Clear up things through 1) Using familiar tools to understand Kosovo 2) Be commited, in your efforts, to harmony between your personal Serbs and personal Albanians 3) Utilize to Internet links on the Balkan battle

4) And refer to an Identitarian platform from 2020 and 2021

1) SOME OF THE "KOSOVO WAR FOR DUMMIES" FOR THE CONFUSED TO UNDERSTAND

Identitarianism is renowned for its divergent yet harmonious halves: self + others.  Yet it is felt for those who stumble upon the first part and get confused. 

Below, the notes add --background-- to the Kosovo idea.   Just in case your eyes roll over “consumer goods are the Serbs” and “the stimuli that comes in contact with your senses”. 

Point one

The “Kosovo” war as an outlet for your stress ^is no different^ than acting out fantasies through intense movies, video games, and music.

Point two

+ Memes! These Internet phenomena take existing image and adds a new message to it; result is the image has been appropriated for humorous or dramatic effect.  So in applying memes to the “Kosovo” idea, substitute similarly personal struggles, and commandeer the 1998-99 historical conflict to your own private life.

In the same fashion of the current girlfriend tagged with “my 13 other videos I haven’t start”, at the top ... take the very thought of the Serbs of Kosovo.   Like a news photo.

Ask yourself “what are the things I like?” from the catechism … and write your answer over that image in your head of the Balkan group. That’s the spirit!

Everything goes according to plan? Then an original photo is now seized to your own meme; rather than for the effect of amusement, but for *stress relief*, instead.

Point three

It’s an adaptation.  Your Kosovo is an adaptation of 1999’s Kosovo, ^in that same way^ the Oscar-winning movie “West Side Story” updates Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet”. 

Or switch the musical for the new “Gnumio and Juliet” animated flick. 

Point four

Why Kosovo and not other war-like, authoritarian places?  In Afghanistan and Iraq, entire Ameurocan counterinsurgency units have came and gone. 

Other “minority rule” areas never pursued the option of suppressing the guerrillas so hard.   Example being, the Israeli forces in the West Bank.    
> Also in "dominant minority" states, the minority is too large (the Sunnis in Saddam-era Iraq).  
It's harder to achieve that state of nihilism, if you empower oh-so-many things in life! 

Hope this holds up, so far.

2) ULTIMATELY, IN THIS IDENTITARIAN GAME, YOU HAVE TO WIN THE HEARTS AND MINDS OF ALBANIANS

+ ...But meaning has its costs.  
As I wrote on "a self to believe in", have AN IDEA, A VISION for conflicting parts in your personality to be eventually be content with.

Such a live + let live outcome can apply to Serbs + Albanians, but also to DCS; say, Dreamers + MAGAers.

+  Jun 13, 2020: It was 22 years ago where, in my reaction to growing up DCS, my study of political/religious regimes went underway.

Today, Kosovo 1999 is the historical example to cognitively govern myself.

But I use that war to manage hardships, not support Serbian nationalism in real life!

I was born to Polish immigrants, so I have nothing political/personal with today's Kosovo. 

So it’s free to be independent, if not a province. 

And it was me at age 13 who made this discovery of belief … maybe because my mental puzzle is more monolithic and straightforward?

A melting pot DCSer puzzle may have quite a lot of *specialized* pieces, however. For them, using that ideology part may disrupt too many other parts.   Disrupt their kaleidoscope of things liked on social media. 

So being open to overlooked ideas is gratitude! 

3) GET A BETTER PICTURE, THROUGH THESE ONLINE LINKS ON THE 1999 CONFLICT

15 min news report of  the 1998 situation of police vs. guerrillas on the ground, none yet in the sky: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjlbJDZaANQ&t=38s

The eyes have it: See the KLA ((0:55 to 1:10 of the video)) + NATO experience in the Kosovo War: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwP3P86u6e

Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway FULL GAME Gameplay Walkthrough

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvopp5jVBcU&t=3193s

+ Actual screens of a third person shooter scattered throughout. 3PS is pertinent as the visual for this video games you’re playing … is lent from actual news photographers and video cameras that took place in the Balkans war.

+ In these two videos, dismiss the idea of taking sides. These reenactments of the Kosovo War here are about cinema, not ethnically based politics. Better study these videos to help you envision the “video game in your head.”

