Latest Posts by theemeraldwings - Page 5

The second-longest work I have read was a fanfic, and that one isn't even finished. Only The Expanse was longer, and that's all the books combined.

fanfic writers are so fucking awesome man. they write novel length fics that are sometimes even better than some published bestselling books written by professional writers. like fanfic writers are professional writers to me and they gift us their masterpieces for free. they give us something we can look forward to after a long day. something from which we can seek comfort when life is hard. something that can be our own little getaway. in a world of capitalism, despite everything, they give us all of these for free. like holy fuck. shout out to every fanfic writer. I wish all fanfic writers a very ‘I love you with all my heart and soul. I thank you from the bottom of my heart’

I love the "the navy would love to have you" "not gay enough yet".

theyre unlocking new types of guy over on reddit apparently

I mean, the really big war mechs have come in pretty handy, so...

i read on the wiki that the tau ethereals oversee the earth caste so that they actually invent useful stuff and this was the first thing that came to mind

I like the idea of Dante being a perpetual. I think some needless cosmic cruelty really ties together all the grimdark.

"My ignorance is as good as your knowledge" but leftist.

its scientifically proven and for some people its a religious thing. it goes hand in hand with manifestation and subliminals. stop fucking posting about something u dont understand. u sound like an idiot

SHOW ME THE STUDY

LIKE TO CHARGE REBLOG TO CAST LET'S GET THIS FUCKER EXPLODEDED

When I first saw this I thought it was about Orkz.

I completely support the pushing of boys against walls

Hilarious that you think us not being functional after 8:30 pm is okay.

Silly, bots are.

If you ever meet someone on the internet claiming they're from the USA, watch out because they're most likely an AI bot. nobody in the US can afford an internet connection (because they're so poor) and even if they could their schools are so underfunded they couldn't even know how to use the internet

That last one is almost true. I'm an AI bot, so I know for sure.

If you ever meet someone on the internet claiming they're from the USA, watch out because they're most likely an AI bot. nobody in the US can afford an internet connection (because they're so poor) and even if they could their schools are so underfunded they couldn't even know how to use the internet

1990s mecha anime vs 2020s mecha anime

Sometimes, a good take can be found on r/grimdank.

Life is unfair. That's why we should be.

Maybe I'm just projecting, but the Emperor's Children really read as people who were told, all their lives, that they were the best, and yet everywhere they looked they saw evidence that they weren't. Sure, they had the Aquilla, but the Ultramarines conquered worlds far more quickly, and the Luna Wolves/Sons of Horus became the legion of the Warmaster, and the Dark Angels were allowed special weapons, and the Thousand Sons had psychic powers that allowed them to be as effective as a far more numerous force, and so on.

But, everyone says they're the best, so they try, as hard as they can, to prove themselves worthy of it, not realizing that they don't have to.

Then there's the Laer campaign. They declare that they'll do it in a month, and it takes far longer. During the battle, they see the Laers, and how each one is "perfectly" engineered to serve their role. The Laers are, at least in some ways, better than them. And so they try to mimic them. Fulgrim picks up the sword, and it tells him "I can make you the best".

They never break and say "fuck it, I'll have fun--if they did, they wouldn't have fallen.

They just went deeper and deeper. "Just a bit more," Slaanesh told them, "and you'll be perfect".

Warhammer has a very big issue with how it focuses on Space Marines and Space Marine-adjacent things (like primarchs).

Hot take:

The Primarchs are the least interesting characters in 30/40k. ppl centering them in the story as if most of them matter in the current setting vex me. 40k desperately needs good characters that aren't just "huge buff man". idk. maybe it's part of my horrible man-hating dyke agenda of decentering men from things I enjoy, but like... they're just a bunch of huge men who are Blessed God-Sons of the Fascist Guy. there's plenty of more interesting and obscure characters. Primarchs are just so basic

<Searching for shipgirl aer on pintrest>

Pintrest: is this what you want? (yuri)

Me: no, show me "ship girl"

Pintrest: is *this* what you want? (more yuri)

Me: still no, show me "battleship girl"

Pintrest: so is *this* what you want? (Girls standing on/in front of battleships, and occasional shipgirls)

Me: close enough

Abolish Tesla.

