Ancient Greece
 Ancient Greece(empire)   | |
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Ancient Greece
Democracy
"Greek democracy was the veneer of a human economy over the substance of a commercial economy. Within the top layers of the pyramid a human economy flourished, arts and culture abounded, and fine points of law were argued. But this rested on a market in flesh, bought and sold like any other commodity, with which the owner could do as he pleased. The thin blanket of civilization left women, slaves, the landless, and the subsistence farmer out in the cold. And it certainly excluded the barbarians both within and without the gate.
At the same time that Athenian law forbade the debt bondage of fellow Greeks, the enslavement of barbarian races reached massive proportions toiling in the silver mines at Laureion and serving in the households of Athenians. A modern article asks why we denounce only barbaric acts done by foreigners but not our own. However, the question is redundant. By definition a barbaric act is an act done by a barbarian, a word that merely means an outsider.
With perfect ethnocentric pitch, barbarians were described as vicious, cruel, and cowardly by those who bound and beat them. They were scorned as lazy by those for whom they labored. Most importantly, they were legally termed incapable of reason and self-governance. This law enabled barbarian daughters, sisters, and wives to be turned into currency for their own betterment."[1]
References
- ↑ Tereza Corragio
