Spartans queer?

You cna't prove either way, they are dead.

Male citizens of Sparta had one, and only one, career option: becoming a soldier. At 7 boys were taken from their families and enrolled in a military training school. As teenagers, each was paired with an older graduate of the school. The two were expected to become intimate, both emotionally and sexually. After graduation from the school, the new soldier would dissolve his official relationship with his older partner, so that he in turn could mentor one of the trainees.
A Spartan soldier was also required to marry a woman for the purpose of producing more citizens. Such marriages often were more political than romantic in nature, and many citizens kept up long-term relationships with another man as well. Keep in mind that a soldier might be away on campaign with his male lover for months, or even years, at a time.
Every soldier was given an allotment of land to provide him enough income to support himself. He didn't work the land, but had slaves and non-citizens to work for him. Many of the slaves were Heliots, a conquered people in the southern Peloponese.
Homosexual relationships in Sparta did not carry the same stigma that they do in our culture. Homosexuality did not imply weakness, femininity, immorality, or anything else that would be perceived as negative. And the Spartans were not the only Greeks to view things in this manner. Either the Thebans or Athenians (I can't remember which) formed an elite military corps of 150 pairs of homosexual lovers; it was expected that an individual would fight better if he did so alongside his lover.
So were they "queer"? You bet. And a description of them as such would not have provided offense.
If you think I'm making all of this up check out the book "The Spartans" by Paul Cartledge.

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Re Mike: I'm a strong proud European (Irish/Scottish born in London). And I'm gay. I love the company of other strong, proud etc etc. And I am one of those "pro-gay people" (even though I find the phrase a little incoherent, I get the drift). And my identity & integrity as a gay man is not something into which a metaphorical brush can be dipped in order to "smear" anyone else (and what on earth is a "gay brush" anyway?) I'm very proud to be gay simply because I love my partner of the past 22+ years so very much - were I straight I'd never have fallen in love with him, and that's an unendurable thought. I can't imagine being proud to be straight because I can't imagine being heterosexual in the first place. But it bears repeating that sexual desire is not really what defines gay people - unfortunately that 19th century neologism "homosexual" and its partner term "heterosexual" reduce human relationships to sexual encounters, when what distinguishes gay people from our straight brothers and sisters is the simple fact that we fall in love with members of our own gender. Always have. Always will. But good heavens, underneath some interesting historical debate, there's been some very unpleasant anti-gay hostility on this thread, quietly simmering away as it does in society as a whole. And "NO society ever looked upon homosexuality as a good thing" ?? Older societies have thought it rather "good" to burn heretics and persecute Jews. That doesn't make genocide and torture desirable, acceptable, or worth emulating, but rather as destructive thinking to carefully be shunned. And I'm not sure that any society looked (or looks) upon inter-racial love and desire as a "good" thing per se. But the signs are that, hopefully, that's changing. And in the slow movement of human social evolution, maybe the societies of the Western world are happily showing signs of being the first to look upon gay relationships as a "good" thing, spiritually, morally, emotionally. Which they are, as I can attest.