is it because you're scared of big words? Or just an easy way to 'prove' me wrong?

Mmm, is accusing me of being scared one of them thar 'ad hominems' then? Is that 'can't beat 'em, join 'em' when you cede the moral high ground and descend to my level?

I've already said, this is a purely opinion-based thing. There is no right answer, no matter how much people might want there to be. Just one that's fair to everyone, and one that's biased in favour of a social group which holds all the power.

As for Straw Man arguments, you're the one complaining the girls are coming to take away your toys.

I have not complained about that anywhere. I haven't played SM for years. I just wouldn't change background just because it isn't currently to the fancy of one demographic or another.

Despite the fact that female space marines would give you MORE toys to play with.

This may be a society of self gratification, but I don't really need an infinite monkey cage to play in - there is enough scope to satisfy a wide range of tastes without pandering to any one dissatisfied group or another.



In-canon, 'Only males can carry the zygotes that create Space Marines'.

No.

Because it's not real. The science is made-up, and dates from the eighties, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Times have changed, but 40K hasn't.

The science is ridiculous, made-up rubbishy rubbish. Hence, 'ridiculously male'.

Hang on - you said how ridiculously male 'everything' is. Now you change your story and focus on one bit of fluff? The whole science of being able to do plasma, void shields, teleportation - but need to say a prayer to turn a tank on - is OK - but zygotes isn't? You can work with a chapter turning traitor and instantly losing the ability to service an assault cannon but not zygotes? Whatever.

Next:



Yes.

Why shouldn't they? Why do you want to make people you don't know unhappy? Why do you want to deny little girls the chance to play our game? It costs you nothing except an idea, and not a very good one.

Why are you being so mean?

I guess I'm just a mean old meany, hey? If we are all equal, why can't they acquiesce to the status quo? It makes no difference to game play, very little difference at table top distance so why can't they join and accept the fluff? Why do they need us to change, they can accommodate the existing universe warts and all.



I let them choose.

Which is what I'm arguing for here. More choice. You're the one arguing for pointless limitations. I say there should be more bits to make our toys from. You want us to stick with what we've got and nothing more.

Why is it a 'pointless' limitation? are you advocating a rules change? If it is just a fluff change, then what is the point? I already stated about 2 posts back I'm all in favour of more female sculpts. Just not in a space marine army. Because you don't get female space marines. Which is nice.

I'm all for nostalgia, but 1st edition was a LONG time ago. The sculpts have improved since then, but apparently attitudes haven't.

there will be frost on Satan's windscreen before I want to see poxy social engineering inflicted on the 40K hobby. Which would be what retconning in female SM would be.

[ElectricPaladin]

there will be frost on Satan's windscreen before I want to see poxy social engineering inflicted on the 40K hobby. Which would be what retconning in female SM would be.

To be fair, Denzark, that's a pretty privileged argument. However you feel about this particular example, I think you'll see the unfairness in it. Basically you're saying "this unfairness that you are pointing out? I don't want to see fixing it change this property I love." That makes sense... to a point. That point is that many properties are old and venerable, and by cordoning off the old stuff and saying "this must not change to match modern ideas of sex and gender" you are saying that a huge portion of the world of speculative fiction can't change.

Because it would make you uncomfortable.

Isn't that a bit selfish?

[Deadlift]

I remember white salamanders...

These ones are recruited from other areas of the Imperium. Easily explained, job done :D

I think 40k fluff wise does a grand enough job of representing strong characters of box sexes, maybe not model wise but fluff wise they are everywhere.

Why do folks feel the need to change something to be more "sex" inclusive. As Wolfie pointed out they are so far removed from their origins on a physical level to no longer be considered human, rather like the Ogryn they are something else entirely.

EG as far as She-Hulk goes, she's my favorite Marvel character after Hulk, but no even she doesn't fit the space marine physique. When we get to the extreme end of muscle bulk and strength I'm sorry but women just can't get that big. But then both the Marvel and 40k universe are so full of sci-fi nonsense who knows ?

I know myself I like it as is. I'm sure some of you will immediately jump down my throat and declare me a sexist or whatever and tell me I'm this or that. I don't care I like 40k as is.

[YorkNecromancer]

I don't really need an infinite monkey cage to play in

IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU.


here is enough scope to satisfy a wide range of tastes without pandering to any one dissatisfied group or another.

Already dealt with this pile of crap. To whit:


People are not asking for every single game to star a female protagonist; they are asking for more than literally one or two titles a year to star a female protagonist. They’re asking for it to be an option. In no way is it tokenism to politely request that games more accurately reflect the makeup of the game-playing public and indeed society, instead of existing in a strange alternate reality where 90% of noteworthy people are white and male and have a number two buzzcut... ’ve had people tell me, look, we’ve got the newly re-humanised Lara Croft and we’ve got FemShep and maybe Faith, can’t we just be happy about that and celebrate it? Yes! Yes we can celebrate that. But we can also ask for more of it, please. That’s not positive discrimination. And what’s really frustration is the way that male gamers on Twitter and in comments sections tend to try to derail the argument by reaching ridiculous conclusions. Ask for more female characters and suddenly we’re apparently demanding for all games to include women, or for strict government guidelines on representation. There is a lot of fear and insecurity. I am fairly certain we will avoid a future in which developers are sent to special gender awareness prison camps for not meeting their quota of female antagonists.



If we are all equal, why can't they acquiesce to the status quo?

God, those women. They really need to shut their mouth don't they? They need to shut their mouth and accept that things are the way they are, that they'll never change, and that's good for us men.

God, they're just so uppity. They've got the vote. What else do they want?


Because you don't get female space marines. Which is nice.

Ah. And there we are. Finally.

Hello misogyny.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZ58HqrvjQk&feature=player_detailpage

[Captain Bubonicus]

I think we should change the uber-manly Space Wolves to the Emperor's Glittery Pink Ponies. I'm sure the fairer sex will come RUNNING to get in on the game.

[David Crossley]

I like how at the end of that strawman 'But I'm a nice guy' vid, YouTube helpfully suggested a vid by Karen Straughan aka Girl Writes What.

[Denzark]

Yorky you are just ignoring the points that don't help you make your argument.

I know it is NOT ABOUT ME. You say '...female space marines would give you more toys to play with...' I respond 'I don't need...'.

Had you said 'female space marines would give one more toys...' I would have responded 'one doesn't need...'.

I know its not about me, but equally its not about these droves of girls that don't want to join your 40K club because it is 'ridiculously male'.

Next, your supposed 'dealing with this pile of crap' by re-posting your cut from some right-on site about tokenism. You've dealt with absolutely sweet fanny adams. I've said my personal thoughts are that it is irrelevant what percentage of IG/Inq/Admech or whatever has females in - because people are equal so one is equally valid - therefore males and females are interchangeable. But as much as I think it would be bloody silly to have male SISTERS of battle and don't want them just to make sisters more attractive to male players, it would be bloody silly to now retcon female space marines, just to apparently make them more attractive to all these girls that shy away from a gaming club. I call BS. Female Space Marines would not open hordes of females to 40K.

Lastly, as to your accusing me of misogyny and posting an oh-so-clever video by some arty-farty media type who's only way to get poontang is to pretend to be alive to 'wimmen's issues', again, a pile of steaming turd. I do not hate women, or mistrust women. You are in error.

@ EP I'm sorry about that. I would equally have the same line to take against say, somebody trying to make male sisters of battle to make them more inclusive to a male grouping, or say - lets change the fluff to make Space Marines fully qualified at 10 years old because 10 year olds don't like to think of 100 year old genetic super soldiers. I don't think Attilans should be less Mongol, I don't think Valhallans should be less Russian, I don't think the Sisters of Silence should have more men in, I don't think SM should be less male. Not just to better portray society.

I am also not saying that they should follow modern ideas of sex and gender in society. Even with barriers changing, most combat troops in RL are male. In the fictional IG if you can fire a lasgun, fair enough - men and women. I am just sick of retconning and definitely don't want to see more just to advance RL issues. Its ridiculous.

I'm with you Deady, I like 40K as is. No problem with more players from any demographic, but not by doing 1 thing different to try and recruit them.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU.

You lost the argument as soon as you left the caps lock on, Mr Teacher.

[Mr Mystery]

See, I don't see the need to change the background so the Astartes can come from either gender.

It's well established that for reason of handwavium biological sciencey clevery stuff, the Geneseed is keyed for the male genome.

Now, what I would like to see is more exploration of why this should be so. Is it something to do with the Y chromosome, which ladies don't possess? Or, was it that as well as a bit of an arse to certain of his sons (no, Angron, you can't have your last stand. Nor shall I send down your legion for you to lead to glorious victory and ensure your homeworld is brought into the Imperium) he was a colossal sexist who felt womens just couldn't cut it on the front line in the necessary way?

Perhaps it was tried on both Genders, but males were found easier to genetically manipulate in the required way, and the scale of the forthcoming Crusade meant research was directed purely on male subjects thereafter?

Another reason could be that because the Primarchs were derived from the Emperor's DNA, and the Astartes from Primarch DNA, that convertees had to likewise be male?

Could be any number of legitimate reasons for the lack of female Astartes. I just want to see it explored in more depth.

[Denzark]

MM - I totally agree. Incidentally, I don't think we'll ever hear the 2 missing Primarchs were female - it would probably be a bit off to find out they were 'offed' by Leman Russ having been found wanting by Daddy...

[Mr Mystery]

I'd need to re-read one of the HH books to check the wording, but there's a conversation between The Sigilite and Dorn (think it's those two), where Malcador says he told The Emperor he should have made them female, and it's made clear he wasn't entirely joking.

However, I can't for the life of me recall if the wording is made you female, or made you all female. It's an important distinction!

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Which, in itself, is a sexist remark, because Malcador is implying women are easier to control. :p

[Mr Mystery]

It wasn't about control, but sibling rivalry and jealousy.

So to recap, I just want a deeper explanation of the process, and why females aren't suitable for the conversion process.

Another possible reason? Tissue rejection rates could be a lot higher in females than males. We already know not all those who undergo the process survive. If that attrition rate was higher amongst female recruits, again the pressures and requirements of the Great Crusade could have seen an interdiction on female recruits imposed in the short term. After all, the Astartes were invented after the Primarchs were abducted, which would mean limited sources of fresh geneseed.

[YorkNecromancer]

You lost the argument as soon as you left the caps lock on, Mr Teacher.

That's a descriptivist view of language; the one the media rams down our gullets as 'correct' English. I subscribe to a proscriptivist view, on account of I like to play with language. English being more art than science.

But that's not when I lost the argument. I lost when I first commented. Every ******* time one of these threads comes up, it's always the same ******* thing - the immovable force of the neckbeards meets the unstoppable force of the progressives, and all that happens is we end up getting angry, bummed out, and depressed at how hateful other people are.

And I knew it would happen! That's the worst thing! These threads are all the same, always and forever, but I cannot help from commenting. It's like a scab I have to pick. I know it's just going to hurt, and it's going to leave me sore all day, but i can't not pick at it.

*sigh*

This thread is so ****ing depressing.

Frankly, 1D4chan's article on Female Space Marines covers everything. Anyone who wants to say something should just go read it, because it sums up this crap better than anything else.

I'm off to go comfort eat.

http://1d4chan.org/images/e/e7/Female_space_marine_warhammer_40k_model_--_Female_Warrior_Gabs.jpg

[Denzark]

Yeah, Urban Dictionary definition of Neckbeard:

1. (n) Facial hair that does not exist on the face, but instead on the neck. Almost never well groomed.

2. (n) Derogatory term for slovenly nerdy people who have no sense of hygene or grooming. Often related to hobbies such as card gaming, video gaming, anime, et. al.

If this party is full of f*cking neckbeards, I'm out. I've got better things to do than sit around with a bunch of unwashed nerds.

Very 'progressive' of you to resort to such name calling.

[Ang56]

Are Space marines even really male? They are heavily modified and don't procreate, they aren't even really human by the time they are space marines. Would think to them gender is irrelevant.

Could just be that at their extremes male physical forms are capable of more strength and endurance then female forms. Who knows maybe some of them go in as women, and the process of being genetically modified so heavily has them come out looking like dudes. The gene seed would determine most of what they came out as.

[YorkNecromancer]

Very 'progressive' of you to resort to such name calling.

You are right. Name-calling is always wrong, and I shouldn't stoop to it, whether directly or through indirect implication.

So, I apologise for that. I shouldn't have done it and I am sorry.

[Gotthammer]

“If we can’t write diversity into sci-fi, then what’s the point? You don’t create new worlds to give them all the same limits of the old ones.”


— Jane Espenson

40k has theoretical diversity, but outside of a bare handful of characters and Eldar, there are almost no women (or non-white people) present in the core books. Go to BL, FW and FF and the diversity increases, but at the entry point 40k screams "white boys only".
And representation is important if you're a minority - seeing people like you be the heroes...

http://31.media.tumblr.com/81d4b72734e30b0f7c33b2c2ab26cc75/tumblr_mvsu2ypik31s1c506o1_400.jpg


...or even just seeing people like yourself at all...


A young black girl decided to not bleach her skin after seeing the success of Lupita Nyong’o.

Lupita Nyong’o was inspired to be an actress after seeing Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg in The Color Purple.

Whoopi Goldberg realized she could BE an actress after seeing Nichelle Nichols in Star Trek


...really makes you feel less alienated, be it due to race, religion, gender or sexuality. So please be careful when you say you don't want to see diversity or inclusion, as it really comes close to the same argument that people use to repress minorities - "it's always been this way, I like it this way, why should it change to make a few people feel better?"

[Psychosplodge]

These ones are recruited from other areas of the Imperium. Easily explained, job done :D


Nah, the charcoal skin is explained as the geneseeds reaction to Nocturnes sun so the first time they went "home"...

[eldargal]

EG as far as She-Hulk goes, she's my favorite Marvel character after Hulk, but no even she doesn't fit the space marine physique. When we get to the extreme end of muscle bulk and strength I'm sorry but women just can't get that big. But then both the Marvel and 40k universe are so full of sci-fi nonsense who knows ?
True but then men can't really get that big either, not Space Marine big. Also worth noting that the difference in Olympic class weight lifters by sex is around 35%, in that men can lift that much more BUT it has been shrinking since women were first allowed into the competition in 1996 I think it was. In most other sports the difference is only 5-10%. As i've mentioned the problem with establishing just how strong each sex is is hampered by many, many different issues.

