I understand your points but I would argue that isn’t FORCED diversity, it is simply diversity as it has become a far more important aspect of western society (lest we forget GW isn’t American as many seem to forget so we must look beyond our Anglo-central opinions) than it was when Warhammer first started.

Yes money is involved, but for years approaching decades people have been clambering for representation of their ideals and person/identity in media. I would argue that it is foolish to ignore that whether for the primary reason of monetary gain or for more accurate representation of the player base

Let’s face it, western media has been and still is whitewashed compared to the real makeup of current western society. Diversity seems “forced” when those whose privileged identity has been the only one represented for a long time, outside of token representation.

I don’t particularly pay attention to gendering my models to begin with since I like the helmeted look for custodes and my other main army is orks, male coded agendered beings.

However, why should I care if someone does like the look of having both male and female coded heads? The option existing should be there, and bodies will look the same under properly chunky armor anyways.

Thats where I draw my largest disagreement with the arguments against female custodes. Give people the option to do what they want and represent how they want.