Fighting for Gender Equality in the Warhammer 40K Universe
The following post was emailed to the CEO and CFO of Games Workshop on 4/7/2014: http://equalgaming.tumblr.com/post/82038305007
Mr. Kirby, Mr. Rountree and Games Workshop Directors and Managers,
Recently, I attended Adepticon 2014 in Lombard, IL where I had the opportunity to meet several Games Workshop, Forge World and Black Library employees. Every one of them that I interacted with was professional, friendly and inviting. They gracefully answered my questions about the lack of Dark Angels and Adeptus Mechanicus merchandise and put in a great effort to ensure that I walked away from their booth, not just once but twice, with bags full of product and a smile on my face. My question to your company as a whole is this; why have you not done this on a grander scale?
I’m a woman that plays a Dark Angels army and among many women 40K players out there, I am dissatisfied with the lack of representation of women in our gaming universe.
When Dan Abnett’s Gaunt’s Ghosts series drew me into Warhammer 40K over four years ago, I was sitting next to a friend watching him paint Space Marine models between chapters. It was at that point that I noticed he didn’t have any women in his army so I asked him why. He replied that women couldn’t be Space Marines but they could be in the Imperial Guard or Sisters of Battle. As we continued talking, he showed me the few female models that were available and explained their “fluff”. I was horrified to say the least. The only models that looked remotely like women were more rare, more expensive, had a sexist plot and were honestly, not very proportional or humanlike.
The other women in my area play xenos armies of Dark Eldar, Chaos Daemons and Tyranids because there is no human gender to worry about. However, I want to fight for the Emperor and my only choice is an expensive, mostly metal, disproportionate looking force of fanatical Inquisitorial nuns with armored boob cups. How could the creative minds of the largest war gamming company not manage to properly represent 51% of the world’s population?
I opened up my Imperial Armour Volume Two – Second Edition to see “Welcome, battle-brother”. This book also has rules for the war machines of the Sororitas who have been referred to on numerous occasions as battle-sisters but yet, there is only recognition given to those “brothers” reading the book or playing the game. What about us sisters, or those who are not cisgendered?
Everywhere I turn, be it a Rogue Trader RPG Arch-Militant or a Dark Heresy RPG Inquisitor or an Adeptas Sororitas or an Imperial Commissar, the women that are depicted by Games Workshop are on the whole sexualized. Should I just be happy that we are depicted at all? I don’t believe so.
I’m a player, a Space Marine player who demands to be represented the same way that men have. Why should I have to buy models from Privateer Press and Victoria Miniatures then alter and sculpt them at an extremely high cost to be properly represented in 40K miniatures games? If men can choose from 18 Space Marine chapters and their successor chapters and all of the Imperial Guard Regiments, then I deserve the same choice.
Women control $20 trillion in annual consumer spending globally. Women also make up about half of the video gaming population but less so for miniature gaming, where we see a lack of representation on the table. If you start representing us in an equal manner to our male counterparts, you will see an increase in sales to women.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, I look forward to hearing from you soon and to seeing the improvements you make towards greater representation of women in Warhammer 40K and its counterparts.
Please help us get the word out that women want equal representation in the 40K universe and a game free from sexism and misogyny.
Thank you!