Racak

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwFEEfj6xJ4&t=4256s

Highlights: 

4:38 Casual ambush by the KLA
33:15 Exchanging of fire in a village street

1:10:05 Pursuing of guerrillas in the woods

Kosare

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULb6rrN0wCs&t=5482s

Noted points:

8:20 More concealed rebel ambush

1:28:20 Backing by tank firepower

1:40:40 Repelling the other side’s advances

Example of a combat in Kosovo: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Prekaz

Want more in-depth?  Here's the Kosovo region, it's history + it's people: washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/balkans/overview/kosovo.htm
 

https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/kosovo-airstrike-articles.3.html

4) idEnt GOES ON THE ISSUES, YEAR 2021

                                                                                         Feel the Issues (in 2021)

Crises continue to grip democratic capitalist society (DCS); not the least of which was Election 2020, and its aftermath. These problems result from policies emanating at home, like the outcome of George Floyd’s killing. Added are the COVID-19 pandemic that instigated from abroad, now is striving to cure itself with vaccines administered at home. As well, DCS is coming to terms following being confronted with the reports of global warming. 

Policy at home

Ideology is losing relevance in today’s political discourse. Vladimir Putin rose through realpolitik; Donald Trump, with his flip-flopping past donations to Hillary Clinton’s Senate campaign, has never been a True Believer. From the perspective of centrists, the mission statement of Joe Biden and Angela Merkel is prosperous stability. Pitch ideas bolder than that to them, and in Biden’s empathic delivery, you may get a “thanks but no thanks.” Such political positions found in both populism and moderation have a long history. But what's new--what's untapped--is for politicians to reach out to a citizen's sense of pride. This is a sense of dignity that is not so obvious at a surface level. Decades ago, leaders couldn't get intimate through a story in the local newspaper. But it's possible through an Instagram app on a smartphone. With politics becoming ubiquitous to appear as mobile device notifications and trending stories, the private and the public link up. Effectively, collective dogma gets traded for a politics that takes it more personally. 

“United We Stand” went as slogan in the aftermath of the September 11th, 2001 attacks—the day, to some, when the 1990s ended. Yet now in a new 2020s decade, could we politically do without this motto? As the future of United States politics lies more in favor of the left, rather than an equal balance of power of both sides of the aisle. Despite the Delta variant and Afghanistan putting the president on the current, partisan-brawling defensive, in the long-run, the information-consuming economy is bound to press for more Democratic college graduates and enhance more the mobility of non-whites, rather than many blue collar Republicans of European descent that gave 2016 for Trump. 

With the White House flipped to Democrats, Biden has called for “an end to this uncivil war.” Yet this may turn off conservatives in the minority. To the right, appealing to egalitarian unity, even to show pandemic empathy, is another Obama-esque strategy to gain votes, resulting in white Christian males displaying their siege mentality in the storming of the U.S. Capitol. More worthy than “bringing us together” is exercising forbearance. Whether it be crises like pandemics, the cost of health care, a death of a Supreme Court justice, care must be taken with matters that may just drop out of the sky and are beyond the control of one mere organization. Authentic leadership is that prevents bad issues from getting worse. Nevertheless, political footballs do deteriorate, and play into opportunists, anyway. It’s all in the line of American values: people—opportunists included—have their behavior motivated by the aim of feeling better, irrespective if doing so comes with any political achievements. 

Policy abroad

The individuals of the world are becoming more like Americans. This does not necessarily mean the world turning into the United States. Instead, globalization offers to serve just the wishes of the customer--- rather than more the needs of a government--through the sharing of products, parts, and technology. Though what are the most impactful item of that exchange for particular individuals to import?  Ideas, such as nationalism or equality. The Congolese market has less demand for cars than the Canadian one; true both before and after capitalism became worldwide. But any possible group is ready--and vulnerable--to taking up groundbreaking concepts.

One enduring concept is the invisible hand, central to democratic capitalism. Yet at times in history, DCS has also proved to have an invisible gameplan. Take World War I. Back in 1913, capitalist Europeans were evident of this; they didn't have a system to duplicate many Bismarcks; a line of leadership to govern judiciously. European monarchs did not envision the rise of Nazism and Communism. As well, their political systems couldn't keep up with their economic ones: technological growth as result of the industrialization in wartime machinery eventually hit all. Fast forward a century, and the globe itself wears the same shoes Europeans were in. Politicians again play catch up with the rapidity of economic self-interest. This was shown in the rampant development into the pristine resulting in greater contact with wildlife. Contact with this fauna played a role in spreading zoonotic disease—as in the case of Ebola in deforested Africa. As well, emerging from the trade of similar animals was COVID-19.

That was how the pandemic got brought into life. Now, in the era of vaccines, the struggle is not just man vs. nature, but man vs. the rest of society: convincing others to get their shots. Yet the current Democratic leadership is falling short of its goals; politics and conspiracy theory is trying to undermine science and public health. Such immunology does come out of nowhere—science is directed by humans, not animals. Would the latter be the subject of attention? It's the farmer, the veterinarian who directs traffic, regardless of any fixation of on those with four legs. So science, in the end, is what your mind makes of it. It shows that in today's partisan battles, anti-vaxxers and doubters of climate change continue to hold their ground. Science is still one more way to have power of over one's environment. Thus, both Anthony Fauci and Robert Kennedy, Jr. make do with coping mechanisms.