Denzark, you're a whtie man. Everything is made to cater to you so you are in a position to say 'who gives a damn, I don't need change' because you really don't. Everyone else does because we have been ignored for the past six thousand years or so in the case of women.


40k has theoretical diversity, but outside of a bare handful of characters and Eldar, there are almost no women (or non-white people) present in the core books. Go to BL, FW and FF and the diversity increases, but at the entry point 40k screams "white boys only".
And representation is important if you're a minority - seeing people like you be the heroes...
+1

[Psychosplodge]

I think we should change the uber-manly Space Wolves to the Emperor's Glittery Pink Ponies. I'm sure the fairer sex will come RUNNING to get in on the game.

http://i57.tinypic.com/6td01j.pnghttp://i60.tinypic.com/2le6xdz.png

[Deadlift]

True but then men can't really get that big either, not Space Marine big.

EG I beg to differ :p

http://i844.photobucket.com/albums/ab3/joenortonjones/e6902f47414b1096f3643e97bef07010.jpg

Dorian Yates would too. Nope this ain't a photo shop either. Freaky ain't it :D

[Mr Mystery]

Freakish more like.

[Wolfshade]

He is from Sutton Coldfield, they refuse to admit they are from birmingham, bring that big is the least of his issues. I walk past his gym from time to time...

[Deadlift]

He is from Sutton Coldfield, they refuse to admit they are from birmingham, bring that big is the least of his issues. I walk past his gym from time to time...

I trained with him years ago at Steve's Gym in newton abbot. He was a really nice guy and very very big. This was about 10-15 years ago. He's not anymore but he's got his own company selling supplements and stuff.

Jay Cutler is another massive man and another example of just how huge a man can get with the right diet, chemicals and training. No woman could ever get to this size ever. Just not possible. This is why I used Dorian as an example.

[Anggul]

They're all male because they're meant to be warrior monks, and the stereotypical view of monks is an all-male monastery where everyone is being holy without the distraction of the opposite sex. That wouldn't be a distraction to the mentally conditioned Astartes of course, but that's the image they were going for, hence fortress-monasteries and strict schedules of training, prayer and meditation, walking around in robes when not in battle. People often get lost with all the fancy new things the Imperium seem to have and the over-characterisation in some games and books and forget that they're supposed to be holy warrior monks in space.

The place where GW drop the ball is the models for factions which don't have such a theme. All you would really need is different heads (only for when they don't have masks such as helmetless or cadian helmets) and maybe slightly more effeminate legs. The torso difference would hardly be noticeable under the armour (flak armour for example). The Eldar 'female' torsos are just comically huge-chested. I just assume that X number of my Dire Avengers, Fire Dragons, Striking Scorpions, Dark Reapers and so on are female, but you can't tell under the armour.

[onlyonepinman]

Without getting into the science too much I can understand why female space marines might not exist, anything that increases bone density and muscle mass is likely to have a much greater effect on men than women - men have naturally more muscle mass and bone density and any genetic modification that changes this is likely to have a significantly larger effect on males.

However, I don't think this should exclude anyone from converting female Space Marine characters. I say characters specifically because let's face it, how can you really tell the gender of the models in an all enclosed suit of power armour? You just need to head swap a few of the unmasked marines, which tend to be mostly the characters, and hey presto you have some female space marines. It's your hobby, enjoy it however you see fit.

The main gripe I have about Games Workshop's lack of female miniatures in their human ranges is that most of the novels I've read (admittedly this is limited to the Gaunts Ghosts series) feature female Imperial Guard. Not in the same numbers as the men (which I personally think is an accurate reflection of the future) but they are there all the same and their miniatures range doesn't reflect this. I would love to see the occasional female trooper in Imperial Guard squads not because I have any particular need for social justice but simply for the aesthetic. Unlike space marines, a female IG Trooper will be obviously female when sculpted as a miniature and that makes a real difference to the overall appearance of the squads and it does so, in my opinion, for the better. Most great sci fi movies contain female soldiers, from Alien all the way to Starship Troopers - think they are an essential part of any sci-fi human army, discounting the genetically engineered meat-heads that are the space marines for which I think it is entirely plausible that they are all male. I do like the Sisters of Battle range although I think they should do more to distance them from the Inquisition and give them more agency of their own. I also think they need to get rid of the bondage element entirely - the repentia sisters in BDSM outfits with whips are just ridiculous and one of the reasons I would never buy a Sisters of Battle army (along with the obvious expense). They look ridiculous and no self respecting commander would consider wasting a highly trained soldier in a battle over some infraction by stripping them of their armour and weapons and making them run into battle in a spikey bikini. Games Workshop, if you're reading this - sort it out.

I do find it interesting that Games Workshop's fluff portrays Eldar as being gender balanced in terms of who fights and who does not - everyone fights; indeed some of their most iconic units and powerful characters are female and yet at the same time they are portrayed as a dying species which actually makes females much more valuable to the species and therefore much less disposable as has already been pointed out. For example, to make a thousand baby eldar requires about 1000 eldar women and one very lucky eldar man although genetic diversity might suffer a bit so expect to see a few six fingered Eldar with webbed feet. A species that is on the brink of destruction simply cannot afford to send females to war. A species like humanity which is generally portrayed as over-populated and having almost limitless bodies to throw into the meat grinder, can easily afford to send women to war.

So, is there a case for female Space Marines? I don't think that there is an explicit case for them but, conversely because it is all pure fantasy there isn't really case to not have them either - fantasy is whatever you want it to be. If I were Games Workshop I wouldn't be rushing out to manufacture legions of female Space Marines because there is no reason to do so. It's a winning formula (although I can't see why) that outsells the rest of their range combined and that is not something you mess with. Is there a case for more female miniatures? Absolutely there is and, far from thinking that a lack of them keeps girls out of the hobby (I don't believe this is the case at all), I do think it would make some armies look much cooler and it would make buying miniatures for my Dark Heresy games so much easier.

[Chris22]

Difficult to inject science and physics into a universe with kilometers long war ships, power-armoured transhumans riding giant wolves into battle, and daemons materializing from a parallel universe. And the idea that there is a veritable horde of women who want to play 40k, but won't because there aren't any female space marines is a bit rubbish to me.

You want female Space Marines? Go play with the Sisters of Battle. It's an exclusively female faction for crying out loud that can serve as a counter to the Marines, who are exclusively male.

Female Space Marines would look practically identical to a male Space Marine so if a woman wants to get an army that actually looks female she would be better getting off getting the Sisters of Battle cause new female Marines wouldn't be any different from the regulars. I actually like the Sisters of Battle and would definitely field an army of them if they ever get a plastic range as their current metal army is just too expensive.

Granted, the IG could use a few more female models to fit the fluff and reflect the fact that the Imperium has trillions upon trillions of humans. A push to get more female models for the IG would be great. Pushing for female Space Marines doesn't really serve any point.

[Billy_Mx]

I can see a couple of ppl here don't have sufficient enough interaction with the female gender in the outside world because I hadn't even noticed all these "sex-equality" issues before.

If you are in desperate need o seeing girls man, go to a WNBA game or just buy a Sister's of battle Codex or modify your models. I put pony tails in a few IG models and BOOM, there be girls in the front lines.

Maybe you are not too familiar with ACTUAL wars and military branches. You will be surprised at the relation between male and females in the front lines. From what I remember there were WAY more male marines than female Marines in Aliens as well, and Dutch's commando team was all dudes. Seriously, if you need to see girls, just go to the outside world and get your dose.

[Thornblood]

So, whilst GW is in charge of the background, I would like to offer two arguments, both complimentary to each other, but also in tension.

Firstly- I loved the warhammer 40,000 background (and fantasy) and one of the reasons is that all the action shave flaws. Its the flaws that make individuals in stories come alive, and trigger emotions about them. In the case of the Imperium, a big flaw is the way its backwards looking. Backwards looking in the sense that it holds the great crusade and when the emperor walked the stars as its greatest point, and it would like to reclaim that former glory and re-instate things as they were, and backwards looking in the more modern political sense that its not forward thinking, not trying to progress, or enable its citizens, but power-monger and forcibly enslave the citizens. New ideas are generally treated as heresy, and it plays off of the hollywood stereotype of the church in the dark ages.

As my (female) boss says; "Give me solutions not problems!"

A potential solution to this problem is; A magos in the adeptus mechanicus ordo biologis has worked out how to create female space marines through a different means to the normal man-hanced way, and is killed for his/her crimes against the Emperors design, back in the 30k era. Millennia later an Adeptus mechanicus explorator team uncover the plans. They begin putting them into practice. (Now for the consequences). A full chapter of female space marines are created and some local space marine chapters also begin to have mixed sex chapters. Some fun fluff is written about romance, brother vs sister internal struggles, the fact that the all female chapter is not as progressive as the mixed sex chapter, all good for exploring the new concept). Then the Imperium gets wind of whats happening and dosn't like it (backwards looking as they are). Perhaps they prove they are still emperor-worshipping devout women and men and the Imperium grants a pardon and contains the female marines in that sector of space for 'further study' which is an excuse which delays the civil war from the backwards thinking Imperial hard-liners (which incidentally would include the Sisters of Battle) and stops it from spreading to the rest of the galaxy.

Two more things are of note- The Sisters of Battle would become pointless, there two unique elements being- extreme faith and all female. The other is who is to say that the sisters of silence are not the female equivalent marines, its just that the role they play only allows for psychic blanks to be recruited?

However players are free to do what they want with models and conversions (and background) so you could still have female marines yourself.

As long as GW remember to keep the female armour 'normal' and have breastplates designed to deflect blows rather than those that are merely bullet traps that redirect a blow towards a ladies heart.

Lastly, the fantasy and sci-fi genre still has a long way to go in terms of sexual equality, its not just GW.

[Levaticus]

Actually, when it comes to the disabled, I was really impressed by the representation of Ravenor. His disability isn't glorified - he gets a chair, not a badass robot body - but he still continues to kick *** and takes names of ***** to kick later. Like a boss.
It's a badass hover chair, with guns and stuff.:D But I agree with everything you say. Correct if i'm wrong but isn't it mentioned that Ravenor's current state allowed him to become the kickass psychic powerhouse he is?

[onlyonepinman]

I can see a couple of ppl here don't have sufficient enough interaction with the female gender in the outside world because I hadn't even noticed all these "sex-equality" issues before.
Speaking as a happily married man, my desire to see female models doesn't stem from a desire to see women, nor is it so much an equality issue; I have no interest in balancing genders anywhere in the name of social justice, least of all in warhammer 40k. But I think the inclusion of two or three female models in a box of Imperial Guard would improve the aesthetic of the squad, in my eyes at least and for me I'm more interested in the aesthetic of my models than the actual army's viability for tabletop gaming. I accept that this is only my opinion and other people may be less concerned. I also don't expect to see Games Workshop actually making female models in any great numbers any time soon - this is hardly a new argument and not only have they resisted it thus far but actually it doesn't seem to have affected them in any way at all.

[ElectricPaladin]

It's a badass hover chair, with guns and stuff.:D But I agree with everything you say. Correct if i'm wrong but isn't it mentioned that Ravenor's current state allowed him to become the kickass psychic powerhouse he is?

Eisenhorn muses on the possibility. Ravenor himself merely says, IIRC, that being cut off from his body has forced him to focus on the mental, which has improved his psychic powers. More a matter of exercise than anything else.

[iandanger]

Personally, I do want to change the culture around 40K on the basis of social justice. Its not just about making the game more inclusive, which is useful for making it more attractive to new players, sure, but its also about the impact that culture has on participants. I don't want 40k to reinforce the machismo of sexists, and I don't want game groups to be inherently hostile to female participants. Sadly I see that all over the place. Striving to make the background more inclusive isn't a panacea, but its progress.

This is also how cultural progress always work. The old vanguards try to keep things as they are, and the people with new ideas start as an insurgency, but more often than not, the better ideas rise to the top, and the old die off as they always must. Human culture is evolutionary, and that includes subcultures. Things are going to change, especially when you're dealing with a commercial entity. It may be slow, and in the end this particular hill might not be crossed (female space marines specifically) but asking for inclusion is still valuable for challenging assumptions.

TLDR I'll take inclusion and social engineering over stubborn insistence that the way things are done shouldn't change any day, and I think in the long run that view will win, regardless of the stubborn resistance of the old.

[ElectricPaladin]

Personally, I do want to change the culture around 40K on the basis of social justice...

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?

Now, I'd like to put out there my own opinion...

I don't think anything is wrong with gendered elements in fantasy settings. It's something that human cultures have done from to time, and stories about humans grappling with the limitations their cultures place on their lives are neat. The thing is that it's important to be more conscious about it. If anyone could be a Space Marine but the Imperium had some "in the image of the Primarchs" superstition, that would be interesting. It would include actual content about the world. If it's just conveniently not possible for women to become Space Marines are dudes, so that all Space Marines are big manly men just like everyone expects, that's... boring. It's just more of the same old same old.

Something else - anything else - would be more fun.

And incidentally, make the world a better place.

[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 :D

[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. :p

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.

[SuperDann]

Just thought I'd add my two cents vis-à-vis 40K being a sexist setting. We're talking about a dystopian future, where mutants are scorned, psykers killed or enslaved, and anyone with a slightly different view is branded a heretic and consequently burned. And that's just the human race itself. We're not even getting started on xenos relations. This clearly is not an ideal place to live. Why, then, would it fit the "feel" of 40K to purposely retcon the fluff to make it less sexist? If we're going to do that, then let's add in a UN-style summit where all races can come together and work for a better galaxy. Let's add a fair, transparent and impartial court system to the work of the Inquisition. No thank you, I like my future to be grim and dark, and I don't consider it sexist to do so. It's a fictional setting, not modern day. If I were writing my own Sci-Fi setting in a flawed universe I'd hate for somebody to come along and say "No, you can't do that because in today's world x, y, z." It's my world, I'll make it as flawed as I like. As has been mentioned already, flaws make for interesting stories.

