Russia and the ex-USSR countries

Everything is ethnicity and identity. We are doomed.

What is “European”? A geographic designation? A cultural designation? Something else?

Ask Borat, OP.

ERM did you not see what happened when Ukraine tried to become more European facing?

The Ural Mountain range is generally considered the dividing line between Europe and Asia so that clearly puts Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine and Moldavia in Europe along with the western part of Russia. It gets more confusing when you come to the Caucasus nations Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia they like to consider themselves part of Europe but being just north of Turkey and Iran puts them more part of Asia. However when you consider that the island nation of Cyprus is sometimes considered part of Europe for political reasons it is clear that the line can be a more political one than one of geography.

Probably. The Eurovision Song Contest has had people from Africa, Asia, and Australia taking part.

We aren't too strict in our definition of European.

Most of the population of Russia is on the west side of the Urals, so they consider themselves more Russian. Same with the Baltic nations and the nations close to Europe like Ukraine. The republics north of the Caspian like Kazakhstan consider themselves Middle Eastern.

*Sorry, I meant "the nations EAST of the Caspian," not north

Well, Russians think of themselves as white, even though technically Slavs are NOT white!

By what criteria are Slavs not white?

they are SlavEs.

^by the Reich's criteria

Yet the nazis did not consider Italians and Spaniards to be inferior, just slightly less-ideal than Northern Europeans. By the way, nazi racial theory was wholly pseudoscientific and politically/economically motivated

Europe includes those countries that have accepted Western Civilization as a shared history. It certainly does not include Russia (or Turkey).

[quote]Europe includes those countries that have accepted Western Civilization as a shared history

Europe is a geographical term. "Western Civilization" is a made-up notion dating from the 19th and 20th centuries, when it became politically expedient to imagine a shared history among these countries. No one before that ever had such a notion; they identified in religious terms (e.g. Catholics against Protestants, Ottomans, and Native Americans) or just as subjects of a country like France or Spain. As far as cultural heritage goes, Middle Eastern and Russian cultures are every bit as influenced by ancient Greek, Roman, and Judaic cultures as western European countries are, in ways more so.

Georgia & Armenia should combine. They’re too small on their own. They could be Georgemenia or ArGeorge.

Before Islam, people around the Mediterranean felt they were joined together by that region.

The arrival of the Arabs into North Africa changed that feeling.

Bruce calls himself a lady, doesn't mean "she" is one.

The Baltic countries are certainly culturally European. I believe Estonians, in particular, consider themselves very similar to Finnish culture.

It's the Muslims we don't want in Europe. So those Caucus countries are out except for the Christian ones that are In.

Cyprus is primarily Greek, so it's European. The Turkish segment of Cyprus is illegal, taken by force and unrecognized by most of the world.

Turkey is Asian/Middle Eastern other than Constantinople/Istanbul, but 97 percent of the country is in Asia.

Russians do not consider themselves European nor Asian. They are simply Russian. They have nothing in common with Western Europe. Different alphabet, different religion, different history marred by years of invasions from - and warring with - Asiatic and Turkic peoples.

I'd imagine the Baltic states believe themselves to be more "European." Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova much less so. The Central Asian SSRs not at all. Caucuses are a mess but definitely not "European."

Russia is so vast that they regard themselves as Russians first and foremost, especially after the transfer of people around the former Soviet Union over the past decades.

Take the Republic of Kalmykia. It may geographically be part of Europe, but socially, religiously and linguistically, its roots are firmly from the east, with it's Buddhist culture.

Hi, Georgia!