…with a whimper

We are noticing a worldwide trend to cancel the 'Classics', first I heard of it, I decided to raise the flag of my Greekness and defend the Classics from what I perceived to be woke attacks against my culture. 

So, I signed petitions to maintain dying Classics Departments and became quite aggressive in my defense as exemplified in my arguments against Dan-El Padilla Peralta. 

Lately, I 've been thinking about this subject a lot; to the point of torture, so after researching the foundations of Classics in the west, and realising that: 

1) They teach "Classics" as a separate subject to Greek [or Roman] studies. That is they have divorced the Classics from the study of the broader Hellenic and Roman culture. 

2) They are fundamentally racist towards the living Greek people as well as all other "non-Classic" cultures. 

3) They teach their students a monstrous Greeklish pronunciation that they have elevated to holy status against all evidence to the contrary. 

At this point, I believe it may be preferable for the entire Classics studies to go to the dustbin of history by decolonising the field.

Their place to be taken by 'Hellenic', 'Latin' and 'Greco-Roman Studies' like we have 'Chinese Studies', etc, that would teach all stages of Hellenic or Latin civilization without distinguishing between good elite ancients and debased poor & slaves nor between ancient/medieval/modern Hellenic people. 

More importantly, the term "Classics" is totally out-of-order. No matter from where one looks at it, it presumes that the Attic & Republican Eras represent the highest form of civilization ever to be achieved. This goes directly against the Delphic Maxims: "ψέγε μηδένα, look down on noone" and "μηδέν άγαν, nothing in excess/everything in moderation" as the term "Classics" looks down on everybody with unmoderated & bombastic supremacy.

If someone were to argue that Classics does not refer to the study of a very particular era and the very particular elit protagonists of that era but to the people studying them then this makes it even worse. As it pretends to be available only to class-based elites like the Roman Patricians. Imagine the smugness of a person driving a classic Ferrari and compare it with the smugness of a person that claims to be their selves a classic human being or of classic provenance & education.

This kind of unprecedented supremacy invites unwarranted criticism against Greco-Roman culture through anachronisms that are rightfully applied to what is deemed the most superior form of civilization of all ages and hence "Classics". By placing it on a pedestal, it can thus be rightfully spat on by other cultures that by default are deemed inferior. Anachronisms cannot be canceled when the field itself deems itself eternal via the term "Classics". It thus creates its own hubris and a self-fullfilng prophecy in favour of its own extinction.

To achieve that "elevated status" western classicists originating from the Cambridge tradition divorce it from all other eras of Greco-Roman civilization and openly treat them as inferior, thus rendering the Greeks and the Romans [of the other eras] themselves as children of a debased culture.

Lastly, western classicists appropriate the provenance of Greco-Roman civilization & literature .ie "Rennaissance", which is really curious because since when did the Germans, Anglos, and Franks ever have this literature to rediscover it? Moreover, they refuse to call it by its name which is 'Greco-Roman Culture' and use an adjective instead "classics" which is similar to naming it "Precious" like a poodle or someone's repressed daughter which subliminally it is an act of claiming 'ownership' over it as well.

A lot of western classicists instruct their pupils to not "taint" their selves with the living Greek and generally treat the living Greek people as the "great unwashed". 

If one truly respects Greco-Roman literature and civilization, one can teach it without the plosive statements, without elevating it to the "highest form of culture" and without ΦΘΧ-ΒΔΓ as Anglo-Germanic plosives. 

Unless of course one is only teaching the "Classics" with the expressed intent to appropriate them, and thus elevate their own persons in the fake pedestal that they have built, in which case these departments should be allowed euthanasia by letting them die out with a whimper so they can be reborn from the ashes as more encyclopedic 'Greco-Roman studies'.

Wouldn't that be a fitting destiny, as tragic as the heroes they pretend to worship.