Wait, weren't the Swiss some sort of......

[Sigma_Orionis]

........ Libertarian Paradise?

Swiss to vote on incomes for all - working or not

I guess Michelle Bachmann won't move there after all....

[Rommie]

Yeah, they do these kinds of referendums pretty commonly due to some constitutional quirk- there was the one to cap CEO pay a little while ago if you recall. Like that one, it's highly unlikely it will pass.

Sorta like how you can put pretty much anything on the California ballots in the US- pretty low threshold to get it on there.

[Morrolan]

The constitutional quirk being a direct democracy.

[Sigma_Orionis]

Oh yeah:

EU halts Switzerland research and education talks

Although the Swiss economy is booming and unemployment is low, many Swiss worry about the effects of immigration

[FZR1KG]

Switzerland has blocked free access to its employment market for Croatians.

Eh, no surprise there.
Croatians are used to being treated as second class as well as being blamed for stuff they didn't do and for being scapegoats for many decades now.

[SciFi Chick]

Switzerland has blocked free access to its employment market for Croatians.

Eh, no surprise there.
Croatians are used to being treated as second class as well as being blamed for stuff they didn't do and for being scapegoats for many decades now.

All these years, and I had no idea I was married to some sort of pariah.

[FZR1KG]

As an example of the above: history

Albert Einstein in the above article blaming the Serbs for their tactics.
That got a lot of publicity at the time then the tactics got more subtle and covert.
Things were staged and Croatians framed repeatedly to tarnish the entire population.
This practice went on into the 90's and extended in many different countries.

e.g. the Croatian six. Framed by Yugoslavian agents from trying to poison Sydney's water supply.
This was uncovered to be a framing about 20 years later.
The reason the Yugoslav government did it was that Croatians were protesting the Yugoslav embassy in Australia because their relatives (Australian citizens) when visiting family in Yugoslavia and were being abducted by the secret police and brought back tortured and their throats slit dumped on door step they were taken from. Intimidation tactics.

During the war in the 90's, in Australia several Serbian Churches were bombed. The Croatians were blamed. Then they discovered that their was a Serbian group orchestrating the acts to discredit the Croatian community in Australia by showing themselves as victims of Croatia.
In the balkans there was also press releases of a person who found a mass grave of Serbian children. This traveled around the world as news that the Croatians were murdering Serbians again, like in WWII. Turns out yet again, that it was actually Croatian children murdered by the Serb forces but no one wanted to print that with the same gusto as they did with the initial report. The Herald in Australia refused to even print a tiny retraction even though their source Reuters did print a tiny little retraction well hidden rather than the front page media blast that occurred with the initial story.
The list goes on and on.

My father recalls Serbs and the Yugoslav army killing Croatians in his village then bringing people from the outside to view them and claiming they were Serbs that were executed by Croatian Ustasa. A couple of hundred thousand soldiers of the Ustasa were executed by after the war during death marches. These people gave themselves to Britain after the war on the condition they would not be sent back to Yugoslavia because they knew their fate. Churchill overrode that and handed them to the Yugoslav army. Executed without trial. One wonders why. Could it be that they didn't want witnesses or conflicting stories to their version of events?

So yeah, why the hell would the Swiss want a nationality in their country so nasty and having such a bloody history.
Being Croatian and seeing the way Croatians were treated, as disposable and second class until even recently it doesn't surprise me one bit there is another group that has believed the propaganda and is making decisions based on that. They won't admit it though.

Hmmm, maybe that's why I got so pissed off when I found out that my rights here in the US are pretty much revocable for any reason, meaning I have no rights. I really should just get used to it.

[FZR1KG]

All these years, and I had no idea I was married to some sort of pariah.

Just in some countries.

[Rommie]

Man, if FZ were Bosnian imagine how long that list would be!

Every country is a bit of a pariah especially in a place like Europe- well Eastern European ones at least, as a lot of history there was never resolved. Poles arguably get it the worst recently as they are sorta the Mexicans of the labor market (work cheap etc) but now that Croatia has joined the EU they are flooding into Western Europe. So I wouldn't say this is anti-Croatian so much as "they terk aur jawbs!" rhetoric and the Croatians are the newest and latest in the line of fire (also note, they joined the EU but are not yet Schengen so they are easier to exclude).

For what it's worth FZ us Hungarians rather like you Croatians, and you seem to like us back- well took our money during my holiday this past summer with a smile anyway.

And we can always join in our mutual dislike of Serbians. Fuck Serbia!

[FZR1KG]

Man, if FZ were Bosnian imagine how long that list would be!

Funny you should mention that. Guess where Herzogovina is. lol

And we can always join in our mutual dislike of Serbians. Fuck Serbia!

Fuck Serbia!
I will at this point just mention I have more Serbian friends than Croatian friends.
It''s not the people but their screwed up government and the fanatics that support that government that sicken me.

