Delta4Embassy
Gold Member
Reading about ancient Greece this morning there's various accounts of the institutional same-sex relationships in the various Greek states, how elite military forces like the 'Sacred Band' were reknown for their bravery in battle while men and their younger male lovers fought side-by-side, and how neighboring Greek-states like Athens would make good-nature fun of others like Sparta in their plays. Obviously, the relationship nature was well-known and even mocked good naturedly by the poets and playrights of the times. But no where is there anyone mocking or making fun of the adult-child sexual liasons as a negative, or hinting at their being abusive like we see now. This begs the question, is how a culture thinks of something more responsible for how people react to it, than the act itself?
The page in question I read reference a couple modern indigenous tribal populations behaving very similarly to those in ancient Greece ("Each method has parallels to this day in tribal societies of the Keraki Indians and the Marind-Anim of New Guinea.") The latter I'm familar with. Adult males feed their semen to younger boys so they 'absorb' the adult's hunting prowess as the Spartans did their boys so they would absorb their battle prowess. (Things you're never gonna see in a movie called "300." But it's worth mentioning here that ALL of the Spartan males practised what we would call homosexuality. And the whole '300' thing is an amalgamation of the Spartans and another Greek state, the 'Sacred Band' of 300 ("In Thebes, in Boeotia, the Sacred Band ('hieros lochos') described by Plutarch was an elite infantry force of 300 men. Founded by Gorgidas (3) as early as 378 BCE, it was made up of 150 pairs of erastai and erōmenoi, who stood side by side in the battle line.") 'Erastai and Eromenoi being the adult and young male pederastry couples. Funny how something so heinous as that would give inspirations to movies about it thousands of years later.
We regard ancient Greece as the birthplace of democracy and western civilization. We study and teach everything about their cultures and socieities to this day. And yet, by modern standards they were the complete emodiment of evil for not only permitting adult=child sexual relationships, but insisting on them and institutionalizing them, (Handsome, well-born boys who failed to acquire an erastēs would be considered disgraced.)
So if a culture has adult-child sexual relationships, regards it not only as normal and acceptable but expected and is celebrated and reveried despite it, is a culture that makes sex into something sinful and negative a 'disgraced' society? Is how society views such things more intrinsic to how they're thought of than the act itself?
Thinking about the Duggar scandal recently, the sisters molested by Josh Duggar seem to have no issues about it. And indeed they were so young at the time, how much they actually remember is a worth question. And if they don't remember anything then any harm from it can only come from modern commentators telling them how they were abused. In effect, projecting their own ideas about such behaviours onto them. And if they don't 'feel abused' brow-beating them until they do - but if you don't feel abused, were you in fact abused? Or is how your culture or society thinks of such things more responsible for how you'll respond to such things?
Another example comes from pre-missionary Hawaii. Before missionaries showed up, and as recorded by them once they did, the Hawaiins of 1700-1800 or so had incest, adult-child sexuality, premarital sex, extramarital sex, and basicly everything else the missionaries didn't. And they did just fine. No records of abuse, complaints about abuse, etc. exist from that time. Despite pleanty of records existing going into great detail about their culture including the sexualities. Surely, if people thought such behaviours were abusive or harmful that would be recorded as in ancient times. But there's no record to that effect from either. The nearest example of negative testimonies comes from ancient Rome and at least one of the emperors who had sex with young boys who then threw themselves from a nearby cliff commiting suicide. But in this case the emperor was torturing them in every sense of the word, not merely having a consensual sexual relationship with them.
So is how we regard sex, sexual relationships, and homosexuality more responsible for how participants regard them than the acts themselves? Thinking of my own examples from youth, I remmeber being very consensual indeed when I started a sexual relationship with a galpal of my Mom's. By modern standards, she raped me. Yet in my own mind I recall every encounter with great fondness and feel nothing negative about them whatsoever other than when Mom found out and forced it to end.
Mom's only problem with it being (as she said, knowing her friend better than I,) "if you catch anything from someone you have sex with, it's gonna be her." Have had a lot of sex in my life and never gotten so much as a cold. I think descriptions of sexually-comfortable people as diseased is the prude's way of casting dispersions on them when they envy them their freedom. And this was not my 'first rodeo.' I'd been having sex for some years prior. And yet don't regard myself as a victim of anything. However, in cases where my Mom found out and chastised me for it, I can see how people react to such things can easily shape a person's outlook on it. And logicly, if Mom had instead encouraged them instead of discourage them, I might have a compeltely different outlook on them.
