Like many people who consume Warhammer content, I have sat back in awe as the fandom has pretty much torn itself apart for the last week over the fact that Games Workshop has decided to make female custodes cannon in the lore. I don’t mean this as an exaggeration either, people have absolutely gone to war over this shit. GW also decided that not only were they adding them into the lore, but they were going to make it retroactive by stating that the giant, gilded demi-gods had actually had ladies in their ranks the entire time. Then that powder keg went boom, and the whole game is worse off for it.
Art by @ccatnnipp
To start things off I want to make my position clear: I am all for female custodes. I am also fully in support of female space marines. I could honestly give a shit what your army looks like or what goes on in your headcannon or what goes on in the official GW codex. It’s a game. We are playing a game, with models. Sure it means more to some of us than just a game, especially when you count time invested, money spent, experiences shared, etc. But seriously, let’s keep some perspective. This is a game, played with toys, painted for fun.
For quite a few fans on both sides of the argument, that paragraph right there pretty much eliminates me from having any further opinion on the matter, because I am a casual or I am not invested enough in the lore to be allowed to have an opinion. Where’s your army? To all of those folks I just want to say fuck you. Fuck your gatekeeping. Fuck your elitism. Fuck you for getting so worked up over something so ridiculous. I play as much as I want to. I paint when I can. I listen to audiobooks when I take a drive but that is pretty slow progress. Your investment has no bearing on whether or not I get to have an opinion.
I wish there was a better way to express how I feel about things like that, but I just can’t think of a more effective way to say it. I genuinely don’t get it. I don’t understand why, if you enjoy something so much, you want to keep other people from enjoying it as well. Especially when the way that they want to enjoy it doesn’t in any way keep you from doing it your way. Don’t put female custodes or space marines in your chapter. Don’t buy the book if you don’t like the characters in it. Half of the appeal of Warhammer is that there are so many ways to customize your experience. The fact that there is a primarch with angel wings, and everyone just rolls with it, is what makes the game so great.
This is something that I have seen a lot this week. You just don’t understand. You don’t get what this means. I agree with you, this seems pretty fucking stupid where I’m sitting and I can’t even get close to your level of worked up about this. Seriously, most of the characters are wearing helmets and armor anyways. Like if you lined your army up across the table from me and said what do you think my guys look like, I would have no response. Who knows? They could be white, black, brown, male, female, or sentient plant people for all I can see.
“Well some of them don’t have helmets”. Alright, well even with long hair or shaved heads GW heads look like potatoes anyways so I still can’t tell you if they are man or woman. I try to paint faces all the time and they look like androgynous mutants. Skill issue? Probably. Also, shut up. If I am across the table from you, you could tell me any made up headcannon fiction about your units and my response will always be the same. “Cool”. I am going to forget what you told me in 3 minutes anyways. An hour from now I am not even going to remember if the PERSON I played against was a guy or a girl, much less what the gender breakdown of their army was.
I probably sound like an asshole right now. Let me be clear, it’s not a lack of respect that makes me think so little of the people around me. It’s brainpower. I have a toddler with another on the way. I have chores I should probably be doing. I have a mortgage and therefore a job to pay said mortgage. Our world is in a constant state of chaos. I’m probably hungry. I definitely haven’t slept enough recently. There is one tiny sliver of grey matter left in my head for info like this and that thing is being wiped clean and written over all the time. I forgot the word for gas pump the other day and tried to call it a spigot and my wife nearly had a stroke laughing at me.
So there you go. Those are the practical reasons why I just can’t be bothered to get upset over the changes. Now I can dive into my moral ones, which are pretty simple and boil down to letting people enjoy things the way that they want as long as they aren’t actively hurting someone else. I am speaking broadly here folks, obviously there are common sense exceptions and caveats to this, but with warhammer it should be pretty simple. It makes people happy and makes them feel represented in a thing if there are characters that look like them. We should lean into that as much as we can.
Everyone experiences hobbies differently, and I get that. My brother and I love RPGs, especially if they have a robust character creator. It’s one of the first things that we talk about any time we play a new game. What’s funny about that though, is that the reasons why we want extreme customization are completely different. He want’s to recreate himself in the game. His character is going to be a human knight/paladin who is tall, fit, and Caucasian. Mine is going to be a wildcard. By the time I am making a character I have created an entire fiction in my head about who they are and how they look. Could be male or female. They may be any race available. Sometimes they are gigantic. Sometimes they are tiny. If they are able to bring cosmetics into cutscenes there is a good chance I will make them look absurd so I can laugh during emotional moments.
I bring this up to say, I have never been a person who needs to be represented in a media I am consuming. If there are no characters that look and sound like me I really don’t care. If there are characters that look and sound like me, I may think it’s cool, but it doesn’t add anything to the story. But I know it’s important to my brother. And I know it was important to my cousins when Miles Morales was the new Spider Man. Just because it doesn’t mean I would want to rob them of that feeling. As a matter of fact if anyone did want to do that, I would say they were an asshole. Assholes make things worse pretty much as a rule.