Also, consist the following: let's have a more equal gender ratio in Imperial officers and stormtroopers in Star Wars. Let's change half of the dwarves to women in The Hobbit (that bigoted Peter Jackson, how dare he not retcon the story). And the Avengers only had one female in it, and she's not even technically a superhero.

As to more sculpts - yes please. With the Astra Militarum being released imminently I am dusting of the few Guard miniatures that I have and it would be nice to get a bit of diversity in there.

Also, my little gaming group consists of myself, three other guys and two (yes, two!) women. One of them, the newest, plays Tyranids. The other, having been around for a while, plays Orks, Eldar and has just recently picked up the beginnings of a Space Marine force. A friend of a friend I played once (female) played Ravenwing. Not once have I heard any of them say anything about gender balance issues in the game. As onlyonepinman has just said, its nothing to do with a lack of female miniatures. Its to do with whether or not girls want to play what is, ultimately, a boy-ish game.

[eldargal]

The Imperium isn't that sexist though, nor is the setting as a whole. They have more important things to worry about than what gender people identify as. Having all male Space Marines is a bit sexist but changing that wouldn't change the setting much at all. As I said earlier the main problems with sexism in 40k are unrelated to the setting:

The model range is far too male-heavy against what the background indicates.
The named characters in codices, even in races that are known to have no defined gender roles, still overwhelmingly favour men.
The main cast of the overwhelming majority of Black Library books is exclusively or mostly male
The people depicted in most 40k artwork are male

Not once have I heard any of them say anything about gender balance issues in the game. As onlyonepinman has just said, its nothing to do with a lack of female miniatures. Its to do with whether or not girls want to play what is, ultimately, a boy-ish game.
A few things:
they may not have wanted to tell you so as not to cause a fuss. Look at what happens in male dominated, geek areas when women do speak out. Death threats, rape threats, massive amounts of abuse is thrown at them. A lot of women tend not to speak up especially if it just in a friendly setting because the last thing you want is to open up a can of misogynist worms in a group you like.

It is a boy-ish game because it has been marketed at boys and predominately features boys as the protagonist. there is no kind of genetic imperative that says 'boys like this, girls do not'. 40k is a predominately male game because it has been aimed solely at men, with no thought given to women. You cannot market something featuring almost entirely men at men for thirty years and then turn around and say 'women just aren't interested'. You haven't given us a reason to be. The same logic still dogs the video game industry despite women making up 47% of the demographic. If you go out of your way to tell women that this product isn't for them you can't turn around and say that women aren't interested as a justification for maintaining that exclusionary behaviour.

Did you know that A Song of Fire and Ice readership is 60% female, despite people thinking of it as 'boys literature'? Give women well developed, female characters to relate to and we will buy your ****. It is simple as that.

Again, I DO NOT THINK ADDING FEMALE SPACE MARINES IS THE ANSWER! I do not think it would be a bad thing, I think there are lot more important things though.


Edit: It is true there is an element of socialisation to this, in that girls are told they should like certain things and boys other things. But that is precisely why I want GW to STOP doing that with the way they market their products. That time is really over, the public growth of the 'geek/gamer girl' over the past few years and the wider battles about female representation illustrate that.

Another edit:It is simplistic to say that adding more female presence will bring more female players for those armies. Women do not automatically go for feminine armies. What it does is show that women are recognised as important by the people making the products, tells us our presence is valued and makes it more comfortable if we aren't surrounded by images of male power fantasies or male sex fantasies.

[Deadlift]

they may not have wanted to tell you so as not to cause a fuss. Look at what happens in male dominated, geek areas when women do speak out. Death threats, rape threats, massive amounts of abuse is thrown at them. A lot of women tend not to speak up especially if it just in a friendly setting because the last thing you want is to open up a can of misogynist worms in a group you like.

Bloody hell, really ? Threats of death and rape from expressing a point of view amongst friends. I suggest to those in that situation finding new play mates. I think you might be exaggerating just a bit there kiddo :D you may have statistics and anecdotes to say otherwise but I'm using the fine fellows in the BoLs community as my counterpoint. They may not agree with you 100% all the time but I've not seen threats from any of my fellow nerds and geeks to anyone else here or in my gaming community.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Female Space Marines would look practically identical to a male Space Marine so if a woman wants to get an army that actually looks female she would be better getting off getting the Sisters of Battle cause new female Marines wouldn't be any different from the regulars. I actually like the Sisters of Battle and would definitely field an army of them if they ever get a plastic range as their current metal army is just too expensive.

This is a good point, because the gene-seed makes the Marine look similar to their Primarch. (Horus Aximand, Kayvaan Shrike, The Alpha Legion)
So if a female had gene-seed, she'd end up having a manly face anyway.

[Deadlift]

This is a good point, because the gene-seed makes the Marine look similar to their Primarch. (Horus Aximand, Kayvaan Shrike, The Alpha Legion)
So if a female had gene-seed, she'd end up having a manly face anyway.

That is a good point :).

[eldargal]

BoLs is LITERALLY the one place I've not had threats of violence and rape for expressing a desire for better representation of women in geeky things.:( I've not had death threats in a long time thankfully.
I don't just mean friends though, but gaming clubs with friends and acquaintances. But there is still a lot of pressure sometimes not to speak up and upset the status quo by bringing up such issues. I know a lot of women who have had problems with friends and brothers even when they have said they find something problematic though. Of course it could be that the women in this situation really didn't care and that is fine too. But just because some women might not care it doesn't mean it isn't an issue.

BoLS is unusually good though as I said. There is no way in hell I'd have started the feminism thread down in the Oubliette anywhere else.


People keep on bringing up having giant, female slabs of muscle Marines like it would be a bad thing though...

[Deadlift]

Luckily for me then this is the only forum I've ever frequented on a regular basis. I heard some of the others can get a bit heated but not that bad.

Don't worry though, I'm still ready to counter you on any issue I disagree with you on :p
Especially when I know your wrong lol

Hug

[eldargal]

Funnily enough, perhaps in keeping with the relative lack of misogynist elements in 40k/WFB I find the community forums somewhat better in this regard than others, at least in my experience. Warseer has it's problems but widespread misogyny isn't one of them, there was a little bit more at Dakka when I lurked but compared to what you see on video game, comic and other forums it might as well be non-existent. for example since the increasing introduction of ladybots into the Transformers comics the main forums have been sporadically been exploding into some obscene outbreaks of misogyny. you couldn't pay me to post on those, just getting excerpts on tumblr is bad enough:
http://25.media.tumblr.com/5877c4810b6aec637cfa113d743e927e/tumblr_n2z57c3fqh1qkinreo1_1280.jpg
Source (http://itswalky.tumblr.com/post/80649282770/transformers-was-the-very-last-refuge-for-those)

So you can imagine if you were a woman playing 40k with friends and you see this sort of thing happening online all the time in ohter areas you might be somewhat reluctant to bring the issue up even with people you otherwise like and trust. Especially when a lot of men still view feminism as some kind of irrational hate-fueled ideology.

I'm never wrong, empirical fact.:p

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Who else but Deadlift? :D

[SuperDann]

The Imperium isn't that sexist though, nor is the setting as a whole. They have more important things to worry about than what gender people identify as. Having all male Space Marines is a bit sexist but changing that wouldn't change the setting much at all.

The Imperium might not be, but the Chapters may well be, recruiting from warrior-cultures. And, historically speaking, how many warrior cultures featured women in any significant numbers?


They may not have wanted to tell you so as not to cause a fuss. Look at what happens in male dominated, geek areas when women do speak out. Death threats, rape threats, massive amounts of abuse is thrown at them. A lot of women tend not to speak up especially if it just in a friendly setting because the last thing you want is to open up a can of misogynist worms in a group you like.

I would certainly hope note. In my case, the two women involved are the wife and fiancée two of the other guys respectively. And they took it upon themselves to investigate the hobby, they weren't forced or even coerced into it. And they have no problem letting us know their opinions on a number of other topics so I can't imagine why they would be coy about supposed gender imbalances.


It is a boy-ish game because it has been marketed at boys and predominately features boys as the protagonist...40K is a predominately male game because it has been aimed solely at men, with no thought given to women...

Why would this be the case? Maybe because traditionally boys have been more interested in these types of games, and therefore from a business perspective you go after a target audience. Or is that sexist?


The same logic still dogs the video game industry despite women making up 47% of the demographic.

I've heard this figure bandied about a lot. Where is the original source? And does this include everything from Call of Duty to Candy Crush? because Those two games are different ends of the video game spectrum.


Another edit:It is simplistic to say that adding more female presence will bring more female players for those armies. Women do not automatically go for feminine armies. What it does is show that women are recognised as important by the people making the products, tells us our presence is valued and makes it more comfortable if we aren't surrounded by images of male power fantasies or male sex fantasies.

Is it really the case that having a feminine army will bring in female players to non-feminine armies? My friends would consider it pandering if GW introduced a more female army.


People keep on bringing up having giant, female slabs of muscle Marines like it would be a bad thing though...

For the sheer physiques of Space Marines, the female body, on the whole, just doesn't seem suitable to take that kind of build. I was going to say it's unrealistic, but then we are talking about space men and space elves and space bugs all shooting at each other here.

[Deadlift]

EG Do you remember that cosplay picture you posted of the 2 girls you claimed were actually the same person but actually weren't ;) I do.

Empirical fact, I think not :D

Back on track, I think as much as GW keeps telling us it's our game and we can play it how we want, the same should really stand with our armies too. You want girlie space marines, do it. But you can bet your life when Sisters do get the much needed plastic revamp, I'm going to all over that army right away.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

So do I Deadlift. :D

I already have Sisters. So I'll probably scrap them when the plastic revamp hits. :)

[Psychosplodge]

Empirical fact, I think not :D


:rolleyes:
You can prove anything with facts

:D

[eldargal]

The Imperium might not be, but the Chapters may well be, recruiting from warrior-cultures. And, historically speaking, how many warrior cultures featured women in any significant numbers?
Scythians, Mongols amongst others. Then you have the mythological amazons of course.

I would certainly hope note. In my case, the two women involved are the wife and fiancée two of the other guys respectively. And they took it upon themselves to investigate the hobby, they weren't forced or even coerced into it. And they have no problem letting us know their opinions on a number of other topics so I can't imagine why they would be coy about supposed gender imbalances.
I would hope not too and I do not mean to speak on their behalf. but you would be surprised how many women are not open about these things with men they love and respect simply because some offhanded comment or joke about feminism or whatever ma have made them feel they can't bring up the issue with them and receive a fair hearing. It is, sadly, a thing. but again the main point really is that just because some women do not care about a problem doesn't mean others who do are wrong. Which you haven't suggested, just making the point.:) Women aren't a hive mind.

Why would this be the case? Maybe because traditionally boys have been more interested in these types of games, and therefore from a business perspective you go after a target audience. Or is that sexist?
Traditionally boys have been told to be interested in more violent/manly areas while girls are told not to be. This did break down at various points in the 20th century but since the 80s there was a huge refocus in geeky areas to market solely towards boys. Lego, video games, comics you name it and GW became a big thing at this time when this culture was growing. they aren't as bad as others, quite the contrary, but there is still a strong element of just not seeing women as a market. I've had some conversations with people at GW and BL and they are aware of this and that it needs to change so I'm hopeful it will. I becomes a self fulfilling prophecy though. You market at boys, boys buy the product, girls don't because the community is often hostile and the company indifferent, so you continue to market at boys because girls aren't as visible an audience, so you keep marketing at boys etc.

I've heard this figure bandied about a lot. Where is the original source? And does this include everything from Call of Duty to Candy Crush? because Those two games are different ends of the video game spectrum.
The Entertainment Software Association of America is the source, there surveys over the past few years have seen a distinct rise in the number of women buying and playing video games, from 42% a few years ago to 47 or 49% in the last year or two. there was another survey which found that 40% of console owners back in 2007 were women, to help counter the 'yeah but they only play casual games' argument. It doesn't differentiate between casual and 'proper' video games but then it doesn't need to. Men play casual games as well as women and while some genres are more popular amongst women estimates of female demographics in genres such as FPS and RPGs still range from 30-45%. There is absolutely no evidence that the 47% overall demographic is represented primarily in casual games.

Is it really the case that having a feminine army will bring in female players to non-feminine armies? My friends would consider it pandering if GW introduced a more female army.
Not necessarily a feminine army, no. Better representation doesn't mean another army. As I've said things like having more women on covers, in artwork, as characters in codices and in the main cast of more books would do the trick. The only pandering is really that white guys get representation completely out of proportion with their actual numbers and even their presence in the demographics.


For the sheer physiques of Space Marines, the female body, on the whole, just doesn't seem suitable to take that kind of build. I was going to say it's unrealistic, but then we are talking about space men and space elves and space bugs all shooting at each other here.
That isn't necessarily true and there are a lot of factors why women tend not to bulk up like men. It is true that men at present find it easier to bulk up because of higher testosterone levels but then those levels have been dropping over the 20th century. Unlike men women are also actively discouraged from building up muscle, even when encouraging feminine exercise muscle isn't talked about, you aim to be 'toned' and only toned enough to be attractive. Then you have the fact that the male physique varies more dramatically than the differences between the sexes. But big framed women will often seek to be as small as possible because that is what is deemed attractive, so rather than having the 6ft woman bulk up to the extent a man might she will do the opposite.
From a skeletal perspective none of the major muscle bearing bones are diagnostic as male or female. The pelvis and skull are really the only bones that sex can be determined with any certainty and even then it isn't 100%. Archaeologists in the past have got into a lot of trouble by assuming robust skeletons are male only to find examination of the pelvis indicates they were probably female.

Now it is quite possible that without some kind of technological intervention the strongest man will always be stronger than the strongest woman. But things are so unequal in how we encourage muscle development that at present we have no way to tell what that difference would actually be. At an Olympic level between weightlifters the disparity in what they can lift is 35% BUT the sport has only been open to women since 1998 or something. In most other sports the difference is 7-15% and that is without addressing the social issues of developing muscle growth in women I talked about above.


But this is also largely irrelevant as 40k is a science fiction setting and this kind of realism doesn't mean a damn thing. Even those guys Deadlift posted earlier don't compare to Space Marine physique even if they come the closest to what we can have naturally.


