Tribunal - Cardassian courts and our own

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I don't get why so many people find it necessary to remind people that it's fiction. Even non-fiction is fictionalized. But still that tends to be a lot of people's response when anything depicted in a movie is brought up.

All we saw of the Spartans in the movie were combatants in battle. We saw the Trojan city and it's depicted as more enlightened, while in combat as far as any direct comparison. But then you also have 300 which didn't go out of its way to depict the society much either.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

The ethics and culture of Sparta is a whole separate thread unto itself.

[Beastro]

And yes, beyond that, people do also admire them for their stereotype of ultra-masculinity. Being that tough and brave and formidable is a fantasy for many men - and also a fantasy for many women to have sex with such a man. Doesn't matter how true the actual reality is, people want to be Spartans for the same reason that they want to be Rambo.

Even the ultra-masculinity stereotype isn't all that there. I'm reminded of a story of IIRC, of a Spartan king who, in a private moment enjoying seeing his kids playing, rode their hobby horse. He then realized someone else had seen it and stopped embarrassingly excusing himself as not acting appropriately.

No one might think that was in keeping with that ultra-masculinity, but the fact is the Spartans seemed to recount the story in praise of the king as a good father taking an interest in his kids and not as someone to look down upon. As much as Spartans seemed to enjoy their regimental childhoods, it seemed to have room to admire a good father-figure.

OTOH, we have things like what the crypteia might have been and how that reflects upon their society.

I can't help but think that the Spartan way of ''stabbing any fucker whom dares to oppose me'' would have achieved equal rights in Saudi a lot quicker than the approach of ''wait for America to apply political and economic pressure''.

That depends. An armed society is a polite society, especially in one very mindful of keeping their population growing like theirs. It wasn't just from a principled stance of conservatism that the Spartans dragged their heels on opposing Athens at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

The ethics and culture of Sparta is a whole separate thread unto itself.

I'd expect that coming from you.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I'm not sure what you mean by that.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I'm not sure what you mean by that.

All I'll say is so much for the tolerant left, and thanks Obama.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I'm sure there's some layer of irony or satire I'm supposed to be getting here.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I'm sure there's some layer of irony or satire I'm supposed to be getting here.

Did it ever occur to you that maternity rights tend to influence parental court outcomes? How can oppression occur under those circumstances? [err] I mean circumstance.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Okay fine, escalate the satirical weirdness and being willfully obscure, I'm sure if you make twenty-seven other Ironic references to bad discourse I'll finally understand what in Hecate's name you're trying to frelling say. -___-

[Mickey_Rat15]

I saw that Troy movie and the Spartans weren't very progressive.

1) Its a Hollywood film. Their historical accuracy is often universally shit.

2) There is progressive by the standards of 4th century BC and there is progressive by the standards of 21st century AD. Although as I said, a Spartan woman probably had more freedom than someone in Saudi Arabia did until a few years ago. I can't help but think that the Spartan way of ''stabbing any fucker whom dares to oppose me'' would have achieved equal rights in Saudi a lot quicker than the approach of ''wait for America to apply political and economic pressure''.

Troy was more or less based on the Iliad, which was not history but a legendary story of the previous Greek civilization. Greece having been through a dark age after the Bronze Age Collapse. The Sparta in that story does not necessarily have much cultural connection with the historical Sparta that existed in the time of the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars. If the history is shit, well it was not based on a historical document in the first place.

To call Sparta progressive by our standards is to focus on one aspect at the expense of the whole. Their political philosophy was based on a having a professional hereditary military caste in order to keep order over the far more numerous helot class who kept their city fed. If memory serves, the helots were analogous to peasants or non-chattel slaves and were people the Spartans conquered early in their history.