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Ancient Greek desire to resolve civil strife resonates today – but Athenian justice would be a ‘bitter pill’ in modern America
America’s divisions are old.
Politically and socially, they are rooted in grudges and ideological vengeance that goes back generations, to the New Deal era, when government vastly expanded its role in people’s lives.
- Joel Christensen
- The Conversation
Economically and morally, the nation was founded on the sins of slavery and Indigenous genocide.
The consequences of this past are still present:
The COVID-19 pandemic has been far harder on Native populations, Black communities and the poor.
Long-lasting civil strife isn’t new. Greek mythology, my field of academic scholarship, is rife with cycles of vengeance that threaten to…