EG Do you remember that cosplay picture you posted of the 2 girls you claimed were actually the same person but actually weren't ;) I do.
The cosplay blog that posted it said they were the same.:p

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

And if she's wrong she blames it on others. :p

[eldargal]

That's because I'm never wrong, only sometimes misinformed.:p

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

And I'm actually Superman.

[iandanger]

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).

I don't see why you are surprised to see emphasis on corporate leadership positions and political positions, rather than gender equity across the board in every profession. When we're talking about discrimination, the issue comes down to power, who has it, how they wield it, and the implications on so-called "minorities" (women being a majority that have a minority of power and therefore fall into that classification). The % of garbage men or teachers of each gender isn't substantially impacting government policy, the low representation of women in Congress and corporate leadership both have serious implications for policy decisions, because while people in general struggle with empathy, understanding the perspective of others, etc, that problem is exacerbated by the position of dominant groups, simply put they have far fewer shared experiences vs other minorities. This tends to manifest itself in different ways in different contexts, but really its all tangential to what we're discussing here, which is a fictional setting and a product line from a company that wants to make money. And considering Barbie is constantly criticized for its portrayal of women, and those criticisms have always been ignored, I'm not sure why protest against the toy line should move on to another issue (gender representation).


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.

Lets leave aside projection from early research, the issue here isn't about young children, its about socialized adolescents, and moreso really adults (who I imagine make up a larger portion of wargaming consumers than children), so regardless of the cause, the preferences of men and women for entertainment do impact consumption of the game. The thing is, Warhammer is not primarily mechanical, really its primarily anatomical (but in reality its both cars and dolls). 40k is best viewed in the context of wargaming, which its itself just a sub-category of board/card games. Unfortunately, I could only find publicly available market research from Germany on the topic: http://www.toy.de/fakten-2009/EuroToys_consumer_summary_ge_2009.pdf, but the breakdown of consumers shows a substantial portion of age 18+ sales of board games are to women. Subjectively, the board game nights I have gone to have featured a diverse mix of female and male players, and games like Risk and Settlers of Catan go over just fine with the women I've discussed them with. That's, of course, entirely anectdotal, but a lack of available data makes fools of us all. Regardless, with the recent growth of popularity of board games among older demographics, the sales *decline* that Games Workshop is experiencing tells you a lot about how it is faring. Hell, even Relic has more female characters as a portion of its options than 40k does. We're living in an era of resurgent analogue gaming, probably largely as a reaction to the socially isolating effect of playing video games in a group of people, but 40k is getting left behind. This is far from solely an issue of gender representation in the game, but you can't say it doesn't have an impact, just as we can't prove it does, we can only urge GW to consider it in their strategy and try to make the game attractive to more players in general, but also women in specific.



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.

Again, your assumption is that making the product more inclusive in who's stories they tell will somehow hurt the appeal to male gamers, I don't see why that would need to be the case. Malifaux and Warmachine both feature a large number of female characters (Malifaux is likely where I will get the model for my female inquisitor when I get around to it), and both products are competing well against a substantially larger, established producer. That said, I seriously doubt the quality of GW's market research, as they haven't managed to increase unit sales (revenue increases for years came from price inflation, until the recent drop) even among their core demographic. GW may not be able to adapt, and in the end it may hurt them, but other companies aren't so constrained. Personally, as a GW hobbyist who doesn't really want to dedicate my time and budget to other games, I'd prefer Games Workshop were a leader on the issue, rather than the big, unresponsive sick man of wargaming that it has been the last few years.

[eldargal]

+1 Relying on the old demographic of middle class white boys is not a good business move. Inclusiveness = broader demographic = more customers = more money. It's usually a matter of doing what you are doing slightly differently rather than doing more, it doesn't cost a lot extra.

[SuperDann]

+1 Relying on the old demographic of middle class white boys is not a good business move. Inclusiveness = broader demographic = more customers = more money. It's usually a matter of doing what you are doing slightly differently rather than doing more, it doesn't cost a lot extra.

Without conducting some proper market research (which would cost money in and of itself) is this a safe assumption to make? And it's not just a question of "Would it make money?", it is a case of "How much money would it make and is it therefore worth the time and effort as well?". As a male I'm not obviously qualified to judge this, but I don't see anything about the game that actively excludes females. But then I regularly play with and against both guys and girls.

[eldargal]

Without conducting some proper market research (which would cost money in and of itself) is this a safe assumption to make? And it's not just a question of "Would it make money?", it is a case of "How much money would it make and is it therefore worth the time and effort as well?". As a male I'm not obviously qualified to judge this, but I don't see anything about the game that actively excludes females. But then I regularly play with and against both guys and girls.
It wouldn't take much:

You're writing special characters anyway, make some female. no extra cost.
You're making artwork anyway, make some of the figures female, no extra cost.
You're writing a novel with characters anyway, make some female, no extra cost.
You're making models anyway, make some female, no extra cost*.

*Probably, I mean it is possible some sculptors might need to spend more time on them to get the mto standard but most of them are on salary so it isn't like you're paying an hourly rate.

I think it is a safe assumption based on other industries. Comic books for example have women as the largest growing demographic and most of that is going to some of the smaller independent companies that recognised this and made an effort to have somegood female led books while the big two are weighed down by an awful lot of sexist baggage. Though Marvel is also doing better in that regard. Video games always had a large female demographic that was completley ignored but a lot of games were somewhat inclusive by accident, giving people the ability to play as a female in an RPG. When companies like Bioware recognised this it tended to go well for them. I remember back in 2007-8 people were shocked when LOTRO had a 40% female playerbase but it was a very female friendly game with no ridiculous macho testosterone laden moments and no sexualised female armour.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

So when are the Male Sisters of Battle releasing?

[Wolfshade]

Of course teh real question is why there are no male sisters of battle...


Explicit ruling barring the Ecclesiarchy from having men at arms.:p

Bit late to the party...

[eldargal]

So when are the Male Sisters of Battle releasing?
After we get female Catachans, female Cadians, female Vostroyans, female Valhallans, female Stormtroopers, female Commissars, female Mordians, female Incubi, female Striking Scorpions, female Fire Dragons, more than two female Guardians, female Warp spiders, female Swooping Hawks, female Dark Reapers, female Dire Avengers, female Warlocks, female Farseers, female Scouts/Rangers and more than one or two female characters out of 8-10 for races that have no defined gender roles. Not to mention female Tau head options. These are all choices which the background has female presence canonically, unlike male SoB which are explicitly forbidden for a reason that makes more sense than inaccurate technobabble.

[Wolfshade]

Would female Incubi still be called an incubi, surely sucubi would be more correct?

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

These are all choices which the background has female presence canonically, unlike male SoB which are explicitly forbidden for a reason that makes more sense than inaccurate technobabble.

So, to re-word that to prove my point.

These are all choices which the background has female presence canonically, but female Space Marines should not exist because it is forbidden for made-up canonical biological reasons, as well as them being a cell of warrior-monks.

[eldargal]

From a mythological perspective yes incubi are male succubi but from a 40k lore perspective they are human translations of the Dark Eldar names which are much more poetic.:) Of course you could have something like the Howling Banshee story Gav thorpe wanted to do with a male Banshee whose Banshee War Mask was female. But then there is no evidence that Incubi are gendered like Howling Banshees.

[Gotthammer]

The Imperium might not be, but the Chapters may well be, recruiting from warrior-cultures. And, historically speaking, how many warrior cultures featured women in any significant numbers?

Historically speaking how many alien species have we had interplanetary / dimensional wars with? None.

It's a fantastical, futuristic setting, the year 40,000 even - that historical things from our point of view apply to keeping women out or second class is weak.

[eldargal]

So, to re-word that to prove my point.

These are all choices which the background has female presence canonically, but female Space Marines should not exist because it is forbidden for made-up canonical biological reasons, as well as them being a cell of warrior-monks.

I'm not actually talking about female Space Marines and haven't for some time. I don't even particularly want them as I've also said. there are a lot more things that would make a much bigger difference to female representation in the setting than adding FSM.

[Psychosplodge]

Historically speaking how many alien species have we had interplanetary / dimensional wars with? None. .

That we know, you know how those time paradoxs are and all that

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I'm not actually talking about female Space Marines and haven't for some time. I don't even particularly want them as I've also said. there are a lot more things that would make a much bigger difference to female representation in the setting than adding FSM.

I was mainly aiming that at the likes of YorkNecromancer.

I too, would rather a bigger female representation. I'm hoping that the actual Guard release helps matters.

[eldargal]

Fair enough. i mean I wouldn't object to FSM and I don't think it would be a bad thing, I'd be quite happy if it happened really but it's not an important area for female representation for me. Actually given how ****ed up the Space Marines are on many levels, in a Greek hero fashion I don't think it is even particularly sexist to have 'humanities greatest defenders' all male because they are just so flawed.

Sadly I doubt we will see any female Guard in this release, I would be ecstatic to be wrong though.

[Gotthammer]

I'd like to see them do more with the segregation aspects of both SoB and SMs if they're going to insist on it. But given BL's bizarre aversion to anything relating to sexuality I doubt it'll happen.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Actually given how ****ed up the Space Marines are on many levels, in a Greek hero fashion I don't think it is even particularly sexist to have 'humanities greatest defenders' all male because they are just so flawed.

When even the Grey Knights admitted that Sisters were the purest and best defenders of the Imperium's ideals.


Sadly I doubt we will see any female Guard in this release, I would be ecstatic to be wrong though.

I want to see new Cadians/Catachans anyway.
Finding human looking female heads is a ballache.

[eldargal]

One thing that does annoy me is that the Marines have no female presence but the SoB still have male priests, special characters and a henchmen I think. so we don't even have a fully female army really.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Who uses anyone other than Canonesses and Celestine though?

[Wolfshade]

One thing that does annoy me is that the Marines have no female presence but the SoB still have male priests, special characters and a henchmen I think. so we don't even have a fully female army really.

While not people in the traditional sense, would all the Machine Spirits be male? Similiarly, the servitors would not need to be solely male either, though I grant you that there are of course no female servitor models. Servo skulls well who knows who they were before skullification?

So I think we don't even have a fully male army really.

I know, I know not the point. :)

[eldargal]

I thought one of the male priest characters was really good? Jacobus maybe, it's been a while since I read the codex.

[Psychosplodge]

I'd like to see them do more with the segregation aspects of both SoB and SMs if they're going to insist on it. But given BL's bizarre aversion to anything relating to sexuality I doubt it'll happen.

There's probably some classy fanfiction out there on the stuff the Black Library won't touch...

[eldargal]

While not people in the traditional sense, would all the Machine Spirits be male? Similiarly, the servitors would not need to be solely male either, though I grant you that there are of course no female servitor models. Servo skulls well who knows who they were before skullification?

So I think we don't even have a fully male army really.

I know, I know not the point. :)
I think the female piloted titan in Helsreach (I think) also had a female Machine Spirit in her titan? I don't recall. So it could reflect the pilot or be otherwise non-gendered in the case of smaller vehicles with less personality.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I thought one of the male priest characters was really good? Jacobus maybe, it's been a while since I read the codex.

He has some nice rules, but he's not extremely survivable.

[onlyonepinman]

One thing that does annoy me is that the Marines have no female presence but the SoB still have male priests,

I agree with this and think that the Sister of Battle should be entirely separate. It really annoys me how they this realy cool faction and concept of an order of what are effectively battle nuns but they felt the need to put them under the control of someone else. I think that the Sisters should be an entirely separate and independent organisation free to pursue their own agendas as they see fit. I'd also give them a Chaplain style unit to replace the priests or at least give them female priest models. The entire range would be female if I had my way. For me, the inquisition should be a supplemental codex that can be used with the IG or SoB to represent the fact that while these organisations may have their own sense of agency, they are ALL subject to the will of the Inquisition. I'd introduce some female Inquisitor models too - I think they used to make some but so much of their range seems to be disappearing these days.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

They technically are separate, Jakobus is a member of the Ecclesiarchy, whereas the Sisters of Battle are the military wing, the Adepta Sororitas, who are entirely female.

[eldargal]

Right but we still get boys in the army.:p I mean I just get around it by using female models for the priests but it's a shame we have to do that.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Marines technically do too, the Adeptus Astartes are ruled by the Lords of Terra and partially by the Inquisition, and some even by the Ecclesiarchy, and each of those groups have females.

[eldargal]

Not in the same way though. I mean you could have five chapters on crusade without a woman in sight answering only to the High Lords with a few female members whereas going by the codex most Orders of Sisters would be accompanied by men.:(

[ElectricPaladin]

...unlike male SoB which are explicitly forbidden for a reason that makes more sense than inaccurate technobabble.

And I'd argue that the lack of male Sisters of Battle is fine for two reasons:

1) Men can't be Sisters of Battle for an interesting reason - one founded in the society's culture - and there's no technobabble to give them a free pass. It's fully stupid that they don't put their power armor on men and women, but they do it anyway because... religion! That's a great idea, right? Personally - if all the other issues Eldargal has pointed out were addressed - if they had a similarly interesting reason why there were only male Space Marines - something other than "science lets us make a setting that's exactly what you expect" - I'd be fine with it.

2) Demanding male Sisters of Battle is a pretty bad argument when you see all the other injustices in the way the game is made. Let's just chunk down to the Eldar. The Eldar have a fully integrated military - including an all-female unit, which in my opinion passes the "interesting reason for stupid gendered stuff" test, because it's entirely arbitrary and for no earthly reason at all - but we only have models for female footsoldiers and the all-lady unit. All the other units, who should also have female options, are all male. Additionally, even though logic would dictate a roughly 50/50 split in terms of special characters, all but one of the named special characters are male.

There's this great animated GIF that I run into on Tumblr in which a male cartoon is receiving ice cream from an ice cream machine. He gets three scoops of ice cream, eats them, and then puts his cone back under the orifice to receive a fourth, when the miffed-looking lady 'toon across from him pushes his cone out of the way. He then goes on to weep piteously about how he has been undone by misandry.

You don't get to whine about there not being male Sisters of Battle and how unfair that is while the entire setting is a sausage party, ok? Let's have some perspective.

...

Additionally, to respond to the people who dismissed my "social injustice" quip, I'd like to say that we've already covered how representation is important. One of the things that is denied to minority and disempowered groups is the opportunity to see themselves being awesome. Do I need to post a link to every article talking about now Nichelle Nichols inspired a generation of Black actors, or the effect of Chis Colfer on America's gay adolescents? Representation is important, which makes every single work of media a viable and important place to have this conversation.

