Talk:Belgium/Archive4

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[edit] FAR removed

I have removed Wikipedia:Featured article review/Belgium from WP:FAR. First, the FAR wasn't listed here on the talk page. Second, it doesn't appear that steps have been taken to resolve the dispute here on the talk page; WP:FAR is not dispute resolution. Third, the previous FAR just closed, so re-opening a new FAR should wait several weeks, during which time neutrality will hopefully be resolved. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:24, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

I think that is not just, an article with disputed neutrality don't was to remain between the Featured Articles. Felipe C.S ^{( talk )} 20:44, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

That's why I felt it should have its Featured Status removed. It would then be up to the editors editing the article to have consensus before it could regain FA status. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:02, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

The version that I kept at the moment that I kept it was within criteria. I made 40-odd edits to get it there. It probably will come back, but we should at least wait a few weeks. Marskell 10:31, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Only one person, Vb, insists on tagging this article as biased, without a proper argumentation. Not a soul agreed with him: not since the tags are up, not during the numerous lengthy discussions before, apart from Marskell – also without providing any reasoning – be it mainly during his last days of copyediting of which in particular 2007-06-21 was a really off day, see 'The LEAD on Belgium' on my talk page (and I did not even mention all the errors he introduced then). And in its present state (at which Vb and I kept editing, not always disagreeing), the FA status appears deserved.

SandyGeorgia appears to make the same mistake that Marskell apparently made: Wikipedia does not praise "neutrality" about discrimination, murder, the Holocaust etc. It requires a neutral point of view in weighing the sources for their relevance etc, and not showing a particular point of view by tendencious terminology. It does not dictate the incorrect rephrasing of good sources or mistranslating them so as not to step on overly sensitive feet, in particular not when these proper sources are from the opposite side as that which Vb states the POV to come from.

For Belgium or its predecessors as the Low Countries or the Southern Netherlands, the speakers of Dutch never discriminated the speakers of French. But French has been the only official language; higher education did exist only in French; good positions were reserved for French-speakers; the Dutch version of the Law was only informative, as the French text always prevailed until 1967; forty years ago, 80% of the financial capital and property of the Belgians were in the minority of French-speakers' possession; Belgian diplomatic circles still favour French; Flemings paying a mere visit to Wallonia still have to speak French, while Walloons can even live in Flanders without speaking the language. Those facts cannot be 'balanced' by facts of a reverse nature, because there are none. And one cannot deny that community and language matters are most important and notable about Belgium, thus cannot be entirely swept out of the article. In fact, many further aspects of forementioned nature are not in the article, up to the point that one could far more easily cry 'French POV'.

— SomeHuman 08 Jul 2007 01:47 (UTC)

Given that bizarre phrasing—"For Islam, Belgium's concept of 'recognized religions' caused a tedious path to being treated in the manner of the Jewish and Protestant religions"—has been reintroduced, I wouldn't complain to me about off days. I stand by the sum total of my edits (though I'm not a typo-free editor) as a great improvement. Does this need another FAR? No, but whatever. If you won't compromise on clearly POV language, round it goes again. Marskell 14:40, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Marskell, you had made it, I do quote you literally: "Belgium has a policy 'recognized religions'; this has allowed Islam to be treated in the manner of the Jewish and Protestant religions". That is not bizarre, that is a blatant error against English. That is not bizarre, that is wrong: that "policy" is not a "policy" but mainly a set of laws, a concept. That is not bizarre, that is utterly misleading, the opposite of the authentic statement: the concept did not allow (which in this context would have to be interpreted as facilitate) Islam to be treated equally: the concept caused a long and tiresome way with many obstacles to overcome before arriving there. And you are surprised that I "reintroduced the earlier version"?... Actually, I had changed the earlier "to become" into "to being" and had put "For Islam" at the start of the sentence instead of behind 'path', while I maintained your change of the earlier "at the level" into "in the manner". Perhaps you can explain what you, after these three changes, still find so 'bizarre', or demonstrate it by properly copyediting the phrase while maintaining "Belgium's concept of 'recognized religions'" and "caused a tedious path". Do you perhaps refer to the typical phrase "tedious path" in Islam teaching? I see that usage as innocent irony for the well-informed, which augments the quality of the phrase. Please do understand that I consider your copyediting a great improvement as well, I only had and still have strong reservations about your last series of edits from the 18th till the 21th of June, and not all of those were without merit, of course.

Marskell, your POV is most clear. Or do you think it to be normal to deliberately deviate from the article text and from the in reference quoted original French-language report, by changing this:

"In 2006, the largest French-speaking university published a survey report calling Flanders' leadership in speaking multiple languages "undoubtedly wellknown", and showing this lead to be considerable : 59% of the Flemish respondents can speak French and 53% English; of the Walloons on the other hand, merely 19% Dutch and 17% English; of the Brussels' residents, 95% declare to be able to speak French, 59% Dutch, and 41% the non-local English. Economically significant in an increasingly globalizing epoch, in their respective regions 59, 10, and 28 percent of people under forty can speak all three languages."

into this:

"In 2006, the largest French-speaking university published a survey report calling Flanders' leadership in speaking multiple languages "undoubtedly wellknown": 59% of the Flemish respondents reported being able to speak French, and 53% English; of Walloons, only 19% spoke Dutch and 17% English; of Brussels' residents, 95% reportedly speak French, 59% Dutch, and 41% English. In their respective regions 59%, 10%, and 28% of people under forty can speak all three languages." ?

• You left out the report's conclusion: the previously assumed leadership was by the reported survey shown to be considerable. In the words of the French-speaking professor at the Walloon university as most visible in his short introduction in that in reference literally quoted French-language report. I had pointed that out, and with the comments on French/English I had made and your infobox of elementary French, you cannot even pretend ignorance.
• You introduced "reported being able to speak" where this is immediately preceded by the term 'respondents' that by itself already indicates "this is what they responded, what they claim". Your edit deliberately casted doubt about the correctness of the Flemish respondents' statement. The French-speaking professor does not imply any such thing, he simply wrote (in French, here translated a bit too literally:) "The survey shows that Flanders is clearly more multilingual, which is without doubt a wellknown fact, but the difference is considerable: although 59% and 53% of the Flemings know French or English respectively, only ..." — and then, in contrast, for the Walloons you claim that they "spoke" Dutch and English. The professor used for Flemish and Walloons the identical term "connaissent" (literally meaning "know" but in English usually phrased as "can speak", a phrasing that does not as generally occur in French).
• You replaced "on the other hand, merely" with "only", though the French text uses "alors que ... seulement" which clearly points out the contrast with what precedes. And "seulement" can mean "only" or "merely", but the nearly identical phrase deeper within the report uses "à peine" which literally means "with an effort" (like 'only with an effort, with extra goodwill, one can state') and needs to be translated as "merely". All that too, I had explained when defending the proper translation; you cannot hide behind ignorance for this either. (The article at present uses "on the other hand, only", thus milder than the text in the report but still according to the text in the report's introduction.)
• Again bending over backwards to indulge Vb, you left out "Economically significant in an increasingly globalizing epoch", thus its following statement is utterly out of the context it has in the report. That too I had more than sufficiently argumented on this talk page before, and yesterday again with a whole series of quotes from the report that show that the statement behind that wiped part is indeed significant, economically, for the future, because of the increasing need of knowing several languages, in an international context.

So I have by arguments shown your edit to only one paragraph to have been a breach of NPOV (and there were several other such edits, as you found argumented on my talk page e.g. about the Federal "prerogatives" and the elimination of the location only of Brussels). I dare you to do the same with any of my edits in an article. Else, you must stop making your false accusations of "clearly POV language" on my behalf, as you did repeatedly and always without the least argument, only based on your sovereign perception which is most likely mainly steered by what you find argumented by me on talk pages: I do not hide my personal or others' recognized points of view there, because there they serve to attain proper NPOV articles.

And no, I will certainly not "compromise on POV". The ridiculous hypersensitivity of Vb that is blindly followed by you, and that ousts everything that does not sound unjustly flattering for French-speakers, though coming from notable Walloon sources of which the pro French-speakers bias has even been criticized by another professor, is not acceptable. There mustnot be any censorship for purely POV reasons, and most certainly not by leaving out what you do not like in the exact translation of the Walloon professor's own words in a final report. I accept only an NPOV article. The tagging of such as disputed by an individual should indeed neither be judged by the people concerned with FA status, nor cause a FAR, and certainly mustnot prevent them from judging the article on its own merits. I saw numerous edits by many contributors, often for minor improvements, but none apart from you found it necessary to 'improve' towards the only by Vb supported text parts for which Vb claims my phrasing to be POV. In particular with such tagging, would that be likely if the article deserved that tag? Doesn't any French-speaking Belgian contributor ever read this main article on Belgium, then?

To set things in a proper perspective: Do you think it to be flattering for the Flemish when they read that the Belgae were "mostly Celtic tribes" (without further context usually interpreted as Gallic, read: they were forefathers of the French-speakers in Belgium)? In his famous report on the Wars in Gaul, 'De Bello Gallico', Gaius Julius Caesar himself had stated the Belgae to speak a German(ic) language. Do you think it feels nice for the Flemish to learn that the famous Flemish painting gradually declined shortly after it became distincted from the Dutch painting? The first is a disputed matter, but sources do happen to allow the 'mostly Celtic' phrasing, and the second was indeed the case, though the fact of being distincted from Dutch painting probably had nothing to do with its decline during the 2nd half of the 17th century and later on — should we then refer once again to this "theatre of most Franco-Spanish and Franco-Austrian wars during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries"? Could both uncomfortable phrases be mentioned in a less, as you or Vb would call it, "POV" way? Well, I tried (and certainly did rephrase your emphasis on that POV about Celtic), but as the current phrases are not obviously intended and probably by most readers not interpreted as biased, one should not go at too great lenghts and into dull details only for an arguable and minute improvement on NPOV. And most certainly not by wiping the phrases out of the article because they just might 'hurt my feelings'.

