MovieChat Forums > The 300 Spartans Discussion > Oppression? Fighting for Democracy?

Oppression? Fighting for Democracy?

posted 17 years ago by slh_j
42 replies | jump to latest

Why is it that the Greeks are represented as the oppressed and the Persians the oppressors? Correct me if I am wrong, but didn't the Greeks instigate the war? The Greeks encouraged the Ionians, semi-independent-Persian vassals of Greek decent, to revolt against the Persians. After putting down the revolt, the Persians then decided it might be a good idea to punish the foriegn Greeks who instigated a rebellion. No oppresion, just bad foriegn policy on the Greeks part and a understandable response from an empire.

Also, how is this represented as fighting for democracy? Although the Athenians might have been a democracy (as long as you weren't a woman, a non-Greek or a slave), the Spartans were an elistist military oligarchy that made slaves of other Greeks (Greeks having slaves was considered ok, but not Greek slaves. This was a point of contention with all of Sparta's neighbors). I don't want to discount that the seeds of democracy were in Greece, but the Greeks were not fighting for democracy. If someone were to say they were fighting for home rule, that would be more accurate than to say they were fighting for democracy.

I understand the military significance of the Battle of Thermopylae; I will never understand how this continues to be propped up as an example of standing up to oppression or fighting for democracy.

[–] Kawada_Kira (7282) 7 years ago

It's purely racial. A racist "clash of civilizations" worldview. In reality Greek democracy was finally suppressed by the Macedonians and later the Romans. Macedon and Rome, and later Constantinople, wiped out Greek democracy for centuries. But this doesn't get the same historical treatment because they were "fellow Europeans", who moreover are regarded as golden ages of Western civilization. The objection to Persia, in our modern treatment of the Greco-Persian Wars, isn't that it was autocratic but that it was Asian. The Ottoman Empire is regarded the same way, because it was Muslim. It was the Macedonians and especially Romans that subjugated Greece, destroyed its political institutions, pillaged and exploited it and reduced it to poverty. Greece to this day hasn't really recovered from that.

Almost all of Greece's oppressors and pillagers have been European. But only the Persians and Ottomans are popularly regarded as oppressors of Greek/European freedom. This reflects an under-examined and deeply disturbing worldview that needs to be addressed in our societies.