sleeperkid
61064
1087
36
Feb 6, 2024 8:43 PM
sleeperkid
61064
1087
36
tenthousandwinters
I just think it’s weird to inject modern sensibilities on stuff that happened thousands of years ago. It was a completely different idea of sexuality. I mean, look at the Sacred Band of Thebes.
IamJacksAwardWinningAsshole
2 guys conquering Asia.. sitting on seperate horses cuz it’s not gay..
FairfaxJack
How did the ancient Greeks separate the men from the boys? With a crow bar
EverNotRelevant
Jacob fucking Chansley, the QAnon shaman, corrected this asshole. How fucking stupid do you have to be to have that dumbass call you on it
Raoul97533
Just tell them That was the tradeoff for not making him black xD
Cedr3000
Heterosexual times of Greece, well...
NotACanadian
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/l9zp64/comment/gllybdz/
yingjun
Since he's not around to tell us. Bi is as confirmed as it's gonna get.
Silkyninja1
theBonyEaredAssfish
I mean, William Shatner was clearly the best Alexander the Great:
tariqk
“heterosexuality” is the neologism
ICanStopScrollingAnyTime
The Greeks invented orgies. The Romans invited women.
dickritchie
Alexander the Fabulous!
HotPinkHobbitMess
And they were just really, really, REALLY, really good friends.
PerpetualExhaustion
Yeah, homosexuality never existed before the 20th century, right? I always find it entertaining/ironic how conservatives love to compare themselves to ancient Spartans, while not realizing that an integral part of the Spartan “agoge” training program was tons of baked-in homosexuality. Hell, there’s a reason that Spartan woman had to ritualistically shave their heads before their wedding nights… Its because her Spartan husband was already used to fucking dudes, and it helped ease the transition.
IUsedToHaveUsernameOnce
Please in the time of ancient Greece sex with women wasn't even invented yet
omegaprimus01
Man that is so damned wrong! He was from Macedonia, not Greece.
inquisitivefluff
Tyrann01
I thought for a moment about how apt this gif was...then remembered that it is 1300 years out of date for Alexander jokes.
PrincessLeliana
Its fine. They were just really good roomates.
BythepowerofchristIamtheLaderlappen
I heard em say "No Homo" under his breath.. and if there were socks back then he was most definitely wearing them.
NachtReborn
I'm kinda socially out of touch. Wearing socks makes it "less" gay? How does that work?
BythepowerofchristIamtheLaderlappen
It was an old joke i vaguely remembered. i just remembered it was funny because leaving your socks on is supposed to help make an orgasm more intense, it wasnt really about being gay more about your inner priciples. Reddit says ' it's because youre wearing clothes and its only gay if youre naked.' So to me it means you are what you say you are and it doesnt matter if youre gay or not.
NachtReborn
Ah, makes sense ish.
LemmyGonau
Right. A man in ancient Greece that didn't at least dabble at least a little on both sides of the gender seas for fun. I'll take things that never existed for $1000 Alex.
Ekaris9
"Only two things have ever conquered Alexander the Great: Hephaestion's thighs"
jmonster2020
That’s nothing they made Alan Turing Gay in the imitation game
DelCorazon
As long as they don’t ruin Liberace for us music lovers
GOAE
I think a lot about how much further computers might be today if he wasn't driven to suicide by homophobes. So many great minds have perished due to bigotry.
CarlBassett
The computer at Bletchley Park was built by Tommy Flowers not Turing. And the worlds first business owned computer was built by Lyons in the UK, before anyone knew the Bletchley Park computers existed. Turing was a genius but there is doubt that he intended to kill himself. Friends at the time say he was not suicidal, there was no note etc.
Molvanian
Urg. I bet they made Elton John and Freddie Mercury gay in their biopics too, those savages.
cominginhot
they made the swans at my pond gay too
WoeToHice
Find me one of these homophobic Republicans who actually knows who Alan Turing was...
HeadJamistan
He only broke the code because of the "German republicans" adding HH to the end of their messages.
SuperfluousMeh
I promise you there's at least one maga out there who's familiar with Alan turing. I used him as an example about rewriting history, or more specifically, about not overwriting the gayer parts of History. Not that it matters, they don't read, fuck maga.