— SomeHuman 08 Jul 2007 20:51-21:11 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman,

Your argumentations may be long but it is nevertheless false. Your translation of French is utterly POV. Please put this in an NPOV language and you get it. This is not that difficult. I did it several time in the past. Being reverted all the time and simultaneously insulted as a troll. You are not funny anymore. Vb 12:20, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

The only false thing here is you, Vb: for you my argumentations are false, of course, only because these do not confirm your obstinate and extreme POV. You cannot show anything in my argumentations to be false. You cannot show anything in my translations to be false either. But you keep accusing me and discrediting my work, "Dear" Vb. — SomeHuman 23 Jul 2007 21:36 (UTC)

[edit] Sic

What is [sic]? Literal quote or not, I don't think there exist things like 'redenenen' and 'het filosofie'. Talking about tampering... Wikifalcon 13:20, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

You had placed the above remark on my talk page, I moved it here because also another user had already missed on 'sic'. Please, when referring to edits on any other place than the relevant article's talk page, do mention (and preferrably link) that relevant article.
Errors that occur in a quoted original text, mustnot be "corrected", such is considered tampering with a quote. The edit history of Belgium shows that both User:Van helsing and I pointed out that '[sic]' was inserted within a literal quote (used in a reference on the section 'Religion'). In the previous sentence here, I linked the term you apparently do not know, just read the article about it. That article mentions it is usually italicized; in fact it might better state it usually to be visually rendered in a style that makes it stand out from the quoted text. I ensured such by showing it in smaller character, which is also quite common, possibly even more common than using italics, and draws less attention while appearing less confusing. In particular in html (internet pages), my preferred style is clearly superior, because it keeps standing out even if a style sheet or style markup (as often used in a WP template) would be modified afterwards (e.g. some WP templates render an entire quote automatically in italics, thus one can assume someone might modify the template 'cite news' to show quotes italicized).
Notice also it was here used in a quote (of Senator Lizin) by the newspaper Metro within a quote (of Metro) by myself (using the cite news template). That is why the [sic] had been brought outside the quote marks, indicating that not the newspaper but indeed the WP contributor had pointed out the incorrect choice of the definite article. That is very important: a '[sic]' by Metro would indicate the French-speaking senator to have made a blatant error against the Dutch language, whereas a '[sic]' by the WP contributor indicates that it is more likely for the newspaper to have made the mistake; not bringing the '[sic]' outside the quotemarks, would itself be tampering with the senator's quote. The intention of [sic] is precisely to ensure readers to realize that the error was not a mistake by the WP contributor, and mustnot be "corrected". Your correction of 'redenenen' to 'redenen' on the other hand, was fully appreciated and of course not reverted, that was a copy/paste error that did not occur in the original quote (and then of course showed no '[sic]'). — SomeHuman 22 Jul 2007 10:43 (UTC)

Allright then:-) Wikifalcon 12:44, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Languages section & POV

I preferred my version [1] of the language knowledge of the different populations in Belgium than the current one. I don't see the need to take over the tone of the report (a tone used in order to get Wallonia into action) to an encyclopedic article. The content of the study (the language knowledge) is relevant to an encyclopedia, the tone isn't. And I think I'm fairly neutral as a Fleming. I won't start an edit war, but I do hope that my version or a similar version is restored. Sijo Ripa 20:51, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

The tone of the report goes much further than what was in the article before your edit (see samples in section #Last paragraph of Language section). There can however be no tampering with the French-speaking scolars clear view about the need for bringing the urgence of the matter and the seriousness of it to the Belgian public. WP:NPOV, means a neutral point of view, it does NOT mean neutrality against all points of view. The report does not merely show the Flemish point of view but instead it shows mainly or solely the Walloon point of view of scolars advising Walloon politicians (as well as European politicians) and newpapers having made this the only WP:NOTABLE Walloon point of view (Le Soir might even be the largest Walloon newspaper as La Libre Belgique is stronger mainly in Brussels). There is absolutely no WP:NOTABLE opposing point of view: no-one denies the facts shown by the survey, no-one suggests its tone to be exaggerated, and no-one denies its relevance. WP:NPOV then dictates to express that single point of view, see WP:NPOV and WP:NOTABILITY. I'm quite sure about your good faith editing, but your text deviated from that WP:policy and WP:guideline, and it was still not enough for Vb, who within 5 minutes still censored further. Hence by now, WP policy did not leave me any other choice than to fall back to the most strict WP:ATTRIBUTION and literal unabridged quote of the report presentation precisely as it was published, with Vb's continued censoring of any economical relevance, including the Walloon economical 'Marshal Plan' that required a short clarification. And I had to translate the (formerly for many readers incomprehensible) Dutch text of the secondary scolared source (that criticizes the authors of the report for not going far enough). I had formerly stretched the bending[sic] to make it sound as mild as the notable sources could possibly allow, as far as was possible without blatantly throwing WP:NPOV overboard. It had the advantage of producing better English and higher readability, and I was satisfied with it. But that required acceptance of that text by other contributors, a consensus; with continued accusations of POV there can be no copyediting to express what sources are supposed to have published, contrarily only the attributed published text can suffice because WP:NPOV is not susceptible to consensus. — SomeHuman 23 Jul 2007 22:21–24:00 (UTC)

I had earlier been considering to change "Economically important in an increasingly globalizing epoch" into "Economically significant for the future", but the Ginsburgh–Weber report makes no less than four separate references to Jacques Maurais, ed., Languages in a Globalising World, Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, in particular to contributions by Fodor, Ferenc and Sandriner Peluau (2003), by Laponce, Jean (2003), by Maurais, Jacques himself (2003), and by Truchot, Claude (2003). And the Ginsburgh–Weber report chapter 2 "Et le futur ?" ("And the future ?") ends with "La Wallonie est par conséquent en défaut sur deux points. Les Wallons n’apprennent pas la langue de la majorité des belges, et ils n’apprennent pas non plus l’anglais, qui pour de bonnes ou de moins bonnes raisons, est devenue la première langue internationale." ("Consequently, Wallonia is in error on two points. The Walloons do not learn the language of the majority of the Belgians, and neither do they learn English, which for good or less good reasons, has become the first international language.") With that "for good or less good reasons" one can hardly assume the report to be quite neutral but one must spot an inclination towards a pro-French-speaking point of view, apart from what has been criticized by the Schoors reference. I had already presented other samples from the report, of the noted increasing globalization. By the way, Sijo Ripa, in case you belong to the 59% that also speaks French, please read under "Et le futur ?" the entire paragraph that ends with "Mais il y a plus inquiétant si l’on examine la dynamique dans deux des trois cas où des données sont disponibles : l’utilisation de l’anglais augmente sensiblement, et celle du français se réduit." — SomeHuman 24 Jul 2007 01:28 (UTC)

Well Sijo Ripa. I completely agree with what you wrote about the distinction between tone and content. Everybody agree with the fact that Walloons speak less (and much less as proven by the numbers issued from the article) foreign languages than the Flemings. Everybody also agree that this is worth being mentioned here. However I UTTERLY disagree with how these facts are presented. First point: this is very uncommon to cite one work by the university where it has been published and not by the authors. Then it is much more uncommon not to give the name of this university but a description of it. This is as if one would say the largest English university in place of Oxford. The only goal of writing this this way is to prove the reader that even French authorities recognize this. This is true but it makes the prose POVed. Because of this stylistic choice, the paragraph sounds like a Flemish argumentation trying to prove a case. Second, "in a globalizing epoch", sounds also like an argument to prove a case more than an information. It underlines the fact that the paragraph has been written by a Flemish authors. Please think about something: if you want to show that the Walloons are idiot. Make it in a NPOV way: it is much more credible! Vb 08:17, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

To readers of the English language WP, Oxford might be slightly better known than Louvain-la-Neuve which is not even its official name, while you already on 19 June 2007 correctly pointed out that the official name could be confusing. Thus I would think you could appreciate my mentioning it by its in Belgium very wellknown abbreviation and for non-Belgian readers the correct description (which allows avoiding to mention "university" twice). Indeed it is important for readers to realize that the source is French-speaking, which makes the statements self-criticism (usually appreciated, I would assume), and which must prevent readers to assume some Flemish POV study or publication (that would hardly be acceptable in this article, note that I mention a Flemish university professor's text on the subject in a footnote but I never quoted it in the article). Presenting the source properly is not POV, on the contrary allowing readers to assume the wildest origin, that would be POV. The "globalizing" future and the effects of the knowledge of languages for the later economical situation in the regions, is what this report is about; it is what its advices to government are all about; one mustnot hide the major purpose of the report. Hiding that is POV, stating it is evident NPOV (especially as the report uses a stronger terminology like "But it is also important to remember that the international importance of French is decreasing." and "The ambulance driver is fallen asleep, and it is time he wakes up"). Please wake up, Vb, there is no Flemish POV here but only a realization by everyone that is expressed; to my POV it appears thate this realization by French-speakers came late, I hope you to be the very latest and last. I worded the globalizing future in a more matt way (which does decrease the quality of the prose, just like the full quoting already did, the version that you so heavily contested was simply better; but those versions are both NPOV.) — SomeHuman 24 Jul 2007 20:06 (UTC)

[edit] Footnotes in scrollbox

I apologize if this has already been discussed; please point me to that discussion if it already exists!

References and footnotes should not be hidden from readers like they were objects of shame or something that is "just getting in the way". They are integral to the integrity of our articles. We've already deleted a template that automatically placed references in a scrollbox primarily for the reasons I just outlined but also because of usability concerns. --ElKevbo 16:44, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

That "We" was not a very convincing majority, I had already read all the arguments. Though a scrollbox can offer several advantages, it also has disadvantages. Having a template would instigate contributors to plaster that template in many articles, while for most articles that would not be desired. It was precisely that concern of overusing that had caused a majority for deleting the template. But there was no discussion about a scrollbox being bad for all cases, and there exists no guideline against it either. In particular, no-one considered the 90 indexes towards well over a hundred footnotes in the 'Belgium' article.
The main concern, also of yourself it appears, was to leave footnotes readily readable. But in case of this article, apart from the footnotes subsection, there are two more and rather extensive subsections with interesting references: the 'General online sources', and the 'Bibliography' (and as everywhere an 'External links' section). Furthermore, there is as for many articles about a country, a quite extensive series of about ten collapsed v.b.e.-boxes. The latter must necessarily come at the end of an article (no-one would try and look underneath those for footnotes or anything).
I think 'Belgium' might be the only article of which the footnotes alone take more kilobytes than the entire article and other references together. These footnotes serve mainly and for most of them solely for the purpose of verifiability. In any case, and possibly unlike what the propagators of the template had in mind, I had enlarged the scrollbox to a height that allows easy reading (about as high as the entire references section of most articles): even the most complex footnotes with the longest quotes could be read entirely without scrolling. One has to scroll without the scrollbox as well: no screen is high enough for the enormous quantity of footnotes. But it is not reasonable to require everyone to perform so tedious a scrolling just to get past the footnotes, to the references that really matter as further reading, and the other mentioned content.
In practice, one would most likely read the article till one finds an index near something of particular interest to the reader. A click jumps to the scrollbox that shows the relevant footnote (the reader never needs to scroll to it), and in nearly all cases also the footnotes thereunder (which often handle the same subtopic) are immediately visible.
Thus the advantages of the high scrollbox greatly outweigh the for this type of scrollbox minor disadvantages, in this particular article. In a perfect world, one should have a 'hide'/'show' baulk: this would allow you to expand the scrollbox to the entire list of footnotes, but I do not yet know a technique that collapses to a still far enough open scrollbox: it would collapse the entire list and just leave one title line – which is certainly unacceptable: I too like to see footnotes, but in this article the list is just far too unreasonably long and requires an unusual measure. Please note that the scrollbox has a frameborder, it is thus immediately apparent to the reader (who might not notice a scrollbar at the right while looking at the start of the footnote lines) that it is unusual and indeed a scrollbox. Every internet surfer knows how to use it and certainly those like you and me paying attention to footnotes will definitely not be deterred.
By-the-way, I personally searched and found a good deal of these many footnotes, and together with SandyGeorgia retrieved nearly all others so as to complete their information properly. If I thought the scrollbox would actually be making my very, very hard work unavailable... — SomeHuman 25 Jul 2007 18:44–19:01 (UTC)

