Talk:Nisus and Euryalus

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[edit] NPOV

This paragraph is simply a one-sided argument: "It has been argued that it is unlikely that Vergil intended this pair to be seen to be in a pederastic relationship due to the Romans feeling that this sort of relationship was taboo. This hypothesis is invalidated, however, by comparison with other poets roughly contemporary with Vergil, such as Catullus and Ovid. One might try to discount Ovid as an appropriate moral standard in the Augustan era because of his exile, but Ovid’s exile cannot be seen as brought about by the sexual, including homosexual, themes in his poetry. He was exiled because of the politically subversive themes in his poetry as well another unrelated political indiscretion. Therefore we must conclude that the idea that the Romans would have found a homosexual relationship, such as that between Nisus and Euryalus, to be distasteful is unfounded, since comparison with contemporary literature offers no such interpretation. Widespread homophobia was a feature of the later Roman society brought about mainly by Judeo-Christian thought; in Greece and the early Roman Empire bisexuality was the norm."

Aristotle1990 (talk) 01:30, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

There is no reason to believe the contents of this paragraph to be incorrect or one-sided. It reflects the the mainstream consensus of the academic community, and there is no reasonable basis to believe this consensus to be false. However, I have edited the paragraph to give whatever pieces of another side to the argument that exists (that homophobia might have existed, although it was not mainstream), as well as a more neutral tone. I will remove the "references" tag because references have been named. There are several more references which I may add if this continues to be disputed.

JMO historian (talk) 03:41, 8 April 2008 (UTC)