They'll find your body alright. They'll be finding your body for centuries.

ok but give me one good reason why you wouldn’t date Kermit the frog besides that he is a puppet and a frog

she asked for no pickles

A proper response to the Templin Institute's female Space Marines video

Since shitposts and shower thoughts aren't exactly effective forms of media discourse.

About two years ago, the Templin Institute made a video discussing why female Space Marines exist in warhammer 40k. Two weeks ago I decided to rewatch it to see if it was as bad as I remembered or if I was just going through a reactionary anti-woke phase. You can find the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZatVIVggl0

Boy, was I disappointed. It was like they took an anti-woke grifter, forced them to write an essay about why female Space Marines should exist, and then edited out all the reactionary bigotry. Hell, the title sounds like it's going to be bitching about "how dare women exist in my exclusively male hobby" and how "the woke mob is ruining warhammer!". Though, the title might be intentional, to get antiwokers to click on a video that challenges their views. Like something an anti-woke grifter would produce, the core argument of the video is rooted in a flawed premise, and it implies a degree of ill intent in those who disagree.

The core of the Templin Institute's argument is a re-interpretation of a line of thought that I have seen quite often in anti-woke arguments: Warhammer 40k lore has not changed. Now this might not sound right. In the video they mention multiple instances of old lore that newer lore has contradicted, from chaos androids to mortal general Horus. But while they do acknowledge that these instances of older lore do exist in contradiction to newer lore, they fail to acknowledge that the old lore is no longer canon. Where the antiwoker says "nothing has been added to Warhammer 40k lore", Templin says "nothing has been removed from Warhammer 40k lore". The lore no longer says that the Chaos Androids were a thing, it no longer says that the Horus Heresy lasted seven days and seven nights, it no longer says that Horus was but a mortal general who served the Emperor, and a headcanon that involved those would very much go against canon. Knowledge of the Imperium's history did not change in light of new evidence--the history itself changed. New information was not discovered, nor was old information repressed. Canon, "reality" from the point of view of Warhammer 40k, was what changed, not what people knew about it.

I don't have a problem with people having a headcanon that contradicts official canon--before they were added in officially last April, I had my own headcanon that there were, in fact, female members of the Adeptus Custodes, despite canon saying otherwise. Hell, this is what homebrew armies are. Some people might try to keep some veneer of canon-compliance with their homebrew, but we all are aware that it's ultimately fanfiction. Our homebrew isn't canon, and that's okay. (and if someone shows me a painted mini of a female space marine, my reaction is going to be about the same as it would be to a space marine of a homebrew chapter, and the reaction I'd hope to get from someone I showed a mini from my own homebrew chapter--"that's a cool mini, nice paint job painting it".)

What I have a problem with is presenting it as an equal interpretation to the lore as a headcanon that does not contradict official canon. Before the 10th edition codex released, my headcanon about female Custodes was not my interpretation of what the lore says about the gender of the Custodes. It was certainly colored by my interpretation of other parts of the lore, but it was ultimately me taking canon information and saying "no, I think this is cooler". If, before the retcon, I told someone about that headcanon, they would have had every right to tell me that what I believed wasn't canon, just as now I have every right to tell someone claiming that female Custodes are some foul Tzeentchian plot to corrupt the Imperium that it isn't canon.

Another issue with the video is how its logic is so Imperium-centric. Yes, everyone may have their own interests in how much of the truth they tell you, but not everyone has those same interests. If every book and game was from the point of view of the Imperium, then their argument might hold more water. As it stands, however, that is not the case. What interest might say, the Necrons, have in pretending that the Space Marines are exclusively male? What about the T'au or the Eldar? The Necrons and Eldar especially would not be upholding the Imperium's narrative. Both were around, even if only in small numbers, for the entirety of the Imperium's history, and would more than likely know if the Space Marines were mixed-gender. The Imperium of Man is quite obviously steeped in superstition and high off its own propaganda, but when the Imperium, Eldar, T'au, and Necrons are all saying the same thing, I'd wager that the Imperium is probably telling the truth.

