Will it break a record?

The Economist recently has published a few articles in the past few months relating to Macedonia. What no one expected was the response. The latest article, about the cosmetic transformation of Macedonia's capital Skopje and the controversy arising from the use of ancient Macedonian figures such as a statue of Alexander the Great, has been groundbreaking. Not so much the article itself though. What has been significant is that it has been one of the most commented Economist articles ever - 1250+ comments so far! Most of which made up of multiple rants by myopic Greek nationalists. This leads to wonder... why are they wasting their time? I mean, what makes them think that it will suddenly dawn upon the Macedonians who even happen to read any the comments (very few) that they have lived their whole lives as a lie and realise, like an epiphany, that they are not Macedonian because of some comment they read on an Internet forum? Plus, the rest of the world don't bloody care, so who in their right mind would bother reading through this all unless they are truly mad. A complete waste of effort that could be better used in doing things that many Greeks otherwise don't seem to have time for, such as paying taxes or obeying anti-smoking laws.

In the end, the last time I checked, I still have a passport that says 'Macedonia' on it, and there is still a country called Macedonia full of Macedonians speaking Macedonian. Therefore all those comments on the Economist forum has led to nothing except wasting the Economist's Internet band length. This is the main reason why I don't get myself bogged down into these pitiful Internet forums. What also makes the whole Economist comments saga even more ludicruous and ironic is that the news magazine even documented about these ethnic conflicts waged on the Internet in an article titled 'You say Lwów, I say Lviv (and don't mention Lvov)' - A guide to Eastern Europe's most tedious arguments, complete with tortured facts, rage, arguments and syntax. The article finishes off with what has to be the best observation about these Internet-waged polemics:

Outside pressure has mostly calmed these arguments within formal politics. But on the internet the rows still rage, with tortured facts, arguments and syntax, all mixed with vituperative insults, phoney politeness and seemingly RANDOM Use Of Capital letters. There is a whiff of pyjamas-at-noon, and of people who check their emails in the small hours. Time to get a life?

Despite this description, the article still attracted 306 comments, many of which fitting the bill. You don't know whether to laugh or cry... or just scratch your head in dismay?

By the way, I am very much looking forward to seeing the Alexander the Great statue going up in the centre of Skopje. There has been one in the Macedonian city of Prilep now for about 15 years (pictured above), though as it is not a place known to nationalist Greeks, they haven't discovered it yet to make much fuss about it (yet). You'd think they could at least be consistent in their ire.

This also reminds me of the Macedonian town located near the Bulgarian border called Novo Selo (translated: New Village) that wanted to change its name as there are about a dozen places in Macedonia, let alone many more in Serbia and Bulgaria, with the same name. Novo Selo is quite the misnomer as it is hardly 'new', and with 3000 residents, no longer a 'village'. So a competition was launched in 2002 for a new name for the town. A local referendum was called for September 2003 and 90% of the residents voted the new name for the town to be... Aleksandrija (Alexandria), named after 'you know who'. After a year of going through slow bureaucratic channels, the decision to rechristen the town was put forward to the Macedonian Parliament for final ratification. However, while some ex-Communists who still see all Macedonians as pure Slavs (more in common with Russians and Poles) were not so keen about the name change, it was the ethnic Albanian politicians who were most vociferous against the proposal and promptly voted against. So thanks mainly to these Albanian politicians, against the wishes of its residents, the old town of 'New Village' remains to this day 'Novo Selo'. The irony is that no Albanians live in Novo Selo (pictured below).

OK, back to the pyjamas-at-noon for me :)