I disagree that "every internet surfer knows how to use it" as I have encountered several users that have been very confused by nested "scroll boxes" (is there a more proper term for these objects?). This is a significant change that should be tested for its impact on usability. Our own experiences and opinions are insufficient to gauge its impact or lack thereof on usability. --ElKevbo 20:13, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

The many commercial sites that use frames with a scrolling frame (or even separately scrolling ones left and right) in a scrollable page should be convincing enough: they would not like to jeopardize their venues for the sake of layout alone. And there can hardly be a better suited article to 'test' whether Wikipedia readers are a match to the surfers in general. The extremely long list is otherwise at least as confusing, and one has to scroll the (entire) page so severely that one easily overshoots and not even notices the other references subsections. Whether we would test that or the scrollbox with a life public, makes little difference. But in case the scrollbox works out, that result offers an advantage. I placed a note at top of the scrollbox; if that does not yet suffice to let people perform the easy trick, we should have to worry more about our readers than about our editors. So far, I bet on the readers.
In fact, your terminology is inaccurate: there are no nested scrollboxes here: there is just one simple scrollbox, and 'scrollbox' is the name for it. The scrollbar to the most far right simply scrolls the page like every long page on the internet. Confusing situations occur mainly with scrollboxes or scrollable frames within (other) scrollable frames in a (sometimes also scrollable) page's frameset (in other words, with scrollable frames in nested framesets). — SomeHuman 25 Jul 2007 23:32–23:44 (UTC)

You haven't addressed the issue at all. This is confusing and completely unnecessary. I'm not quite sure how one could argue with that. Placing multiple vertical (or horizontal) scrollbars in an article, nested inside one another, is terribly confusing for some people and a real usability problem. It doesn't matter whether they're nested scrollboxes or simply one scrollbox in a page long enough to have its own scrollbar. --ElKevbo 00:00, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Of course I addressed the issue. The fact that a scrollbox is a common term, means that it is being used often. Your claim to be worried that people might not know how to use a simple scrollbox, in this case the most simple type that exists, is a claim of WP readers to be complete imbeciles. I refuse to assume such. In particular, the very small minority of people who might have any problem at all with a simple scrollbox, are not very likely to read an article in an encyclopaedia. And the most highly exceptional reader who might, will certainly not be the same reader that would be interested in ploughing through over a hundred footnotes for close inspection; it was the latter reader in whose interest one had decided not to have a template for scrolling footnotes. This is not a suggestion to use a scrollbox in general, but contrarily to use it in this extremely exceptional case because it makes so much sense in these exceptional circumstances. — SomeHuman 26 Jul 2007 05:05 (UTC)

While I'm sure you had the best intentions when you increased the height of the scroll box, it highlights yet another usability problem with it. Specifying the height of the scroll box in pixels prevents users from resizing the page and text as they please. In fact, if the main window is not as tall as the scroll box height you specified, the scroll box itself becomes nearly impossible to use. — The Storm Surfer 01:18, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm quite familiar with that problem. That is why the scrollbox was sized to allow the title 'Footnotes' + the entire scrollbox + the following title 'General online sources' to be seen on most screen, and after a little tweak still the entire scrollbox on the smallest screen WP addresses (800x600 pixels), even in a browser with several lines of controls (I now allowed for one extra line of controls, just to be sure it works for everyone). The problem of difficult scrolling because the scrollbox is not completely visible on the available screen, should thus not occur (of course, one has to position the scrollbox first but that is obvious enough: intuitively one does not put half a scrollbox in view with the intend to start scrolling it). This brings us to the value in px (pixel) units: One could replace it with the font-size related em units, but that would cause the height of the scrollbox to increase with a larger font. Your first concern is more important and requires a height related to the screen height, which is not as different between the screens that different users have or may set. People with a preference for larger fonts will simply see a smaller part of the footnotes in one glimse; but as the scrollbox is set near the maximum height that all screens allow, this will still suffice. These same readers also see less of any ordinary page, in fact they will still see almost as much of the footnotes in the scrollbox than they could see of the footnotes if they were not in a scrollbox. — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 01:41 (UTC)

There is another problem that you do not seem to recognize: the extreme length of the footnotes in combination with an already lengthy article, causes the normal page scrollbar to be abnormally sensitive: it is almost impossible to bring any section of the article in proper view because a minor move of the scrollbar causes a too large sweep of the article. That is a problem for all users.
Putting the footnotes in a scrollbox decreases that problem to half, which is more in line with what users know from other (lengthy) articles. In the only case that the scrollbox could not be shown entirely on a screen, that is when a user deliberately resizes his browser window to less than screen height, the problem without scrollbox would be even more intense, and at least as problematic as the one you worry about on such screen with a scrollbox. — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 01:55 (UTC)

Could you please link me to the Wikipedia policy you alude to that requires users to have a certain minimum screen size?

The abnormally sensitive scroll bar you mention is certainly an inconvenience, but it doesn't outweigh the other more pressing technical problems (printing in particular). Actually, it's not a problem for me personally because I use a scroll wheel, which you may be interested to know wigs out when dealing with two scroll bars. — The Storm Surfer 02:09, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

We were editing here at the same time; In my above comment I just inserted the minimal screen WP caters for, and tweaked the scrollbox more precisely for it under the worst of conditions. Depending on the printing software, under the very worst circumstances one can still select the footnotes and print the selected text separately. Thus printing the footnotes is always possible, but I do not think facilitating printing should be the major concern: such lengthy article requires 11 pages without the footnotes and twice as much with them (even with the footnotes in the small font size they require 5 pages more); few people will like to print such quantities rather than send a link to someone, and even those who insist on wasting some paper will be all too happy that the content of the article can be printed in merely 11 pages without footnotes. — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 02:42 (UTC)

I'd appreciate it in the future if you'd not modify your comments after I have responded to them. (Or at least use strike-through text). Having an actual size specified is nice, but I still don't know where you're getting that number. And I do not consider printing the footnotes separately to be acceptable. — The Storm Surfer 03:15, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

As I had mentioned, I had saved the text before I realized that you had so aptly responded. Your eagerness does not allow me to find guidelines that you request before you already obliterate the scrollbox; it appears indeed 800x600. Anyway: do you know someone surfing on a less than 800x600px screen with a browser that can take as many control lines as IE7? Older browsers do not have that many control lines and that compensates for the few pixels less in screen height (as far as such screens might still occur). Some concerns have been brought up elsewhere, for instance in three FA reviews. One person on Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of polio survivors mentioned it and that same person removed the scrollbox without support by others and without discussion on the talk page either. It was removed from Bengali Language Movement but that article had a very short list of footnotes for which I would not at all recommend using a scrollbox either. Also Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Russia/archive2 mentioned the concern, but the scrollbox in Russia is still there because no other FA reviewer did appear to mind (though the article was not promoted for other reasons). Your opinion on printing may not be the community's, after all few people would want to print the footnotes and the possibility still remains. Please do not anxiously get the scrollbox out of sight: the article Belgium has a longer series of footnotes than any of the forementioned articles (even with more indexes, the polio article has much shorter footnotes), and people cannot judge the pros and cons if the scrollbox is not there. Better wait for more reactions, those can come only if the scrollbox exists. If there is a genuine problem, it will appear within a few days or a week (and allows someone perhaps showing a nicer solution for printing). — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 03:43–04:14 (UTC)

Of course it would still be even better in case one could more easily print the entire content of the scrollbox. I do know that modifying style="height:338px;..." into style="Xeight:338px;..." would cause the scrollbox to take all the room it requires for the footnotes. The solution should thus need to modify only one character depending of the page being shown in normal mode or (by the toolbox left of the article) in "Printable version". Suggestions ? — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 05:14 (UTC)

Well, I don't know what a control line is in this context, but the Apple iPhone apparently has a screen that is 320x480. And I have no way of knowing what the proverbial starving kids in Africa are using these days. — The Storm Surfer 07:57, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Probably not an Apple iPhone, and those who are starving wouldn't have the electricity for an old PC, nor batteries for their multimedia cell phones with screens that are not suitable for WP regardless the scrollbox. WP sets the low end limit at 600 pixels high screens. I don't know the interface of all those small screen devices, but there should always be a menu system that allows the browser view window using the entire screen, hence allowing also the current scrollbox at 338 pixels on the iPhone.
I referred to what I had earlier called "one extra line of controls", a series of buttons, search bars, etc that a browser usually shows at top of its view window, apart from a status bar at the bottom. Microsoft Internet Explorer traditionally has quite a few series one above another, and in the recent version 7 there came one more (mainly for its tabs to multiple urls in one browser). Even with 600 pixels height, this allows only a relatively low page view window, thus their users will usually eliminate some of the controls anyway – which makes the current scrollbox height even easier accessible.
I appreciate your not immediately reverting, I hope someone can thus come up with a solution for the printing problem. I do not see the somewhat more tedious work to print the footnotes as a major issue, because few people will actually want to print those (only in a few articles, mind you: I do not want to see scrollboxes appear in a considerable number of articles either). But I will further look into that print issue myself anyway. Meanwhile readers do have an opportunity to react, hopefully with a print solution and otherwise with arguments that can finally tilt a decision either way. Kind regards. — SomeHuman 27 Jul 2007 10:32–11:01 (UTC)

I still believe the scroll box should be removed until the problems can be fixed, not left until someone convinces you it should be removed. — The Storm Surfer 21:46, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I completely agree. You were bold in making the change. It has been reverted. And now we discuss. Please don't start a one-man edit war. --ElKevbo 22:33, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

ElKevbo, there is absolutely no reason to assume one must have consensus before a change. In this case most certainly not: removing the scrollbox prevents consensus to appear, which makes such removal on the contrary censorship. It is not because there are two people contesting the scrollbox and only my arguments here, that there would even be a majority: another contributor had created the scrollbox in the first place. The discussion has been made, "now we discuss" without any new argument and without undermining my arguments, shows that indeed censorship is being enforced and not an effort made to reveal a consensus. We need others to tilt a decision, as I suggested earlier, the scrollbox should be in for about a week to allow others to appear. — SomeHuman 28 Jul 2007 00:09 (UTC)

Storm Surfer, there are no problems by having a scrollbox: there is only one minor problem (printing the footnotes) which is a very rare need and which can be done, only with a little more effort than without a scrollbox. Without the scrollbox there three problems:
1) for the entire page, difficult positioning of a particular part of the content by scrolling because of the unusual disproportion between the moving of the scroll glider and that of the article content;
2) requiring to attentively scrol past an unexpectedly lengthy portion of footnotes in which most readers are not interested (apart from jumping to them from an index, which works fine with the scrollbox);
3) the danger of overshooting (as a consequence of the first two problems) and not even spotting the subsections that immediately follow the footnotes subsection, while precisely those are the ones intended for further reading.
Those problems occur for nearly every reader, while the one printing problem may not even become a reality for a single person: the chances of anyone actually wanting to have a print-out of this article with all footnotes, are pritty dim - and even then, it can be done. — SomeHuman 28 Jul 2007 00:23 (UTC)

