A YouTuber from Germany with heritage from the country known today as “North Macedonia”, has uploaded a new video that he said is a “very controversial topic” and that he was “contemplating if I should discuss it at all”.
The topic?
The reclamation of his Bulgarian identity and renouncement of a Macedonian one.
The YouTuber Bobby’s Perspectives has just under 100,000 subscribers and a total of 4.65 million views.
At the beginning of the video he said this is “for my Balkan brothers and sisters. For my Bulgarian brothers and sisters. For my Greek brothers and sisters. For my Serbian brothers and sisters. But more importantly… most importantly actually, this video is for my ‘North Macedonian’ brothers and sisters,” using hand signals to invert comas to North Macedonia.
The YouTuber, speaking in a very thick typical German accent, explained that his followers know him to identify as a Macedonian-Slav but that he was not overly patriotic because he was raised in Germany. He emphasised that he is a truth seeker, and this is reflected in his videos about diet and religion.
However, in his quest for truth seeking, it took him down a road that surely he would have never expected… His very own identity.
“I did my research, objectively. I investigated the Greek side. I investigated the Bulgarian side. I investigated the rest of the world. I investigated the Osman [Ottoman] archives, the Turkish archives. I investigated the ‘Macedonian’ claims’,” the YouTuber said, who went on to say that Slavs first arrived in the Balkans 900 years after Alexander the Great’s death.
The next part of the video would have taken many people by surprise.
What did ancient languages sound like? (video)
200 years since the 1821 Greek Revolution – Prince Charles in Athens (photos)
“I am talking from the heart, I’m talking to my fellow ‘North Macedonians’, and even I cannot accept that name any longer,” as the camera zooms into his fingers doing inverted comas.
The reason why he no longer accepts the name Macedonian?
“Because Macedonia was Greece, and it is well established and historical truth – as simple as that. We are not the descendants of Alexander, we are Slavs,” he emphasized.
The YouTuber then explains that many historical figures, such as Tsar Samuil the Bulgarian and Gotse Delchev, are claimed as Macedonian, but are in actual fact Bulgarian – just in case Tsar Samuil “the Bulgarian” was not obvious enough. In fact, Byzantine Emperor Basil II had the nickname “the Bulgar Slayer” as Tsar Samuil the Bulgarian was his greatest adversary.
Murder of Solomos Solomou: This is how his assassination was ordered
Great city routes to explore on foot in Athens
He then references Ottoman records that noted in the geographic region of Macedonia there were many ethnic groups, including Greeks, Bulgarians and Jews, but never a separate Macedonian ethnicity listed.
The YouTuber explained that Josip Broz Tito, the communist dictator of Yugoslavia, was against Bulgarian identity in the region of Macedonia and started the propaganda, killing those who continued to identify as Bulgarian.
“My great-grandfather was haunted by the Serbs for saying he was Bulgarian,” he said.
Read more: greek city times