PJVeddersGirl
There's a comedian and writer in the UK, Dr Adam Kay, who writes about his time in the NHS. They televised it and about 3 episodes in, his partner was added as a character. People took to twitter to complain that they made an ACTUAL IN REAL LIFE GAY DOCTOR homosexual. IIRC he commented something along the lines of "someone should probably tell my boyfriend"
NozzleBozzle
The series is ludicrously good. Incredibly sad. But still amazing
tutyfruity24
Loved his book this is going to hurt
PJVeddersGirl
It's fantastic. Just reading his latest one, Undoctored, after he quits.
psstuphere
That's how they get you. One kiss - gay as a day
oozabooza
Alexander, amiright?!?!?!
Monty777
Alexander The Great was famously homosexual like many Greeks at the time. Read some history you muppet.
OliverOtter
Homosexuality didn't exist back then. Orientations are a modern concept. They just screwed men when they felt like it, and screwed women when they felt like having children.
tariqk
but, consider... it isn't “homosexuality” that was the new term — there were people who were described as engaging in exclusively same-gender relationships, and folks who didn't fit the binary.
it wasn't until after the beginning of the gay liberation movement that we had people define themselves as straight and cis, in opposition to gay and trans folks. people didn't think of themselves as, you know... only exclusively straight or cis as a Thing™ and making it a part of their identity.
Lavos5181
You next thing you know it they will turn the straightest president Abraham Lincoln gay too. /s
CptnOHare
He just shared a bed with his best friend. Sleeping butt to butt. SometimesTiptoTip but thats not unusual! /s
Fendeezy
Wait Abraham Lincoln was gay?
Lavos5181
Nah he just had a really good "friend" and "roommate". /s
Raventhief
Per conservatives, literally everyone in history prior to 1990 was straight.
beeeeeeerkaaaaa
Were they not?
mrollings53
Except for that Milk guy. They murdered him.
Quizz25S
'cept those sodomites, but I heard they were burned to a crisp so....
OddlyPacific
They got genocided by their creator god so their genes wouldn’t pass on! /s
SomebodyalreadytookMyPants
Also everyone in every culture was entirely binary.
InfocalypseRising
Except a couple of musicians
EinsteinHair
Ah yes the famous Sappho and her roommates
JacktheKind
Do you mean the famous cock-gobbling man hungry, yet only surrounded by females ever Sapphos of the (non-foreshadowing) island of Lesbos?
Miyamotofan
Hey she had a husband. Dick Allcocks from the Island of Man.
JacktheKind
varyael
Didn't Alexander throw like, a fucking billion dollar funeral for his "roommate"?
imnotinthewitnessprotectionprogram
They were just REALLY close friends
NayaTaylor
I mean ya bro imagine how much money he saved up having a roomie. Probs the least he could do
NotTheDevilYouKnow
As is said, Alexander was only defeated once; by Hephaestion's thighs.
NappaTheFriendlyGhost
This isn't even one of those historical figures where people say crap like roommate and best friend... Pretty much every historical document from any source about him basically says the guy took every possible opportunity to bang his boyfriend and he wasn't shy about making sure EVERYONE knew how freaky they got. not like ancient Greeks had anything against gays... just read Greek mythology. Artemis and her roving bands of wild lesbians and Apollo who.... well Apollo would fuck anything
Dagordae
Yes. He was an astoundingly dramatic dude.
varyael
I've always figured with how he was, giant party guy and all
BojanglesTheFlyingCar
Only the bestest of friends
HypersonicHero
A historian wrote that he was the only man to bring Alexander to his knees. And the Christian-washing historians were like "oh because he was such a great swordsman". To which I'm sure the Greeks in the after life were like "of a fashion" *giggles*
iamlamp2
He had a while big gay army. Homosexuality was encouraged to keep the soldiers tight.
Friendlyhedgehog
Alexander very likely had a lot of sex with men, but Hephaestion may or may not have been one of them. It's possible that he was "just" a friend he had for 20 years and who he fought together with to the end of the world. Males can be emotionally close to one another without having sex, although it's hard to get exact details for events from 2,500 years ago.
Ekaris9
"Only two things have ever conquered Alexander the Great: Hephaestion's thighs"
Friendlyhedgehog
Alexander had dozens of concubines, and was supposedly "excessively friendly" to boys, but that was according to Roman historians, and the Romans had plenty of repressed sexual views of their own. I wouldn't be surprised with either view being correct.
mrsdowneyjr
This is something that bothers me about the "roommates" joke. People really can have heterosexual relationships that rival or surpass their love lives and it's damaging to male friendship to imply that every one will think you're gay (and hate you or tease you) if you have a good friend
Zoomoth9000
I think you mean "platonic," not "heterosexual."
mrsdowneyjr
Both I think
phoenix071
Obviously people can have close friends, the joke is that for decades historians have been straightwashing things that were clearly gay or at least not definitively platonic
mrsdowneyjr
I think straight and gay are modern divisions but yeah
Quasime
That he is speculated to have accidentally killed and speculated to have taken his own life when he realized what he did. I may be mis-remembering, and, again, speculation.
