[ SECRET POST #4560 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4560 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



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02.
[Soldier's Girl]


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03.
[Good Omens]


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04.
[Clone Wars 2008 cartoon]


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05.
[Sleepaway Camp]


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06.
[When They See Us]


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07.
[Dominic Keating/Star Trek: Enterprise/Diablo III/Dragon Age: Origins/Beowulf 2007]








Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 30 secrets from Secret Submission Post #653.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

Actually, I believe they are North Macedonia now. That was the deal the struck with Greece. Be that as it may, I still say Greece doesn't get to tell another country what it gets to call itself. And the fact that it was throwing around its weight and keeping them out of the EU to do it was really crappy.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

DA

...IDK, but if a country wanted to join the EU as North Rome and Italy didn't like that, what would be your stance, too bad for Italy, North Rome gets to decide what it calls itself?

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

Yes, actually, that would be my stance. Countries decide for themselves what they want to call themselves. Other countries don't. And they don't get to hold out membership in the EU or any other organization as a prize for name change and block membership unless that country does what they want. There is a list of requirements for being in the EU. Name changing is not one of them.

I guess to me it seems like whether or not North Macedonia should or should not be named Macedonia is beside the point. The point to me is that Greece used its veto power in the EU to force a country to change their name in order to be allowed to join. And that just seems really terrible to me. I just don't think countries should be able to do that.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

The EU isn't some all knowing prescient body that made a list of rules that accounts for every possible circumstance, though.

Allowing one country to take a name or historic name that another country has claim to, means any other country could take another country's name and nobody can say anything about it. You could in theory end up with four countries that call themselves the same thing - just because there's no rule against it, doesn't mean it's a good practical or political idea.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

Can't it be equally dangerous to allow a country to dictate to another country their name. Now that Greece has successfully done it without international rebuke, other countries can freely do similar things without fear of reprisal. Other countries can veto EU membership over similarly small disagreements and use EU membership to force smaller countries to do what they want. That seems far more dangerous than allowing a country to take a name it might not have historical claim to.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

other countries can freely do similar things without fear of reprisal. Other countries can veto EU membership over similarly small disagreements and use EU membership to force smaller countries to do what they want.

They can only do it to the extent that they have the power and ability to force other countries to agree to their wishes. Which is the way that the international order has pretty much always worked. It's no different than anything else. The strong do what they will and the weak do what they must. Shoutout to Thucydides.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

The EU was supposed to be a counter-balance to that, though, I thought.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah but it doesn't do so by making countries act morally. It aligns the interests of a bunch of different countries together, and it provides them with a mechanism for resolving disputes.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

I wouldn't say that's the same thing at all. One country isn't dictating to another their name, they're staking a mostly historically accurate claim on a name and saying that country can be anything else besides that name. They're not forcing Macedonia to be "a name of Greece's choosing," they're being like "uh can we not have people staking a claim on a history that is also ours"

An example of a different country "trying the same thing" would be like Italy telling another country they can be anything besides Rome. This would also not the same as Italy "dictating what a country calls themselves" and more like a historical trademark or copyright dispute. Which I think would be fair

And an example like Italy refusing to let a country in because they don't like which end they break their eggs on is a totally different situation and to compare the two is absurd to me frankly

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

I think it is possible to say they shouldn't call themselves Macedonia and still be uncomfortable with how things went down. Greece vetoed their membership into the EU because they named themselves something Greece thought it owned. Greece also embargoed them because they used a symbol on their flag that Greece thought it owned. In both cases, Greece ended up getting what it wanted through being a bully. That makes me uncomfortable.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

Welcome to how things are done in the real world I guess? I can't think of a single issue where countries have behaved decently to resolve them. This at least didn't involve a war. And Greece is nothing compared to the US, Russia and China in terms of bullying.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[philstar22]

Right. And like I said, I get why Greece did it. What I don't get is why other European countries haven't even commented at all. They all just seem fine with it.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

I mean, what is the actual nature of the Greek claim to the name "Macedonia"? What is the actual right that is being infringed on here? Trademarks and copyrights seem like really poor analogies. Those are legal constructs that exist for a specific reason - ensuring that creators can benefit economically from the things that they make. And that's not the case, obviously, in this instance. So what is the specific right that's being appealed to, and why does it exist?

I also think it's unclear to what extent modern Greece is actually meaningfully historically connected to Alexander the Great, or what relationship any modern Greek has to a fella who died about 2300 years ago, but that's a general problem with nationalist construction of identity, not something specific to the Greeks, I guess.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

Alexander had a large empire, but the ancient kingdom of Macedonia itself was, I believe, pretty much entirely within the modern nation of Greece. It's kind of like a former British colony deciding to change it's name to Mercia. I think modern North Macedonia has a claim to being on the periphery of ancient Macedonia, but I'm not sure that means they have equal claim.

Re: Greece vs. Macedonia

[(Anonymous)]

But no one living in modern Britain today has any meaningful relationship to Aethelred, Lord of the Mercians.

Of course, if the Macedonians are claiming the name because they want to claim part of the heritage of Alexander, that's equally silly on their part as it is for the Greeks (in my personal opinion). But to the extent that their country is within the region known in the present day as Macedonia, I think they have a valid case to use the name.