We used to iconize the Balkans as the home of unending unforgiving disputes over tiny points of doctrine or loyalty, incomprehensible to outsiders. The disputes are still there, as US learned when it tried to take one side in the tangle of Serbia vs Kosovo vs Albanian Kosovars vs Albanian Kosovars Who Like Serbia vs Albanian Kosovars Who Like Serbia But Can’t Stand The Horrible Serbian Habit Of Depalatalizing ж Before и.
Those short Ripley features in my bedtime playlist are full of examples. Women in one village were wearing black for 500 years to mourn the death of local nobles killed by the Turks. Nothing ever goes away.
The advice to AVOID such divisions is equally old, from Verse 1 of the Book of Proverbs to the entire New Testament to every handbook of good persuasion and preaching and salesmanship.
Sell your product, whether it’s Jesus or Jeeps. Skip everything else.
Corporations who break the rule are realizing that those useless old divisions NEVER GO AWAY. After you take one side, you’re STUCK IN THE BALKANS.
Before you pick a team, the team-centered people don’t have strong feelings about your product except a rational like or dislike of the product itself, which you may be able to overcome by Sampling and Glamorizing. After you invade the BALKANS, the qualities of your product are irrelevant.
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Speaking of incomprehensibly convoluted divisions, here’s a headline at The Federalist:
Activists Harass Immigrant Parents Celebrating SCOTUS Ruling Against Anti-Asian Racism
Six layers of anti and pro.
Polistra's Mill 