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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Dear all, </STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Let me add a note to the
discussion.</STRONG></FONT>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>When people used to slaughter their
daughters, sisters and wives after their being described as witches (all that
Hell for the pleasure of the Church and for serving Nonsense), they thought they
were doing the proper-most thing in the world, the civilised most
thing.</STRONG></FONT></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Does the soldier fighting in Iraq know
anything about what he is fighting for? Why he may have to lose his life there
or why others have lost their lives there? And whose benefit he has become so
petty an animal?</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>Is there any similarity between the gays,
lesbians and the American soldier in particular and all soldiers in
general?</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>That was their culture, psyche, etc.,
etc.</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG></STRONG></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><STRONG>One more grave problem facing humanity is
drug-addiction. Is their any similarity between drug addicts' and same-sex
partners psyche?</STRONG></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></STRONG> </DIV>
<DIV><STRONG><FONT face=Arial size=2>Ramesh</FONT></STRONG></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>----- Original Message ----- </FONT>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>From: "Charles Brown" <</FONT><A
href="mailto:cbrown@michiganlegal.org"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>cbrown@michiganlegal.org</FONT></A><FONT face=Arial
size=2>></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>To: <</FONT><A
href="mailto:lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org</FONT></A><FONT face=Arial size=2>></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Sent: Monday, January 22, 2007 8:34 PM</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Subject: [lbo-talk] Nepal gays and Maoists/Marxist
Approach</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial><BR><FONT size=2></FONT></FONT></DIV><FONT face=Arial
size=2>> <BR>> <BR>>><BR>>>^^^^^^<BR>>>CB: Was this
an ideology of all classes of the time and place, or only the<BR>>>ruling
class elite ?<BR>> <BR>> I'm not sure that the words of [the dramatic
character] Aristophanes<BR>> should be regarded as expressing an
"ideology." As I pointed out, the<BR>> treatment of sexual orientation
as determined by "nature" goes along<BR>> with [the historical] Aristophanes
ridiculing Cleon's effeminacy--and<BR>> that neither the speech in the
Symposium nor the jokes in his own<BR>> plays should be taken as proof of his
opinions, ideological or not. The<BR>> whole point was that *the
existence of the stable sexual orientations<BR>> we today call "straight,"
"lesbian," and "gay"* was familiar, even<BR>> commonplace, to the amcient
Greeks.<BR>> <BR>> Shane M<BR>> <BR>> ^^^^^<BR>> CB: How about
"custom" ? Is that an apt word. I'm assuming that Greek<BR>> customs
regarding sexual practices is somehow reflected in the passage. Are<BR>> the
customs described confined to the ruling class elite or did the working<BR>>
classes have the same customs ?<BR>> <BR>> Also, it seems that not only
were there stable sexual orientations, but that<BR>> the man-boy sexual
relations were considered of superior virtue in the<BR>> "mainstream", and
among the ruling class.<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> The below addresses the
question of whether the practices were in all<BR>> classes.<BR>> <BR>>
Charles<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> </FONT><A
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_in_ancient_Greece"><FONT
face=Arial
size=2>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_in_ancient_Greece</FONT></A><BR><FONT
face=Arial size=2>> <BR>> Scholarship and controversy<BR>> After a long
hiatus marked by censorship of homosexual themes,[15] modern<BR>> historians
picked up the thread, starting with Erich Bethe in 1907 and<BR>> continuing
with K. J. Dover and many others. These scholars have shown that<BR>>
same-sex relations were openly practiced, largely with official sanction,
in<BR>> many areas of life from the 7th century BC until the Roman
era.<BR>> Although this perspective is the scholarly consensus in North
America and<BR>> Northern Europe, some scholars believe that homosexual
relationships,<BR>> especially pederasty, were common only among the
aristocracy, and that such<BR>> relationships were not widely practiced by
the common people (demos). One<BR>> such scholar is Bruce Thornton, who
argues that insults directed at passive<BR>> homosexuals in the comedies of
Aristophanes show the common people's dislike<BR>> for male
homosexuality.[16] Other scholars, such as Victoria Wohl, emphasize<BR>> that
in Athens, same-sex desire was part of the "sexual ideology of the<BR>>
democracy," shared by the elite and the demos, as exemplified by the<BR>>
tyrant-slayers, Harmodius and Aristogeiton.[17] Even those who argue
that<BR>> pederasty was limited to the upper classes generally concede that
it was<BR>> "part of the social structure of the polis."[18] Outside
academia, both<BR>> opponents of LGBT rights and Greek nationalists have
latched on to the<BR>> argument that homosexuality was limited to the elite
for political purposes.<BR>> The subject has caused controversy in modern
Greece. In 2002, a conference<BR>> on Alexander the Great was stormed as a
paper about his homosexuality was<BR>> about to be presented. When the film
Alexander, which depicted Alexander as<BR>> romantically involved with both
men and women, was released in 2004, 25<BR>> Greek lawyers threatened to sue
the film's makers,[19] but relented after<BR>> attending an advanced
screening of the film.[20] The movie was a financial<BR>> disaster in Greece,
where it played for only four days<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> <BR>>
Context<BR>> The ancient Greeks did not conceive of sexual orientation as a
social<BR>> identifier, as Western societies have done for the past century.
In the<BR>> ancient Greek context, the terms "homosexual" and "heterosexual"
are<BR>> properly used only to describe activities, not identities. Greek
society did<BR>> not distinguish sexual desire or behavior by the gender of
the participants,<BR>> but by the extent to which such desire or behavior
conformed to social<BR>> norms. These norms were based on gender, age and
social status.[5] There is<BR>> little extant source material on how females
viewed sexual activity.<BR>> <BR>> There are two main views of male sexual
activity in ancient Greek society.<BR>> Some scholars, such as Kenneth Dover
and David Halperin, claim that it was<BR>> highly polarized into "active" and
"passive" partners, penetrator and<BR>> penetrated, an active/passive
polarization held to be associated with<BR>> dominant and submissive social
roles: the active role was associated with<BR>> masculinity, higher social
status and adulthood, while the passive role was<BR>> associated with
femininity, lower social status and youth.[5] In this view,<BR>> any sexual
activities in which a male penetrated a social inferior was<BR>> regarded as
normal; "social inferiors" could include women, male youths,<BR>> foreigners,
prostitutes and/or slaves; and being penetrated, especially by a<BR>> social
inferior, was considered potentially shameful.[5]<BR>> <BR>> Other
scholars, however, argue that the relations, while usually<BR>>
age-structured, were mutual and democratizing.[6][7] They also describe
them<BR>> as "warm," "loving," and "affectionate," [8] and argue that the
Greek<BR>> tradition of same-sex relations was central to "Greek history and
warfare,<BR>> politics, art, literature and learning, in short to the Greek
miracle."[9]<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> <BR>>
___________________________________<BR>> </FONT><A
href="http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk"><FONT face=Arial
size=2>http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk</FONT></A><BR><FONT
face=Arial size=2>> <BR>> <BR>> <BR>> -- <BR>> No virus found in
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