‘TAKE ME TO VALHALLA!’ - Why The Far-Right LOVE The Vikings and The Spartans

In the Western imagination, the Ancient Spartans and the Vikings are seen as the pinnacle of warrior culture. Of course, the militaries of these societies have also attracted the attention and affection of nationalist and ultra-Conservative groups who appropriate their history’s for their own agenda.

Western civilisation at large as idealises the Spartans, particularly the famous Battle of Thermopylae where 300 Spartans (with their Thebian allies) stood against the Persian forces. Their later alliance with the Persians against Athens is largely ignored, and instead they are remembered for this one battle - that they actually lost. In reality, the Spartans were not uniquely highly regarded for their military tactics compared to the other Greek states. But their militaristic authoritarian monarchy was fairly unique for the region.

In terms of the Vikings, they had already been cemented in the Christian histories of Europe has they constantly attacked monasteries and vulnerable cities and later won pitched battles against English armies to capture much of England itself. However, later they would be looked upon fondly by the Germans of the 1930s who believe they shared a common generic and warrior heritage. In modern times, the Norse religion itself has been appropriated.

In the video we discuss both these groups and how their history has been distorted to fit a certain political agenda.

.00:00:00 - Intro
00:04:30 - 300, Spartan Society and the Spartan Myth
00:15:15 - Why Conservatives LOVE Sparta
00:21:00 - Why they Love Vikings
00:25:13 - Their love for Paganism
00:30:00 - Closing Thoughts

[TheKavernacle]

Vikings regularly bathed so you’d think the Far-Right wouldn’t like them that much - both the Spartans and Vikings also had same-sex relationships - and there were Muslim Vikings

[Malky]

Things the right wing Spartan bros might want to know about Spartans:

- They were massively into paedophilia.
- Their insane military-focused culture was the thing that led to the degradation of their culture and the decline in their population and, ultimately, their people.
- The battle you mentioned, Leuctra, saw the 'elite' Spartans get their arses handed to them by the elite troops of Thebes who were known as "The Sacred Band": a unit that entirely consisted of homosexuals, specifically multiple gay couples. This unit worked on the principle that you would fight harder to save the man you love next to you. It worked very well. So, yeah, the Spartans were eventually defeated by...the gays.

[MaxAim]

"Spartans where the freest society"
Most people where slaves and the ones that weren't couldn't even pick a profession lol

[boxdynomite]

White supremacists trying to appropriate viking culture is the most hilarious thing to me when I first heard of it. Modern conservatives want to believe vikings were some kind of hypermasculine, traditional, nuclear family, pure blood society but that's so far from the truth.
Their family structure was the epitome of the old saying "it takes a village to raise a child".
Women had more rights compared to other European societies by being allowed to own property and being allowed to divorce their husbands.
The vikings bathed regularly and learned to bleach and dye their hair.
As you said in the video, which I wish more people knew about, they had extensive trade with the middle east and the Byzantine emperors had private armies comprised of viking soldiers.
The cognitive dissonance it takes to be a conservative and ignore actual history is always so staggering to me.

[anggi]

Knights, Samurais, Vikings, Spartans were actually rich noble and land owners. Viking long ship was very expensive investment and they expect a huge profit everytime they raid a kingdom. Armor was so expensive that only the rich can afford it. So these warriors were just bunch of rich landlords who fought a turf war against other landlords. But the right wing, as always, adopted them and repackage it in identity based narative. They always fantasize that if they were in the past they would be part of the warrior class. The reality is they probably would ended up as peasants just like the rest of us.

[HSRoss-lzlc]

"The left historicizes; the right mythologizes." -- Michael Brooks

[current]

One thing far right always tends to dismiss about Sparta is that later on they actually allied with Persia to gang up on Athens together, and had joint military campaign against it. Spartans were just cynical pragmatists concerned about the power of their own state, they were also only Greek people who even later on refused to co-operate with Philip of Macedon and Alexander the Great.

[MerrillDragonAge]

Anyone who claims "restoration" as their political agenda, consider that a red flag.

