Zack Snyder

Yeah, of course.

That's why all these sports teams have Spartans as their, like, mascots, you know?

Yeah, the cryptea, like, you know, the whole thing, like, where they would send you, like, around seven, you'd go in the agogia, you'd go, like, into the wilderness, and you're basically living among other kids that were between, like, seven and 13, and you just were, like, wild.

And the...

The sort of elite of those groups were called the Krypteia, and the Krypteia would come down and just kill helots whenever they wanted.

They were encouraged.

The helots were the slave class that the Spartans sort of maintained, Spartan society.

And these guys, these kids, imagine if you lived in the hills, you knew there was just this 13-year-old gang of 13-year-olds that were going to just come down and murder you at any moment.

And they were encouraged.

And they were encouraged to do it.

And also, the helots were fine.

If the helots killed them, that was fine because that meant that they weren't good enough anyway.

And then they did this ritual with this table of cheese where all these Spartan warriors would stand around the table and all the 13-year-olds who were ready to transition to becoming true Spartans, you'd have to try and get and pull a piece of cheese off this stone table.

And the Spartan warriors who guarded the table could do anything to stop you.

And it was just like just beating the crap out of these 13 year olds.

And finally, like, you know, if you got it, then you were you were given to a Spartan soldier who raised you.

And basically the idea was that you he was your lover.

He was your teacher.

He was everything to you because the Spartans believe that, you know, really, they believe that you you.

you would die for your brother if you were also lovers.