AxelTenveils
Are you maybe thinking of the story of Black Cletus who he did in fact murder during a drunken fit and argument(attested in almost all sources available to us) and then tried to kill himself several times? Hephaestion is agreed to have died of illness some time after the Indian campaign.
Quasime
Yes, I am, that's the problem with recalling from memory
SometimesISayHistoryStuff
You're mixing some stories. His famous almost certainly lover was Hephaestion who he had the elaborate funeral for and attempted to make him claimed a deity. Cleitus the Black is the friend and general that Alexander killed while drunk. There is no evidence of a relationship between Cleitus and Alexander, Cleitus was of his father's generation, a hold over from Philip's army. But still a friend. It is also unlikely either death resulted in Alexander taking his own life.
EroticZombiePants
I read somewhere that he probably wasn't actually dead yet when they buried him. It was noted his body didn't decay after he supposedly died.
SometimesISayHistoryStuff
There's some debate on the "probably" part of that sentence. Only one account mentions this lack of decomposition, which is Plutarch writing some 400 years later. And good old Plutarch had, let's say some personal bias to make Alexander look miraculous. Now it's possible he's drawing from sources we've lost, but it's also possible he was playing up Alexander's ascension to divinity in parallel to Julius Caesar's in his Parallel Lives work.
ghos5t7
I've been watching the 6hr run on Alexander done by kings and generals, they bring up the differences between sources often and its probably my favorite bit talked about
Calicious
Weird how all my studies of primary sources for my degree in ancient near east history point to him dying of illness.
varyael
Didnt his mom maybe kill his dad? Wouldn't have put it past her to have machinations for her grandkids if she had them for her own kid
Promethianfire
Olympias was extremely clever and quite the schemer. Much is possible.
Quasime
I believe that is speculated
SometimesISayHistoryStuff
It is definitely possible (though unproven) that Olympias had something to do with Philip's death. She certainly took control of the situation quick to get Alexander crowned. It is very unlikely she had anything to do with Alexander's death, as even though she was quite cunning the aftermath sent her scrambling to hold onto power in Greece and Macedon, and Alexander's child by Roxana wasn't even born yet. Not that the heir to Alexander ended up mattering all that much anyway.
Promethianfire
Yeah, but Greece is in total denial of all that. A lot of Greeks (and their government) threw quite a fit when the movie "Alexander" dared to hint that maybe Alexander and Hephasteon were "more than friends."
Steed
Hephasteon, that's the chap. Couldn't summon his name. There's an excellent BBC radio drama about Alexander's rise and exploits, sadly not available at the moment but will likely come round again (and, indeed, one might find it elsewhere) - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00cjzgy/episodes/guide
AxelTenveils
Yeah...that's kinda frankly embarrassing of them. Alexander had an incredibly deep bond with Hephaestion, and I think even the movie kinda falls short of the actual bond we are told of by sources surviving?
Promethianfire
Yeah. It treats it as subtext. No more than loving gazes.
drduffer
I think Alexander was Macedonian and had conquered Greece before heading into Anatolia and beyond. But I might be wrong about that.
bril350
He was Macedonian i believe his father conquered Greece. Alexander was tutored by i believe arisdotal or plato and became the greek loving equivalent of a weeb and decided once in power to invade the Persian empire.
KilliK69
Ancient Macedonia was part of modern Greece and it is Greek. not to be confused with North Macedonia.
vanIllian
Nope
KilliK69
yep.
Promethianfire
Oh yeah. It was called the Macedonian Empire after all, but Greece considers him one of theirs. Kinda like how Illinois claims the Kentucky-born Lincoln.
Alozar
Well he was born in Pella, which is in Greece, along with most of the Macedonian region. The ancient kingdom of Macedon is not the same as modern day Macedonia. The modern Macedonian ethnic group is a recent thing, and they are very very different from the Macedonians of Alexander's time.
KilliK69
yes they are located in North Macedonia which is geographically and ethnically a different region than Macedonia both ancient and modern.
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And it’s not like the Greeks considered the Macedonians barbarians or anything like that