I also have a daughter these days. I hope that we share in many interests as she gets older. The first time that she comes to me and says that she wants her own miniature or wants to try to paint one, I am probably going to be beside myself with excitement. When that day hopefully comes, if she decides she wants her space marines to be painting neon pink and that they are all women I’m all for it. If she decides the emperor himself is actually a princess then hell yeah he’s already wearing a crown lets go. If she wants to dress up as a space marine for halloween one year I’m going to try to make her the best goddamn space marine costume I can and I’m showing EVERYONE. If, at any point during this someone tries to take these things away from her, or rob her of that joy I can promise you it’s going to be a huge fucking problem.
Now I’m not saying that everyone around us needs to make their space marines women, or agree with her that the emperor is a princess. Her emperor is a princess. Yours is a male corpse-god on a golden throne. Games Workshop’s is a corpse-god on a golden throne. She will have to come to terms with the fact that when she reads about the lore there is going to be a contradiction there, but she will hopefully have enough perspective to understand that this is fiction and also a game and that everything doesn’t have to line up with the way that she thinks or wants it to be. I have to do that all of the time when my wife points out that the Sororitas are actually celibate when in my head I am in fact married to all of them. That’s right. Every single one.
Look at all of my poorly painted wives
I don’t expect this rant to change anyone’s mind. After what I’ve seen for the last week that ship has very much sailed. If you support GW changing things up to add women you got a big W. If you are against it and decided it was worth fighting over you have had plenty of targets with which to rage. For what it’s worth I think the whole “it’s always been like that” is lazy and dumb. Just say “Hey they’ve opened up the recruitment, and now there are female custodes”. Do the same with space marines down the road. “Yes the geneseed used to be like this but science happened and now it works with women”. Boom. Done. Walk away and leave the burning wreckage land where it may. Because holy shit with how upset people got about the custodes the Space Marines is going to be so toxic.
That’s what really sucks about all of this. The precedent is set. GW got to see a mini version of what is going to happen if they decide to add FSM and hopefully this doesn’t change their minds. The fandom, although already dealing with multiple levels of toxicity, got to really tear into eachother and I don’t think it’s ever going to get to a better place. The memes are great. The hate is not. I can’t think of any IP that has ever gotten back to a good place after getting to this level of toxic. Hopefully it does. If not I will try to keep finding the good ones and avoiding the bad like I always have. In the meantime more Muscle Mommy custodes memes please.
Perspectives are always interesting. Mine is completely different. I’ve always seen Fem-Dom as THE geek fetish. Cloaked in virtue (“diversity”, “inclusion”), the presence of “strong women” (and now your “muscle mommies”) was always about the thrill simps get when women defeat/humiliate men in geek fiction. Men created Catwoman, Lara Croft, Xena, Buffy, etc. for their own pleasure. (Of course female fans have entered the space in greater numbers and enjoy identifying with sexy/deadly characters themselves.)
I’m fascinated how the film Kickass tried and failed to satirize this fetish for female violence. Too many geeks said “I’d wait too!”, and then we ended up with pre-teen girl-bosses everywhere. If a guy looked at your daughter in a kick-ass costume and said “I’d wait for her!”, would that be a H.F.P. for you?
Anyway, you are absolutely entitled to have and express your own opinion on anything in WH40K. If you can get emotional about it, perhaps you can sympathize when others do also.
I think the plan is that Amazon (ironic name here) wants to let Space Marines be the iconic swaggering alpha males of the 40K universe, as long as there is an uber-alpha-female who has a scene of dominance/humiliation to put them in their place. That’s why SoB’s were not acceptable. SMs don’t take orders from them. “Grrrl’s Rule” is the order of the day with studios. You are perfectly OK with that. However, you should accept that not every geek is simping for another armored boot to lick.
First off I want to say I appreciate you sharing your opinions on the situation. Obviously we are kind of on opposite sides here but I respect you engaging and explaining why you feel like you do. I have heard the Amazon thing being tossed around but not from any actual verified source. 4chan leaks can be pretty hit or miss so I am taking it with a grain of salt. Also, the fact that Amazon is producing any 40k IP means it is going to be full of stupid decisions and commercialized and pamper to all kinds of different audiences and so the fact that they would do something like that is basically par for the course and so I don’t see why that particular thing is what people are mad at. They are not going to respect the world they are playing in. Case in point the Wheel of Time and Rings of Power. Those shows are ass. I have no hope for the 40k show from them period. If GW decided to make a decision like this to pander to them that’s lame but we are kind of talking about two completely different issues here. Should GW insert bullshit into the lore to please a TV show that is just shooting to make a quick buck on 40k? No. I hate it. Should female custodes be allowed and should people be allowed to be excited for them without catching a bunch of hate and shit for it? Yeah.