You're still entitled to your opinion, of course, but I don't think there's any argument that this doesn't matter.

[Psychosplodge]

Not in the same way though. I mean you could have five chapters on crusade without a woman in sight answering only to the High Lords with a few female members whereas going by the codex most Orders of Sisters would be accompanied by men.:(

Well yes, because a lack of available penis would lead to lesbianism, and lesbianism leads to chaos worship, and can you imagine the scandal if entire orders fell to chaos?

scandalous

:rolleyes:

[SuperDann]

Additionally, to respond to the people who dismissed my "social injustice" quip, I'd like to say that we've already covered how representation is important. One of the things that is denied to minority and disempowered groups is the opportunity to see themselves being awesome. Do I need to post a link to every article talking about now Nichelle Nichols inspired a generation of Black actors, or the effect of Chis Colfer on America's gay adolescents? Representation is important, which makes every single work of media a viable and important place to have this conversation.

You're still entitled to your opinion, of course, but I don't think there's any argument that this doesn't matter.

This could sound incredibly sarcastic, but I don't intend it to be: do we need some gay, ethnic and disabled characters/models then? (I know Ravenor has already been covered.)

[eldargal]

This could sound incredibly sarcastic, but I don't intend it to be: do we need some gay, ethnic and disabled characters/models then? (I know Ravenor has already been covered.)

Well you can't really model gay, but as a background thing sure. Some human heads with different ethnicities would also be very welcome, you can only go so far with paint. There are already disabled models though, any human ith cybernetic prostheses and dreadnoughts.:)

Edit: Weren't there some lesbian Guardswomen in one of the novels?

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Let's just chunk down to the Eldar. The Eldar have a fully integrated military - including an all-female unit, which in my opinion passes the "interesting reason for stupid gendered stuff" test, because it's entirely arbitrary and for no earthly reason at all - but we only have models for female footsoldiers and the all-lady unit

They aren't all ladies, providing Banshees are the ones in discussion. As explained in Path of the Warrior, it's just that female Eldar are more susceptible to that line of emotion.

[Psychosplodge]

There's plenty of potential ethnic models, you paint them whatever colour you want.
And in the fiction most of time a characters skin tone is never mentioned, except in things like the cain series where I think a dark skinned or dark haired trooper is mentioned due to their unusual colour for a valhallan, but outside of that sort of thing its normally left to the reader...

Yeah I think its hinted at in a cain book. His only misgivings were a slight disparity in their ranks iirc

[ElectricPaladin]

I do think that it would be great if the human heads gave us more options for racial diversity. They all have Anglo/European features, and it's really annoying. With my Space Marines, I do my best to make some of them black and use a variety of skin tones, but I need to pick my faces carefully. It wouldn't be all that hard to do some African, Asian, or South American faces, for example.

Yes, the setting could definitely do with more open homosexuality. I think it's worth noting that the same author who brought us Ravenor pretty clearly implies that the Imperium of man is a society without homophobia (reading between the lines, in any conversation about sexuality it's viewed as just another facet of a target's identity, which might or might not be useful, but has no attached cultural significance).

The thing about disabled characters - other than cybernetics and dreadnoughts - is that this is a war game. People with injuries generally get to go home. This is an actual fact - rather than a made up fact like "women aren't fit to serve in combat." If the representation for the disabled never got further than Ravenor, dreadnoughts, and cybernetics, I think that it would be more or less ok because that sort of thing being rare on the tabletop makes actual sense.

Nobody here is arguing that Warhammer 40k has to become some sort of social justicy parody of itself where everything in the setting is calibrated to obey some sort of "agenda." For myself, I'm just pointing out that with a few simple - and as Eldargal mentioned, inexpensive - changes, Warhammer 40k could be a game that does some good in the world by providing representation to some groups who have been traditionally ignored and/or pooped on in the world of speculative fiction.

- - - Updated - - -


There's plenty of potential ethnic models, you paint them whatever colour you want...

No, you really can't. The features aren't right, the hair isn't right, and it shows. I mean, you can do an ok job of it with what you've got, but it could be a lot better.


They aren't all ladies, providing Banshees are the ones in discussion. As explained in Path of the Warrior, it's just that female Eldar are more susceptible to that line of emotion.

Having not read the book, I bow to your superior (read: actual) knowledge.

[iandanger]

This could sound incredibly sarcastic, but I don't intend it to be: do we need some gay, ethnic and disabled characters/models then? (I know Ravenor has already been covered.)

You mean beyond the weird, potentially homophobic Dark Angels winking gay references from the old days? Surely homosexuality would be present and common in the 41st milennium. Do those stories have to be told? Maybe not, but I think it would only add to the story.

[eldargal]

The irony when it comes to social justice and 40k is that there is really no reason for them to be carrying on the same prejudices as we have. When you literally have real deamons trying to tear down the wallso f reality and **** your **** up who cares if some people are attracted to the same gender? When you have trillions of enemies surrounding you trying to destroy your species why only fight with half of it? People always act like not including our current prejudices would make it into some kind of Star Trek like setting but that is just not true.

While there may be homophobic or sexist worlds in the Imperium it certainly isn't a widespread cultural thing as far as we can tell, there are far more hints to the opposite in fact. That doesn't make it a nice place, it just means the things they worry about are different.

[SuperDann]

Nobody here is arguing that Warhammer 40k has to become some sort of social justicy parody of itself where everything in the setting is calibrated to obey some sort of "agenda." For myself, I'm just pointing out that with a few simple - and as Eldargal mentioned, inexpensive - changes, Warhammer 40k could be a game that does some good in the world by providing representation to some groups who have been traditionally ignored and/or pooped on in the world of speculative fiction.

At the end of the day, though, GW investors aren't looking to be a force for good, they're looking to make money. And, to be perfectly frank, I don't choose to play 40K because I want a game that delivers social justice, and if that's what it aimed to do it'd get a raised eyebrow from me, though I'm not sure how it would affect my purchasing of the game. Depends on how they went about it.


When you literally have real deamons trying to tear down the wallso f reality and **** your **** up who cares if some people are attracted to the same gender?

Depends on population levels I guess ;)

[eldargal]

At the end of the day, though, GW investors aren't looking to be a force for good, they're looking to make money. And, to be perfectly frank, I don't choose to play 40K because I want a game that delivers social justice, and if that's what it aimed to do it'd get a raised eyebrow from me, though I'm not sure how it would affect my purchasing of the game. Depends on how they went about it.

More inclusive = more money. Notto mention that, assuming you are a white male or male at least, you are in a position to not care about social justice. For the rest of us it is the difference between being recognised by the hobby we love or being kept to the sidelines while a dwindling demographic is held up above all others for no reason than that they were the ones who it was marketed at in the past.

If you haven't noticed things like the lesbian Guardswomen, disabled Ravenor, feminist High/Dark Elves and so forth then chances are you won't notice them in the future. You'll just see more variety of characters and hopefully more female models.

Remember this is NOT about changing the character of the setting, we love that. It is about including more people in it. No one wants 40k to be anything other than a brutal dysoptia, we just want to see women struggling to survive alongside men, and people who aren't white and so forth. They just need to be there doing what everyone else is doing, that's all.

[ElectricPaladin]

At the end of the day, though, GW investors aren't looking to be a force for good, they're looking to make money. And, to be perfectly frank, I don't choose to play 40K because I want a game that delivers social justice, and if that's what it aimed to do it'd get a raised eyebrow from me, though I'm not sure how it would affect my purchasing of the game. Depends on how they went about it.

Depends on population levels I guess ;)

So, what you're basically saying is that it's ok to only be a good and decent person in some aspects of your life, and that it would take "looking to be a force for good" to add a few models and even things out, despite everything that's been said so far about females being the largest growing sector of the board game and speculative fiction markets?

I take issue with the idea that making a few small changes requires you to be some kind of crusading super hero. That's the whole point: adding in a few more female models and a female IC or two for the armies where it's appropriate is quite literally the least GW could do, and you characterize that as being "a force for good?"

Now, it's true that some of the things discussed in this thread - like retconning an entire faction to add ladies - would be significantly more than the least... but this conversation has gone past that initial thought.

I guess it depends on how your moral compass is calibrated. I don't see "I'm a corporation - I only exist to make money" as an excuse for failing to do the absolute least.

- - - Updated - - -


Remember this is NOT about changing the character of the setting, we love that. It is about including more people in it. No one wants 40k to be anything other than a brutal dysoptia, we just want to see women struggling to survive alongside men, and people who aren't white and so forth. They just need to be there doing what everyone else is doing, that's all.

Where's my like button...

[iandanger]

The irony when it comes to social justice and 40k is that there is really no reason for them to be carrying on the same prejudices as we have. When you literally have real deamons trying to tear down the wallso f reality and **** your **** up who cares if some people are attracted to the same gender? When you have trillions of enemies surrounding you trying to destroy your species why only fight with half of it? People always act like not including our current prejudices would make it into some kind of Star Trek like setting but that is just not true.

While there may be homophobic or sexist worlds in the Imperium it certainly isn't a widespread cultural thing as far as we can tell, there are far more hints to the opposite in fact. That doesn't make it a nice place, it just means the things they worry about are different.

Not just that, the Imperial Truth certainly insists on challenging superstition and dogma, the only potential issue would be the inevitable issue of an imperial planet falling behind its reproduction projections and blaming it on homosexuality.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

In your butt?

[eldargal]

Not just that, the Imperial Truth certainly insists on challenging superstition and dogma, the only potential issue would be the inevitable issue of an imperial planet falling behind its reproduction projections and blaming it on homosexuality.

Good point.

[onlyonepinman]

I find most of the feminist theory on this subject to be nonsense, applicable to only a small percentage of women. If women really were being socialised out of enjoying hobbies that are gender typically male, then as soon as they were told that it was OK to enjoy those things, all the suppressed interests would shine through. Except that isn't happening for wargaming leading me to assume that, despite the enormous amount of media attention feminist nonsense receives, either women generally just don't like wargaming or there's lots of women who haven't heard the message - I find the latter unlikely. He is not deceived who knows himself to have been deceived.

Wargaming is what it is and women have every opportunity to enjoy that hobby, but generally it is males who are interested which is why it appears to cater more for men/boys (let's be honest, with 40k, it's boys). Personally I don't give a rats arse whether Games Workshop do or don't produce female miniatures in their 40k (or fantasy for that matter) range, they've retconned enough fluff in the past for fluff to not be an obstacle. However I don't think that they will unless they have proof that there is a need (as opposed to a want) for them to do so (i.e. losing customers by not making them), something that would justify the expense of changing lots of kits around, until that happens they simpy won't take the risk.

[Sam Menethil]

Well you can't really model gay, but as a background thing sure. Some human heads with different ethnicities would also be very welcome, you can only go so far with paint. There are already disabled models though, any human ith cybernetic prostheses and dreadnoughts.:)

Edit: Weren't there some lesbian Guardswomen in one of the novels?

Is it bad that I now have this image of a space marine in pink armour skipping around the battlefield saying "Have you seen my new gun? Its faaaaaaaaaabulous"?

[Gotthammer]

Yes.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Pretty Marines?

[Sam Menethil]

Yup pretty marines. Emperors Children just wasn't pink enough

[Psychosplodge]

I thought pretty marines were purple?

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Fuschia.

[iandanger]

I find most of the feminist theory on this subject to be nonsense, applicable to only a small percentage of women. If women really were being socialised out of enjoying hobbies that are gender typically male, then as soon as they were told that it was OK to enjoy those things, all the suppressed interests would shine through. Except that isn't happening for wargaming leading me to assume that, despite the enormous amount of media attention feminist nonsense receives, either women generally just don't like wargaming or there's lots of women who haven't heard the message - I find the latter unlikely. He is not deceived who knows himself to have been deceived.

Ah, the old classic, telling women and allies that their views are a minority, irrelevant, and implying they're deceiving you for some dastardly end. I think I just got bingo on my knee-jerk patriarchy defense bingo card!

Again, we ARENT talking about women being socialized out of interest in some toys, that issue applies to young children, who aren't part of the wargaming community. Instead, we're talking about Warhammer 40k, which is more than just a wargame mind you, and whether making the perspective of stories told and options for playing pieces broader would improve the game's accessibility, and in that regard increase the chance that an interested female player would actually play the game. As I noted before, there's nothing inherently male oriented about building figures and painting them, and other areas of board gaming are thriving with an influx of 20-somethings purchasing board games. The industry is in rennaisance. Games Workshop's unit sales (rather than revenue) are in a fairly steady decline at the same time. Other companies are also offer story lines that include far more female protagonists without suffering at all. Telling a broader spectrum of stories, and including more women and minorities in the company could only broaden appeal.

And lets get real, the vast majority of people of all genders are not aware of wargaming, let alone Games Workshop, that's what happens when you don't engage in public relations or advertising.




Wargaming is what it is and women have every opportunity to enjoy that hobby, but generally it is males who are interested which is why it appears to cater more for men/boys (let's be honest, with 40k, it's boys). Personally I don't give a rats arse whether Games Workshop do or don't produce female miniatures in their 40k (or fantasy for that matter) range, they've retconned enough fluff in the past for fluff to not be an obstacle. However I don't think that they will unless they have proof that there is a need (as opposed to a want) for them to do so (i.e. losing customers by not making them), something that would justify the expense of changing lots of kits around, until that happens they simpy won't take the risk.

In fact GW doesn't seem to have a plan to deal with their market share decline at all, aside from opening more single person stores. We're not talking about changing kits around, we're talking about including female sculpts in future releases, it wouldn't be difficult and wouldn't cost any more than the mini cost to develop in the first place. As we've already discussed, there's a huge gap between what is available and what exists in the stories.

[Sam Menethil]

Depends how you paint them really. It seems to vary from a fairly medium purple right up to a bright pink. I've seen both purples and pinks used for them. Either way pretty marines. Not that I can talk really with my BA's

[Gotthammer]

Well pretty marines aren't archaic gay stereotypes, they're a parody of the Japanese bishounen warrior, who is basically just a super pretty guy who loves beauty in the world. So all you're really doing by saying you think of them when you think of LGBT people in 40k is displaying your ignorance.
And, as psycho says, they're purple.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Because I know what a Japanese bishounen warrior is? xD

[Wolfshade]

Ok, time to wade in with my size 12s (do your own conversion (http://www.shoesizingcharts.com/#men)). Surely regardless of sexual orientation they would look the same at war. Unless you want something horribly stereotyping (http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery/2008/11/29/3750_md-Humor,%20Rainbow%20Warriors.jpg).

