4 ms·

Yeah, oversold to me, sorry. Just to start with: "definitely" and "subtly done" are at odds with each other. You can't be both. Klaatu is "definitely" a Jesu

by ajross 29d ago

Yeah, oversold to me, sorry. Just to start with: "definitely" and "subtly done" are at odds with each other. You can't be both. Klaatu is "definitely" a Jesus analog. The Emperor... meh. It's strained, precisely because GW never really went there: fine, he's Jesus, but then what represents the Gospels? The Old Testamanet? The Emperor is only "Jesus" insofar as that's how "Jesus" looks to a 20th century disaffected nerdy atheist. Well... OK I guess? Also... the 19th century British Empire is... kinda not at all viewed as a theocratic totalitarian autocracy consumed by cult-like worship of a dead god. Like, at all? It was a bourgeois, wealth-focused and extremely secular colonizer power driven by very worldly desires and a vaguely racist idea of How Things Should Be. And there's a lot of valuable source material for fiction there![1] And... GW didn't really do any of it, and almost none of that until much later. [1] c.f. like 80% of Cyberpunk

throaway198521 28d ago
Saying somethings subtly done but "definitely," identified as a certain character is in no way a contradiction lol. It just means its subtly done. 40k is not a satire of "Jesus," its a satire of Jesus-obsessed materialist Britain. How can you say that 19th century Britain wasn't obsessed with worshipping a dead god? They worshipped Jesus, put him into every part of everyday life, said that if you didnt worship him you'd end up in hell being tortured forever, etc etc... There doesn't need to be an entire 1:1 translation of the Bible into 40k for it to be a satire. A carrion-God Emperor of (white) Mankind who is "apparently" watching out for all of us, at all times, and gives us manifest destiny to rule all other races? That's the modern political Euro conception of Jesus, ensconced the same way into an Imperial state. The British Empire was extremely secular? You might want to brush up on your history. The COE (Britain's State religion) was not friendly to other religions inside the Empire. Especially at home. The British Empire was a devout place. You couldn't own property as a non-Anglican Christian until 1846! And they said their Jesus-God was responsible for everything, everywhere, at all times. Outside of Egypt and Ethiopia, Christianity exists in Africa why exactly? India they found it was too difficult to break their faith, so it wasn't worth the bother when they could extract resources anyways. But Africa is heavily Christian for no reason other than British missions. Bourgeois & wealth-focused is exactly how the Imperium is set up. They don't care about anything other than control and wealth being sent back to Terra. That's part of the satire too.
- ajross 28d ago
  > How can you say that 19th century Britain wasn't obsessed with worshipping a dead god? I think the burden of proof goes the other way? Obviously there were christians in England. But the British Empire really just was not a "Christian Empire" in any way that works in fiction. All the archetypes are secular! Tweedy bemonacled professors, Victorian romantics sharing cucumber sandwiches with their love triangles, gritty-but-cultured naval officers sipping tea and exploiting natives, Sherlock Holmes, for Christ's sake! (pun intended). Like, this is a very deep well of narrative source material and like none of it is explicitly religious in even the most minimal way. Like, where outside of 40k is anyone trying to construct an explicitly "British" cult warrior along the lines of a Space Marine[1]? I just don't see it. And if this is the only example, maybe it's just a bad example. Basically: the idea that 40k is based around British ennui about its imperial history is mostly a meme. It just fails as analysis in my eyes. 40k is about drunk nerds laughing too hard about weird stuff, and the analysis was a retcon picked up by atheists like us to flog our own particular culture wars. [1] And to the extent you can find better analogs, they're to American grunts in the 20th century and certainly not redcoats!
  - throaway198521 28d ago
    All those "archetypes" were explicitly Christian, including Holmes, who frequently refers to Providence (not talking about the BBC reboot here). Are you American by chance? Im not an atheist. Victorian Britain was heavily Christian, you are missing many archetypes such as the archbishop, vicar, the missionary, the good wife...Victorian Britain was an extremely Christian place. Why do you bring up redcoats? Those were the land soldiers. I guess you aren't aware that British Imperial Marines wore blue uniforms? And the Imperium's marines serve in its Navy. British Imperial Marines were a ROUGH lot, and some of their finest soldiers.
    - ajross 28d ago
      I think we need to agree to disagree here. The kinds of things you view as evidence for literary analysis just aren't what I'm looking at, and frankly to me they look like coincidence and prestigitation. Holmes using christian-derived rhetorical idioms is, needless to say, not evidence that Conan Doyle was describing a religious cult! Basically everyone (except you, I guess) views Holmes as an almost perfect expression of the Victorian secular rennaisance man archetype. I mean, duh. And FWIW, "redcoats" were a pun on the fact that I'd introduced americans into the argument (to spell it out, since that's seeming more necessary at this point: redcoats are the bad guys in american revolutionary mythology). But that said, if your argument for the British Empire being a christian totalitarian cult hangs on the fact that the infantry and marines wore different uniforms... We're done, basically. You're wrong, but I won't be able to convince you here.

