LOL..I enjoyed that part as well...How un-pc of them !
What's really sad is this employee of mine...good kid...was completely clueless on ancient history...a product of our "outstanding" liberal union driven educational system...
He had no idea the Spartans were who they were primarily because they used slave labor to do almost all the manual work it takes to run a society so they could maintain their military prowess...
This employee was a black guy...so that sort of struck a nerve...
My comment about the sneer at the Athenians was, as you are probably aware, based on the fact that Spartan society was based on institutionalized ephebophilia. Much more so than Athenian society, which was bad enough in that way.
When a Spartan girl got married, her hair was cut and she was dressed as a boy for the wedding night, on the assumption that the groom would have to pretend she was a boy in order to “function.”