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

I like the Rainbow Warriors aztec-y theme though.

[Gotthammer]

Well I think it's enough to say that just because a character is gay that they have to be akin to Julian Clary (or the reverse that someone who displays non-traditional gender traits is gay) is an idiotic, outdated and harmful sterotype.

[iandanger]

My Heldrake's hull is mostly pink, he cares not for your stereotypes

https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2852/9663146403_43921a0b77.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/fHU9Lt)

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

When I think gay I think Ian Mckellen.

Or Steve from work, who is outrageously fabulous, and I love him for it. xD

[Sam Menethil]

Love the helchicken. Just don't expect me to go against it. I have very bad experiences fighting them. Terribad rolling skills

[iandanger]

Love the helchicken. Just don't expect me to go against it. I have very bad experiences fighting them. Terribad rolling skills

That's ok, I'm playing pure deathguard currently, no drake in sight :P

[Sam Menethil]

Thank god for no helchicken. Last time I fought my friends one I hit it with around 14 lascannon shots over the course of the battle, 7 got through the jink..........and I dropped it by 1 hull point. I swear my dice are loaded against me

[Pyredragon]

I don't really want female marines... *taps his fingers together and looks at his feet* I'm sorry, I don't want to seem like a curmudgeon but really to me, it doesn't add anything but personally it detracts.

The current old fluff dictates that the organs and surgery only function in a male, and changing that would be a really big retcon but it would detract from the tragedy of being a space marine.

When you are taken by the men of the stars to face the trials and don the armor of the battle brothers, you give up everything, who you are, who you were, you will know nothing but hardship and war. No peace, no family, no love.

The video game 'Space Marine' does a good job of illustrating how some Marines look upon humans. They viewed the gaurdsman in a sympathetic light and there was a feeling of needing to protect them as they died in easily two or so hits from any greenskin. They are so far above us we're like children, the only children they'll ever have.

Don't get me wrong, I like well written strong female characters. Hell, Lt. Mirra from the above source was a wonderful character. She managed to hold the guard together by herself after the deaths of her commanding officers, which in an army in fluff that is usually regulated to the role of 'damsel in distress' is remarkable.

But I just don't think they would fit in the astartes as well, not without taking away some of the tragedy.

[onlyonepinman]

Ah, the old classic, telling women and allies that their views are a minority, irrelevant, and implying they're deceiving you for some dastardly end.
I'm not saying anyone's views are irrelevant, all I'm saying is that despite all the best feminist intentions, things aren't really changing. The majority of people are still gender typical despite attempts to engineer society otherwise. I also do not think people are beig deceived, but feminists would like to tell you that you are and that the things we enjoy in life are the result of our upbringing and nothing to do with biology - a position I entirely disagree with. I think if left to their own devices, the majority of people will exhibit gender typical behaviours and express gender typical interests and motives; which unsurprisingly is exactly what we see manifesting in society today despite 30 years+ of attempts to socially engineer gender neutrality.

So rather than persisting in a failed attempt to engineer gender neutrality, I say just let people be who they want to be; if girls want to be girly, let them, if boys want to be boistrous, let them and vice versa. This approach will never achieve numerical parity of genders anywhere at all - but you will see a rise in happiness levels accross the entire spectrum of society. This is what is called equality of opportunity as opposed to equality of outcome.

This also means there will be some hobbies where boys predominate and others where women predominate - and this too isn't a bad thing. It become a problem when demands are made to make the minorities happy. Making female miniatures won't attract hordes of women to the hobby - if there was any proof whatsoever that this was the case you can bet your bottom dollar that Games Workshop would be making them because that's how businesses work. Neither is not making female miniatures costing GW market share and so they have no need to pander to that particular demand.

And if we're playing gender war Bingo, the feminist card paid out many pages ago.

[Wolfshade]

Consider you see a baby dressed in pink, you consider it to be female despite it not showing any gender traits. You see the same baby dressed in blue and you think it is a boy. The only reason why is because we are socialised to believe that pink is for girls and blue is for boys. If wwe go back not that far in history, pink was associated with males.

So people are briought up believing certain things are approrpiate and are encouraged to do so by society. You walk into a tyo shop and see toys for girls you buy those for a girl. Even though there is no reason why you can't choose a male one.

Gender typical is a societal construct which children are socialised. In terms of nature vs nuture it is a combination of both scientifically speaking.

[iandanger]

I'm not saying anyone's views are irrelevant, all I'm saying is that despite all the best feminist intentions, things aren't really changing. The majority of people are still gender typical despite attempts to engineer society otherwise.

If you think feminism is trying to engineer people to a state of being beyond gender, you're confused. I'm a cisgendered male, and while I do exhibit some traits that don't fit in the male gender box, I don't aspire to be anything but who I am, which largely lines up with the gender role society gave me. I don't represent a failure of the feminist agenda, because I stand against cultural enforcement of gender norms on non-conformists. Its not about telling people how to live, its about letting people express their gender identity.



I also do not think people are beig deceived, but feminists would like to tell you that you are and that the things we enjoy in life are the result of our upbringing and nothing to do with biology - a position I entirely disagree with. I think if left to their own devices, the majority of people will exhibit gender typical behaviours and express gender typical interests and motives; which unsurprisingly is exactly what we see manifesting in society today despite 30 years+ of attempts to socially engineer gender neutrality.


...ooookay, I was literally responding to your comment about those who know they are being deceived not being deceived, so, whatever. But the rest of this comment... huh? I seriously don't know what you're talking about. Feminism is not about creating a neuter gender, it never has been.



So rather than persisting in a failed attempt to engineer gender neutrality, I say just let people be who they want to be; if girls want to be girly, let them, if boys want to be boistrous, let them and vice versa. This approach will never achieve numerical parity of genders anywhere at all - but you will see a rise in happiness levels accross the entire spectrum of society. This is what is called equality of opportunity as opposed to equality of outcome.

Yeah, except equality of opportunity is itself impossible, but this is completely tangential to what we're discussing, which is accessibility. But yes, from a Marxist "all art is politics" standpoint, I want my politics expressed in everything I do. I want the games I play to reflect my worldview, I want all of my entertainment to push boundaries and progress. Anything that doesn't challenge the world as it is reinforces the world as it is.



This also means there will be some hobbies where boys predominate and others where women predominate - and this too isn't a bad thing. It become a problem when demands are made to make the minorities happy. Making female miniatures won't attract hordes of women to the hobby - if there was any proof whatsoever that this was the case you can bet your bottom dollar that Games Workshop would be making them because that's how businesses work. Neither is not making female miniatures costing GW market share and so they have no need to pander to that particular demand.

We're not talking about changing the predominantly male player base, we're talking about whether the game could better reflect the variety of stories that exist in a univers of trillions of humans spread across a galaxy. The fact is that GW's leadership is male, most of their designers are male, most of their sculpters are male, etc. Just because something hasn't been done does NOT mean it wouldn't be good business, the fact is that having a homogenous group of leaders tends to lead to a lack of originality of ideas. Has GW explored interesting women in 40k? We don't know, because obviously that sort of thing is priveledged info, but I can guarantee you a more diverse corporate leadership would bring in more ideas that challenge existing conventions.


And if we're playing gender war Bingo, the feminist card paid out many pages ago.
Ah, I'm upfront about what I want, which is to challenge gender hierarchy and patriarchal elements in every culture I belong to, and support and ally with anyone who wants to challenge those elements in their culture. I'm Ian, and I am here to recruit you.

[Adam Huenecke]

This also means there will be some hobbies where boys predominate and others where women predominate - and this too isn't a bad thing. It become a problem when demands are made to make the minorities happy. Making female miniatures won't attract hordes of women to the hobby - if there was any proof whatsoever that this was the case you can bet your bottom dollar that Games Workshop would be making them because that's how businesses work. Neither is not making female miniatures costing GW market share and so they have no need to pander to that particular demand.

And if we're playing gender war Bingo, the feminist card paid out many pages ago.

Heavens knows there aren't any miniatures companies that make literally thousands of female minis... I'm guessing their intent is not to attract female gamers.

I'll admit that this post became tl;dr about 10 pages ago, but I felt the need to chime in here (forgive me if I make any arguments similar to ones voiced earlier).

The reason GW makes (and will continue to make) all-male armies is that they are targeting an immature male demographic. Now, I game- I game hard. And that is why I feel qualified to make this statement. 12 year old boys are afraid of women. Many men are afraid of powerful women. This is why the "Men's Rights" movement exists. Games Workshop (and just about every other game company) cater to their target demographic, which is to say "men who play miniature wargames." Hence, they create sympathetic characters their demographic will enjoy.

How does one start playing miniatures wargames? The same way one gets interested in any cultural phenomenon- long-term and careful conditioning. Say what you will about inherent behavior of the sexes- science and research have proven time and again that sexual difference is negligible in regards to cultural behavior. Look it up, we all have Google (stick to peer-reviewed sources- Men's Rights blogs don't count). Gender is a construct of conditioning. Modern males are conditioned from a very early age to adhere to war-like cultural elements. If you don't believe me, check the boy's toy section of any store (it will be the dark colored one bristling with weapons). If men do NOT adhere to these cultural norms, there are often socially stigmatizing or violent consequences. Hence, males are conditioned to be attracted to these things, and some eventually end up playing miniature war games. I won't even engage the seemingly high proportion of socially mal-adjusted men in gaming, characterized by the "virgin" stereotype.

Some women even end up playing too, despite all the conditioning to the opposite. Gaming companies would call this market share "negligible."

So before you go attacking the integrity of the fluff, or blaming your X chromosome for how much you like make-believe ubermenchen space-warriors with boy parts, take a long hard look at yourself and your place in modern culture. They are, after all, an extension of your "manhood." They are an immediately recognizable signal that you consider yourself a talented strategist, one of many signifiers of masculine identity. You have been conditioned from birth to like the kind of stuff GW is selling (or not like it, for the errant female reader). These games were developed by people with a similar upbringing and cultural context. People with the same constructions of gender and social usefulness that you have.

So ask yourself (and you don't have to answer in writing, as what you find might not be something you want to share)- Could I genuinely sympathize with a female Space Marine? How would I feel about working for a strong female leader? Could I refrain from sexualizing her as an "other," or would I feel the same about her as I would a male commander?

The answer that just popped into your head is why it will be a long damn time before there are any female Space Marines.

[onlyonepinman]

Consider you see a baby dressed in pink, you consider it to be female despite it not showing any gender traits. You see the same baby dressed in blue and you think it is a boy. The only reason why is because we are socialised to believe that pink is for girls and blue is for boys. If wwe go back not that far in history, pink was associated with males
And now pink shirts appears quite a lot in mens fashions - we were told we'd been deceived into rejecting pink as being girly and lo, men start wearing Pink. We are no longer deceived because we know we are being deceived.

But being taught that pink is associated with femininity is not quite the same as having a preference for certain pursuits and interests, which is why it is so easy to undo that particular myth while other alleged myths persist. We have no biological predispositions regarding colours, except perhaps red as a sign of danger. We are all predisposed to certain needs and wants which in turn govern our interests, of which hobbies form a part. Social constructs have grown out of biological roles they did not occur independently.

[Adam Huenecke]

We have no biological predispositions regarding colours, except perhaps red as a sign of danger. We are all predisposed to certain needs and wants which in turn govern our interests, of which hobbies form a part. Social constructs have grown out of biological roles they did not occur independently.

So what biological need does miniature wargaming fulfill for males? Is it because we are born "leaders?" We are inherently "warlike?" I think that any serious deconstruction of your claims is going to lead to some troubling conclusions.

[onlyonepinman]

The need that it fulfils is that of entertainnment, like all hobbies. The question isn't what need is wargaming fulfilling but why are men more interested in the strategies and tactics of war, real and imagined. The answer to that is that men are, naturally, competitive - war is the ultimate expression of competition. I'd like to think that most of us are sensible enough to realise that real war is not a pleasant or desirable experience and yet men are generally fascinated by it - wargaming offers a way of exploring that interest without taking up arms.

[Adam Huenecke]

And you are arguing that this interest is specific, based on the sex one is born and not social constructs? You are saying that women lack the same level of competitiveness by nature?

[SuperDann]

So ask yourself (and you don't have to answer in writing, as what you find might not be something you want to share)- Could I genuinely sympathize with a female Space Marine? How would I feel about working for a strong female leader? Could I refrain from sexualizing her as an "other," or would I feel the same about her as I would a male commander?

The answer that just popped into your head is why it will be a long damn time before there are any female Space Marines.

Could I sympathize with a Space Marine, male or female, at all? No, probably not.
As to working for a strong female leader - in my last three jobs at least half the management has been female. My current boss could be said to be a very strong female leader. I certainly don't (haven't) sexualize(d) any of them. Their being female had nothing to do with how well they did their job (i.e. leading me).

[onlyonepinman]

In terms of percentages of each gender that display competitiveness, yes men are more competitive in that a much higher percentage of men display increased levels of competitiveness than women. That's not to say that all women are uncompetitive or that all men are competitive, only that when you talk in general terms (i.e. what would be considered normal among the majority), competitiveness is much more common among males than females - it's a natural phenomenon exhibited byalmost every mamalian species.

I'm also, for the record, not an MRA.

[Adam Huenecke]

SuperDann- you are either an exceptional male specimen, or disingenuous. You know which one it is.

- - - Updated - - -


In terms of percentages of each gender that display competitiveness, yes men are more competitive in that a much higher percentage of men display increased levels of competitiveness than women. That's not to say that all women are uncompetitive or that all men are competitive, only that when you talk in general terms (i.e. what would be considered normal among the majority), competitiveness is much more common among males than females - it's a natural phenomenon exhibited byalmost every mamalian species.

I'm also, for the record, not an MRA.
You are conflating gender with sex, which indicate you might not have the best grasp on the distinction. If you are indeed speaking of gender, yes- those are the ways in which those roles are most often constructed in modern society. If you are indeed saying that males are genetically predisposed to being more competitive than females, I would be interested to see the literature to which you are referring.