Maintaining the stability of a featured article in the face of a lack of consensus to make such a significant change is in no way censorship. You're free to make a major change in a sandbox and point others to it to discuss and evaluate it. You're not welcome to continue to make disruptive changes and accuse other editors of censorship. --ElKevbo 01:10, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

You were not here to maintain that stability before. I am free to make the proper change, your accusation of it being disruptive is counter-argumented here above. I would not need to "continue" to make the same change over and over again, if you would not continue to revert it each time. Your telling me not to be welcome to make that one change, while you revert it, is WP:CENSORship (though obviously in this context not of content) and WP:OWNership, in particular by not allowing us to look at it in a week (as I explicitly asked) or two (as WP:OWN suggests). And your setting boundaries unsupported by WP guidelines to what I am allowed and under which circumstances, although I argumented my case here extensively, violates the WP:CONSENSUS#Note on use of discussion page policy (not a mere guideline, mind you).
There is absolutely no urgency in removing the scrollbox, as a severe hinder can definitely not be caused by it. There is no guideline whatsoever that states one should use a sandbox as a demonstration room before making the change to an article, featured or not. Sandboxes are for testing, and there is no need for that: it works precisely as expected (especially after my tweaking of the original scrollbox that had been properly introduced by User:Vb and of the template:Cite web that had initially caused a severe readability problem, wich is fully resolved). — SomeHuman 28 Jul 2007 02:42–03:06 (UTC)

Adding a scroll box to the reference section breaks formatting, inhibits printing, and prevents users of screen readers from "viewing" an articles references. Scroll boxes are not to be used in references, and this has been made quite clear in the above discussion. I am removing the scroll box. Do not re-add the formatting; it is disruptive. - auburnpilot talk 14:48, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

It shouldn't affect screeen readers (negatively) as it's just CSS formatting. But I obviously agree with your other arguments and your main point. --ElKevbo 14:53, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

But of course the question (that relates to screen readers) is whether or not it actually does effect them. I don't have any evidence either way, personally, but clearly if it has a negative effect on them that's a very strong argument against its use. — The Storm Surfer 14:58, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

The issue of screen readers was brought up in the deletion discussion on the talk page for the template that added a scrollbox. Of course that discussion is now deleted, but I'll go take a look and see if there was any real proof regarding the screen readers. - auburnpilot talk 15:02, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I asked the deleting admin RyanGerbil10 about undeleting that talk page on his talk page since it was referenced in the deletion discussion, but he has yet to respond. Perhaps you could undelete it yourself for the rest of us if you think that would be appropriate. As an aside, the three of you might have constructive comments to contribute to the Template:Scroll box TfD. — The Storm Surfer 15:13, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I just read through it, and the screen readers issue was only brought up briefly (one comment I believe). The issue was dismissed with the same reasoning of ElKevbo above; it's wrapped in CSS and shouldn't be an issue. - auburnpilot talk 15:22, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Am I missing something or did AuburnPilot just undelete the template? The here above 'Template:Scroll box' link by The Storm Surfer shows a template presentation page itself with a link (to the 'June 2007 discussion' on deleting the 'Template:Scroll box') that still works, and the 'TdD' link by The Storm Surfer still shows an earlier version of that discussion (before archiving). The template presentation's bold top comment about not using the template for citations had been introduced on 2007-06-27T19:20:52 by Mrzaius. As far as I can see, the only counter-argument for a long list of footnotes, appears to be the printing issue. My earlier argumentation above ranks the practical weight of that single problem (known but not making printing entirely impossible, and footnote printing can be assumed to be very rarely required) much lower than the three practical problems that always exist without a scrollbox. This discussion is not intended to set an example for all or many articles, we would not create a template (and we might set an inline comment "<--DO NOT COPY THIS footnote's style to other articles! (See talk page)-->" in the 'Belgium' article's Footnote section. Please realize, that now already having a few more opinions here is directly related to having had the scrollbox visible in the article; we should not keep this discussion amongst ourselves, hence it would still be better to reintroduce the scrollbox for a week unless the problem is shown to be more obtrusive than can so far be assumed: the more contributors that are drawn to this discussion, the higher the chance of finding a solution for the only problem we have. — SomeHuman 28 Jul 2007 16:19 (UTC)

You are missing something. {{scroll box}} was never deleted. {{Scroll ref}}, which did the exact thing you are trying to do here, was deleted because of all the reasons we've listed above and more. Please do not reintroduce the template, as it is not appropriate, and breaks formatting. Belgium doesn't get to operate on a different set of rules. - auburnpilot talk 16:23, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

You may also be missing the fact that weighing the pros and cons of the scroll box is a somewhat subjective matter. You believe that the benefits outweigh the drawbacks. ElKevbo, AuburnPilot, and I believe the opposite. — The Storm Surfer 16:33, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Ah yes, I was confounded by the {{scroll box}} referring to the 'June 2007 discussion' which was not on deleting the 'Template:Scroll box' but instead on deleting the 'Template:Scroll ref', but that archived (Scroll ref) discussion is still or again readable as I had mentioned; you can navigate to it as I had done or click here.

• What I fail to find, is anything that makes AuburnPilot assume that I wish to introduce the template: I'm dead against creating a template because I do not want the scrollbox to appear in many articles; that was a major concern in the discussion on deleting 'Scroll ref'.
• I also fail to find AuburnPilot's "set of rules". This appears one of these cases for which Wikipedia:Ignore all rules still applies (if indeed there would be some "rules" regarding our topic): see the fifth of the WP:PILLARS.
• I wonder which and what "more" opposing arguments apply for the article Belgium with a scrollbox of height:338px defined; only the printing issues appear relevant, accessibility problems appear to have been misunderstood though if there are problems for e.g. disabled people or for specific pointing devices, these should be discovered and not just be assumed to exist: since several years, many sites have been using (often too) complex framesets and it would surprise me that solutions for as simple a thing as the suggested scrollbox would not yet be readily worked out.

This makes The Storm Surfer's comment most interesting. The subjectivity is however not some arbitrary feeling. To assess for oneself the final outcome about pros and cons, one must for each pro and for each con do two things: first determine the seriousness of a functionality problem (aka usability, con: usage impossible or how difficult, and extra time-consuming) and second determine how often the problem occurs (a theoretical assumption, or definitely for a limited number of users with specific needs or configurations, for a considerable number of users, for all readers). If specifically for the article Belgium you try to put numbers on a scale of 0 to 5 for usability and on a scale from 0 to 5 for occurance, for each different pro and each different con argument, what balancing (indeed subjective but for most people within practical limits) can then make anyone arrive at rejecting this scrollbox ? I have the impression one has been building solely on arguments that may have been relevant for the template but not for an exceptional usage of a discrete solution in just the very few articles that without a scrollbox suffer the specific problems by extremely lengthy footnotes (List of polio survivors, Belgium, United States, and possibly Russia, American Civil War, and perhaps the extremely long list of footnotes under which does not appear so much however, in List of Chicago Landmarks).

I also do not see anyone presenting a compelling reason to immediately kill the scrollbox on this article: its existence is the thing that brought people here and that opportunity is still valid, to discover possible problems regarding accessibility and also to possibly overcome the print problem (either by allowing all footnotes to be printed regardless of the scrollbox, or by having a scrollbox that can jump from/to its 338px to the full height taken by all the footnotes). — SomeHuman 28 Jul 2007 20:00 (UTC)

You lack consensus to make this change to a featured article and that is a compelling reason to not make the change until you can gain consensus. We've presented non-trivial concerns, concerns for which the template that provided the functionality you are attempting to introduce into this article was deleted. "Others do something vaguely similar" is not an argument for doing it here.

Once again: discussion is fine and you were bold in making the initial change. It's been reverted and now we discuss the issue. Your stubborn refusal to follow the collaborative editing process successfully used throughout Wikipedia is disruptive, harmful to the editing process, and unacceptable. Please cease edit warring and continue discussion. You're welcome to file an RFC if you want to attempt to draw in other experienced editors. --ElKevbo 00:37, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

You lack assumption of good faith and accuse me falsely by 1) stating I refuse to follow the collaborative editing process successfully used throughout Wikipedia; 2) calling that assumed refusal stubborn. 3) calling my edits disruptive, harmful to the editing process, and unacceptable 4) stating that I was edit warring, which is what you had started. If you paid attention to the discussion instead of shutting me up, you should have realized that someone else had introduced the scrollbox (to which I had only made a minor adjustment) that you reverted. In other words, I was reverting your reverts that occurred before any other party had supported you, and when the two-in-favor/two-against situation had been shown, there was no reason to give in to you because there were no convincing arguments for such. I did not introduce the scrollbox again once there appeared more contributors here.
Once again, you claim "discussion is fine" and "now we discuss the issue", but by your tone apparently indicating you are aggrevated by my having further discussed the issue itself, and you repeat your arguments to be non-trivial - as if my arguments are.
I already had explained that FA status does not lend a special protection, and demonstrated it by showing that earlier FA reviews had noticed the use of a scrollbox (and then by a template) with inconsistent reactions but never paying much attention to it, and certainly not gathering the least consensus, about such scrollbox template being a hazard to FA status. That is nothing like the words you put into my mouth "Others do something vaguely similar", but in fact does reduce your compelling reason to no reason at all. I asked for a compelling reason based on a serious usability hazard; whether you and others may find the balance of arguments going another way than I see it, does not make these reasons compelling. Such should be demonstrated and not merely claimed. Hence my former comment that showed only printing issues to remain and printing not to be prohibited.
And an RFC is likely to do what most RFCs do: with a majority of three against (in this discussion only) one and a total lack of technical knowledge by the commentor as usual, and probably not spending the time to read all the arguments let alone evaluate these, I trust you to know the outcome as well as I do. Your tone and recommendation thus appear to say: the scrollbox is reverted and that's it, forget about it. What I try to do is finding technical solutions to overcome the objections against the footnotes scrollbox, because the latter offers a solution to several entirely unresolved problems in the few articles with an extremely lengthy footnotes (sub)section. Such technical solution is not likely to fall from the sky; having the scrollbox draws some attention here to the issue. — SomeHuman 29 Jul 2007 01:55 (UTC)

[edit] Automated Review

The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

• If there is not a free use image in the top right corner of the article, please try to find and include one.^[?]
• Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), there should be a non-breaking space -   between a number and the unit of measurement. For example, instead of 10 millimetres, use 10 millimetres, which when you are editing the page, should look like: 10&nbsp;millimetres.^[?]
• Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), when doing conversions, please use standard abbreviations: for example, miles -> mi, kilometers squared -> km², and pounds -> lb.^[?]
• There are a few occurrences of weasel words in this article- please observe WP:AWT. Certain phrases should specify exactly who supports, considers, believes, etc., such a view.
  • is considered
  • might be weasel words, and should be provided with proper citations (if they already do, or are not weasel terms, please strike this comment).^[?]
• Please make the spelling of English words consistent with either American or British spelling, depending upon the subject of the article. Examples include: meter (A) (British: metre), metre (B) (American: meter), defence (B) (American: defense), organize (A) (British: organise), recognize (A) (British: recognise), ization (A) (British: isation), isation (B) (American: ization), grey (B) (American: gray), mold (A) (British: mould).
• Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.^[?]

