The history of Homosexuality

[Rosacrux redux]

As Hellenes desperately tries to prove - and nobody pays attention to his quotes and sources - homosexuality was not legit nor socially accepted and most certainly not "the norm" in ancient Greece. The Spartan thing is a common misconception, although the Sacred Band probably isn't (but we are talking about 300 people here). And of course exclusive homosexuality was for the greater part unknown in the Greek world.

The ancient Greeks were much more tolerant to "sexual misdemeanor" than our society (blame it on the Christian morals) but they faced bisexual males as "kinda weird" and the whole male love was considered a vice of the upper classes, not something a good Athenian (or Spartan, or Theban or whatever) would engage self into. Of course there is the other side: the laws against homosexuality were rarely if ever enforced - the only cases we know of men being condemned for having sexual affairs with other men had to do with male prostitution (in the broader sence, to change sexual partners really often was considered also "prostitution" in a way).

But you can read Aristophanes, for instance, as he is very much the "voice of the common citizen of Athens" in the early 4th century: he lashes out against male lovers all too often and calls them with extremely derogatory terms (lakkoproktos, lakkos, kinaidos etc.).

One more thing: homosexuality as a man having affairs only with men, was very, very, VERY weird for the ancient Greek world and was really frowned upon and condemned heavily. Having sex with men too I(in addition to women) was not so "bad", but still not accepteptable or the norm, just a privilege of the elites.