Interesting how people pick and choose from history whatever supports their ideas. About the current muscle guys and gun enthusiasts etc.: aren't many of them homophobic? Do they know that the Spartan military not only allowed, but encouraged homosexuality? And (according to Wikipedia) accepted pederasty, "the sexual relationship between an adult man and a boy"???
Interesting how people pick and choose from history whatever supports their ideas. About the current muscle guys and gun enthusiasts etc.: aren't many of them homophobic? Do they know that the Spartan military not only allowed, but encouraged homosexuality? And (according to Wikipedia) accepted pederasty, "the sexual relationship between an adult man and a boy"???
Even Sparta's military exploits are much exaggerated. Like most militaristic totalitarians, their propaganda was better than their actual results.
I cannot recommend this series enough, which goes through Sparta's mediocre record in detail.
https://acoup.blog/2019/09/20/collections-this-isnt-sparta-part-vi-spartan-battle/
Thanks -- I like Devereaux a lot, although I didn't know about his Sparta posts...