Maria, the winner of the 2007 European TV Song Contest, a Serbian female singer? Erifuwei? After winning the championship, he made a gesture of opening his thumb, forefinger and middle finger to celebrate the victory. After this gesture spread all over Europe on TV, it immediately aroused the disgust of Croats, Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina and their overseas immigrants, because this three-finger salute gesture reminded them of the painful experience of the civil war in the former Yugoslavia.
Salute with three fingers is necessary for Serbs to celebrate victory and even express their determination and will to fight. It is regarded as the symbol of Serbian nation. However, this gesture means barbarism and provocation to other ethnic groups in the former Yugoslavia, especially Croats and Muslims. The exact meaning of "three-finger ceremony" is not accurate. A popular saying in various materials is that this gesture of "three-finger ceremony" is not directly related to ethnic conflicts, but comes from the Orthodox prayer mode believed by Serbs. In Christianity, the common way of praying is to touch the forehead with three fingers together, then touch the chest, and finally touch the left shoulder and the right shoulder. When doing these four steps, you should say: in the name of the father ... what about the son ... and the sacred ... spirit, while the Serbs interpret the prayer of the Orthodox Church as one of the Christian factions that separate three fingers, which represent the father (Christ) and the son respectively.
With the passage of time, this gesture has gradually been used in various occasions for Serbs to celebrate their victory, and has evolved into a symbolic gesture of Serbian nationalism. In the field of sports, NBA stars Predrag Stojakovic and Vlade Divac celebrated their goals with a "three-finger ceremony". In the political field, after the Serbian Radical Party won the parliamentary election in 2003, its supporters took to the streets to express their joy and excitement with three fingers. Especially in the bloody civil war and ethnic conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, this gesture became a symbolic gesture for Serbian soldiers and nationalists to celebrate their victory. Every time a town is captured and a group of enemy troops are killed, the Serbs have to stretch out three fingers. This is the official reason why Croats and Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina regard the "three-finger ceremony" as a symbol of Serbian extreme nationalism.