Do feminists want everything to be like ancient Greece?

Question

It's no secret that the Greeks were very feminine, even the males. (With the exception of the Spartans). Women were very pampered, always catered to and were worshiped like goddesses while the men were in a way servants to the females. The only thing women lacked in those days was voting rights but other than that life was good for them.

Is that the kind of world feminists crave for? Where women are constantly pandered to and are worshiped while the men walk around in skirts acting very feminine?

Answer 1

Outside of Sparta, ancient Greek women had few rights or none at all.  

Answer 2

You're the ones trying to force women into your preconceived gender roles. I wish these anti feminist women on here would have to live in a completely patriarchal society where they weren't the spoiled brats they are now, so they would learn to appreciate their rights.

Answer 3

Well, I don't think life was as good for women as you make it sound. Women were oppressed. They could do hardly anything with their husband's permission.

But if life was like you say it was, I'd love it. I'd love to be pampered and treated like a goddess! But that's not because I'm a feminist (which I am). For me, being a feminist just means that I believe in equal rights and opportunities for women. But I think what you described sounds pretty good. I"D LOVE IT! Gosh, I wish the world really was like that...(starts daydreaming) Sounds like Utopia to me. LOL.

Answer 4

You have obviously been reading some books that were not on the History of Civilization list I read.  Greek women were little more than slaves themselves, and Spartan women had it the worst.  Men were openly homosexual, and only married for procreation.  When the ruler of Greece married his concubine (Hetarae)  for love it started a scandal.  No woman would want to live like that.

Answer 5

Sheer nonsense. The Greeks were a strictly stratified society, with defined roles. Women were little more than 1950s housewives without the mod cons. Women also had very few rights. It's not a coincidence that no women appear in the lexicon of Greek philosophy, they were actively discouraged from education. Aristotle thought it destroyed a woman's brain.

Homo-eroticism in ancient Greece is not about effeminicy, you need to read up on hellenic culture.

Answer 6

Only in the minds of some misguided people did women "back in the day" and in ancient Greece had it made.

Next we will hear that women in the Middle East have it made.

Answer 7

Sure seems like it sometimes, doesn't it.

Pretty much all you hear when a feminist opens her mouth is "women, women, women"  which translates to "me, me, me".  They wont acknowledge any mens issues. They wont acknowledge any childrens issues. Selfishness!  

Answer 8

Actually, we can't speak of Ancient Greece as a single entity. There were several city states and each had different gender relations which changed over time.

In Sparta the women were treated equally and had more personal freedom. Even though the Spartans were known for their aggression, they actually treated women better than the Athenians whom we tend to idealize and think of as the quintessential Greek culture.  

Women in Athens, where men were as you say "feminine," were actually seen as sub-human and their freedoms were severely limited, perhaps more limited than anywhere else in the world at that time. This is why men were "feminine." The ideal of love was between two men and women were only useful for making babies and keeping house.

Much like women in modern day Iran or Afghanistan, women in Ancient Athens were isolated and kept in the home. They were never allowed to act as independent agents and were treated with utter disdain.

There were female godesses in Ancient Greece, but their existence did little to raise the value of women in society, just as the ideal of the Virgin Mary didn't make Medieval women any more revered. Zeus was always cheating on Hera and beating her, treating her like c**p, and Hera was always blaming the other woman. It was a time when the male gods were establishing dominance and women were loosing power.

Incidentally the wearing of skirts, wigs and makeup was only recently limited to women. You project your own cultural values onto other cultures and assume that they see things in the same way you do. Greek men saw themselves as very masculine and did not think of skirts as a marker of femininity. They engaged in homosexuality precisely because women were thought of as ugly, stupid baby making slaves. "Real love" was only possible between men because only men were fully human.

No. This is not the model feminists want. We would like to be seen as equal partners and we would like to be honored for what we do contribute to the world, but it is men who are obsessed with being respected, revered, superior, etc. Women want equal partners. Men want to be "on top" because men believe that there are only two options, dominant or submissive. That belief is incorrect and causes much trouble.

Women want equal partners. Men want to dominate and thus project that desire onto women, misinterpreting every move toward equality as an attempt at dominance.

Answer 9

I'm not sure what ancient Greece you are talking about but in the one I know, women had far less rights than men. While you are probably right about guys being more feminine back then, women were still treated as second class citizens, they couldn't get an education or vote, had no say in politics, they couldn't even express their ideas. The higher class ones probably had more rights than the average wife or slave girl, but overall women were still seen as less than men and thus were in no way treated like how you describe. As someone else said, they were treated no differently than the 1950's housewife.

I think the only women who were treated like goddesses were the goddesses themselves that's it, but certainly not a mere mortal woman as they saw it.

Answer 10

No, thanks. We gave up the pampering in 1963.