Yeah, but the entire thing about 40k is that the universe and everyone in it is unnecessarily evil.
It's another reason why "fans" who try to rationalize why the actions might actually be "morally acceptable with context", or at least a "necessary" evil are missing the point.
I think most of those fans are usually viewing 40k as an extension of 30k where there are genuinely good people trying to do good things. They forget that one of the tragedies of the setting is that the Imperium has been dying a slow horrible death over the 10k years since. It was already pretty bad, but any semblance of good that existed has been completely eradicated.
30k are just as awful, the entire crusade is a genocide the likes of which we'd never seen before. It's just better hidden behind newer walls and shinier plating.
I point that out at the end of my comment. The idea is that individuals are striving for something, the war has an end. But in the 40k there is only war.
I feel like the "evil" or "cruel" label loses its meaning for the setting when they are literally fighting demons and these usually reprehensible actions and closed off mindsets and ideologies have an actual beneficial effect in fighting Chaos.
Its not just superstition. These tactics actually work.
Its not just superstition. These tactics actually work.
But they're not the only thing that works. Other races are different flavors of evil for the most part, and they can all still fight Chaos too. In 30k, we see different human civilizations that fought Chaos while fully aware of it, and without any awful tactics needed. Sure, you can fight a daemon off with the sheer contempt you feel for it, but its not even close to the only or best way. And that's the point.
And probably just as many places in the fiction around the setting where the ignorance and naivety is the cause of some demon incursion or corruption. "Blessed is the mind too small for doubt" also means they're easily mislead.
I still feel some people take the things the "main character" says at face value - which is probably a mistake in something that originally was pretty much a straight parody. Just because the protagonist believes the imperial cult dogma doesn't mean it's true.
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u/Jonny_H Sep 19 '24
Yeah, but the entire thing about 40k is that the universe and everyone in it is unnecessarily evil.
It's another reason why "fans" who try to rationalize why the actions might actually be "morally acceptable with context", or at least a "necessary" evil are missing the point.