Aristophanes and Plato's Conflicting Methods of Accomplishing Harmony, Reconciliation, and Peace

Aristophanes and Plato's Conflicting Methods of Accomplishing Harmony, Reconciliation, and Peace

During the ancient Greek period there were rivalries between poet-dramatist and political philosophers, they both had their own views of how harmony should be achieved. Although some of their ideas were similar, Aristophanes and Plato had conflicting methods of accomplishing harmony, reconciliation, and peace. Some of these ideas still affect how we live our lives today from politics to our though process. Both of these men believed that change was necessary for the ideal conditions to exist.

In the time period that these two men lived and shared their thoughts, society was based upon a rigid structure, things have been a certain way and no one wanted or thought about change. People felt that things were a specific way for a certain reason and should remain that way because that is how it should be. They based the way they lived around traditions as we also due today. Today we have turkey on Thanksgiving because we follow traditions set forth by our ancestors.

Aristophanes wrote the play Lysistrata that depicted men as ignorant and barbaric. The women on the other hand were negotiable and experienced. At the time Aristophanes used humor to etch thoughts into peoples minds. He believed that women should rule or at the least play a major role in society and politics. Plato had a similar idea, he thought that women should be equal with men and also share the positions of politics; this would create an equilibrium because men and woman have different qualities that would counterbalance society.

One of the main points that Aristophanes and Plato had was the structure of state, family, and society. Aristophanes thought that politics should be ran as the family was. Therefore government and the citizens should come together and work as one, the same way that a family is controlled. At the time their were conflicts and regulations that were stopping this to become reality, for instance, the women being second class citizens when in actuality they ran the household when the men were off fighting in wars. They handled all of the duties like clockwork. At the time men were the dominant figures in society ruling all, just as a monarch or dictatorship would control all of its subordinates. He created Lysistrata to poke fun of the ways things were controlled, and also to show that change would be the only logical solution to the ignorant views.