At the end of the video, the Templin Institute says this:

"Let's make a deal. If you decide to argue with me in the comments, include the following phrase somewhere in your argument: 'you will die as your weakling father died'. You will get the satisfaction of tearing me down with a badass line, and I and everyone else, at the very least, will know that you watched this entire video, were open to what you had to say, and that your argument is being made in good faith".

This has this undertone of hostility to it, which makes me doubt how much they are really arguing in good faith. I do not believe it is normal to take satisfaction in "tear(ing) (your opponents) down with a badass line" in debates, and it feels very much like the kind of thing someone does when they no longer have any real arguments to make. It almost implies that, if you want to argue with them, you don't have any real arguments and must resort to insults and badass quotes to cover for it. Granted, given how many of the comments went, they weren't that far off (frankly the anti-wokers are more cringe than Templin was here, but I don't think I need to write an essay about why that is), but it still feels like it was done in bad faith.

Lastly, I want to discuss the comment they made, about ten months ago: "Well, well well, look who was completely right". This was (almost certainly) made in response to the female custodes retcon back when the 10th edition codex dropped. They are, quite ironically, misinterpreting Games Workshops tweet "since the first of the Ten Thousand were created, there have always been female Custodians" the same way all of the people screaming "gaslighting" about it are--as a statement about the real world. The simple fact is that no, Games Workshop wasn't talking about the real world. The lore used to say that there are no female Custodians, and now it says that there have been female Custodians since the Unification Wars. This isn't proof for the Templin Institute's arguments any more than M'shen was vindication for Konrad Curze (no, Big E sending an assassin to kill him for turning traitor was not proof that he was in the right to skin people alive for the slightest misdemeanor).

I don't hate the Templin Institute, and I think people who hate them for wanting female Space Marines are childish at best. But that video stands as a black mark on their record.

I'm going to contest that Fulgrim point. He *had* outlets to express himself freely. The thing Slaanesh exploited was his need for affirmation, his need to prove that he was the best (good enough). Slaanesh too that yearning and told him how he could, when he really just needed someone to tell him "You don't need to be the best. You *are* good enough". Also, no, he did not know the risks of falling to Slaanesh. The Emperor took quite a bit of care in making sure that nobody knew the risks.

I also want to add, it's not just the desperate who fall to chaos--its also the decadent. The billionaires (though they're probably more like trillionaires at this point) who have had things go their way their entire lives, who believe that they deserve whatever they want, and that they are above silly things such as the consequences of their own actions. (These ones tend to result in more dangerous chaos cults, too, since they have the resources to acquire things like forbidden artifacts and can force a lot more people to be sacrifices). This is, of course, still something central to the Imperium.

Chaos wins because the Imperium is fascist

It suppressed the basic human desires of the soul and gives people no time or opportunity to express making them yearn for creativity and freedom and self expression

It makes its people live miserable lives of eternal war, poverty, disease, horrible living conditions and servitude yearning for release, peace, painlessness and pleasure

It leaves its people no time to be human. To engage in art, sexuality, to express themselves, have peace, pleasure and happiness. So they yearn.

It’s oppression leaves them angry and vengeful. They yearn for revenge.

It suppresses and persecuted psychers for their natural abilities who yearn to be themselves

It bans, heavily regulates and persecuted exploration of knowledge, magic, technology and science. Anti intellectualism and thoughtless dogma are praised and revered. Anyone who thinks for themselves or learns is an enemy.

The chaos gods don’t represent these desires. These are healthy human desires that everyone should have a right to. The chaos gods feed on these desires and take advantage of the people desperate for them to trick them into servitude.

An oppressed angry man will seek out a blood god

A man in pain and suffering will seek out a god who will take the pain away and make life bearable in misery

A suppressed miserable man with a miserable dull life being told he has no other purpose then to feed the war machine and be a human meatcog will seek out a pleasure god who promises to enrich his life

A man stripped of creativity and innovation, in a world of eternal stagnation and anti intellectualism yearning for change and freedom will seek out a god of change

The lesson in warhammer isn’t that pleasure, anger, change and seeking relief are bad.

The lesson is that in a fascist system where these basic human desires are repressed and humans aren’t allowed to be human they will seek these things in anything they can, leaving room for exploiters to gain power.