George Floyd 

People deliberated and pondered all about in 2020 on what the George Floyd meant for DCS. One thing, though, became clear in 2021: ex-police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty of the crime. Yet how far has really things really came over the year? Personally for me, I looked back at my summer 2020 “To the Victor Goes The Broils” piece, conjuring lines such as "handling things by case, person by person", and "change (is to be) directed from the bottom up." Could these precepts come straight out a “hearts and minds” counterinsurgency manual to win over restless locals? Bring up any problem: If you connect with one conflicted individual, with his or her warts and all, you don't see a person by ethnicity, even nationality. Rather, you come to regard that person a part of your memory. There's that up close and personal … and there's the same subject from a distance. The social turmoil seen, as someone else’s proxy, via the lens of a news camera. As well, just writing this constitutes as making a remote connection from me to you. Yet events move fast: before a person can make positive beliefs about a stranger, some other belief fills in the former’s void. Before such a face-to-face encounter can be even met.

Rising temperatures

The climate issue is said to be humanity's biggest test, but a remedy is simple: just consume less. Stick to buying, using energy on what is most essential to you, and that would drain the fossil-fuel sucking swamp. But addressing global warming is a behemoth, as politicians want it both ways on economic modernity and social justice. And they find it hard that far-reaching blueprints like the Green New Deal find some way to alienate the right and its business allies. 100% agreement may be lacking here. What can be unanimously agreed, be celebrated is the human courage to withstand these rising sea levels and advancing deserts. In altering ancient atmospheric chemistries and driving species into extinction, humans as a collective wield godlike power in ways not witnessed during in Jesus' time. It's power. But more noble aims may lie less in power, and more in control—being free from giving oneself into the grip of industry's convenience and instant gratification.

Establishing control over one’s self then comes before how technology is controlled. Yet to pull off the former remains elusive, as such identity is a construct of the imagination. Like a soul unused until the afterlife, the self has been regarded as abstract. Yet self-discovery, an awareness of one truth, can be an exact starting point. A beginning links to another, constituting an operation that may be the best way to overcome most dominant hardship: that which looms in the mind.

 Plus 2020                                            

                                            To the Winner Goes the Broils: Democratic Capitalist Society Confronts a New Decade

The anguish of 2020s is taking Americans into “uncharted territory” and unnerving uncertainty. Democratic capitalist society (DCS) —which, in an “end of history”, globalized world, pulls in just about everyone—is forcing its subjects in a march of adaptation. The engulfing COVID-19 pandemic, the upheaval of the George Floyd killing, adds to other vexing issues of third millennium: climate change, refugee crises and the dislocations of automation. Age-old belief manifested today as religion and politics, in the following commentary by a private citizen, both enables and hinders DCSers who seek an appealing “new normal” in a world of ever-more newness.

Think Globally, Act Contagiously

As much as people strive to remedy the current crises, these efforts are limited in affecting true root-and-branch change. Years ago, the entrenched American Dream was present at Pearl Harbor in 1941 and Lehman Brothers in 2008. The ensconced motions that those in DCS went through at the pandemic’s spring onset—going to work and staging campaign rallies--became disrupted. Eventually, these processes re-asserted themselves.

Disease, compared to prior epidemics, isn’t getting that deadly. It's just that there's more in the way for these plagues to affect. Today, there are larger crowds of people gathered at workplaces, stores, schools that previous pandemics missed. This population density argument, unique to the 21st century, is in same vein of hurricanes not intensifying; merely more DCSers moved to the coast. So coronavirus is yet another outcome of the millennium’s masses at work: people in Washington have to keep an eye on those in Wuhan … and quite a bit elsewhere. Whether it is climate change by private polluters, artificial intelligence abused in order to make unfortunate humans subordinate to machines, world events like COVID-19 is change directed from the bottom up. Not the flipping of a switch from top down, as a Franklin Roosevelt or a Ronald Reagan would have done generations ago. How will this human nature wind blow in the future?

Turmoil in Race Relations (Once Again)

The tragedy of George Floyd, on display in a world intertwined by social media, gives the publicized message to African Americans that “I could be the next George Floyd.” “My government, the forces that supposed ‘to serve and protect’ me, could in fact kill me.” What could stand in the way for attaining righteousness for Black Lives Matter? An ever-polarized atmosphere. To encourage conversation and education about race, to pass federal police brutality reform bills, take even more effort than ever to win over the established, entrenched opposition.

Certain individuals are convinced otherwise—they believe in a cause, and to defend that stance, they ultimately become rigid. To deal with racism, anything involving rigidity and belief, takes handling things by case, person by person. It’s self-awareness: something that the premodern European colonists who introduced slavery in the first place lacked. Addressing this discrimination takes individualism more than collectivism. Regardless of how the current discussion of systematic racism turns out, there is now the dilemma of subtle racism ... rather than overt prejudice. One widespread example of slightness within DCS: entertainers Michael Richards or Rosanne Barr making a gaffe and then try to apologize. Another instance of less blatant discrimination would be bigots more likely concealing themselves under a "White Heritage Party" than in running for office as the "Racist Party of America."

