The second fact is that, whatever we think of Marxism or identity politics, the sins of nostalgia and utopianism are compounded if one turns to Classical Athens as a point of departure and reference. While sympathetic to the rediscovery of citizenship, Chantal Mouffe warns against going "back to a pre-modern conception of the political." "We need," she continues, "to be alert to the dangers of nostalgia for the Greek polis and Gemeinschaft types of community.'" It is not merely the enormous differences in scale and complexity that make Athenian democracy suspect as a vantage point by which to illuminate contemporary democracy; it is also its exclusion of women from the public realm, its reliance on slaves and resident aliens, and its imperialist adventures. If the premodernism of polis makes references to Athenian democracy seem quixotic, the glaringly undemocratic features of it make such an appeal perverse.