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Davnel03 21:15, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

This automated report might cause more problems than it solves, unless verified by someone who is familiar with its quirks before putting the report in a talk page:

• The first [?] leads to "There should be an image to the right side of the lead (usually, it should be located in the first couple of lines or in an infobox/other template)." but it also says the script cannot recognize an image unless it is specified as "image:". In an infobox (or other template, I assume) it is almost never specified like that. Thus in this case the flag and coat of arms were not detected. In particular in templates, the script should look into values (behind "=" in the first six or so parameters) for ".png", ".svg" etc and shut up if such is there.
• Inconsistent British or American English: This message would only be helpful if the script would count typical BA and typical AE occurances, and when there is a considerable difference (e.g. >3:2 ratio) assume the smallest number as suspected mistakes and point them out. It appears that someone already changed 'kilometre' to 'kilometer' shortly after the report appeared here, although the article is (assumed to be) written in British English. If there is an oversight, we would like to know where.
• Also the reports of missing &nbsp; and of non-standard abbreviations, lack that pointing out and are too vague to assume where it could be. The script has already (assumedly) found them, it should make that information available by (to keep it simple) e.g. reporting the line number(s).
  Now I don't know whether there is a bug, oversight or shortcoming in the script (like the image thing), that for instance reports an error when it sees '10 square miles' (which does not need &nbsp;) or might not recognize some correct abbreviation; we could be looking for hours and even if we find and repair something, we would still not know whether we caught all errors that the script had caught.
• This must be intended sarcasm: "There are a few occurrences of weasel words in this article- please observe WP:AWT. Certain phrases should specify exactly who supports, considers, believes, etc., such a view." Certain phrases is the summum violation of WP:AWT and in this case, there is certainly no indication, let alone exact ones, which phrases are meant. Again: where?
• I'm not sure whether Marskell, who recently copyedited towards FA status and just claimed the article still to be broadly within FA criteria, can fully appreciate the last marked item of the semi-automated report.

— SomeHuman 30 Jul 2007 21:37–22:27 (UTC) — P.S. : I dropped a note on Davnel03's talk page. SH

To answer some of your questions:

• The non-breaking spaces in this case should be before … (like this …)
• "Eddy Merckx is considered one of the greatest cyclists ever," requires a citation or specification of who considers him one of the greatest cyclists ever.
• The automated review always says "Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting" regardless of the quality of the text. It is automatically added. DrKiernan 08:08, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] National motto

The infobox presently lists the motto thusly:

Eendracht maakt macht (Dutch)
L'union fait la force (French)
Einigkeit macht stark (German)
"Strength through Unity"

Is "Strength through Unity" the way the Belgian government translates it into English? I ask because while it's semantically correct, it's not the closest translation of the Dutch/French/German versions. Funnyhat 05:45, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

See also Talk:Belgium/Archive1#Motto. The problem is that Belgium does not have an official English-language version (one may find different translations into English). In the three official languages, the meaning is three times a different one: In Dutch it says approximately The stickingworking together makes strength or power (macht denotes strength, especially in Flemish usage: "Hij heeft veel macht" can mean "He has a lot of strenght, the physical power to lift a heavy object of to squeeze hard" or "He is a man with a lot of (figurative) power". As far as I can judge, the French 'la force' can have either meaning as well, but the German (and assumedly most recent translation) apparently says makes strong without any connotation of possibly enforcing power upon someone, it rather denotes the capacity to resist to a force than to enforce. "Eendracht" means cooperation, the stickingworking together, in the sense of pulling at the same end of the rope. It does not mean the French or English "union", with a connotation of a (formal) joining into one body; on the contrary, the Dutch assumes several individuals, separate groups that work together but do not form a homogenous new group. The German "Einigkeit" is usually translated into English as 'unity', but one also finds 'union'; my sensitivity for this particular German term is not sufficient to judge its connotations.
Thus the closest middle-of-the-road translation that fits each of the three languages could be "Unity makes strenght". But this formulation does not quite feel like it could have been an originally English slogan. In English-language mottos one does not usually say "A makes B" but rather expresses that B (the goal) follows from A (what is required), formulated as "B through A". Just as in English one normally capitalizes both terms in a motto like this, we follow the English language style as if it were a truly English-language motto. In this we follow the three official languages making their very own statement in their very own style, without introducing any novelty and abiding what the mottos in all three official languages agree upon. I think that the inversion is also required to demonstrate this not to be a literal or strict translation; otherwise we would have too many reactions of readers stating that the English is not a proper translation of the one language a particular reader happens to understand. — SomeHuman 04 Aug 2007 23:27–23:54 (UTC)

Concerning the German word "Einigkeit" I would like to point to the text of the now German National Anthem (Einigkeit Und Recht Und Freiheit), the 4 th stanza of the Deutschlandlied, written by my "compatriot" Albert Matthai, by the way (Und im Unglück nun erst recht. Nur im Unglück kann die Liebe Zeigen ob sie stark und echt.) and probably well-known and sung in the East Cantons between 1921 and 1941 (when it dawned on the inhabitants of the area that the wonderful Germany they had known for two-three generations had been taken over by sadistic murderers) and of course the German version of The Brabançonne. Basically, "Einigkeit" is "unbreakably" connected with Recht/Gesetz (an unofficial first version of the Belgian National Anthem in German did use "Recht": [2]) und Freiheit and personalized by the King of Belgium. Einigkeit of territory and people, from generation to generation ("von Geschlechte zu Geschlecht"). I do not see the reason for a translation in English of the German motto, unless it should become "Unity has (always) made us strong". The "Flemish" or Dutch language version of the anthem also gives a clue to the meaning of "eendracht": "Bloei, o land, in eendracht niet te breken, Wees immer uzelf en ongeknecht" (Blossom, o land, unbreakable in unity, be always yourself and not enslaved). Note that it starts with a reference to the third stanza of the Deutschlandlied (Blühe im Glanze dieses Glückes, blühe, deutsches Vaterland.) and clearly contradicts the meaning given to "Eendracht" by SomeHuman. The claim is made in the anthem that the Belgians are only "themselves" in unity, a homogeneous group. SomeHuman's explanation for "eendracht" smacks of "Hineininterpretierung" - so often used in Dutch by the way and so rarely in German (just google it) that it has almost become a Pseudo-germanism (sorry guys, Mikkalai deleted the lot as unreferenced) in Dutch. --Paul Pieniezny (talk) 15:49, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

If you know German, this also gives an idea about the link between Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit. And suggests a link with the French Revolution, which I also suspect in "le Roi, la Loi, la Liberté". Funny how it diverts in 1815- 1860 and later comes back together. Yes, unity again.--Paul Pieniezny (talk) 16:36, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cutting the table for now

	Official services rendered in the language of			Areas where the institutions for 3 groups of matters exercise power
	individuals & organisations expressing themselves			the Communities			the Regions (and their provinces)			the Federal State
	in Dutch	in French	in German	Flemish	French	German- speaking	Flemish [1]	Walloon	Brussels- Capital
Dutch language area		facilities (12)	not required		-	-		-	-
French language area	facilities (4)		facilities (2)	-		-	-		-
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital			not required			-	-	-
German language area	not required	facilities (all 9)		-	-		-		-
	Within parentheses: number of municipalities with special status, i.e. required to offer facilities for speakers of the column's language. Facilities exist only in specific municipalities near the borders of the Flemish with the Walloon and with the Brussels-Capital Regions, and in Wallonia also in 2 municipalities bordering its German language area as well as for French-speakers throughout the latter area.

OK, RelHistBuff has suggested that he's upset this article was kept again at FAR (closed by Joelr31 this time). He has a point, as actionable objections were outstanding. Conversely, it's comprehensive, extensively cited, and the prose is still passable despite some blemishes. One thing is clear from the last review: no one understands the table. All of the uninvolved people who commented on it—me, Sandy, Rel, Ceoil—said it should be improved or removed. This isn't POV but a genuine inability to understand what it's saying. I've cut it on that basis, temporarily. First thing, could we break down what each of the sections is actually saying? "Official services rendered in the language of individuals & organisations expressing themselves." What does that mean? What do the numbers in brackets indicate? Step-by-step. Marskell 13:16, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

In fact perhaps it would be better to write text (i.e., some paragraphs) rather than reworking the table. A lot of the info is in the Municipalities with language facilities article so a summary would be sufficient. --RelHistBuff 19:29, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

It cannot be summarized shortly enough for the article 'Belgium', that's why the table was created in the first place. And information is now indeed more clearly available here, because I did mention not only that article 'Municipalities with language facilities' but just day-before-yesterday also 'Language legislation in Belgium' in the 'See also' at top of the section that had the table, and I had put the information that existed more completely in the 'Belgium' article into the 'Main article' at top of the section. I cannot understand why four or five people should be taken seriously while they would be claiming that they cannot imagine what e.g. "Official services rendered in the language of individuals & organisations expressing themselves in Dutch" could possibly mean, and one or two who do not understand what the numbers in "brackets" might indicate – which round things were actually parentheses, but unless the copyeditor Marskell does not know the difference between what is usually called a bracket, and a parenthesis, Marskell wants to prevent someone making sense of the table that explicitly mentions the proper word under at the table: "Within parentheses: number of municipalities with special status, i.e. required to offer facilities for speakers of the column's language." Or perhaps Marskell has never seen an index-link between square brackets to the references section, of which the table has one – while the article that Markell copyedited has over a hundred of those?
Apparently, some people have difficulties in understanding crosstabs, though their method is assumed to make slightly complex relations easily understood. In Dutch there is a saying, here freely translated: "What use do a candle and binoculars bid, if the owl does not want to see it?" Notice that an owl has formidable eyesight even in the most dim light of the stars, but shuts its eyes in daylight; hence in Dutch, calling someone an owl is calling someone stubbornly stupid or stupidly stubborn. There remains the fact that no-one during the long, very long, and multiple discussions with Vb about the table, had ever found it too difficult; only Marskell and then three people with whom Marskell is likely used to work with. And Marskell forgot to mention that the people who claimed not to understand the table, had said so before several changes to the section and to the table had been made: this even after RelHistBuf's remark of the ninth, though it did not change his mind; Ceoil "From a casual (ie 10 minute) view" (on the entire article!) ten days ago; SandyGeorgia "clean up or remove that table" two weeks ago. Hence, the table is going back in, for the happy few who might have more than ten minutes to spend and are used to crosstab tables.
This is a very simple crosstab table:

	Areas where the institutions for 3 groups of matters exercise power
	the Communities			the Regions (and their provinces)			the Federal State
	Flemish [1]	French	German- speaking	Flemish [1]	Walloon	Brussels- Capital
Dutch language area		-	-		-	-
French language area	-		-	-		-
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital			-	-	-
German language area	-	-		-		-

And this should hardly be more difficult, with the 'Main', 'See also', mentioning of four language areas:

	Official services rendered in the language of			XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
	individuals & organisations expressing themselves
	in Dutch	in French	in German
Dutch language area		facilities (12)	not required
French language area	facilities (4)		facilities (2)
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital			not required
German language area	not required	facilities (all 9)
	Within parentheses: number of municipalities with special status, i.e. required to offer facilities for speakers of the column's language. Facilities exist only in specific municipalities near the borders of the Flemish with the Walloon and with the Brussels-Capital Regions, and in Wallonia also in 2 municipalities bordering its German language area as well as for French-speakers throughout the latter area.

