Socrates, Piraeus, Athens
On guardians sharing wives and children
What was going on: As Plato tells it, Socrates is in Piraeus laying out laws for the guardians of a city. He has just argued that women guardians should share all pursuits with men, and warns his listener that an even bigger wave of objections is coming.
Why it matters: The Republic is one of the world's most influential works of political theory, and Huxley's Brave New World bears a resemblance to it, with state-organized breeding in place of traditional families.
My proposed law: the guardians share their wives and children. No parent knows which child is theirs, and no child knows their parent.
The law, I said, which is the sequel of this and of all that has preceded, is to the following effect,—‘that the wives of our guardians are to be common, and their children are to be common, and no parent is to know his own child, nor any child his parent.’