Laughter at the sight of nude women

[Mudhammam]

[FatAndFaithless]

Could it be that it's simply laughing out of pleasure, and the translations just kind of skew the meaning with our current words?

[Mudhammam]

That was my first thought but I'm not really sure, since they're all translated from different times and languages.

[FatAndFaithless]

Yeah, even something as simple a word for "smile" could be skewed to something like laughter through enough translations. There may very well be a historical reason for actual laughter at the female body, I just have no idea what it would be.

[Minimalist]

They're laughing cuz, no dick.

[Mudhammam]

Third example:
In Plato's Republic, the following scene is recorded: "The women then must strip for their physical training, since they will be clothed in excellence. They must share in war and the other duties of the guardians about the city, and have no other occupation; the lighter duties will be assigned to them because of the weakness of their sex. The man who laughs at the sight of naked women exercising for the best of reasons is 'plucking the unripe fruit of laughter' he understands nothing of what he is laughing at, it seems, nor what he is doing. For it is and always will be a fine saying that what is beneficial is beautiful, what is harmful is ugly. — Very definitely."

Is it just me or was there some joke about the female form in patriarchal societies?

So I came upon this passage a moment ago while reading the Republic from the beginning, and it appears that in context the nudity is not the butt of the joke. Socrates is laying out his plan for the hypothetical perfectly good polis, and the discussion arrives to the role of men and women in his city. He basically runs through the different classes he has already assigned and decides that men and women should be able to partake in all of the same activities, even in matters of physical training and warfare.

I guess in Greek society men, exclusively, would train at gymnasiums and be naked doing so, and Socrates is basically saying---in refutation that watching a woman strip and compete in such an exercise would be like watching a wrinkly old man or woman wrestle---it's good for certain woman who have the ability to train like men do, even if to more vulgar minds it invites mockery and laughter.

[abaris]

Could it be that it's simply laughing out of pleasure, and the translations just kind of skew the meaning with our current words?

I'm pretty sure that's meant with that phrase.

[psychoslice]

Well there are some weird bodies out there that make me laugh.

[Pyrrho]

Third example:
In Plato's Republic, the following scene is recorded: "The women then must strip for their physical training, since they will be clothed in excellence. They must share in war and the other duties of the guardians about the city, and have no other occupation; the lighter duties will be assigned to them because of the weakness of their sex. The man who laughs at the sight of naked women exercising for the best of reasons is 'plucking the unripe fruit of laughter' he understands nothing of what he is laughing at, it seems, nor what he is doing. For it is and always will be a fine saying that what is beneficial is beautiful, what is harmful is ugly. — Very definitely."

Is it just me or was there some joke about the female form in patriarchal societies?

So I came upon this passage a moment ago while reading the Republic from the beginning, and it appears that in context the nudity is not the butt of the joke. Socrates is laying out his plan for the hypothetical perfectly good polis, and the discussion arrives to the role of men and women in his city. He basically runs through the different classes he has already assigned and decides that men and women should be able to partake in all of the same activities, even in matters of physical training and warfare.

I guess in Greek society men, exclusively, would train at gymnasiums and be naked doing so, and Socrates is basically saying---in refutation that watching a woman strip and compete in such an exercise would be like watching a wrinkly old man or woman wrestle---it's good for certain woman who have the ability to train like men do, even if to more vulgar minds it invites mockery and laughter.

This.

[Sterben]