by ajross 29d ago

throaway198521 28d ago

Saying somethings subtly done but "definitely," identified as a certain character is in no way a contradiction lol. It just means its subtly done. 40k is not a satire of "Jesus," its a satire of Jesus-obsessed materialist Britain. How can you say that 19th century Britain wasn't obsessed with worshipping a dead god? They worshipped Jesus, put him into every part of everyday life, said that if you didnt worship him you'd end up in hell being tortured forever, etc etc... There doesn't need to be an entire 1:1 translation of the Bible into 40k for it to be a satire. A carrion-God Emperor of (white) Mankind who is "apparently" watching out for all of us, at all times, and gives us manifest destiny to rule all other races? That's the modern political Euro conception of Jesus, ensconced the same way into an Imperial state. The British Empire was extremely secular? You might want to brush up on your history. The COE (Britain's State religion) was not friendly to other religions inside the Empire. Especially at home. The British Empire was a devout place. You couldn't own property as a non-Anglican Christian until 1846! And they said their Jesus-God was responsible for everything, everywhere, at all times. Outside of Egypt and Ethiopia, Christianity exists in Africa why exactly? India they found it was too difficult to break their faith, so it wasn't worth the bother when they could extract resources anyways. But Africa is heavily Christian for no reason other than British missions. Bourgeois & wealth-focused is exactly how the Imperium is set up. They don't care about anything other than control and wealth being sent back to Terra. That's part of the satire too.

ajross 28d ago
> How can you say that 19th century Britain wasn't obsessed with worshipping a dead god? I think the burden of proof goes the other way? Obviously there were christians in England. But the British Empire really just was not a "Christian Empire" in any way that works in fiction. All the archetypes are secular! Tweedy bemonacled professors, Victorian romantics sharing cucumber sandwiches with their love triangles, gritty-but-cultured naval officers sipping tea and exploiting natives, Sherlock Holmes, for Christ's sake! (pun intended). Like, this is a very deep well of narrative source material and like none of it is explicitly religious in even the most minimal way. Like, where outside of 40k is anyone trying to construct an explicitly "British" cult warrior along the lines of a Space Marine[1]? I just don't see it. And if this is the only example, maybe it's just a bad example. Basically: the idea that 40k is based around British ennui about its imperial history is mostly a meme. It just fails as analysis in my eyes. 40k is about drunk nerds laughing too hard about weird stuff, and the analysis was a retcon picked up by atheists like us to flog our own particular culture wars. [1] And to the extent you can find better analogs, they're to American grunts in the 20th century and certainly not redcoats!
- throaway198521 28d ago
  All those "archetypes" were explicitly Christian, including Holmes, who frequently refers to Providence (not talking about the BBC reboot here). Are you American by chance? Im not an atheist. Victorian Britain was heavily Christian, you are missing many archetypes such as the archbishop, vicar, the missionary, the good wife...Victorian Britain was an extremely Christian place. Why do you bring up redcoats? Those were the land soldiers. I guess you aren't aware that British Imperial Marines wore blue uniforms? And the Imperium's marines serve in its Navy. British Imperial Marines were a ROUGH lot, and some of their finest soldiers.
  - ajross 28d ago
    I think we need to agree to disagree here. The kinds of things you view as evidence for literary analysis just aren't what I'm looking at, and frankly to me they look like coincidence and prestigitation. Holmes using christian-derived rhetorical idioms is, needless to say, not evidence that Conan Doyle was describing a religious cult! Basically everyone (except you, I guess) views Holmes as an almost perfect expression of the Victorian secular rennaisance man archetype. I mean, duh. And FWIW, "redcoats" were a pun on the fact that I'd introduced americans into the argument (to spell it out, since that's seeming more necessary at this point: redcoats are the bad guys in american revolutionary mythology). But that said, if your argument for the British Empire being a christian totalitarian cult hangs on the fact that the infantry and marines wore different uniforms... We're done, basically. You're wrong, but I won't be able to convince you here.