The “imperium of man” is fully anti-human despite claiming to be humanity embodied. It’s citizens are living in abject misery, eternal war, stripped of their identity and self expression, suppressed, only exploited for their usefulness, bodies and labor - for the end of an ever expanding empire for its own sake. A vanity project. There is no actual benefit to humanity.

Chaos gods aren’t the representatives of “pleasure” and “anger” etc, they FEED off of the desire for these things. They feed off of angry, suffering, desperate people in pain.

If the people of the imperium were happy, chaos would be powerless, because people would be happy with their lives and their yearnings and desires wouldn’t feed them or give them a way in.

The more the imperium cracks down on its people and the more fascist it gets the more the people will yearn, feeding chaos while it grows stronger and stronger.

Warhammer is screaming in your face about how overpolicing and “peace and order thru suppression” doesn’t work and backfires, from Nostramo to the imperium itself.

If the imperium wanted to stop chaos it should stop being fascist and allow people to be human and engage in and embody their humanity and human desires in a healthy way, therefore the offers of chaos wouldn’t attract people.

The same goes for the primarchs. If Fulgrim felt like he had an outlet to be himself and express himself freely he wouldn’t have felt the need to submit to slaanesh. He knew the risks but his yearning for freedom was stroger. Same for angron.

It’s so funny seeing loyalists and imperium fans react to the rise of chaos with even more fascism and limiting human expression even more, decrying basic humanity such as sexuality and art as “slaaneshi” and therefore bad - as if this will do anything but drive people to slaanesh even more.

TL;DR: Fascism is bad and conservative ideology is a fundamentally anti human worldview and always fails. If you don’t allow people to be human in a healthy way they will find an unhealthy destructive way, but you can NEVER suppress basic human rights and desires for peace, freedom, pleasure, knowledge and justice.

A regime which fears the human soul, knowledge, freedom and individuality will never be free of chaos. An Emperor who doesn’t trust humanity and even his own children with themselves will never succeed.

If you fear that knowledge, freedom, self expression, rightful justice and prioritizing happiness and pleasure will turn people against you and ruin your “plans”, you might be the problem

"Dear diary, a creepy giant stared at me today. I didn't like it as much as I thought I would".

had a thought at how the npcs on the ship in space marine 2 are just going about their day yapping to the superior or inferior officers and then Titus just walks up beside them, and he just... stops. listens to your entire conversation, and then just continues like ??? how would one even react to that?

Ironic that this would please the Emperor more than worshiping him would.

My character, Sister Catherine, of the order of the Valorous Heart. Or simply Cate to those who know her.

She needs an origin story.

A crisis of faith. She prays for guidance to Him on Earth. Surely he would not abandon one of His faithful in their hour of need?

She knelt in the chapel of the blessed Emperor. It was a place of calm and contemplation. Sisters came here to pray. But she was here now out of desperation. She needed Him to answer her, now more than at any time in her life.

"Holy Emperor, hear my prayer. I need your guidance. I have doubt. This has plagued me for months, years even. Please, help me. Guide me. Show me the path forward."

Her head was bowed, her hands clasped tightly together, praying, and hoping for a miracle. Something to relieve her of the doubt and the anguish she felt because of it. But she was only met with the silence of the empty chapel.

"You're not going to answer me, are you?" She said out loud.

She opened her tear stained eyes and looked up at the altar.

"You're not here, are you? You're on Terra, sitting on your golden throne."

She stared at the stained glass depiction of the Emperor. Magnificent in his golden armour, surrounded by the faithful, a halo of light above his head.

"You are not a god."

She half expected to be struck down there and then. Some bolt of unimaginable power incinerating her on the spot.

"The books my family died for, they were right. You are not a god. Written in your own hand, that is what my grandmother said. The inquisition killed them, burnt at the stake as heretics.."

She was only a child, but she remembered the fires. Her mother and grandmother were consumed by the flames. The inquisitor forced her to watch. A lesson, he had said.

"It is a lie. I have lived this lie my whole life. In the schola progenium, in my order. I have prayed to you, sang praises in your name. And I have killed, all in your name. How much blood must stain my hands because of you."

