Yeah I’m sure it was people’s desire for unity, and not the drastic drop in the quality of life experienced by the average Russian during the 90s.
The greek expat community in america has some of the most cartoonish beliefs I’ve experienced. For many of them only the history they seem familiar with basically ends with “greek independence day” and any mention of civil war, junta or coup gets met with blank stares or hostility.
Tell me more, it’s always very funny to hear about that stuff lol.
Also do you mean expats as in first generation migrants or older communities? They’re much different groups. In the US Greek communities have been getting much more conservative, however in many places in Europe they’re often pretty cool (especially Germany) since lots of working class people went there to find work, and there’s actually lots and lots of old guard communists there, to the point where overall the KKE (old guard communist party, pretty shit today for various reasons but still important) typically ends up being the 2nd most popular party with diaspora voters, and in some countries it is actually first. The thing with the US is that these communities are growing increasingly nationalistic as well as bougie. Maybe assimilating with American brainworms is part of the issue, but also the junta was supported by the US so various people who left the country after the fall of the junta went there. In general for some reason Greek migrants are more nationalistic than the people who actually live here.
First generation migrants are a different case, the ones who go to the US are frequently bougie college kids. I can’t stress enough how impossible it is for an average person here to study in the US. Average monthly wage is around 1k here. Imagine a family of 2 parents having to send one of their children to study in the US while they have to live in Greece, living costs alone are more than an average family can manage if the parents don’t want to literally starve. Even upper middle class families won’t let their children study there because of how expensive everything is. So as you can deduce the people winding up there are almost always bougie as fuck, and they have the beliefs that go with that.
I was referring to older communities in the US, but funny enough I actually also know someone who went to princeton on merit scholarship (old enough to have memories of the coup and not be a chud).
I’d say the assimilation is definitely a big part of it, you can see it in the US with similar groups like irish and italians where as soon as they stopped getting treated as non-white they became eager to join the ranks of the oppressors. The greek chuds have a real obsession with hating islam/turkey in particular.
Part of the reason I try to communicate to other americans the economic situation in greece is that it’s starting to look more and more like the fate that awaits people in the US now that austerity and empire is really returning home.
Also if you need a laugh allow me to summarize the typical understanding of greek history as taught via US education:
-
Zeus and polytheism- but mostly through disney movies and the Hercules TV show
-
Brad pitt invaded Troy for some reason
-
300 spartans fought off the evil persians
-
greek democracy as romanticized by the br*tish (what slaves?)
-
the byzantine empire survived the fall of the roman empire because they converted to christianity
-
the evil muslims overthrew the Byzantines because of trickery and reasons
-
war of independence
-
“Glücksburg is just the family name, what are you a communist?”
The greek chuds have a real obsession with hating islam/turkey in particular.
Ah yes, of course. Yeah that’s a common theme. Do they also freak out about North Macedonia? They probably do.
Funnily enough Greeks in Germany are from what I’ve seen closest to Turks than any other ethnicity there, pretty funny how that works. Thing is, lots of Greek people hate Turks because of the history between the countries, especially older people. Thing is, the Armenian genocide wasn’t just Armenian, lots of Greek people lived in Turkey these years, including my great grandparents who ended up having such an aversion to Turkey that they changed the channel the moment they heard Turkish. Greece was also not blameless in what happened, the atrocities were partly in response to the invasion of Turkey by Greece under the pretext of protecting and liberating the Greek populations in Turkey. It seemed to be going well until the Greek side thought “wow this is so easy, guess we’re just gonna take over half of Turkey now instead of just the coastal places where there actually are Greek populations”. So then Ataturk counterattacked and ethnic cleansing happened. The history is more complicated of course but I can’t explain it here since it’s pretty delicate and I don’t even think I have the appropriate knowledge to seriously talk about this.
It didn’t stop there. The trigger that eventually collapsed the junta was Turkey invading Cyprus (a country which is basically Greece but even shittier) in 1974 because the Greek junta tried to establish a similar regime in Cyprus, which helped Turkey invade under the pretext of protecting Turkish populations in Cyprus.
So basically Greece and Turkey have been at conflict since forever, and shit is kinda escalating again (though in all likelihood it won’t go anywhere this time). Which fucking sucks because people get really racist when really, the nationalists may not want to admit it but no other country is closer culturally to Greece, Turkish people are pretty cool and the proximity really shows in places like continental Europe (especially Germany) where the two groups are both discriminated against and get closer to each other.
I’ve had so many dreams about the Soviet States of the Mediterranean and Balkans lol I really fucking hate what nationalism has done to separate all these amazing cultures from each other and how much it hurts minorities. That’s the end of my sad “why can’t we just be friends” rant. I just really hate this shit and how governments want us to hate each other when I just want to eat kebabs and swear in Albanian with my comrades :(
Part of the reason I try to communicate to other americans the economic situation in greece is that it’s starting to look more and more like the fate that awaits people in the US now that austerity and empire is really returning home.
If the US enters a serious crisis (not like 2008, I mean a SERIOUS crisis like what Greece had), it’s gonna be much worse for the common people than Greece. Greece is still 50 steps ahead of the US in terms of labour power. Don’t forget communist guerrillas used to be so powerful the country was actually controlled by them for a brief while after WWII and the succ Andreas Papandreou government under the pressure of communists post junta was by far the most leftist government to be democratically elected in Europe. There is some things that even right wingers consider obvious that you could never convince Americans to do. But unfortunately with the current government I am afraid we are finally well on our way to completely become a neoliberal hellscape. I don’t want to despair but I’m not feeling good about where things are heading lately.
Also if you need a laugh allow me to summarize the typical understanding of greek history as taught via US education:
Well that’s what people in Greece believe too lol. Except the Glucksburg thing, that’s just sad.
Also there’s a very weird perception about byzantium. People don’t really want it to have anything to do with the roman empire, they want it to be Greek through and through so they make weird excuses to themselves. I guess that stuff it is the result of preschool plays where literal 4 year olds pretend to be fighting off Turks in 1821 and military style marches for school students (although maybe the 28th October ones are less bad because they’re about resisting Nazis I guess…). And yes, I’ve done all of these things, so has the vast majority of Greeks. The one thing I haven’t done yet and I can probably avoid it only I get enough PhDs is mandatory military service.
You are right though, people have to know about the Greek debt crisis. It was insane and pretty traumatic for many people. The quality of life in Greece before was actually much better than the US I’d say because despite being much weaker in terms of GDP per capita and overall much lower average income, labour was much stronger so you had way more bang for your buck, less inequality and better working conditions. But it just collapsed so fast. My parents income decreased by over 60% and we were among the luckiest people around us. I went to a private school at that time, one year there were 4 classes per year, next year there were 2. Unemployment went up to 30% or something like that. It was crazy, it’s also crazy how it was reflected in suicide rates.
