Editing The Imperium of Man (section)

===Governmental & Ideological Structure of the Imperium===
Additionally, while the Imperium, as referenced above, looks like a merciless and oppressive empire and certainly functions as one on paper, it is in fact a confederation of several powerful organizations and a million planets. It occupies a strange place in between a libertarian paradise (as planets have a fair bit of autonomy, more than GW would like to admit) and oppressive theocracy, (as shown all over this page) as the Imperium's main policy for what a world does under their control is "Pay the tithe, send your psykers over when the Black Ships show up, and don't make me come over there." Each 'normal' planet in the Imperium (besides specially classified planets like Forge Worlds, Fortress Worlds, Death Worlds...) has its own laws, Government, culture and social order that can [[Attilan Rough Riders|differ]] [[Tallarn Desert Raiders|from]] [[Salamanders|one]] [[Ultramarines|another]] [[Catachan Jungle Fighters|by]] [[Vostroyan Firstborn|A]] [[Space Wolves|LOT.]] Just like today's countries some have merciless dictators (North Korea) and some have democracy to an extent where citizens can choose their own head of government (UK) and a majority are in between absolute tyranny and (some) democracy (you can only have so much democracy when someone with near monopoly on space warfare assets is concerned with you filling up production and/or manpower quotas and doesn't want you to fall into daemonic corruption when the literal souls of billions to quadrillions are on the line). Furthermore, each planet itself is actually quite independent to the extent where they can have their own armed forces and even wage their own civil wars. Due to this, the Imperium only cares when some serious shit happens (like xenos invasion, [[Chaos|corruption by Oh-God-What-The-Fuck eldritch horrors from beyond space and time]], when the aforementioned civil wars disrupt the military supply chain, harm Imperial officials on the planet or compromise the Imperial Cult, or when a Planetary Governor decided to declare himself independent of the Imperium), and given that this is the Imperium, these kinds of things vary from "happening by on a regular basis" to "Not seeing an actual war for multiple millennia". They have to be- even at the height of the Great Crusade there was no way for any sort of centralized government to keep control over thousands of worlds at once. The stand out example is [[Ultramar]], which is legally completely autonomous and can tell the government to get bent as long as the Gene Seed tithe is provided.

[[File:Tumblr nnrqjzAyKm1si96eio4 400.jpg|thumb|400px|right|A sprawling Imperial city. That ship's around two miles long, by the way. In Rogue Trader, anyway. In the novels more like ten to twenty.]]
Of course, in a few cases where a Planetary Governor or planet does declare independence, it is usually listed as [[HERESY]], however most Governors don't do this kind of thing because [[Chaos|they]] [[Necrons|know]] [[Orks|what's]] [[Dark Eldar|out]] [[Tyranids|there]] and that the Imperium is the only thing that [[Imperial Guard|can]] [[Space Marines|protect]] [[Imperial Navy|them]], because the [[God-Emperor of Mankind]] and the system of the [[Adeptus Astra Telepathica]] provides a cheap system of FTL and communication through the horrors of the [[Warp]] that cannot be replicated, and because the Merchant Fleet enables intergalatic commerce. There is also the reason that they have so much autonomy already that there isn't really a reason to leave the Imperium that can justify the risks in most cases. If a planet declares independence, it loses the right to FTL and trade with the Imperium, and that's bad for Hive Worlds that need Agri-Worlds in order to survive, meaning the Imperium doesn't even ''need'' to send in their military since ''they'' know that the young usurper would most likely peacefully surrender in that prospect. The reason why the loyalty of some planets differ in question varies over the Imperium's history. During the Great Crusade, most worlds were extremely loyal to both the Imperium and the Emperor because it rescued them from all sorts of indescribable horrors that had plagued them for the thousands of years of the Long Night (Age of Strife). After the Great Crusade, the Imperium remained (mostly) cohesive as a whole due to both a remaining sense of loyalty to their savior and for mutual survival in the face of a severely fucked up galaxy, not the least of which include the multiple doom counters running such as the Rangdan conquering too much or the Orks hitting critical mass without the Eldar Empire and old human federation + allies purging infestations. After a few thousand years of that, the Imperial Cult had gained sufficient strength that the reasons for remaining loyal to the Imperium and the Emperor expanded from just mutual survival to a shared religion where loyalty between each planet must be routinely checked to prevent separatism or [[Horus Heresy|another civil war that essentially kicked the Imperium in the galactic nuts.]] [[Derp|However, even then,]] [[Age of Apostasy|some religious asshat decides to do it all over again]] [[lulz|for the lulz,]] the aftermath of which persuaded some Planetary Rulers to question the legitimacy and thus loyalty to the Imperium. This is why you see that although most planets would never dare to even break away from the Imperium, a certain few that do break away is either due to the above questioning, your typical [[Just as Planned|Chaos hijinks]], xenos manipulation (as is frequently the case when the Tau or Genestealer Cults are involved), or just a Planetary Governor who's either arrogant enough to think he can get away with it or desperate enough to believe his world has nothing to lose from rebellion. 