If you know a better way to say that the authorities are legally obliged to render all official services for the public, to the individuals and to the organisations that form the public, in the single language belonging to the language area; except in the bilingual language area where forementioned services will be rendered in either of the two languages of the bilingual area that the individual or the organisation happens to prefer or in both these languages; and except in the other language areas within one of the legally defined municipalities with special status, in which some of the authorities are required to render a limited set of services to the individual or the organisation located in that particular municipality, on his or its request, in the official Belgian language explicitly recognized for that municipality and other than that of the language area, be my guest. Does anyone still prefer a "text" above the table, here is one, and still without specifying in which areas or in how many municipalities or where the municipalities are to be situated – and I guarantee that any noticable simplification will make it a false statement. Furthermore, strictly according to the law, the table could mention "no" instead of "not required", but in practice it is not at all unthinkable (especially in Flanders) for an individual representative of an authority, to be willing to render vocal information or assistance to an individual, in the language of the individual or in a language common to these both individuals; the conversation might thus be held in French, English, German or more rarely even in Spanish, Italian, ... , hence "not required".

Apparently several other administrators did have a glance at the latest ridiculous FAR that was held purely for POV reasons, and stayed out of the discussion except for closing that FARCE. Should I remind you that the table existed when the former FAR was closed with maintained FA status without ever having mentioned the table, that the latest FAR did not even mention the table during two weeks, until Vb plastered it for the so-manieth time at yet another place, inside the FAR space. Vb's forum-shopping obviously paid off but I do not accept finally finding one bunch of just a few comrades at that space to be convincing. — SomeHuman 15 Aug 2007 03:34–04:42 (UTC)

Ah, I see you're as insufferable as ever SomeHuman. (Parentheses) may rightly be called 'round brackets' or simply 'brackets' in English; see Bracket. Let's also be clear about one thing: you are the only editor who has expressed satisfaction with the table. "Official services rendered in the language of individuals & organisations expressing themselves" is simply not good phrasing. How about simply "Official services rendered"? The extra words serve only to confuse. Why "yes" and "not required"? Doesn't "yes" and "no" make more sense? And what exactly is the difference between "yes" and "facilities"? When it says "yes" does that not mean facilities are offered? Sorry, I still don't get it. You can come up with another clever version of "it's not my problem that you're all stupid" but all that you're emphasizing to me is your own lack of good faith in dealing with other editors. Marskell 07:22, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

You're as insufferable as ever, Marskell: You pretend you cannot read a crosstab table, and you do not read a text either. Here above I have

• explicitly said why it's "yes" and "not required" instead of "yes" and "no",
• in the text in italics shown that "yes" means rendering all official services (e.g. also streetname plates) for all individuals & organisations (without considering where there domicile might be), thus for the public; whereas "facilities" does not mean "yes" as you suggest but "no"/"not required", except for those individuals and organisations that are registered in one of the very few municipalities that offer only limited services (e.g. obtaining documents) in the language from outside the language area, and such only on their request and only from the one municipality in which they are registered.

Thus it should by now have been more than clear that "Official services rendered in French" would not be the same as "Official services rendered in the language of individuals & organisations expressing themselves in French".

I had stated that you had chosen the term 'brackets' even though the table mentions 'parentheses', and as nowadays 'brackets' (on WP nearly always unambiguously named braces, parentheses, or square [often without predicate] brackets) makes readers "usually" think of 'square brackets' rather than of 'round brackets', this deliberate deviation from the already correctly presented unambiguous term is not what people do when trying to bring clarity in a hard to understand matter. It is not my nature to have a lack of good faith in people, but I'm not daft enough to forget that some, very few, editors may not be as unbiassed as they pretend. As you have at multiple occasions proven not to properly read what I, even with complete argumentations, write, and what article references tell, while you all too eagerly jumped to all of Vb's opinions that were neither argumented nor referenced but even contradictory to article references, as the forementioned Dutch saying goes, it is not so much simple stupidity but rather stubborn bias that I have become forced to assume. And it is only your unargumented support of Vb's opinion that brought only the very few of your close companions to agree with the table having been gibberish before it was improved. The less clear and equally comprehensive original table had not even been mentioned by the previous FAR during its last five weeks (from May 19 till closing)the article had been scrutinized, and you cannot pretend that one might have overlooked the table's existence: it's rather visible, don't you think. — SomeHuman 15 Aug 2007 10:34 (UTC)

Both the 'yes' and the '×' in the tables above were replaced with after next comment by RelHistBuff.

Please note that I read the article first before looking at the FAR comments. I was completely confused by the table. I only partly understood what the table was getting at only after someone put in a link to the Municipalities article during the FARC phase. I then realised what was meant by "Official services" (there isn't any definition of that which is fundamental in understanding the table). I am still not sure what "facilities" mean. From the Municipalities article it seems to be schools and official documents and communications, but there is no explanation in the main article. In each table cell, you explained the difference between "yes" and "facilities" and "not required" here in this talk page, but it is not obvious to the reader of the article. Your italicised text is, in my opinion, more understandable! Could we try a combination of explanatory text with the first table?

As for the second table, I find it is even more confusing. What does "Areas where the institutions for 3 groups of matters exercise power" mean? The rows are defined to be geographical areas and the columns are the three-tiered authorities, that I understand. But then what do the "x"s and hyphens mean in the table cells? --RelHistBuff 11:35, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Excuse me? Did you never see such? A table is not a nice looking box to write sentences and words in, you know. In cross tabulations, one usually uses either figures, e.g. 79% or 180 [matches], or simple symbols, e.g. x (applicable, exists, present, yes, available, known, full correlation, vote [see ballot]) and - (not applicable, none, absent, no, unknown, not available, no correlation); the precise term would depend on the subject but is not shown in such table because the simple symbols give a far better quick overview. It's an elementary school thing, I would think that anyone knows that, else, of course the table appears as gibberish. Anyway, I'm glad with your constructive attitude. The x crossmark is like a v checkmark, if there's a small image for such (a v with a longer right line going up), we could use that instead, and I replaced them now with the latter in the 3 tables above, if you think people are more familiar with it; an mdash '—' or ndash '–' could be used instead of the shorter dash '-' but I do not think that to be better. Each 'yes' is now for consistency replaced with the v checkmark as well, it makes much clearer that the language areas with only a few municipalities with 'facilities', are in general rather more like 'not required' than like the apparently different checkmarked ones.
"Areas where the institutions for 3 groups of matters exercise power" tries to express that the table shows that each of the theoretically seven constitutional institutions that are empowered for three groups of matters (Community matters, Regional matters and Federate matters), exercises its authority in the language area(s) that are marked in the institution's column. Nevertheless, the figure 'seven' should not be expressed because two of the seven actually merged, or more precisely the Flemish Region's powers, from the moment these came to exist, have been left to be exercised by the Flemish Community, as the constitution allows. Thus there are "only" six actual parliaments and governments. But the scheme of the table remains correct, because the single Flemish body can exercise its power for regional matters only in the Flemish Region, which coincides with the Dutch language area, while that Flemish body can exercise it power for community matters within the geographical boundaries of the Flemish Community which includes that same language area as well the language area that constitutionally gives equally full weight for the Dutch and for the French language. Specific offices of the Flemish administrations may mainly or solely handle community matters, or regional matters, or may even handle both aspects because one has to answer to the same government anyway.
I do not consider rendering the 'facilities' in text, because the matter is far too sensitive and legally strongly disputed, in the past and at present, with quite different viewpoints on either side. That forces us to give a very lengthy and impossibly accurate text unless we want disputes going on forever. The table however, does not depict anything controversial. It does have the merit of showing the existence of the facilities and the links should then do their work for the interested reader. In case the linked articles (about language legislations, municipalities with facilities) are not clear or good enough, those should be improved; but that is rather outside the frame of this talk page. Kind regards. — SomeHuman 15 Aug 2007 19:08–22:12 (UTC)

Somehuman, have you not thought that when various uninvolved editors tell you something doesn't make sense, that it probably doesn't make sense? Your response continues to be "you're stupid", which really isn't helpful. I don't get it. I never set out to antagonize you but the only attitude I've received is your impugning my good faith. This article, like all Wiki articles, should be intuitable to the casual reader. The table (along with some of the prose) clearly is not. You're explaining all of this minutiae on talk but the whole point is that the reader isn't going to be aware of the minutiae when reading. Perhaps it is better to come up with a prose paragraph explaining the table info? We'll lose detail but increase understanding.

As a last point, the term 'bracket', stated alone, refers to round brackets in colloquial English. 'Bracket' does not usually make people think of 'square brackets' but the regular round variety, according to my years of speaking the language. Sorry, just had to be pedantic on that one. I've not claimed to be William Faulkner with the prose here, or that my copyedits are perfect, but what this article desperately needs is a native speaker to regularly audit it—to be told off, wrongly, on points of orthography and grammar is a bloody annoyance. Marskell 22:43, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Dear Marskell, I had tried to replace the table with the following paragraph because. From my POV, this paragraph has exactly the same content as the table but is understandable. This paragraph has been suppressed by SomeHuman for some obscure reason.