[onlyonepinman]

I don't consider there to be a distinction - your sex and your gender are the same. When I refer to gender, I do so in the biological sense because as far as I am concerned that is as far as gender goes. It does determine a lot of how we think and act but it shouldn't constrain us if we don't want to conform to gender typical behaviours, nor should we be forced not conform if conforming is what we want.

A lot of people seem to be missing my point though. I have no real problem with female miniatures or with girls wargaming and showing non-gender typical behaviours if that's what makes them happpy. I don't even think it's impossible for GW to produce female miniatures because there are no real blockers on them doing so; in fact I've even gone so far as to say that I DO want to see female miniatures, especiallly in the IG range and that I think GW made a mistake by including male characters in the Sisters of Battle army. I just think it's improbable that we'll see female miniatures any time soon because unfortunately it's a risk GW simply won't be prepared to take without something forcing them to do so - more's the pity.

[David Crossley]

12 year old boys are afraid of women. Many men are afraid of powerful women.
Is this before or after we Ban Bossy?

[ElectricPaladin]

I don't consider there to be a distinction - your sex and your gender are the same. When I refer to gender, I do so in the biological sense because as far as I am concerned that is as far as gender goes. It does determine a lot of how we think and act but it shouldn't constrain us if we don't want to conform to gender typical behaviours, nor should we be forced not conform if conforming is what we want.

My friend Gillian - formerly George - would take issue with that statement... but I'm not entirely certain that we want to get into that kettle of worms.

[Adam Huenecke]

Okay, now I get our misunderstanding. There are some nuances to the meanings of the words you are using-
Sex is a BIOLOGICAL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex) difference between members of a species.
Gender, in social sciences, refers to the SOCIAL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender) constructions of acceptable behavior for men and women in a given setting.

Every other miniature company produces female miniatures for nearly every faction (though many are hyper-sexualized, and wear armor with bare midriffs, which illustrates another issue entirely). Granted, all of their fluff was written long after that of GW, and reflects different societal norms based upon when they were created. I think there is a bigger question that breaks off from all of this- If GW made female space marines, would it be significant in any way? Would we, the gaming public, deny a space marine with a female head based purely upon collective misogyny? We probably wouldn't care, and it probably wouldn't make a difference in anyone's conception of gender equality.

-however-

If that 12 year old whose social identity is in the flux of creation sees a less gendered depiction of power and heroism, might that make the world a better place in a tiny way?

Regardless, there is one major issue that may have been addressed earlier and I didn't bother reading it- it is the issue that the world of 40K is a horrible, dark place that none of us would want to live in. The Imperium is a hateful, xenophobic, genocidal regime bent on killing anything that disagrees with it. If ANYTHING, the world of 40K is a bleak commentary on the potentially negative roles of religion, military conquest, and racism in which a vein of progressive gender equality would be counterproductive. The Imperium is a cautionary tale- not a blueprint for a desirable society. Let's take that lesson to heart and combat ANY inequality when we find it in our own lives.

[Gotthammer]

I don't consider there to be a distinction - your sex and your gender are the same. When I refer to gender, I do so in the biological sense because as far as I am concerned that is as far as gender goes.

Well you're wrong.

[Eldar_Atog]

Consider you see a baby dressed in pink, you consider it to be female despite it not showing any gender traits. You see the same baby dressed in blue and you think it is a boy. The only reason why is because we are socialised to believe that pink is for girls and blue is for boys. If wwe go back not that far in history, pink was associated with males.

So people are briought up believing certain things are approrpiate and are encouraged to do so by society. You walk into a tyo shop and see toys for girls you buy those for a girl. Even though there is no reason why you can't choose a male one.

Gender typical is a societal construct which children are socialised. In terms of nature vs nuture it is a combination of both scientifically speaking.

To add a little more to the discussion, the PBS idea channel episode about the Brony community had a bunch to say about the idea of gender/societial norms. The gender norms for today are not the gender norms of 100 years ago. It used to be that the husband was the primary and only breadwinner. Today, it could go either way on whether the wife or husband is the primary breadwinner.

A 100 years from now, we could see a world where the wife is the breadwinner. It's very possible since more women than men are going to college now.

[onlyonepinman]

Okay, now I get our misunderstanding. There are some nuances to the meanings of the words you are using-
Sex is a BIOLOGICAL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex) difference between members of a species.
Gender, in social sciences, refers to the SOCIAL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender) constructions of acceptable behavior for men and women in a given setting.
That's a selective quote. "Gender in the social sciences sense" because outside of sociology it is also used to describe the physiology of (non human) animals without descriptions of gender roles, as wikipedia also says. I just happen to view humans as animals and therefore gender is a perfectly acceptable word to describe your gender as Male or Female. Many words have many different meanings - for example my sex might refer to what I did last weekend or it might refer to my preference for what I might like to do on future weekends. We're arguing over semantics and adding very little to the discussion about about female miniatures. Despite your own choice to use the word gender in a different way to me, we still both understand what each other means when we use he words gender and sex within the contexts that we have. I won't be responding to further debate about dictionary definitions of "sex"or "gender" when by using either of those words, we can both get the gist of the points simply by the contexts in which they are used.

[DarkLink]

Well, according to wikipedia, "Depending on the context, the term may refer to biological sex (i.e. the state of being male, female or intersex), sex-based social structures (including gender roles and other social roles), or gender identity."

[onlyonepinman]

A 100 years from now, we could see a world where the wife is the breadwinner. It's very possible since more women than men are going to college now.
Possible but unlikely. While more women are enrolling in college, more women also choose to work part time for a number of years after they have children or, in some cases leave employment altogether (rare considering how hard it is to live with only a single income). I think we'll see an increase in the number of families where the woman is the breadwinner but I don't think they will ever be the majority.

Although the gender norms of today are not exactly the same as they were 100 years ago, the reasons behind today's "gender norms" and those of 100 years ago are roughly the same. 100 years ago, women were expected to marry and raise children the reason being that most women are predisposed to want to do that. Today we see women routinely sacrifice career for a more balanced family life because they want to spend time with their children. conversely today men who father children generally earn more than men who do not (although have less disposable income) simply because they prioritise work over the balanced family life because they are pre-disposed to provide for a family. There have and always will be exceptions to these norms, men who do prioritise work/life balance and women who prioritise career and I am thankful that we live in an age where the latter is supported and encouraged and even though the former does not yet get all the support he needs to live that lifestyle I feel we are moving towards it - slowly. 100 years ago these exceptions were destined for miserable, unfulfilling lives because society didn't expect them to conform to gender norms, it demanded that they did. Today we expect that people will act, think and live a certain way but most of us don't demand that people conform to those expectations and we tolerate (and in some cases celebrate) people who do not.

[Houghten]

SuperDann- you are either an exceptional male specimen, or disingenuous. You know which one it is.

I like how you assume anyone who doesn't fit your model is lying.

[Deadlift]

Not in the same way though. I mean you could have five chapters on crusade without a woman in sight answering only to the High Lords with a few female members whereas going by the codex most Orders of Sisters would be accompanied by men.:(

Somebody needs to carry the groceries.

[SuperDann]

SuperDann- you are either an exceptional male specimen, or disingenuous. You know which one it is.

I like how you assume anyone who doesn't fit your model is lying.

Thank you for support, Houghten. As it happens, Adam, my religious beliefs lead me to have a strict moral code that I choose to live by. I'm not perfect, but I try, just so you know.

[Tzeentch's Dark Agent]

Somebody needs to carry the groceries.

Fair point. :p
Who even likes carrying groceries? It's awful.


Thank you for support, Houghten. As it happens, Adam, my religious beliefs lead me to have a strict moral code that I choose to live by. I'm not perfect, but I try, just so you know.

Good man, I may not follow a religion, but I choose to live by the tenets of bushido. I respect people, if they respect me.

[Dominion]

Back in the good ol' days of the Great Crusade, I'm suprised the Emperor didn't think of some way to include women better, the only meaningful force of women now is the Adepta Sororitas which worship the Emperor, although I doubt he would look too kindly upon them. He could of doubled his armies if he found some way to include them.

[onlyonepinman]

He could have doubled the size of the resource pool from which he drew his armies, doubling the size of his army would have required double the amount of materiel and logistics.

But to say he could double the size of his armies implies that every man who could wield a gun had already picked one up which in the case of the Space Marines just wasn't true. Let's assume that each had 250,000 men - at the time of the first founding that gives the emperor 5,000,000 Space Marines. That's not even the population of modern day London so human resources wasn't really an issue for recruitment into the Space Marines; because such a tiny fraction of the human population of the Galaxy were recruited as Space Marines the Emperor could afford to be very choosy and elitist - much like special forces and pilots in modern militaries. I don't think there's any doubt that women served in the Imperial Army at that time, they just weren't recruited into the Astartes

[YorkNecromancer]

Could I genuinely sympathize with a female Space Marine?

Yes. Because I am a sane human being and have functional empathy.


How would I feel about working for a strong female leader?

Just fine. I've worked under many powerful women through my whole career, and in various jobs before then. Women in positions of power seem to me to be no different in their abilities than the men I have worked for. Some have been better at their jobs, others worse.


Could I refrain from sexualizing her as an "other,"

Yup. Because my sexuality isn't the be-all and end-all of who I am. Have I worked for women I was attracted to? Sure. Did it get in the way of my job? This is because I am a professional.


would I feel the same about her as I would a male commander?

Never served, never will. But I've had female superiors in my jobs for years, and they have varied from pretty cool all the way through to hateful douche; their personality was what made the difference, not their gender. Almost like the male bosses I have had.


The answer that just popped into your head is why it will be a long damn time before there are any female Space Marines.

The answer that popped into my head was 'I have no problem with women in power or authority, and can cope with my sexual urges because I am not a sexually-motivated serial killer'. I think I filled in your questions wrong, because the answers I gave seemed to suggest there was no impediment to female marines at all.

What answers was I supposed to give? Ones that say that all men are psychopaths who must obey their testicles at all time? Because as a man myself, I don't hate men, so I don't think that way. Am I supposed to view women in positions above me as bad? Because over half of my female superiors have been really, really cool. Very intelligent, and way better at their jobs than me or my male colleagues. And here I include the time I spent in the financial sector, as well as both my sisters, the youngest of whom holds a management position in London raking in over four times my wages. A position which she earned through merit, BTW.

[Psychosplodge]

What answers was I supposed to give? Ones that say that all men are psychopaths who must obey their testicles at all time? .

I hope not. Mine would insist I lounge around in a dressing gown permanently so they got more freedom...

[YorkNecromancer]

Like a gentleman, you say...? :)

[Psychosplodge]

da, tovarich

[eldargal]

Model is obviously a female Space Marine.

[GoffWarboss]

Model is obviously a female Space Marine.

I'd love that, if only to enrage the woman hater club. Yesterday a saw a Tumblr blog about asking for more equality from GW and the amount of vitriol and spite from embittered men was disgusting.

I hope the new GW site only has tasteful and powerful female miniatures.

[eldargal]

That is the sole reason I have a FSM army really, to enrage haters.:) Yeah a lot of men are terrified of the idea of having to share their toys especially with women.

[Deadlift]

That is the sole reason I have a FSM army really, to enrage haters.:) Yeah a lot of men are terrified of the idea of having to share their toys especially with women.

Terrified lol. Embittered shallow human beings maybe, but terrified I think not. Post us some pics of your Army EG I'm sure many of us would be interested in seeing some cool conversions :)

[GoffWarboss]

I can't imagine anything worse than GIRLS being allowed in my little stinky mens club, they'd want to put flowers up and paint everything pink and stuff. Urgh.

[eldargal]

Terrified lol. Embittered shallow human beings maybe, but terrified I think not. Post us some pics of your Army EG I'm sure many of us would be interested in seeing some cool conversions :)
Nope it's terror. Terror of losing a privileged position, of being considered the only demographic work catering to in spite of all the actual evidence, terror of having women turn up to games clubs and all of a sudden having to behave like human beings. they mask it with vitriol and hatred but it all boils down to terror at no longer being privileged.

[Mr Mystery]

And they'd probably insist on having their period at you.

[GoffWarboss]

Terrified lol. Embittered shallow human beings maybe, but terrified I think not. Post us some pics of your Army EG I'm sure many of us would be interested in seeing some cool conversions :)

I'd say terrified is about right, most people who have a problem with it have probably never had a real and meaningful interaction with a woman, they fear having to treat women as equals when they hate them for rejecting them

[eldargal]

And they'd probably insist on having their period at you.
Blood for the Blood God! Shed uterine lining for the shed uterine lining throne!

[Deadlift]

Lol, anyway EG. Pics of these FSM ?

[eldargal]

I don't do photos.:p

Nothing that radical though, just headswaps on a Chapter Master, Captain, Librarian and a few others, every one else is helmeted in regular unconverted SM power armour.

[John Bower]

Same here, I have all my marines with helmets, and not only is my Imperium not all male, they aren't even all human either. I do my own fluff; GW's rules are about the best out there for now, but their fluff leaves a lot to be desired, I go for a more 'realistic' approach, so yeah there could be monsters out there, but I have no Daemons and nor do I intend to. My Grey Knights in my fluff were a counter to psykers and tyranids mainly. I do believe that even the CIA have investigated psychic talent, so the idea that we could evolve it at some point in the far future is within the realms of possibility. Warp travel is just another way of saying 'faster than light without actually having to go faster than light' - sot of a shift into a parallel dimension if you like, or wormhole travel at a push. I don't have 'warp currents' or psychic navigators and communication is done via transceivers that can somehow communicate over very long distances.
Why does everything have an Aquila on it? Simple; like all wars somebody usually profits; in my campaign that somebody is an unnamed corporation that makes 90% of the equipment (lasguns, boltguns, buildings and tanks etc.) and sells them to whoever will pay their cost. It's not the symbol for my Imperium (heck even I don't know what that is... lol) and the Emprah? He's a dude, about the 300th in a long line of dudes trying to run a fair and democratic organisation and not entirely succeeding. So still pretty grim and dark, just a little less xenophobic/ant-girl.

And for the record - there were actually female space marines in Rogue Trader, in 2nd ed they got retconned out.

