Viewers see alternate ways to read ‘300’

ANYONE who thinks that the Spartans in “300” resemble American forces in Iraq may be getting his combatants confused [“The Few, the Proud Among Fans of ‘300,’ ” by Tony Perry and Robert W. Welkos, March 14].

The Spartans in the movie are zealous fanatics willing to commit virtual suicide for a beautiful death, against a vastly more powerful invading enemy bent on expanding its empire and headed by a dangerously deranged megalomaniac. Does that make things a little clearer about who is who?

JAMES DAWSON

Woodland Hills

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“300” is the most racist, homophobic, historically inaccurate piece of trash that has ever come out of Hollywood, with a message that is disgraceful, at best -- and I include D.W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” in that pack.

This movie, through its images and actions and attitudes, tells everyone that being a white, well-built, blue-eyed, heterosexual male is wonderful and heroic. Being black or brown, being gay, being anything but physically perfect, or being from Africa, Persia or Asia, means you are evil, immoral and fit only to be destroyed.

The reality of the Spartan practice of destroying any child who was not born physically perfect is put forth as a good thing (and a hunchback is used as an example of what will happen if you don’t kill the deformed at birth). Freedom is bantered about as a way of life being preserved in Sparta, when that city-state was anything but free (it was a monarchy where most of its population were slaves!).

KYLE MICHEL SULLIVAN

West Hollywood