Before I even read this article, let me make the following point.

This is the SECOND person to write an anti-Greece article on this site, yet not one pro-Greek article has been written.

Why?

Well, I did not have to go too far into the article to see that the writer is full of vitriol towards Greece.

The following statement, for example, is very confusing.

"Macedonia and its people have been in existence centuries before Christ and have a separate language and identity from the Greeks"

Is the writer claiming that Alexander the Great spoke Slavic? That is what can be implied. I do not need to read any further.

You do your readers a disservice with such poor writing.

Savvas Tzionis

Perhaps the problem is ethnic nationalism itself. Unification of any people by any standard of ethnicity or religion will mean that people of a different ethnicity and religion will be within the national boundaries and not share the paradigm on which the state is constructed. They will likely be second-class citizens. The solution to this problem is to have secular governments with separation of religion and state and equal treatment of all regardless of ethnicity and religion. Switzerland has retained its present boundaries since 1648. The country has four languages, several religions and is one of the most stable countries in Europe. Australia is a multicultural society where immigrants are encouraged to keep their ethnic associations. The Aboriginal languages are now recognised for their value and their preservation is encouraged.

When Prime Minister Costas Simitis wanted to strip all references to religion from the new national ID card there were howls of protest. Greece has a magnificent heritage dating far earlier than the Orthodox Church. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Aristophanes and other great minds still enrich our culture. None of them were Orthodox and would have possibly rejected Christianity altogether.

Who was Alexander? He was an unimaginative brute who wept because he had no more worlds to conquer. He couldn’t think of anything more worthwhile to do than to conquer and kill. Does it matter what language that scum spoke?

Let Greece recover its magnificent heritage and be open to all thought, opinions, ethnicity and religions.

David

Get your facts right. If you are going to use Switzerland as a positive example you may want to point out how it votes on the acceptance of immigrants at the local level and very often the Swiss reject people from non-European backgrounds

Dear Chris,

My facts are right on Switzerland. The article addressed a squabble over boundaries and national designation between Greece and Macedonia. Switzerland is not a paradise, and the people with different ethnicities can be quite prejudiced toward each other. However, its boundaries have been stable since 1648, and its only internal conflict during that time was the war of the sonderweg in the nineteenth century.

David,

Of course, your facts are right. Switz maintains a stable society by ensuring that those poor immigrants who want to live in their nation mostly look and behave just like them.