[Lord-Boofhead]

And for the record - there were actually female space marines in Rogue Trader, in 2nd ed they got retconned out.

NOPE, those were female warrior ADVENTURERS in Power Armour. Power Armour does not and never has equaled Space Marine.

8208

- - - Updated - - -



I have some older Imperial Guard females, few and far between, but still present.


I have every Female IG Mini ever made. (ironically the most recent cast one the Tanath lass was hardest to get) and its sadly not a full squad and I have to bulk it out with lasgun wielding Esher.

[Kaptain Badrukk]

For me SM aren't a "male" only, but unless GW moves the fluff forward (at last) they have to stay that way officially.
Now if you turn up with an army of converted overtly female marines I will appreciate a job well done, and be impressed with your skills with a sculpting tool, but personally it isn't for me.
It's not a 'boys club' thing, I just don't think of them as human so it's never really popped up in my head.
We know that (although the model range is woefully lacking) every other part of the Imperium seems to have no gender bias at all. At all levels and in all institutions where humans are concerned 40k is a combination of meritocracy and horrifically corrupt inbred clandestine agency.
I don't see marines as much more human than I do Orks or Nids, and we don't wonder about their gender.
Marines likely don't care, I'm sure if they could induct women they would, given what the process does to you I doubt you' even be able to tell once it was done.
EG earlier posited that you could hyper-feminise like the newer generation She-Hulk, and whilst I find that idea to be pleasing I still prefer the idea that a Astartes is no more defined by their gender than they are by their taste in music or their skills as a horse wrangler.
Ultimately an Astartes for me is an inhuman killing machine, and I don't think they'd have much truck with gender politics. They'd take anyone who could pass the tests and take the geneseed, but that someone would end up just like the others at the end of the process.

[Denzark]

Aaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnddddddd Lets start again.

Everyone is equal irrelevant of race colour creed religion sexuality age able-bodied-ness etc. We are all equal.

Therefore an army of x% of x demographic is equally as valid as any other.

I support an increased number of female GW sculpts in any army where the fluff says females already serve. I have no problem seeing armies with all female cadres if the fluff supports that.

I don't however support a changing of the canon for SM just to advance a real world political agenda. I find the argument pertaining to 'science' irrelevant because scienece in the 40K verse as portrayed in canon does not comply with real life science fact. It is therefore acceptable within the fiction to say 'zygotes work only in the male'.

This does not make me 'terrified' of females or their inclusion. Trying to imply a proportion of people for whom you will have no idea of what their motivation or outlook is, are 'terrified' of something is just tosh. I think actually it is pidgin psychology - you call someone terrified in the hope that they say 'no I'm not I'll prove it by acquiescing to what you want and not reacting'. it is a weak argument unworthy of the cause of feminism.

Actually what I am slightly concerned about (not terrified) is that GW would change canon just to appease a minority of their current customer's political outlooks.

Because there clearly isn't a current majority of GW customers who want a change of canon to include female SM. Or maybe there is (I doubt it) but the issue is not being exposed to GW HQ with sufficient alacrity to make them make this change to date so I suspect it is a hobby horse of the vocal minority.

Am I terrified of them? No. Want females, see IG/Eldar/Tau/Tyranids/Inquisition/Sororitas.

Thank you please.

[John Bower]

NO there were actually listed 2 female Space Marines too. Remember that in 1st ed they were ordinary bods in power armour, didn't have to be super human monstrosities as their armour gave them the extra toughness and strength.

[eldargal]

It would be interesting to have tyranids declared to be all female.

[Deadlift]

I kind of think of Nids as being like "Aliens" from the movies or similar to bug colonies. With a "Queen" as the controlling entity and main reproductive organism.

[YorkNecromancer]

And if that's the case, they'd all be female, just like ants, bees, etc...

I do like the idea of having some useless 'drone' males; sculpt up some weaponless Termagants, and say they're male Tervigons/Tyrants/etc... then use them as Tyranid objectives.

"We must reclaim the King for the Hive; the Swarmlord demands her mate back."

Although Genestealers should be male, because, well, holding you down and penetrating you with their thrusting reproductive organs and all that.

Wow, I hadn't realised just how super-rapey Genestealers are until right now.

[Wolfshade]

Well they do steal your jeans....

[Psychosplodge]

:eek:

[onlyonepinman]

It would be interesting to have tyranids declared to be all female.

I already consider Nids to be female, or at least all of the monstrous creatures. I'm more inclined to consider the swarms as male, like ants and wasps. It annoys me greatly that GW haven't really cottoned on to this and constantly refer to things like the Hive Tyrant in the masculine context when in all probability, the only Male nids would be the "workers drones", things like Gaunts and Stealers. Maybe we should all make a point of being nerdy and correcting fellow gamers who refer to nids as male that they probably aren't.

[Lord-Boofhead]

I already consider Nids to be female, or at least all of the monstrous creatures. I'm more inclined to consider the swarms as male, like ants and wasps. It annoys me greatly that GW haven't really cottoned on to this and constantly refer to things like the Hive Tyrant in the masculine context when in all probability, the only Male nids would be the "workers drones", things like Gaunts and Stealers. Maybe we should all make a point of being nerdy and correcting fellow gamers who refer to nids as male that they probably aren't.

I thought all worker ants were female as well like bees there are just a handful of breeder males.

Most drones are asexual anyway

I've always considered most non breeder Nids to be asexual.

[Deadlift]

I thought all worker ants were female as well like bees there are just a handful of breeder males.

Most drones are asexual anyway

I've always considered most mon breeder Nids to be asexual.

Yep, I would agree with this and pretty much sums up my thoughts on Nids reproduction. Tervigons and the other big reproductive bugs being female, a few males to fertilise and the rest non reproductive being non sexed.

[Lord-Boofhead]

NO there were actually listed 2 female Space Marines too. Remember that in 1st ed they were ordinary bods in power armour, didn't have to be super human monstrosities as their armour gave them the extra toughness and strength.


NO they weren't they were listed as Adventures, that picture was the first one and every other appearance since was listed as Adventures or Mercs, NOT Marines. If you can find proof other wise show us, but you can't because it doesn't exist. There are Squats in Power Armour too from that era are they Space marines too?

Again Power Armour =/= Space Marine.

on a related not I would kill for one or both of those Power Armoured ladies as my Small collection of Inquisitors could do with some female Ordo Xenos Inquisitors and those lasses would be perfect.

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Yep, I would agree with this and pretty much sums up my thoughts on Nids reproduction. Tervigons and the other big reproductive bugs being female, a few males to fertilise and the rest non reproductive being non sexed.


You could argue with that and the Orks being gender neutral in makes GW pretty damn Trans-friendly. ;)

[onlyonepinman]

Yep, I would agree with this and pretty much sums up my thoughts on Nids reproduction. Tervigons and the other big reproductive bugs being female, a few males to fertilise and the rest non reproductive being non sexed.
I don't know, I haven't studied them in any great detail - I just know that the Females are generally the most important/influential/powerful gender in the insect world (i.e. the colony or Hive queen). I don't really know too much about the rest of the population because there is generally only one breeder per colony and lets face it, the gender of an insect that isn't capable of breeding is pretty much irrelevant to most people. They only want to know whether or not it will sting or bite them.

- - - Updated - - -

I do know that it's female wasps that sting you so perhaps all Nids with any kind of offensive weaponry should be considered female!

[eldargal]

Apparently warrior ants are female also, basically every ant you will see out of it's burrow will be female. At least that is what The Brain Scoop taught me.:p

[John Bower]

There actually was a pic posted as proof in just such a debate, and they were listed as 'Female Space Marine' 1 & 2 but it's going to take time to find that again. I don't know if they changed the packaging come 2nd ed though. But somebody did a review of 1st ed, and he pointed out the fact that Space Marines were not geneboosted ignoramouses they became later. (for ignoramous see; does what the Imperium says without thought for own safety or question of right or wrong).

[YorkNecromancer]

This article (bit sweary) contains basically all the details of the history of 1st edition female space marines: http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Female_Space_Marines

Also just found this article: http://www.gamingaswomen.com/posts/2012/07/on-playing-a-female-space-marine/

Fascinating and useful viewpoint, with this perfect encapsulation of why I will always believe there should be female space marines:


I think the idea of limiting a fantasy class to just one gender is boring and ignores that part of this hobby that is supposed to be fun. I’m already told I “can’t” do things in the real world because of my gender, why on Earth would I want games trying to pull the same line?

[Lord-Boofhead]

This article (bit sweary) contains basically all the details of the history of 1st edition female space marines: http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Female_Space_Marines

Dude? 1D4chan? Not a creadable source BUT even that one backs me up


Sometimes it is pointed out that back in the Rogue Trader days, Games Workshop did briefly produce two power-armoured female models, but they were changed to "Female Adventurers in Power Armour" and were never meant to represent female Marines.

Look I don't care if you want to make female space marines for what ever reasons, creepy or otherwise. Just don't lie about thei canon status historically or otherwise.

But to be honest I like that there are things only guys can do and that there are thing only girls can do in 40K. When a setting is to idealistic it doesn't ring true with me.

Space Marines a re Sci Fi Warrior Monks in the same way the Soritas are Sci Warrior Nuns, the gender split fits thematically to me.

- - - Updated - - -


There actually was a pic posted as proof in just such a debate, and they were listed as 'Female Space Marine' 1 & 2 but it's going to take time to find that again.

Of course it will forgeries take plenty of time. The Pic I Posted was the Original, there is no other.

Seriously if this is a genuine picture why is it not on Stuff of legends or an other reputable Citadel Collecting site?


I don't know if they changed the packaging come 2nd ed though. But somebody did a review of 1st ed, and he pointed out the fact that Space Marines were not geneboosted ignoramouses they became later. (for ignoramous see; does what the Imperium says without thought for own safety or question of right or wrong).

Space Marines changed from Dudes in Power armour to what they are today in the First Compendium or earlier. I don't think those minis were out before that point.

You have stated that you don't care much for the background and its pretty evident from all the errors you've been making you've not actually read much of it.

[Lord-Boofhead]

Knights: Mixed


Actually they are restricted to the first and 2nd sons of the Nobility so Sexistt AND Classist :P

[Chris Copeland]

It seems pretty clear that there could be female Space Marines. One thing seems pretty certain about this 40K universe: there is more unknown out there than known... more things have been forgotten than are remembered. GW has always made it clear that the universe is ours to do with as we will and it is up to us to uncover (make up) bits of the universe.

Many of us have created Chapters of our own with backstories of our own devising. It's far from a big stretch to have a heretofore unknown Chapter of FSMs show up on a battlefield. Again, I fall back on the idea that this is a universe full of unknowns and unreliable narrators.

Lastly, I think it's fun to thumb the nose at any overgrown man-child who would look at such a Chapter and say, "Well, THAT can't happen!" Really? THAT is where the willing suspension of disbelief evaporates? Hmmmmm... Go FSMs!

[Mr Mystery]

Plus, all joking apart.

Warp Travel. Why couldn't that genderswap people? It can age you in either direction.

[Littha]

Plus, all joking apart.

Warp Travel. Why couldn't that genderswap people? It can age you in either direction.

Warp exposure certainly can, Slaanesh is rather fond of that kind of thing. I doubt the inquisition would be all that happy though.

That generally sums up my thoughts on Female space marines actually. I hate flat retcons, GW saying "oh, by the way there were female space marines all along. Ignore all that old fluff" would be bad and any of the in universe ways to create new female space marines like warp exposure or tampering with astartes gean seed would likely result in a swift inquisitorial visit. Besides that the only character established to have any expertise is Fabius Bile and I doubt anything he produced would be accepted into the Imperium.

[m3g4tr0n]

It seems pretty clear that there could be female Space Marines. One thing seems pretty certain about this 40K universe: there is more unknown out there than known... more things have been forgotten than are remembered. GW has always made it clear that the universe is ours to do with as we will and it is up to us to uncover (make up) bits of the universe.

Many of us have created Chapters of our own with backstories of our own devising. It's far from a big stretch to have a heretofore unknown Chapter of FSMs show up on a battlefield. Again, I fall back on the idea that this is a universe full of unknowns and unreliable narrators.

Lastly, I think it's fun to thumb the nose at any overgrown man-child who would look at such a Chapter and say, "Well, THAT can't happen!" Really? THAT is where the willing suspension of disbelief evaporates? Hmmmmm... Go FSMs!


The lore doesn't support your case. That being said, anyone should be free to field a customized force if the opponents/tournament organizer allows it. Although you open yourself up to criticism when people see your female Astartes, and shake their heads in disappointment. You also set aside any reason to take offense when that happens.

[SuperDann]

That being said, anyone should be free to field a customized force if the opponents/tournament organizer allows it. Although you open yourself up to criticism when people see your female Astartes, and shake their heads in disappointment. You also set aside any reason to take offense when that happens.

There have been a fair number of cases where I have seen a conversion or heard a back story and have rolled my eyes and had to bite my tongue. However, in a gaming situation, I'm not going to not play someone because they field female Space Marines as, at the end of the day, it doesn't make a blind bit of difference to the actual game play. I might think a thing or two about the fluff, but I won't necessarily say it.

[Lord Asterion]

The lore doesn't support your case. That being said, anyone should be free to field a customized force if the opponents/tournament organizer allows it. Although you open yourself up to criticism when people see your female Astartes, and shake their heads in disappointment. You also set aside any reason to take offense when that happens.

I've shaken my head at many conversions, never anything female, more often men going over the top with blood and gore

[Kaptain Badrukk]

That 1D4 Chan article has reminded me that there has indeed already been a female CSM(ish) in the current fluff, the inestimably badass Larana Utorian.
So between that and CSM mutations I'd say that vanilla marines are our only "male only" marines. And if Larana can do it for chaos..........

[SuperDann]

That 1D4 Chan article has reminded me that there has indeed already been a female CSM(ish) in the current fluff, the inestimably badass Larana Utorian.
So between that and CSM mutations I'd say that vanilla marines are our only "male only" marines. And if Larana can do it for chaos..........

Yes, she's CSMish. She's a daemon-possessed woman with power armour. She resembles a Space Marine, but isn't a Space Marine. Just like Sisters of Battle are like Space Marines, just without all the genetic modificiations.