characters do not even know who they are, much less where home might be:
Pithetaerus: If I only knew where we were--
Euelpides: Suppose we could ever find our way home again?
That exchange neatly sums up the situation of the characters, as well as the apparent situation of humankind. The Athens of the era in which the play was first produced is similar to our own place and time. While the people may be in good shape economically, there was then, and is today, a sense that all is not well under the surface, that there is a restlessness and a dissatisfaction in the land that is the root of social turbulence and political uncertainty. Athens in Aristophanes' time and the United States at the end of the 20th century would recognize one another as nations that are powerful, but which are looking for security in an insecure world, which still have imperialist or imperialist-like tendencies to want to control the fates of other nations.
However, the play is not overtly political, and the argument of this study remains philosophical rather than political, social, or even ethical. This is so because Aristophanes, at least in this particular play, seems to this reader to be focusing more on the human proclivity to self-centered dissatisfaction with reality in general rather than with the blatantly political. Certainly the subject of trying to create a utopia on earth is present, and that may certainly be said to be political, but, again, the goal of this study is to explore the theme of human restlessness in general, with the tendency of individuals at every point in history and in almost every culture to be unhappy with what they have and to seek something that they don't have and likely will never have. In fact, it can be argued their inability or unwillingness to be satisfied with reality (personal, social, psychological, and political) is the source of their happiness.
In any case, the audiences in Aristophanes' ti...