[maritimeretro]

I do think that Zac Snyder's directorial style is specifically responsible for the spartan love. When I was in high school, before 300 came out, I learned in an ancient history course about the battle of thermopylae and it was cool as hell, and hearing about their social structures was interesting; but not really the type of thing you would want to emulate. ESPECIALLY the far right considering that spartans regularly aborted tons of kids after birth even. They also had a weird code of honor; if you got caught stealing you were punished for getting caught, not for stealing. Not as admirable as you might think

[primrosepath]

As a white scot, i'm almost certainly descended from vikings; and i'm endlessly disturbed by seeing viking culture appropriated to prop up white nationalist ideology.

[steinarvilnes]

The war between Thebes and Sparta would make an interesting movie I think. The alt-right would absolutely hate it.
The issue for the Spartans is that they created a society where their numbers did not really grow, but slowly but surely shrunk. The people that really were successfull in war at the time like the Romans and Macedonians were the ones that integrated new people into their society and especially army.

[grapeshot]

Well when it comes down to the Spartans you know they're big fanboys of that whole fascist man-boy love.

[ThumbSipper]

By experience, most people claiming to be descendants of the mighty Spartan culture would have been sent tumbling off of mount Taygetos as babies lol

[MotherGapshin]

Hearing about the whole norse viking mythos makes me think of how Japanese far-right views itself as this divine pure race of Japanese people.

In actuality Japanese are themselves a mix of Koreans, Chinese, Austronesian people, Siberian people.

Japanese culture itself has been heavily influenced by Korea and China so it is very confusing how right-wing japanese think of themselves as this special unique race separate from Asia when the japanese themselves are a mix of various east asian people, culture and even religion from confucianism to taoism, buddhism and shinto.

Edit: Not to mention that there has been so much immigration between Japan, Korea and China that there is so much overlap in East asian culture and even genetics, in fact it is only a recent phenomenon with modern nation state and ethnocentrism of neo-confucianism that immigration between east asian countries has slowed down.

[akumakorgar]

Kavernacle: "So it's been 32 degrees consistently in the UK"
Me: "Wow! Break out the parkas."
Kav: "It's only going to get hotter."
Me: "Oh you mean Celsius."

[ThexDynastxQueen]

Yeah...I knew a guy 😅
Dudebro friend: 300 is the perfect guy movie. Times were tough back then but all men were tough not like now.
Me: Yeah I miss when yall would go to war, be gay then die.
Dudebro friend: WHY YOU ALWAYS GOTTA MAKE EVERYTHING I LIKE GAY?!?!

[nektariosorfanoudakis]

Sparta always had undeserved adulation even in ancient times; most Athenian conservatives and Oligarchs idolized Spartans even then.

Note that Sparta wasn't competent enough as a society to produce historians and philosophers, since everyone was either a slave (treated no more than cattle) or a soldier. So it was Athenian traitors to the Democracy, who couldn't appreciate what opportunities Athens offered them, that fetishised Sparta and thought it offered a better alternative to Democracy, due to their war-aristocracy values, and it was they that did the propaganda heavy-lifting to present Sparta in a good light. There was even significant overlap between Sparta-lovers and wanna-be "Quislings" of the Persian Empire, ironically enough, so they were considered traitors in ancient Athens and occasionally enough of a threat to be sent to exile.

Sparta installed an Oligarchical puppet regime in Athens, the Thirty Tyrants regime, which was strongly hated, and it may had something to do with the reasons Socrates was executed by essentially, the people of Athens.

[Zomy]

What’s weird is they don’t really mention the Mongols at all. Like if you want to emulate one of the most successful military cultures in human history you’ll be hard pressed not to look at the Mongols. Mongols were a fierce fighting machine that conquered and ruled over contiguous empire in human history. Their soldiers were expected to be extremely self sufficient, proficient, and adaptable. Then there’s Genghis himself who went from a timid fatherless orphan of no standing to, well Genghis Khan whose very name invoked terror and through what seems sheer force of will significantly altered the course of human history.

[BlueBeetle]

These people are so unimaginative too they can only imagine going back in time to get wiped out in a battle I would start a restaurant I bet no viking has ever had a cheeseburger

[GeneralKenobi]

Amazing how conservatives love to praise Sparta and the Spartans "prowess" when in reality Sparta's military history had more defeats than victories. Their success at Thermopylae was more due to the terrain than the Spartan fighting skills. Not to mention there were other Greeks at Thermopylae and as soon as the Persians found a way around the pass they destroyed the Spartans. Then Thebes would kick their asses years later by raising a much better trained and more versatile army while the Spartans still relied on their old tactics. Most Spartan fans seem to get their military history from watching 300.