Talk:A Lighter Shade of Grey

In Warhammer 40000, the Tau were created to basically be this trope, and whilst some Fan Dumb has forced them to get darker since their introduction, they still manage to be this. It says a lot about the state of the 40k verse where the race with a "communist manifest destiny" motif, who openly admit to wanting to conquer the universe and make all other races part of their empire, who resort to violence if their efforts to diplomatically subsume other planets fail, and who (in one videogame comment of dubious canonicity) are implied to set up concentration camps and forced sterilization programs for races that resist their conquests and fail, are still the comparatively good guys.

Is there any proof of Word of God sort? Or is it some other fandom being funny and habitually exercising internet-telepathy? Because "a faction modeled after the RL factions infamous for their invariable predilection for mass executions and building concentration camps was introduced into Grimdark, and surely it was intended to be BETTER than the originals" is a thesis that needs some solid support. And possibly lots of sealant, to hold water.

Well, the only sources that I have is from Wikia and 1d4chan. But the gist of it is that GW made them to stand out from...everyone else and another obvious reason. People were pissed off about having an "optimistic" faction in the lore, so they gave the Ethereals some dubious mind-controlling powers. I have no idea about the concentration camps, but I'll vouch for their never-ending quest of expansion. But overall, they're better than certain organisations of the Imperium of Mankind; but it isn't much since they're the new guys and a lot hasn't been revealed on the castes aside from Fire, Ethereals, and Air.