The above mentioned linguistic regions the Regions and Communities are based on are geographical areas with a very precise linguistic status. In these regions official services are rendered in the language of individuals and organisations expressing themselves in the official language of the region. In the Dutch, French and, German regions the official language is Dutch, French, and German respectively. In the bilingual region of Brussels both French and Dutch are official languages on an equal footing. In these regions the official languages are used for contacts with public authorities, as regards administration, the law, education and labour relations in companies. However there are some exceptions: in some few municipalities bordering the linguistic regions —the so-called communes with special status or communes with linguistic facilities— the language of the neighbouring region can be used to contact local authorities.^[2]

Please tell me what you think about it. Vb 13:07, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

With the exception of some corrections needed in punctuation and grammar, the paragraph is understandable and in my opinion, preferable. Marskell, what do you think? --RelHistBuff 13:24, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry guys, but you should never believe Vb when he states my reason to be "some obscure" one. Just read my (several) arguments I gave long ago. Yes, find my arguments yourself between all the repeated discussions that Vb over and over again pops into all sections of this talk page (and elsewhere). They're not about mere punctuation; and in fact Vb is once again trying to lure you into POV French-language pushing onto the English language, while Vb does know it: he has read about that and understood it very well.
If RelHistBuff finds Vb's text with "official services are rendered in the language of individuals and organisations expressing themselves in..." clear enough, than it is just as clear in the table. Marskell or RelHistBuf, if a crosstab with v-checkmarks indicating which columnn and row get a match, is above your understanding, then there is only the Simple Wikipedia for what you want to make of this article.
I am not calling you particularly stupid, Marskell, (stupidly stubborn, perhaps), but if just a few readers cannot understand the basics of a crosstab, which is abundantly used and generally simply understood, they should not consider themselves so great geniuses that no other readers possibly could understand the table. Apparently you and RelHistBuff have a better mind for fully written text, not for schemes. For many people it is just the opposite.
Are you two still not seeing that Vb never presents arguments but only "I think this is POV" and "I think this is good". Vb never produces arguments for anything being "POV" or "good" and certainly does not support anything by references, but keeps constantly trolling and by reverts pressing that burden onto others, and then still edits texts away from what the references say. There are always going to be people that fall for the false "there are two sides, the truth will lie in the middle" and then "Oh this nice guy starts discussions with a polite 'Dear SomeHuman', he must be more right". Guys, start reading this entire talk page, carefully looking at what is actually said about the topic instead of letting yourself be influenced by style, and think about what is there. So far, one person took that trouble and then addressed me: "I understand your patience is gone now, after all those ridiculous discussion above. Respect actually for staying so calm". — SomeHuman 16 Aug 2007 18:17–18:29 (UTC)

Suggestion, following RelHistBuf's earlier advice:

For unilingual language areas, the Law determined in which municipalities a person can request a specific service belonging to a limited subset of all the official ones for the public, in the municipality having registered this inhabant to be rendered to this individual in a language of a nearby Belgian language area. For those twenty-seven^[3] municipalities with special status offering these language facilities, their numbers per relevant language area for its extraneous language(s) are in underneath table, which further shows where each constitutional institution has authority for the matters that belong to its level:

	Official services rendered in the language of			Areas where the institutions for the 3 groups of matters exercise power
	individuals expressing themselves			the Communities			the Regions (and their provinces)			the Federal State
	in Dutch	in French	in German	Flemish [1]	French	German- speaking	Flemish [1]	Walloon	Brussels- Capital
Dutch language area		in 12 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-		-	-		-	-
French language area	in 4 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')		in 2 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-		-	-		-
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital			-			-	-	-
German language area	-	in all 9 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')		-	-		-		-
	"Facilities" exist only in specific municipalities near the borders of the Flemish with the Walloon and with the Brussels-Capital Regions, and in Wallonia also in 2 municipalities bordering its German language area as well as for French-speakers throughout the latter area.

While some may find it difficult to understand the text in which every comma has meaning, they can rely on the table; and vice versa. — SomeHuman 16 Aug 2007 21:02 – 17 Aug 2007 10:35 (UTC)

Vb's paragraph is more understandable than the table above. The problem is that English syntax requires that sentences be written in the form "subject-verb-object" to be clearly understandable. That isn't true of any part of the table. Just taking the first sentence, for example: "For unilingual language areas, the Law determined in which municipalities a person can request a specific service belonging to a limited subset of all the official ones for the public, in the municipality having registered this inhabant to be rendered to this individual in the language of a nearby Belgian language area." There are half-a-dozen subjects, at least five verbs and a similar number of objects. That is why no-one understands it—it is not possible to make syntactical sense out of this arrangement of words. If you dislike Vb's paragraph so much you have to re-write the table so that the meaning is clear—for example, by sticking to simple sentences of the form "subject-verb-object", as in Vb's paragraph. DrKiernan 10:57, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm tired of explaining that one should read my criticism on Vb's text. It is simple because it gives false information and is fundamentally incomplete, and it also introduces a POV terminology. It cannot be put in this article because everything in it is already put in words in this article. I am not the one who initially suggested to try and put the correct information in text: it's too intricate and too controversial, hence only a table and a link to the article on the municipalities with language facilities should do better here.
To my text, I just added an index to a footnote reference saying "Footnote: Apart from the municipalities with language facilities for individuals, the French language area has three more municipalities in which the second language in education legally has to be either Dutch or German, whereas in municipalities without special status this would also allow for English.".— SomeHuman 17 Aug 2007 11:37 (UTC)

I did not say that Vb's paragraph was preferable or that it should be included. I said it was "more understandable" in a linguistic sense. Your version remains incomprehensible. DrKiernan 11:47, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

To reiterate, my criticism is wholly one of style, not of substance. DrKiernan 11:47, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I know; the problem is that an easily understood text is going to be far too lengthy to possibly be acceptable for this article, a shorter alternative must be a compact legalese as I suggested above. I think the modification of the table as now presented here above, mainly because of its stating the 'facilities' to be limited and to exist in the specified number of municipalities only, should be clear enough without a text. Only a line like

By Law, inhabitants of 27^[4] municipalities can ask limited services to be rendered in a neighbour language, forming 'facilities' for them.

should then come immediately underneath the boxed table at top of the line that is here above. Links will have to do the rest for interested readers. Hence, I suggest to put this in:

	Public services rendered in the language of			Areas where the institutions for the 3 groups of matters exercise power
	individuals expressing themselves…			the Communities			the Regions (and their provinces)			the Federal State
	…in Dutch	…in French	…in German	Flemish [1]	French	German- speaking	Flemish [1]	Walloon	Brussels- Capital
Dutch language area	Y	in 12 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-	Y	-	-	Y	-	-	Y
French language area	in 4 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	Y	in 2 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-	Y	-	-	Y	-	Y
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital	Y	Y	-	Y	Y	-	-	-	Y	Y
German language area	-	in all 9 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	Y	-	-	Y	-	Y	-	Y
	By Law, inhabitants of 27[4] municipalities can ask limited services to be rendered in a neighbour language, forming 'facilities' for them. 'Facilities' exist only in specific municipalities near the borders of the Flemish with the Walloon and with the Brussels-Capital Regions, and in Wallonia also in 2 municipalities bordering its German language area as well as for French-speakers throughout the latter area.

Note that the indexed references (with in article consecutive numbers matching with those hereunder) state:

[1] Footnote: The Constitution set out seven institutions each of which can have a parliament, government and administration. In fact there are only six such bodies because the Flemish Region merged into the Flemish Community. This single Flemish body thus exercises powers about Community matters in the bilingual area of Brussels-Capital and in the Dutch language area, and about Regional matters only in the latter.
[2] Footnote: Apart from the municipalities with language facilities for individuals, the French language area has three more municipalities in which the second language in education legally has to be either Dutch or German, whereas in its municipalities without special status this would also allow for English. See e.g. Lebrun, Sophie (2003-01-07). Langues à l'école: imposées ou au choix, un peu ou beaucoup (French). La Libre Belgique's web site. Retrieved on 2007-08-17..

— SomeHuman 17 Aug 2007 12:42–18:39 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman,

Please tell me why the paragraph I wrote is not NPOV. I really do my best to write a neutral understandable prose and really don't enjoy your repeated insults. I agree that my prose is not the best brilliant English but only allowing brilliant writer s to participate to WP is simply a strong biasing of WP. According to several native English speakers it also seems your English is not brilliant either. Does the Belgium article need to be written in Germish? The CRISP is a official office of the Walloon Region. If they use the word "commune" for "municipality", this is their right to do so. My Harrap's dictionary French-English provides the translation "Commune. Adm. Jur. Commune." Commune is maybe not the most common translation to the French word commune (because the French word commune is older than the French Revolution which replaced the word commune by municipalité) but commune is however a correct synonim (in particular in the Belgian context where Gemeen and Gemeinde (Dutch and German) have also the same etymology (putting something in common - was gemeinsam haben). Vb 08:51, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

(remove indent) Comments: I agree with you that CRISP is a reliable source. I disagree about the use of the word "commune" in the English portion of the text. If you look it up in the dictionary, you may find that the word in English could have the same meaning in French, but in normal usage among average readers, the first thought that would come to mind is a place where people practise socialism. I also have a suggestion. At least two English speakers have noted that Vb's paragraph is understandable (and one, i.e., me, prefers the paragraph over the table). So I suggest taking Vb's paragraph as a starting basis and the two of you work with it (and I should not need to add "in good faith"). --RelHistBuff 16:21, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I too prefer text over table in this case. It's hard to grasp a "big picture" from SomeHuman's table, there are too many cases with non-obvious relationships with each other. Such complexity comes, for instance, from the partial redundancy between the 4 rows and the 3 region columns. Also, the 4 rows represent an administratively unnatural split of Belgium (they're a mixture of regional and communitarish division) with non-official and IMO misleading denominations (why describe the Flanders region as "the dutch-speaking area" ? Isn't Dutch also spoken in Brussels ? Is French spoken nowhere in Flanders ?).

Also I wonder why such a heavy formulation as "Official services rendered in the language of individuals & organisations expressing themselves in [the other language]" is necessary. Why not "Official services provided in [the other language] on demand". Or more neutrally and concisely "Official services may be provided in [the other language]." Or see below. (Of course the fine print of facilities has to be explained somewhere, but probably not in such a short paragraph whose aim is to describe the various linguistical-regional configurations across the country.)

But I think Vb's paragraph is not precise enough. e.g. "the dutch, french and german regions" division is as misleading as SomeHuman's.

My take at it would be :

The combination of Regions and Community makes for some complexity; with respect to administrative language use, the country gets divided as follows:

• in the Flanders region, Dutch is the unique official language; in a few municipalities next to Brussels or Wallonia, French language facilities apply.
• in the Brussels capital region, French and Dutch are the two official languages on equal footing;
• in the Walloon Region, not counting the German-speaking territory, French is the official language; in a few municipalities next to Flanders, Dutch language facilities apply; in two municipalities next to the German-speaking territory, German facilities apply;
• the German-speaking territory belongs to the Walloon region. German is here the primary language, and French facilities apply everywhere.

This division is exactly SomeHuman's, but with hopefully clear and less misleading denominations.