To be honest though, I really think most people are ok and that leaders/government tend to attract and promote sociopaths in every country with no real difference in numbers. Only differences lay in just how easy they have the opportunity to screw people over.
Those countries with greater transparency have less opportunity. Those countries with better more unified, equal and moral laws also provide less opportunity. By equal I mean rich people don't have the option of buying their way out of trouble while poor people have to suck it up. This is major failing in most democratic countries which will end up biting them in the ass in the future. Those countries with a free press that actually work are less likely to get screwed over. Yet another failing in many countries when its taken into account that almost all media are owned by a handful of people.

Anyway, I'll be on a boat soon and the sharks I have to worry about won't be after me because of my race. They will be after me just like any other food source. That I can deal with. Honest life forms that want to kill and eat me. Not this deceptive shit humans do.

[Rommie]

Yeah FZ, from the way you've been posting lately I think you could do with a bit of a recharge. Not saying as a judgement or anything, just a friend who's read your thoughts for years and seen your voice get really bitter and cynical on some things.

And yeah, one thing I've noticed about Serbia from those I've discussed it is it really is a country with similar militant patriotism on some issues that is very similar to its neighbors (Serbians and Kosovo seems very similar to me when talking to Hungarians about the "lost territories" in Transylvania), but unlike most countries this is actually nurtured and supported by the local government to a greater degree than elsewhere.

And BiH is fucked the way the government is set up. Lots of protests there lately actually, because after 20 years people are starting to realize how unsustainable it really is to essentially have two governments who can never agree on anything.

[FZR1KG]

Yeah FZ, from the way you've been posting lately I think you could do with a bit of a recharge. Not saying as a judgement or anything, just a friend who's read your thoughts for years and seen your voice get really bitter and cynical on some things.

Burned out is what I call it. The mind can only take so much. I can either sink into depression then give up or get angry and motivated pull myself out. I tend to default to the latter when pushed physically or mentally. Lately its been both.
I suppose the best thing that could happen to me right now is getting mugged. Probably not so good for the mugger though. lol

[Morrolan]

remember Vukovar, is al i will say...

[FZR1KG]

remember Vukovar, is al i will say...

Won't that be remembered for a long time in military strategy.

[Morrolan]

remember Vukovar, is al i will say...

Won't that be remembered for a long time in military strategy.

the military part is very much like the tale of the 300 Spartans. what came after fits more in things like the Rape of Nanjing.

[geonuc]

Perhaps I'll have to do some research on Vukovar.

But in looking up Vukovar on a map, I'm reminded of a question I've had about Croatia, post-Yugoslavia. The borders are oddly drawn. Are they accurate, in the sense that the borders capture all the mostly Croatian towns and few non-Croatian ones?

[FZR1KG]

Perhaps I'll have to do some research on Vukovar.

But in looking up Vukovar on a map, I'm reminded of a question I've had about Croatia, post-Yugoslavia. The borders are oddly drawn. Are they accurate, in the sense that the borders capture all the mostly Croatian towns and few non-Croatian ones?

The whole of Croatia is oddly drawn really.
If you look at the map its a boomerang shape.
That marks the line where the push of the Ottoman empire was halted.
Prior to that Bosnia/Herzegovina was a largely part of Croatia.
The Ottoman's had the policy, convert 1/3, kill 1/3 expel 1/3.
My family was from Herzegovina. Really rough mountainous and rocky poor part of the country that invaders had little use for.
Interestingly DNA studies have found that region has widest genome diversity and dates back 50,000 years.
That puts it as one of the oldest human settlements in Europe. Just thought I'd throw that in as I found it interesting.

Anyway, the lines are largely vague at best.
If you look towards Dubrovnik, Croatia is broken or disjointed there.
It's historically known to be Croatian but is broken up from the Croatian mainland by Bosnia in the latest redraw.

I'm not 100% sure how they drew the lines in the latest incarnation.
I remember being told it was based on town populations who identified with a given nationality.
Which can create issues explained below.

Historically there was never a people called the Bosnians or the Herzegovians.
They were more like, Virginians, Floridian's living in the USA.
Correctly they were, Croatian, Serbian, Hungarian, Albanian etc living in that area.
The ones the Ottoman's converted were largely of Croatian heritage though there were others there as well.
Back in the 90's the push to have a Muslim country was done by Referendum.
The Muslims chose overall to not identify with any nationality but wanted their own made up based on their faith.
This imho was a big screw up. A race is a race and a religion is a religion.
Separating race by religion is always a recipe for disaster. Its a driving wedge between the same people.
The Bosnian leader, Izetbegovic screwed up by refusing help from others offering (Croatia offered for example and came to their aid in the early stages of the war) but then he insisted that only the US/Nato come to their aid. I guess from fear of assimilation.
The war was made far worse by this decision. He got what he wanted in the end but imho he would have got the same thing had he just taken the help that was there and it would have saved many lives in the process.