As with the Duggars. That the sisters have seemingly no ill feelings about it, no animosity for their brother because of it, etc. I can only conclude their family isn't making what happened into an end of the world thing. But society is. Thus, any harm from the acts is potentially going to come from society's disapproval moreso than the acts themselves.
The page in question I read reference a couple modern indigenous tribal populations behaving very similarly to those in ancient Greece ("Each method has parallels to this day in tribal societies of the Keraki Indians and the Marind-Anim of New Guinea.") The latter I'm familar with. Adult males feed their semen to younger boys so they 'absorb' the adult's hunting prowess as the Spartans did their boys so they would absorb their battle prowess. (Things you're never gonna see in a movie called "300." But it's worth mentioning here that ALL of the Spartan males practised what we would call homosexuality. And the whole '300' thing is an amalgamation of the Spartans and another Greek state, the 'Sacred Band' of 300 ("In Thebes, in Boeotia, the Sacred Band ('hieros lochos') described by Plutarch was an elite infantry force of 300 men. Founded by Gorgidas (3) as early as 378 BCE, it was made up of 150 pairs of erastai and erōmenoi, who stood side by side in the battle line.") 'Erastai and Eromenoi being the adult and young male pederastry couples. Funny how something so heinous as that would give inspirations to movies about it thousands of years later.
We regard ancient Greece as the birthplace of democracy and western civilization. We study and teach everything about their cultures and socieities to this day. And yet, by modern standards they were the complete emodiment of evil for not only permitting adult=child sexual relationships, but insisting on them and institutionalizing them, (Handsome, well-born boys who failed to acquire an erastēs would be considered disgraced.)
So if a culture has adult-child sexual relationships, regards it not only as normal and acceptable but expected and is celebrated and reveried despite it, is a culture that makes sex into something sinful and negative a 'disgraced' society? Is how society views such things more intrinsic to how they're thought of than the act itself?
Thinking about the Duggar scandal recently, the sisters molested by Josh Duggar seem to have no issues about it. And indeed they were so young at the time, how much they actually remember is a worth question. And if they don't remember anything then any harm from it can only come from modern commentators telling them how they were abused. In effect, projecting their own ideas about such behaviours onto them. And if they don't 'feel abused' brow-beating them until they do - but if you don't feel abused, were you in fact abused? Or is how your culture or society thinks of such things more responsible for how you'll respond to such things?
Another example comes from pre-missionary Hawaii. Before missionaries showed up, and as recorded by them once they did, the Hawaiins of 1700-1800 or so had incest, adult-child sexuality, premarital sex, extramarital sex, and basicly everything else the missionaries didn't. And they did just fine. No records of abuse, complaints about abuse, etc. exist from that time. Despite pleanty of records existing going into great detail about their culture including the sexualities. Surely, if people thought such behaviours were abusive or harmful that would be recorded as in ancient times. But there's no record to that effect from either. The nearest example of negative testimonies comes from ancient Rome and at least one of the emperors who had sex with young boys who then threw themselves from a nearby cliff commiting suicide. But in this case the emperor was torturing them in every sense of the word, not merely having a consensual sexual relationship with them.
So is how we regard sex, sexual relationships, and homosexuality more responsible for how participants regard them than the acts themselves? Thinking of my own examples from youth, I remmeber being very consensual indeed when I started a sexual relationship with a galpal of my Mom's. By modern standards, she raped me. Yet in my own mind I recall every encounter with great fondness and feel nothing negative about them whatsoever other than when Mom found out and forced it to end.
Mom's only problem with it being (as she said, knowing her friend better than I,) "if you catch anything from someone you have sex with, it's gonna be her." Have had a lot of sex in my life and never gotten so much as a cold. I think descriptions of sexually-comfortable people as diseased is the prude's way of casting dispersions on them when they envy them their freedom. And this was not my 'first rodeo.' I'd been having sex for some years prior. And yet don't regard myself as a victim of anything. However, in cases where my Mom found out and chastised me for it, I can see how people react to such things can easily shape a person's outlook on it. And logicly, if Mom had instead encouraged them instead of discourage them, I might have a compeltely different outlook on them. As with the Duggars. That the sisters have seemingly no ill feelings about it, no animosity for their brother because of it, etc. I can only conclude their family isn't making what happened into an end of the world thing. But society is. Thus, any harm from the acts is potentially going to come from society's disapproval moreso than the acts themselves.