Still, whether slight or obvious, divides exist. To pick a pair of forces that seem to unjustly divide humanity, race and religion are among the top. Staging an opposition to this opinion is hard, as people aren’t free to choose their ethnicity or basically were unable in childhood to oppose being raised in the faith of their parents. Was the colorblind, purple state advent of Barack Obama supposed to buck this trend? Yet when faced with the onslaught of globalizing newness, race and religion end up being the old, lifelong refuges DCSers fall back on. As things like race and religion change, the more they stay the same. What’s also more the same is the global postmodernism and the fragmentation that comes with it. For instance, generations ago, people were across the board moderately religious. Now, change has wedged DCS to be more observant … and, elsewhere, more atheistic. Republicans tending in the former, Democrats looks to be the latter.

Interconnect the Dots

Some forces seek to pursue an alternate to global problems. Yet the worldwide populism from Trump to Putin to Bolsonaro still operates in the framework of DCS. These politicians act as opportunists who were once more firmly center-left/center-right— the one-time Europhile, Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán is a case in this. Such once-fringe demagoguery is more possible due to the decay of 21st century DCS, and this decline in a political unity is ripe to take advantage of.

Politicians, wherever they may be on the spectrum, haven’t come to the full terms that divisions are interconnected. Outsiders hate the establishment, but these populists need it to galvanize and mobilize their supporters. On the other hand, establishment bastions like the Washington Post do not adhere to “Make America Great Again”, but could do well covering the hoopla to increase print subscription in today’s digital era.

Other efforts may come short of erasing the partisan raucous. The Republicans had a chance in 2016 to put country over party and cast their votes for the opposite Democratic Party. However, that would mean risk giving up power; subsequently as of June 4th, 2020, Republican support for Donald Trump is at 85%. Those who follow current events have no over-arching institution they can belong to … that can truly transcend electoral politics and its power-pursuing. 

And You

It’s not the leaders--capitalist participants all over may not be able to keep up with capitalist expectations. Globally-set expectations launched by ceaseless change in prices, profits, technology and consumer tastes. So in turn, DCS likewise necessitates ceaseless adjustment for all its humans. This is not merely capitalist adaptation for the Secretary of Treasury or the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. It’s adaptation for everyone— in work and play as well as mind and matter. For many workers tired by all this adjusting, the weekend continues to be of value. In the meantime, as historian Yuval Noah Harari stated, “there is no serious alternative to the liberal package of liberalism, human rights, democracy, and a free market.’’

No serious alternative to the situation that involves so much fear in politics, so little love. Good economies can only do so much to help politicians who are presiding over disillusioned and disengaged DCS workers. Even historically low unemployment figure doesn’t assuage workers that their jobs would not be eventually taken away by automation. The stock market has never been higher, but that won’t narrow the gap in the salary between a chief executive and a rank-and-file consultant. Rather than the good, only a bad economy really could determine the fate of a politician. The media of one’s political choice can spin progress. But a recession—a global Great Lockdown--is undeniable to the most fearful.

Much of today’s problems can be traced to what separates the premodern from the postmodern: the division of labor. “The customer is always right”, as the saying goes. As a result of this, though, DCSers are so specific in what they want; in turn, production has to meet such narrow consumer needs. Therefore, everything in life has to be specialized to match one producer to a consumer. This is true as well for politics, yet specialization struggles in matching one citizen to one politician. That is why for the left, going anti-Trump is more galvanizing than being pro-Democrat; African-Americans in the critical South Carolina Democratic primary felt they had more to lose with Bernie Sanders as an opponent to Donald Trump than Joe Biden. Generations ago, philosopher Eric Hoffer took a similar note, observing that mass movements can do without a god, but always need their devil. A devil, emblematic of DCS pressuring pluralisms, necessitating protection for one’s fragile beliefs—one’s loves.

Resolution?

It is said for political problems, including for the ones mentioned in this treatise, voting is the best solution. But elections can only do what they’re designed to do: please the majority. As what happens for at least the other 49% can be outside its realm can be disregarded as much as desired.

Lacking in DCS is thinking that takes 100% of the human race into consideration, rather than 51% of it. Criticism may be raised towards such an ideology that strives for total, 100% reach. But the “100%” alternative to democracy is to be open all of humanity, all of the political process. Not, right off the bat, label a negative thing as “fake news.” Instead, look closer and confront those problems. Out of many partisan divisions, the result for that one individual is a 2020s conviction that “what didn’t kill me actually made me stronger.”