Probably more than you wanted to know but it might help explain how things got randomly divided.
You see, a lot of Muslims consider themselves Croatian and have the same view I do, race=race != religion.
So when you go to these towns and you get the demographic in terms of Bosnian/Croatian it is with the underlying assumption that all Muslims are Bosnians. That however isn't the case as they might see it. So some areas might have more Bosnian's but they identify themselves as Croatians of Muslim faith.
Combine that with the fact that in the early stages of the war the Croatian forces liberated many towns near the borders of Croatia and Bosnia of the Serb armies while the Muslim leaders chose to wait on Nato aid, made many Muslims not want to be a part of the new Muslim nation so would have voted to be with Croatia.

All pretty messed up and overall simplistic but I hope that helps some.

[FZR1KG]

Perhaps I'll have to do some research on Vukovar.

If you like military strategy this is one that stands out in all respects.
Vukovar was a Croatian town near the Serbian border.
It had about 1800 well trained but poorly armed defenders. It fought against tens of thousands of heavily armed Serb military troops.
It stopped the bulk of the Serbian army for about three months and allowed the Croatian forces to regroup and arm themselves (illegally) in a time most countries put embargo's on the area.
Basically the embargo was like a genocide order. When one side has access to all military hardware and the other has hunting rifles the net effect should be a slaughter. The world at the time still refused to understand the nature of the Serbian regime and thought it was both honorable and legitimate. Big mistake.

While Croatia was arming itself and training troops, the defenders of Vukovar were humiliating the Serb forces. The Serbs had tanks, fighter jets, Helicopters and heavy artillery. The town was completely leveled by almost three months of assaults to be the first town in Europe to be completely destroyed since WWII.
When it fell, the Serb forces practiced ethnic cleansing, I just call it by its real name and purpose, genocide.
It was the turning point in the war.
After that the Croatian's had organised themselves and armed themselves.

When you read up on it, be careful of the source and the date.
If the date is around the time of the battle it may be highly prone to propaganda.
If the source is from Belgrade or Serbia, it's total propaganda.
This is the town where the Serbs killed children and tried to blame the Croatians.

One thing is however fact, that is that the defenders of Vukovar weren't all Croatians.
They also had a good sized portion of Serbs that had family roots in Croatia for centuries.
It's the new comers from Serbia that usually caused the problems. Those that were moved there since WWII.
Just goes to show, races themselves are not inherently good or evil, it's the propaganda that the government pushes that makes them so.

[Rommie]

Yeah, I feel obliged to mention that one of the interesting take aways I got when traveling through Bosnia and Croatia was how jealous everyone was that I got to "pick" my religion- these days if you're Croatian you're Catholic, if you're Bosnian you're Muslim, and if you're Serbian you're Orthodox, and that's just how it is. But everyone in Bosnia in particular said how before the '90s no one cared about these things, it's only when the war started that people were forced to split up in ways they hadn't considered in hundreds of years.

[FZR1KG]

That always bugged me about the region.
It's been like that before the war though. Not sure why they think this is a new thing.
e.g. in Vukovar there were Serbs fighting alongside Croatians against Serbian forces.
They had their families history in Vukovar (Croatia) for centuries but still call themselves Serbs.
Likewise Croatians in Serbia for generations still call themselves Croatian.

I was born in Croatia, raised in Australia and consider myself Australian.
I might be Croatian by birth but Australia is my home and it's what I know.
My father found this attitude offensive. When he was in Croatia he was asked why I didn't visit home.
He replied to them that I'm an Australian. He meant it with insult but when he relayed the story to me I felt no insult.
I think he's changed his tune a now. One son married an American, the other a Peruvian.
The daughter that married a Croatian (by his force) got divorced.

[Rommie]

Umm, if I may ask, how do you force someone to marry someone in this day and age?

I'm sure my folks wouldn't complain if I went for a Hungarian, but they're not about to betroth me to one.

[geonuc]

Probably more than you wanted to know but it might help explain how things got randomly divided.

No, not too much. It does answer my main question - the borders are wrong, as they are in many parts of the world.

[Rommie]

Probably more than you wanted to know but it might help explain how things got randomly divided.

No, not too much. It does answer my main question - the borders are wrong, as they are in many parts of the world.

Yep, pretty impossible to get them right. (I find it interesting that when you visit Dubrovnik in the southernmost tip of Croatia you literally go through Bosnia, as that part of Croatia is isolated from the rest by a mile or so of land.)

That's why one of my big pet peeves is when people imply Africa should stop being so messed up. I'm no expert on African policy, but I can look at a map of Europe and Asia and see how there are no straight borders and they still have issues. (Actually I guess there's one, but Korea ain't exactly a good example.)

[geonuc]

I don't think it's the lack of straight borders that defines the problem, but rather borders that divide ethnically and socially related groups. Rivers, hills and mountains tend to divide groups. Not always, of course.

[Sigma_Orionis]

IIRC, in Africa, most of those borders were drawn at the Berlin Conference, which of course suited the needs and interest of the Colonial Powers at the time.