Sex and Politics in Lysistrata
Sex and Politics in Lysistrata
In the play, Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, Aristophanes was able to illustrate his beliefs about the Peloponnesian Wars through the use of satire. Aristophanes’ two main points emphasized through this play was that war does not have a positive result because men were the ones who were in control of the decision making, and women are the ones who hold the true wisdom and peaceful attributions. Through the strong intelligence and leadership of Lysistrata, and other women, they were successfully able to put an end to the war and reunite their families.
The fact that war has negative results, are the main reason Lysistrata and other women united and wanted to put an end to the emotional pain they had based on the absence of both their husbands and sons. The women are tired of the patriarchal society in which they live and the male mistreatment of them by preventing them from participating in politics and allowing them to have a say in war. The main characters Lysistrata, Calonice, Myrrhine and Lampito, all discussed how war affected them physically and emotionally. Emotionally, women had to deal with their double-burden of losing their sons or/and husbands and become virgins or widows due to the deaths of many men due during the seemingly endless Peloponnesian Wars between Athens and Spartans. In this case, many women had to send their sons and husbands to far off campaigns while they were forced to remain within their households. During this time, it was extremely difficult for a woman to leave the household, for the reason a woman was supposed to be in charge of taking care of the children, waking the slaves up to begin chores, and pleasuring their husbands when they return from fighting (Aristophanes, 141). Some women had to face the concept of not seeing their husband or sons never again. Physically, women were lusting over their husbands while they were away and the men were gone for several months leaving their wife alone and restrained from sexual intimacy. Women desperately needed the pleasures of their husbands and likewise. The constant war affliction had no positive impacts resulting in a loss of hundreds and thousands of men through war, break-ups of families, increases