To address one of your other points, with regards to the whole Uber Alpha female humiliating and dominating the heroic men thing, I actually agree with you to an extent. I am definitely feeling the fatigue of the whole male protagonist is useless and the new female protagonists being the only capable and powerful one, constantly putting him in his place and also saving the world to spite him thing. I cannot describe how much I hated The Last Jedi, especially the characteros of Rey, Holdo, and Tran. Hated it. Haven’t watched a Star Wars IP since. Same thing with the 2016 Ghostbusters. I think this type of writing is lazy and pandering and it can kill my interest in a franchise if it is overdone. If tomorrow GW comes out and says actually ALL of the Custodes are women, and also here is a new FSM chapter and they are actually the strongest one and their Primarch is the most powerful and she is immediately solves the problems that no one else has been able to solve that will probably be my end point with Warhammer. But that isn’t what happened. They said “also there are Female Custodes”. That’s it. And people lost their goddamn minds. The reaction is the problem. With the movies I mentioned above I didn’t lose my mind and try to burn the franchise down and attack anyone who liked those movies and characters like what has been going on with the WH fandom this week. I thought damn I hate this, and I stopped watching. If the people who share your opinion just said “Well I hate this idea, I’m not using Female Custodes” I fully respect that. That’s a normal adult reaction to something you dislike and don’t agree with. But don’t try to shit on the people who do like it, or prevent them from enjoying the game the same way you do. I like the idea of making more characters that women 40k players feel connected to and I think lore wise it makes sense that there would be women custodes, so I think this is a good decision.
With regards to your whole “if a guy sexualized your child daughter in a kick ass costume” I feel like this is a disingenuous hypothetical at best, and is way less of a real point than the rest of your post. Obviously I would have a problem with that, as any normal human should, and that has nothing to do with if she is wearing a 40k outfit because she thinks it’s cool or not. People simping for strong women characters is not new or a reason not to have them. Before simping for strong female characters it was just simping for female characters period. Every bond woman, before they were strong, they were just eye candy. The rotating cast of women Indiana Jones saves in his movies. Ripley, the OG strong female sci fi lady, back when they did it well, kills Aliens in her underwear because simps. That doesn’t mean it’s the ONLY reason she exists. She’s also just a badass character who carried the whole franchise. This is not a new or novel thing in any IP and so the fact that people are going to sexualize and enjoy them only for that reason regardless. Slave Leia changed the lives of an entire generation of nerds. If you are sexualize a child dressed as any of those characters someone should kick your head in. We should all be in agreement on that. Strong female characters can exist because strong women exist and they can also have sex appeal because people in successful media have sex appeal.
For your final point though I am with you 100%. Don’t simp or lick any armored boot you don’t want to. If the idea of FSM or Female Custodes, or any strong female character makes you feel a certain way then feel all of those feelings. But do it in a normal, adult way. Stop giving GW your money. Don’t play custodes. Write a blog post explaining why you refuse to lick boots. But end it there. Don’t attack the people on the other side, or try to prevent them from enjoying the game the same way you did up until the point you decided you didn’t.
Glad to read your response. We both agree with your main point: Don’t attack other folks who would like more female characters in WH40K. In general, fans shouldn’t attack other fans who share so much in common over small differences.
I don’t think the problem is Gw making female castoties so much as the lie “there has always been female castoties”. Basically GW is gaslighting there customers. There’s even a rumor that gw is planning on saying the emperor of mankind has actually been a woman presenting her self as a man this entire time. As a halo fan where female Spartans have existed for as long as I can remember I don’t care about female castoties becoming a thing really. The problem is the gaslighting and telling people if you don’t like and except the lie that there have always been female castoties then warhammer 40k isn’t for you. While also saying warhammer 40k is for everyone. That’s also gatkeeping.
Oh and for anyone who wants warhammer 40k minis without supporting GW now. Get a 3D printer and print your warhammer army.
I definitely think that is a part of it. I agree that was a very obtuse and lazy way to do it. However, people were already raging about it days before that GW comment came out. So I’m with you on that. The idea of GW making the Emperor a male presenting woman I am going to have to see with some type of source because that seems crazy even for modern day media standards. Like they are still a business and are going to try to make money, I would be shocked if they would nuke their IP like that.
I’m 100% with you that their messaging on this has been kind of double sided and just all around awful. I think what I am describing is a very clear distinction: If you don’t accept female custodes as part of your cannon and so you decide to not play with them then that’s totally fine and fully in line with all of the other problems people have with GW and things they have done in the past. Plenty of people did the same thing about the Primaris SM. It’s when they take it the step further and start attacking/harrassing/trying to push the people who do enjoy female custodes out of the fandom. Those I think should clearly fall under then GW and most of the community don’t want you there.
I am curious to see if there is about to be a huge explosion of Warhammer minis in the printing community. I have a printer and print things all the time but good warhammer sculpts have been few and far between for me.