>>Of course, when the stool hit the fan, each side claimed these as theirs "who were oppressed and did not dare declare themselves as Serbs/Croats/Muslims they were".
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>But Canada has been Canada since 1867. You'd think they'd have realised there would be at least a few Canadians around by the 1900s.

Just shows that politicians' stupidity doesn't care about political system. It claims ground regardless :).

What I mentioned took place about fifty years since the country was put together. One generation is about 25 years, so... it was a time when third generation of people living in the same country was coming about. And also the time when the children of those who made them after the WWII, therefore in the times when their own anti-nationalist politics was taken seriously and the general feeling of liberation took over, i.e. people didn't care about religion or origins anymore, they just got together and had kids. And not only in my traditionally mixed province, but elsewhere too. The new state took care to mix and match its people, so whoever was sent to serve in rebuilding the country, specially until 1953, while we still had command economy, so one of my uncles is Croatian - my aunt fell for the charms. And I'm pretty sure there were other cases even within that branch of the family, which nobody bothered to mention; I know this one just because the guy had a regional nickname.

But this politicians' blindness is a sign of a larger lack of understanding. They fail to see their grasp of reality doesn't include their own influence. In case at hand, if a country started as a mix of nations, and politicians over the years keep that mix mixed... they keep thinking the mixed components will not mix and will stay as before.

They change the world, then behave as if there was no change... not too smart, eh?