Therefore, the loyalty of most to the Imperium is not just out of an ideological obsession to stamp out HERESY, but of pragmatism and necessity in order to survive in the grim darkness of the 41st Millennium as Protectorates. This real-life perspective again, is then supported in WH40K where the Imperium, being a decentralized but powerful semi-autonomous group of Corporate entities, have different ways of pledging allegiance to the Emperor himself rather than the State: the Inquisition stamps out anyone caught separating from or perverting the Emperor's rule of conduct as Heresy, the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]] worships the Emperor as an aspect of another pagan Machine-god called the Omnissiah and benefits from an ancient pact of alliance dating to the Great Crusade, and the [[Adeptus Astartes]] are altered transhumans who merely view the Emperor as an exemplar of humanity, but were created by the Emperor himself and so can claim a closer connection to him than the other above-mentioned organizations via their genetic descent from the Primarchs. They all might just as well declare each other's ideologies as HERESY but each of them are personal Protectorate vassals to the Emperor himself, and both know that they need to work together lest humanity as a whole goes extinct. Thus, as said multiple times before, the Imperium is not a centralized superstate despite what it tries to portray itself as, and more akin to a Coalition of Confederated Mini-Empires that's disguised as a Galactic Superpower (though the Imperium has its independent military and technological might with which to enforce its laws); or in real-life examples, the Imperium is more of a mixture between the "Protectorate" system like the Roman Empire, which allowed local governments to exist as Protectorates as long as they pay taxes and say that the Emperor is all "Good and Dandy", and today's UN which allows member nations to join while still keeping their national/cultural dignity, along with the Veto Powers between the founding members of China, US, Russia, France and Britain so they can keep each others powers in balance (Similar to the equal powers between the High-Lords of Terra). Essentially, its a demented combination of feudal Europe, Mandate of Heaven China deifying its ruler, Shogunate Japan where the Emperor isn't actually in direct control but the Shogun (High Lords of Terra) is, NATO/Warsaw Pact and the United Nations, with all flavors of cultures dotted around from Vikings in Fenris, Romans in Ultramar, Mongolians in Mundus Planus/Chogoris, repeats and variations on basically every human culture, any primitive tribe in Feral Worlds, Australia in Death Worlds, North Korea in Penal Worlds and so forth.

Additionally, while chastity and prudence are technically heralded as virtues by [[Sisters of Battle|some]] organizations and planets within the Imperium, the Imperium as a whole is decidedly pro-sex. The reason is more utilitarian than [[Slaanesh|hedonistic]]; more babies means more soldiers. Even in the smallest sectors, there are always more planets to colonize (even if it's on the ruins of some other civilization) so space is seldom a concern. Imperial citizens are encouraged, by most local customs, to be fruitful so that the tithes may be paid. If you'd ask "why not just clone more soldiers?", the reason the Imperium doesn't do that (at least excluding their black projects like the [[Afriel Strain]] soldiers and the [[Death Korps of Krieg]] which is an extreme exception) is because it's considered a perversion of the holy human form (hence it's labeled as heresy). Plus, attempting to clone regiments of soldiers on a rapid basis is likely to come with a variety of genetic problems that would hinder the Imperium rather than help it. Then there's the problem that the technology to clone a full human with a functioning mind (as opposed to a brain-dead clone fit for making into a servitor) is extremely difficult, to say nothing of how the clones' souls seem to be inherently abnormal for reasons nobody can explain. 

And if anyone still complains that the Imperium is still 'dark and miserable,' (at least to the memetic extents, it is still not a good place to live but is understandable considering the state of the Milky Way in the 41st Millenium) just shove Stephen Baxter's [[Xeelee Sequence]] down their throats, portraying a human empire that is so downright evil and malicious that you will actually applaud their [[rape|cosmic butt-whipping]] by the nigh god-like Xeelee. Seriously, the Interim Coalition of Governance is what happens when the [[Marines Malevolent]] becomes a pan-galactic empire that has no qualms in sending over [[Grimdark|200 trillion child soldiers to die in a rather hopeless and pointless war;]] they make the policies of the Imperium [[Noblebright|look like the]] [[Star Trek|United Federation of Planets]] [[BrightHammer40k|in comparison.]] Were the Imperium truly as bad as GW tries to hype it up as being, it wouldn't have been able to survive 10,000 years in the first place without disintegrating. 

As a side note, the Imperium doesn't give a flying fuck about your sexual preferences and gender (excepting the Sororitas, legally only women as a specifically crafted loophole to let the loyalists continue to exist and to give the Ecclesiarchy some military force, Astartes, who are genetically required to be men and the Emperor may have intentionally failed to make sure they didn't replace humanity, and the [[Callidus]] assassins because the polymorphine drug works better with women, oh and individual planets may have different cultural values, though any random shmuck attempting to tell off an Imperial official for gender etc. is getting a power maul to the face courtesy of the nearest Arbitrator), so that automatically places it above a good chunk of real countries on this count.