Hello, I am commenting creepily quickly because I am trying to write but it isn't happening so I keep refreshing my flist like LET'S SEE WHAT'S GOING ON
Anyways, this post. <3
the penetrative or active partner in a sexual act probably didn't give a fuck about reciprocating or making sure his (and it's nearly always "his") partner had a good time. and he also didn't define himself in terms of whether he was fucking a man or a woman.
This is definitely beyond true for the Romans. I wrote a paper on this shit. Not that that makes me somehow qualified to talk about it, really, but yeah. Caesar the queen, haaaa.
But expanding to the Greeks: their relationships with women were like this, definitely. But the erastes/eromenos relationship seems to defy a lot of the conventions. There's all kinds of teasing about men being totally whipped for these boys--and yeah, the teasing implies that they're not living up to the social standard, but none of it seems mean-spirited. More like, "Oh man, Dikaiopolis is soooo whipped for Diophantos. Whelp, who could blame him. dat ass." The eromenos were courted and could choose who they wanted--and the cockerel & walnut gifts and everything. It isn't love between equals, by definition, and it isn't anything like love in our sense of the word. But I think it's--accessible to the modern person? If there isn't love there, ideally, there's a lot of care and affection and general mutualness. It's kind of paradoxical, that the ancient relationship-type we could potentially relate with the most--at least in terms of reciprocation and devotion and "love"--happens to be the one that everyone freaks out over and generally avoids talking about.
You already know all this and are clearly not contradicting any of it at all in your post, I know, but when you say "classical world", I just thought of that.
But yeah, gladiator AUs are right out, lol. Though I love reading them. So much.
no subject
Anyways, this post. <3
the penetrative or active partner in a sexual act probably didn't give a fuck about reciprocating or making sure his (and it's nearly always "his") partner had a good time. and he also didn't define himself in terms of whether he was fucking a man or a woman.
This is definitely beyond true for the Romans. I wrote a paper on this shit. Not that that makes me somehow qualified to talk about it, really, but yeah. Caesar the queen, haaaa.
But expanding to the Greeks: their relationships with women were like this, definitely. But the erastes/eromenos relationship seems to defy a lot of the conventions. There's all kinds of teasing about men being totally whipped for these boys--and yeah, the teasing implies that they're not living up to the social standard, but none of it seems mean-spirited. More like, "Oh man, Dikaiopolis is soooo whipped for Diophantos. Whelp, who could blame him. dat ass." The eromenos were courted and could choose who they wanted--and the cockerel & walnut gifts and everything. It isn't love between equals, by definition, and it isn't anything like love in our sense of the word. But I think it's--accessible to the modern person? If there isn't love there, ideally, there's a lot of care and affection and general mutualness. It's kind of paradoxical, that the ancient relationship-type we could potentially relate with the most--at least in terms of reciprocation and devotion and "love"--happens to be the one that everyone freaks out over and generally avoids talking about.
You already know all this and are clearly not contradicting any of it at all in your post, I know, but when you say "classical world", I just thought of that.
But yeah, gladiator AUs are right out, lol. Though I love reading them. So much.