Does anyone else have a problem with glorifying the Spartans?

Question

There's a new movie "300" about the Spartans' battle with the Persians at Thermopolae. But even a casual glance at the history of the Spartans should have high schools and colleges dumping Spartans as a mascot. The Nazis were efficient, organized and passionately devoted to nationalism. All that sounds great, if you don't see the whole picture. But nobody's choosing the Fighting Nazis for a school's nickname. Aside from military training and heroism, just about everything about the Spartans is a legacy of inhumanity.

Answer 1

The Spartans deserve respect for their dedication to their peculiar beliefs - but not emulation. No way.

Answer 2

Actually, there is a difference between the nazis and the spartans. The nazis had a policy of extermination and cruelty that was unsupassed throughout history. Although the Mongols were also cruel, the nazis were deliberately and discriminatley cruel to the extreme. The nazis set out deliberately to exterminate peoples of particular groups and it didn't matter what you did, they would exterminate or use and then exterminate you.
Also the record of the nazi war machine was atrotious. They would march into an area and start killing people.
The Spartans on the other hand, although they did opress the Helots and at times did set out to kill them, only killed them at selective times and then only a few. They did not target the race as a whole for extermination. Although every year the Ephors(the judges of Sparta) formally declared war against the Helots, it was only a formality in case one was killed out of hand and for the sometimes practice of young training spartans. They knew that they needed a labour force and had the sense the nazis did not have. Although once during the Peloponesian Wars they declared that any Helot who would fight would be granted their freedom. They got about 2,000 volunteers and paraded them around, took them to a temple, locked the doors and set them alight. Also when they took Plataea the Ephors asked each in turn what they had done to help Sparta in the war. If you couldn't answer to the affirmative, you were immidiatley put to death. But the first instance was a plan to weed out potential troublemakers in time of war and the second was because Plataea was a traditional ally of their mortal enemy-Athens, and also resisted greately and was hand in glove with Athens.
Having said this however, the Spartans were cruel. Thought not to be compared or anything like the nazis, they were cruel to the Helots, weak babies they left out to die and some enemies in war. They did have a rutheless society. However the reason why people do admire them, and you must give the devil it's due, is that they did have the qualities of martial prowess and a great discipline without the insane, stupid and phychotic lunacy and total without limit bastardry of the nazis. The one is a difference of degree and of somewhat the kind of cruelty. The nazis had much greater range of cruelty and a much much different and lunatic kind of cruelty. And unlike the nazis there idea was not based wholly and soley on race but on many other factors too and they did not go anywhere near the extremes the nazis went. They were a cruel , militaristic and disciplined power who mostly stayed where they were, unlike the nazis who were completely bonkers and sought to bother everybody else. If they were around today they would be in prison, the nazis, however would be in a criminal wing of an assylum.
But because of their stupidity and conservatism they eventually went down. Until they disappeared from history. And it is their former arch enemy, Athens, that is now the capital of a united Greece. As for the Spartans. Admire them, learn from their folly and condemm their crimes. But give the devil it's due. After all this the only thing the poor stupid bastards have got left. There is nothing else save a few entries in history books and a few old and broken down monuments. And it serves them right.

Answer 3

Seems like a statement asking for agreement rather than a real question.

You can't compare Ancient Greece to Nazi Germany - totally different time and place.

Spartans at it's peak were the finest infantry the world had ever known...until the romans came along. Yes the lifestyle was regimented and harsh. Art held very little value etc...but you have to ask yourself why? There was no united nations, no sense of natural justice that countries agreed to...the political landscape was lots of small city states (Greece) who's power and influence extended little beyond 50 -100miles beyond the city walls. City states were constantly at war and hence the requirement to field a strong army was essential. Sparta did not have the wealth of Athens or Corinth and therefore could not buy mercenary armies from Persia and therefore built it's own loyal corp. Lets also not forget the agression of the Persians with millions of soldiers at the emperors command...enough for anyone to start training for war.

It was a very violent time that called for extreme solutions.

If you see the movie also take into account that the 300 is based on a graphic Novel (comic) and therefore applies some artistic licence and fantasy to the tale of Thermopylae.

Thermopylae was a watershed moment for the Greeks. The Spartans held the pass, but it was the Athenian General Themistokles who provided the tactics. Why were the Spartans chosen...because they were the best. Thermopylae was a failure, Spartans elite and their king died, but it gave the rest of the Greek city states time to gather and fight as one against the Persians.

Courage, hard work, desire to win these are great attributes the spartans gave to History, ad great treasures to be extolled.

The helmets they wore were allways damn cool too.

I'll be first in line to see the 300.

