I am not a racist!I love and respect all religions and cultures BUT:I look at my country Greece and see that what i used to love about it is changing.Europe is mixing as people from all over especialy in our case Albania and China start to move in and chnage the way things were.The little neighbourghood shops i used to like visiting are now closing.They can not compete with the Chinese immigrants that import products and sell at the markets.The streets are full of Nigerians selling copy DVD nad CD.Nice people who are searching for a better life but is it fair to allow them into our country so that in 50 years time we are just another America with no culture and a boiling pot of people who dont get along?
This is an open question i honestly am still forming a view on the subject so dont slam me as a bigot!
2007-09-02 02:12:49 · 13 answers · asked by Global gipsey. 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Cultures & Groups ➔ Other - Cultures & Groups
NO it is not wrong...I do not live in Greece, I live in US but visit Greece when I can. I don't go every year...when I went this summer it was the first time in about 6 years. I was saddened by a lot of things that I saw. In many ways I noticed that Greece is starting to lose that "greekness" that I fell in love with from my very first visits there. The laiki agora I remember from my childhood has been replaced with a supermarket......and the sweet tree-ripened peaches replaced with the ones that are picked agoura. The little shop with the home-made yogurt has been replaced with a boutique selling designer knock-offs. The zaxaroplastio in the neighborhood has been replaced with a McDonald's. The store where the old man used to make shoes and slippers and purses has been replaced by a Chinese shop. It's hard to buy souvenirs for my friends because I refuse to buy anything made in China. That cute little street I used to take as a shortcut to the plateia is filled with foreign prostitutes and drug addicts. None of my relatives will let me sleep with the windows open in their home because they all have been broken into in the last 5 years.
The fact that immigrants from all over have flooded Greece is only part of the equation. The other part is that Greece has the highest abortion rate in all of Europe. The birth rate is so dismal that sooner or later Greece will be just another melting pot. I don't know why all this bothers me. I guess I just want Greece to be GREEK...but alas, everything changes.
2007-09-02 14:29:31 · answer #1 · answered by dvatwork 7 · 4⤊ 2⤋
My friend, welcome to the grim reality of the modern world. I myself am a Serb, and I've watched and listened to what's happened in my homeland since the illegal NATO invasion. What was a relatively small Albanian community has, well, taken over almost all of Kosovo, as well as vast parts of Montenegro and Macedonia. Chinese immigrants have flooded into Serbia. In my father's hometown, they bought what used to be the most popular club/nightspot, and turned it into a flea market. And, as you said, many of the local stores have closed or been forced to change since they can't compete. Plus, Beograd, even after everything that's happened, is still considered to be the hub of higher education in the Balkans, so there are many, many nationalities that can be found there.
The sad thing with your case, all these foreign cultures will use the recent tragedies to expand within Greece. They will make promises of additional income and taxes, which I'm sure you're government could use after everything that's happened, in exchange for bypassing immigration and import regulations and procedures. All they need is an opportunity, and they will find a way to fill whatever voids currently exist...
*EDIT* To Dellarovere: I honestly don't understand why you take offense to my use of the name Macedonia. After all, that is the name of said "independent province", recognized by the U.N., Greece included. I realize that it has no historical connection to the ancient Greek empire of Macedon, but that is the name they have chosen, and that is the name they have been allowed to keep. However, if you were to poll the country, outside of the growing Albanian population, you'd find a rather fair split of how many citizens consider themselves Serbs and how many Greeks. Very rarely (at least in my experiences) do you come across someone that sees themself as a Macedonian.
2007-09-02 03:03:01 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 5⤊ 3⤋
No,but it is all over pal.We are a few years away from a Fascist New World Order.The erasure of national borders has been going on for several decades according to illuminati blueprints.And at least 2 generations of our youth around the world have been indoctrinated with a Globalist Worldview.
2007-09-02 21:17:48 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 5⤊ 0⤋
Being wrong is often a learning experience (or it should be). Generally, you can learn more by being wrong than you can be from being right. Strange how most religions seem to think that life is not a learning experience and that some form of eternal existence is the "price" for being right or wrong.
2016-05-19 02:58:00 · answer #4 · answered by ? 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting Greece to retain its cultural identity but with the way things are nowadays, it's just a dream. People want to make a better life for themself and/or their family so they will do whatever it takes to go to a place where they can realize their dreams even if it means going to another country. And if you think about it, who can blame them.
2007-09-02 02:34:07 · answer #5 · answered by WilmaF 5 · 1⤊ 1⤋
Keeping our cultural identity is not related to immigrants, who try to adopt the greek way of living, but a massive and personal endeavour to monitor and keep alive what our cultural identity is consisted of.
If our cultural identity continues being tsifteteli dances on the tables, insufficient or wrong use of greek language and scandalous ingnorance of our traditions, then there in no need to be kept.
2007-09-02 09:48:54 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 2⤋
hello,,,we have suffered same thing in our own nation,,flood of illegal immigrants,,all they both was death,,drugs and crimes,,in a country the crime rate is below 1%..we became 15 % and all cases were related to foreighners,.,,drug addiction spreaded,,infectious diseases,,,no control,,they reached a level of giving free doses of heroin and cocaine,,to encourage youths to get hign and hooked,,,its a national issue in every country ,,and the rules should be more strict,,i understand your agony,,.becoz i saw it ,,and i lived it,,and still live in my society and the problem is bigger than what we expect,,generations r lost ,.,and economy is ruined,safeness isnt available ,double pad locks ,metal windows and still we get thieves...politics r corrupted for self glory,,,best luck ,,i am a lover of greece and from the meditaranean also,,and i know how it feels to be unsafe threatened in your own homeland.
2007-09-02 08:45:11 · answer #7 · answered by reifguy 6 · 2⤊ 1⤋
It is not a question of Nationalism or even cultural identity, as the greek one is gradually but fast americanized.
It is a matter of survival of our economy, of our personal safety and dignity, of our present and future.
Albanians are as from many years beyond any control, people in the cities are afraid to walk through many territories of Athens and other cities because of them "solving" the problems among their gangs, and people at the distant villages shut their doors and windows before night falls terrified by their activities.
Many of us who happen to go out with our dog get offended or threatened by Albanians (because according to their allegations streets are for people, parks too), who got hold of almost all our neibourhoods and impose their rules forgetting that they live in OUR country.
As for Chinese, not only they make greek shops shut down, by selling their dangerous products in law prices, but also threaten greek shop keepers to stop their commercial activities for them to be free to handle the market.
The State stands indifferent and the Police hardly intevenes as it gets accused very often by "democratic" parts like Synaspismos (SY.RI.ZA. - what an inventional name!) for "violent behaviour"....For example the Nigerian case in Thessaloniki.
As a result, we are immigrants in our country...
2007-09-02 05:08:00 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 8⤊ 2⤋
We have the same issues here in the U.S. The truth is that the face of the world is changing, whether we like it or not.
2007-09-02 02:37:40 · answer #9 · answered by la buena bruja 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
this is rather good than bad.
wanting to keep sth more traditional means that you are not completely destroyed from todays community.
you are not being a racist but you are protecting your culture and everything that you are.
but of course there is a limit everywhere. this doesnt mean we should start fighting with the chinese industry or sth like that.
2007-09-02 04:10:19 · answer #10 · answered by Emily 3 · 4⤊ 2⤋