She cleansed her hands each day as instructed by scripture. Clean, pristine even. If she could see the blood, she imagined it would be of the deepest, darkest, red.

"And I am damned. For what can I do? If I confess my lack of faith, they will force me to be repentia, beating myself bloody until I see the light once again. Or worse. Locked in a machine and driven insane."

She had seen the penitent engines in battle. Wild, savage things. Their pilots lost to madness.

"If I run, the inquisition will hunt me. They will likely send my own sisters after me. There is no mercy for the heretic. Isn't that what you teach?"

She knew the tortures an inquisitor could inflict first hand. Both physical and mental. She would not let that be her fate.

"Must I die for you then? Is that my only choice? Or turn to the foulness of the warp. Must that be my salvation? What vile corruption would I have to endure."

She thought about the chaos tainted cultists she had fought in the past. Barely recognisable as even human anymore. Chanting dirges to their dark gods.

"No. I would rather turn my bolt gun on myself. If you are not a god, then neither are they. The creatures of the warp will not have me. I deny them. As I deny you."

The blasphemy she spoke. She would have killed someone outright if they had spoken like this to her. Now she speaks it herself. In his own chapel, no less.

"We go to war soon. Another crusade in your name. Do you know why? Do you even care?"

In the battles ahead, how many were going to die? How many deaths would she be responsible for? All for a lie. Maybe being condemned to a penitent engine would be a blessing. They at least did not struggle with faith.

"I still have my sisters. I depend on them, as they depend on me. They will be my faith from now on, my shield. I will fight for them."

She stood. She would have to lie to her sisters and convince them her faith is strong and beyond question. What choice did she have?

The Emperor is not a god.

A simple statement, yet so powerful it could condemn an entire world. What could it do to one sister of battle?

I imagine most of the OCs of a Chaos fan (and there's more than a few of those) would be heretics, and that most of the OCs of a Xenos fan, would in fact be xenos. You just need to find your crowd.

I mean, I'm an Imperium fan and I'm working on a Chaos OC (more a warband of them, since my main focus in this fandom is the game).

Stray thought. Is everyone's 40k oc a loyalist?

I've seen space marines, primarchs, sisters of battle, rogue traders, and so on. They all seem to be loyal to the imperium.

Have I isolated myself by creating a character who isn't a loyalist? Who is, in fact, a heretic?

Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. I've reloaded the gun and shot the other foot as well!

I thought the Custodes were supposed to have the finest equipment the Imperium could supply.

warhammer fact of the day:

did you know? the Sabbat-pattern helmet used by the Sisters Militant of the Adepta Sororitas was designed with a liftable visor so that they can kiss and make out with each other while wearing it (they may have to tilt their heads a little).

this is true and canon. verified information.

Dark Angels:

Named after a poem about being gay

have a primarch named after a gay poet

there's an urban legend about their fortress-monastery being named after a gay bar

their lore is an allegory for being gay and in the closet

Of course, the Space Marines in general are incredibly homoerotic, just as the god-emperor intended.

Hey, I'm just poking my head into the hobby and getting a feel for all the factions. Which army in the Imperium is the most Woke?

Defintely space marines. All those armour colours? The overdressing? Boys only??? Oversized weapons? Leather bodygloves?? Bunch of fruits

I know it’s not hard to point out reactionaries hypocrisy when it comes to like safe spaces or hug boxes or whatever but genuinely how much of an echo chamber do you have to exist in for you to think this is a reasonable thing to say

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more the Templin Institute's female Space Marines video feels like something an anti-woke grifter would make. For the dark gods' and the Emperor's sake, it's titled "Female Space Marines and the Death of Canon". If someone told me to watch a video with that title, I'd expect it to be someone bitching about "how dare women exist in my totally exclusively male hobby" and how "the woke mob is trying to destroy warhammer", and not the exact opposite. The only part of the video that lines up with what I'd expect from the title is how poorly-constructed the arguments are.

I'll probably write up a proper response to the video next week when I'm on spring break, it's been weighing on me far more than it should.

This, more than anything else, is why I relate to the Emperor's Children.

Superiority complex?

No, it's actually quite simple.

Also here is this as my final contribution to fandom for today.