Answer 4

how can u compare the Nazis to the Spartans? for one learn some history the battle at Thermopile was because the Persians were trying to take all of Greece almost every man that could wield a sword in the Persian empire was there so it was a huge force. so in all facts here the Persians were more like the Nazis here.

now as for mascots they were brave 300 men against that huge force and they died to the last man plus took almost half of the perrsin army with them that's why they were respected and as for the in humanity they showed u will have to prove that to me yes they did own slave states but name one nation that didn't back then. and most of the inhumanity u will say was common back then and was part of their training because war was an everyday thing it's easy for u to sit back and say they were inhumane by todays standards but it was the way of life they were no more cruel than the Trojans or any other civilization back then.

Answer 5

The Spartans of Michigan State University would beg to differ with you. The Spartans didn't ethnically cleanse the Athenians after defeating them. The did slow up the Persians enough while causing them huge losses that allowed the remainder of Greece to mount a defense. Remember that history is written by the victors and without the "story", history is just a greeting. If you want a barbaric mascot to attack, try the knights. During the crusades they were brutal. Hear the one about the ships full of noses and ears from conquered lands?

Answer 6

I don't know that comparing the Spartans to the Nazi's is entirely justified. The Nazi's were bent on world conquest, invasion, and the extermination of Jews and other groups. The Spartans were certainly militaristic and had other flaws, but were not like the Nazi's for the reasons I mentioned.

People admire the Spartans for their discipline and fighting spirit. If you want to say that glorifying them is like glorifying the Nazi's, well then I guess you're going to have to disqualify any militaristic, disciplined organization including the U.S. because of it's military, medieval European countries because of their rigid, militaristic fighting orders, and any other nation with an army.

Answer 7

Admittedly, they weren't such "nice guys" and their life-style was, well, spartan, but you've got to admire their guts:

"Vastly outnumbered, the Greeks delayed the enemy in one of the most famous last stands of history. A small force led by King Leonidas of Sparta blocked the only road through which the massive army of Xerxes I could pass. The Persians succeeded in defeating the Greeks but sustained heavy losses, disproportionate to those of the Greeks. A local resident named Ephialtes betrayed the Greeks, revealing a mountain path that led behind the Greek lines. Dismissing the rest of the army, King Leonidas stayed behind with 300 Spartans, 400 Thebans, and 700 Thespian volunteers. Though they knew it meant their own deaths, they secured the retreat of the other Greek forces."

Final stand of the Spartans and Thespians
At first he asked Leonidas to join him and offered him the kingship of all of Greece. Leonidas answered:
If you knew what is good in life, you would abstain from wishing for foreign things. For me it is better to die for Greece than to be monarch over my compatriots.[27]
Then Xerxes asked him more forcefully to surrender their arms. To this Leonidas gave his noted answer:
Μολών Λαβέ
(pronounced: /molɔːn labe/)
which means "Come take them".
Herodotus wrote that when Dienekes, a Spartan soldier, was informed that Persian arrows would be so numerous as to blot out the sun, he remarked with characteristically laconic prose, "So much the better, we shall fight in the shade."

None of the actions of the Persians were a surprise to Leonidas. From a variety of sources, he was kept apprised of their every move, receiving intelligence of the Persian outflanking movement before first light.
When Leonidas learned that the Phocians had not held, he called a council at dawn. During the council some Greeks argued for withdrawal in the face of the overwhelming Persian advance, while others pledged to stay. After the council, many of the Greek forces did choose to withdraw. Herodotus believed that Leonidas blessed their departure with an order, but he also offered the alternate point of view: that those retreating forces departed without orders. The Spartans had pledged themselves to fight to the death, while the Thebans were held as hostage against their will. However, a contingent of about 700 Thespians, led by general Demophilus, the son of Diadromes, refused to leave with the other Greeks, but cast their lot with the Spartans.
Ostensibly the Spartans were obeying their oath and following the oracle from Delphi (see below). However, it might also have been a calculated strategy to delay the advance of the Persians and cover the retreat of the Greek army. In fact, with the Persians so close at hand, the decision to stand and fight was probably a tactical requirement, only made more palatable by the oracle.
At dawn Xerxes made libations. He paused to allow the Immortals sufficient time to descend the mountain, and then began his advance.
The Greeks this time sallied forth from the wall to meet them in the wider part of the pass, in an attempt to slaughter as many as they could. They fought with spears until every spear was shattered and then switched to xiphoi (short swords). In this struggle Herodotus tells us that two brothers of Xerxes fell, Abrocomes and Hyperanthes. Leonidas also died in the assault. The Greeks and the Persians fought for his body, the Greeks winning.
Receiving intelligence that Ephialtes and the Immortals were coming up, the Greeks withdrew and took a stand on a small hill behind the wall. The Thebans under Leontiades put hands up, but a few were slain before the surrender was accepted.[32] Some of the remaining Greeks were fighting with their hands and teeth. Tearing down part of the wall, Xerxes ordered the hill surrounded and the Persians rained down arrows until the last Greek was dead.[33] Archaeology has confirmed the arrow shower at the end."

In doing this, they saved Athens, and perhaps Western civilization

Answer 8

Agreed.

Answer 9

agreed