This proposal is partly redundant with previous paragraphs of the article and I don't claim my statements to be fully accurate (nor perfect english), they need to be reviewed. And another short paragraph should expand a bit on what facilities are. -- --FvdP 18:40, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

P.S. one should probably add that outside the "facilities" areas, the administration is monolingual (bilingual in Brussels). --FvdP 18:48, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Vb's text is nonsense. That makes its "understandability" utterly irrelevant. If it were merely a matter of some poor English or a minor inaccuracy, I gladly would have helped out.
"The above mentioned linguistic regions the Regions and Communities are based on are geographical areas with a very precise linguistic status."
Of course, invariably we see the French language being pushed in where English belongs: There are far more native speakers of English capable of reading French than of understanding Dutch, whether actually translating or only using sources on this topic; the texts in French are also more abundant. Thus one can expect a certain influence from French appearing in English texts. And yet, 75% of English texts use "language areas" rather than "linguistic regions", simply because the first is English: The Belgian constitution is not particularly interested in studying the intricacies of the languages themselves, as 'linguistic' tends to suggest. More importantly, the correct "language areas" cannot be confounded with the Flemish or the Walloon Regions, which awfully sound like linguistic regions to most people. That has been pointed out to Vb numerous times but Vb can be very insisting in pushing POV.
"The above mentioned linguistic regions the Regions and Communities are based on" (apart from a strictly correct but hardly understandable phrasing without a "that" between 'regions' and 'the Regions') 1) refers to the text not far above, and 2) repeats that text as well, without adding anything new yet.
So, "linguistic regions" aka "language areas" are "geographical areas", we learn, and they have a "linguistic status". How informative, who would have guessed? But there is even more information here: the "linguistic" aka "language" areas have a "very precise linguistic status". Indeed, each area has one official standard language, or two. Really unique in the world, that is. And the fact of a linguistic/language thing having a linguistic status, how revealing. We surely must mention that (over and over again) in the article. Thus we have "language areas with a very precise linguistic status", which is then certainly not the case for the "municipalities with special status" as the municipalities with language facilities are officially called. Someone is trying to confuse readers here, guys. And that is what the table does not permit, hence some readers might understand instead of just having the feeling that they were able to read something. I here described only the opening sentence of Vb's understandable text, for a featured article.
Whether everyone understands the table or not, its current version is more informative and less confusing than earlier versions that had troubled people, it is quite accurate, (I'll show such regarding FvdP's comment this evening), it does not bring any kind of NPOV, and does not contain bad English. Vb's idea that we all must accept CRISP to be the leading authority on the English language, while continuing to revert an understandable, accurate and appropriate phrase on the "common heritage" retained at the federal level as if the source, the federal government, would be POV (and more than so than CRISP) while several contributors stated that there is nothing wrong with that sentence, only shows how strongly Vb wants to force POV into the article; his words on a talk page may appear constructive, his actions on the article often tell another story. I would appreciate if people here would finally understand that some people are good at reading texts but less able to understand schemes, while others easily understand tables but have problems in understanding complex matters from mere sentences. The article should not be specifically aiming at only one part of the public. — SomeHuman 21 Aug 2007 05:33 (UTC)

Undoubtedly, my native language may have an influence, occasionally, on my English. Grammatically, it simply happens to be closer to English than French is, as both are Germanic languages. Nevertheless, no other language of this group, arguably not even the Brussels dialect, has such a large number of loan-words from French. If I hated French as Vb seems to think, I'd be writing mainly on the Dutch-language Wikipedia. But Vb's usage of the term "Germish" does need an example, and more than just one, considering the number of my contributions. Vb never stops his attempts to put "Franglais" in, even after having been asked repeatedly, e.g. for 'linguistic regions'. If I would not have to return here all the time to the often stupid and generally futile discussions (I'm not referring to FvdP who just arrived on this talk page, but to months of the same things being senselessly repeated and wild accusations of POV by the only two people who have shown to express such in the article), I could much more usefully help out by finding and translating sources or improving articles.
— SomeHuman 21 Aug 2007 05:33 (UTC)

Whereas I had decided earlier not to go into DrKiernan's comment on my grammar because it hardly helps the article, and only replied accordingly, Vb's sneer on my English forces me to show DrKiernan to have made three mistakes, or at least to have suggested these to have been made by him. I'm not going into all details, I'll just give a few hints: English syntax does not require the form "subject-verb-object", but only that order; in front, in between, or behind there can be other elements (in this case several of the type <location/limitation> and one of the type <manner>). Furthermore, the subject may include an entire subsentence, as may the object, even both can have one each. It generally makes reading tougher, and hardly suitable for the article, as I agreed with, but it is still correct English syntax, and typical for what I called legalese because it allows an unusual unambiguous accuracy. DrKiernan claimed that such a "subject-verb-object" "isn't true of any part of the table" (he meant the text just above the actual table). It is in fact true for all sentences/subsentences, though for both deepest subsentences (if one can call a phrase with a verb that is not quite conjugated, a sentence) the subject and verb are rather implied or indicated, correctly though. For instance, within the extremely long object of the main sentence, there is a subsentence of which the object is nearly just as long; the latter object has a subsentence with as subject "a specific service belonging to a limited subset of all the official ones for the public", followed with the <location/limitation> clause "in the municipality having registered this inhabant". Both last quotations consist of an implied sentence: "a specific service that belongs to (a subset)" (the latter is the only object with a dative function, btw), and "the municipality that has registered this inhabitant. I am not familiar with all English terms about grammar, thus implied might conventionally be expressed quite differently, but I think I can analyse a sentence, or create one properly. I appreciate a native speaker's criticism on my contributions mainly for my sometimes inadequate sense about using a gerund or an infinitive, and for a possibly incorrectly chosen preposition, not to mention typos or mistakes being caused by rephrasing without noticing all grammatical consequences. Oh, did anyone notice my tendency to write lengthier-than-average sentences? I'm a bit old-fashioned about that, because it gives better control on precision, accuracy, and on showing proper relations, compared to modernistic keep your sentences as short as possible of which I particularly like the last two words. Perhaps I'm mistaken, and then we'll soon hear of a Thai-language work of literature causing its author to win a Nobel Prize.
— SomeHuman 21 Aug 2007 05:33 (UTC)

We believe in your English ability. However, you seem to be unable to discern that despite the ability, the table is insufficient for the comprehension of the average reader. At least three anglophones and two francophones have mentioned this in this subsection of the talk page (I won't mention how many more anglophones have also commented on this in the previous FAR). So I suggest Vb, SomeHuman, and FdvP work on a paragraph. The anglophones here can assist in correcting punctuation and grammar. Consensus is a policy on wikipedia. --RelHistBuff 06:02, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I can tell you how many made a comment on the table at the second featured article review that closed on 2007-08-10:

• "Please clean up or remove that table; it is gibberish and unintelligible to someone not familiar with Belgium". SandyGeorgia 2007-08-02
• "I would not have a substantive objection to make about its current form, its good, though I did not try and understand the table discussed above." Ceoil 2007-08-06

The only others that made a comment on the table are the same as here: Vb and Marskell of course, and on 2007-08-09 RelHistBuff. And on this entire talk page only two others (I'll come to FvdP later on) while the table was still in a much poorer state:

• "Also I think the table is too complicated indeed, it could be used in a more specified article, but a simple explanation should satisfy here." Dionysos1 2007-06-05
• "The in-depth explanation then goes to a special article. For instance, the above table belongs in the article Communities, regions and linguistic regions of Belgium and not in the article Belgium." JoJan 2007-06-05

There has been no comment on the understandability of the table by one who clearly had a look; his remark cannot be rendered without object because 'facilities' is also in English the term for this (in a table or in text):

• "Given that "facilities" in English is widely used to refer to "Toilets" it's actually rather funny. :) DrKiernan 2007-08-08"; and the same DrKiernan later mentioned "Vb's paragraph is more understandable than the table above." and "I did not say that Vb's paragraph was preferable or that it should be included. I said it was 'more understandable' in a linguistic sense. Your version remains incomprehensible." while also his remark on 'the table' referred only to the very complex sentence above the disputed table, shown together in the page-wide white box.

The table had been introduced on 19~20 May while the article was under scrutiny by a first featured article review. Vb started questioning the table already on 2007-05-23. That version was quite different from what it has become after a series of improvements, in its titles and the footnote immediately underneath the table, its layout, the use of checkmarks, and especially the replacement of the mysterious "facilities (12)" style by "in 12 municipalities (only facilities)". That does make the table quite understandable, for most readers. I do not know how FvdP came to this, but every other person that ever criticized the table had found it being pushed under the nose by Vb; no-one had made a remark on it before, not a single reviewer of the featured article review that closed on 2007-06-21 while that table had been there in plain view for the whole month of the review. Even SandyGeorgia who was quite actively working at the article would not mention the table before the later FAR, upon Vb displaying the table within that new FAR space. That means that even the older and far less clear version did not strike anyone as particularly difficult to understand. That proves that removing the table as if it were too unclear, is highly POV. If one harrasses people long enough and on different platforms, one is bound to finally find a few guys supporting ones point of view. That is called forum-shopping and it is why I do not recognize the opinions of five people on an article with the table in it for as long as three months during which it passed a featured article review twice, as a "consensus" representing the Wikipedia community as a whole. I'm sure there are more people who do not know how to interpret the table, and that can be said of any paragraph that would replace it, and of any paragraph in any section that is in the article. But for a considerable part of the community, the table can be more clarifying than any text within reasonable length for this article.

The last person commenting on the table, is then FvdP who is not as much confused by the table, at the contrary: it is the table that at least started to make FvdP wonder, because FvdP had a completely wrong understanding of an important aspect of the Belgian institutionalization, as is shown by, "partial redundancy between the 4 rows and the 3 region columns. Also, the 4 rows represent an administratively unnatural split of Belgium (they're a mixture of regional and communitarish division) with non-official and IMO misleading denominations (why describe the Flanders region as "the dutch-speaking area". Clearly, FvdP does not realize that the "mixture" of "non-offical" and in FvdP's opinion "misleading" denominations are in fact article 4 of the Belgian Constitution which names all 4 language areas precisely as they are on the left in the table (in the constitution's three official language versions, the unofficial English translation is abominable).
Note that FvdP not only saw the table but also the attempts to put it in sentences, thus that is not going to do the trick of making things understandable for everyone either. FvdP has a logical point though, I too do not see the absolute need for maintaining the language areas as one could just as well consider the geographical boundaries of the regions to determine which places are to use which official language(s), the language areas could become redundant, provided the Minister President of the German-speaking Community would have his wish come true by giving that community its own Region. But such is not the case. That funny mixture is mentioned in the article in the paragraph "The overlapping boundaries of the Regions and Communities...". And it is the main reason of existence for the table: showing both the relevance of the language areas for the official languages (and where and for whom exceptions occur) and their relevance for the two kinds of administrative subdivisions (having their parliaments, governments, and matters they are authorized for), and where and why they overlap. That is the 'logic' of the present Belgian federal kingdom. I'm quite sure that now, FvdP will like to take another look at the table: without his misconception, it may be a lot more revealing. To say it simply: the four rows are not a mixture, they existed long before the Regions and official Communities, and it was according to those language areas that the latter were created as a compromise with two contradictory ideological viewpoints in mind: divide the territory so that people need to speak the language of an area with fixed borders and do not have to worry which language will prevail in the future (a major Flemish concern), nor do they have to learn several languages in the larger regions (a major French-speakers' concern), or on the other hand let people choose which language they use, wich renders more respect for the individuals (and mainly in the interest of the people in Brussels, and in the municipalities with language facilities - where the first concept causes the second to have only very limited facilities).
I think this is rather clearly put into words and reasonably objective too, but I would absolutely refuse to try and find the proper sources that would be required to put it in a featured article: there will also be sources stating or claiming the opposite of every mentioned detail and we would have to show nearly all the different positions (with different viewpoints even within each of the three regions, and of course different viewpoints on each side of the language border.) That can't be done within the scope of this article.The importance of showing the exceptions formed by 'facilities' cannot be emphasized enough: they prove that the forementioned ideological viewpoint with respect to individuals, though limited, was not entirely overlooked by the regionalization. Recently, there have been European investigations of and disputes about the situation of speakers of French as a minority language and the typically Belgian solution has been questioned. I start to suspect an interest in keeping the correct information as presented by an overview, out of the article that then depicts Belgium as a country having put the regional territoriality principle and regional territorial integrity completely above the personal principle and human rights. It may also be relevant because a strictly territorial subdivision would facilitate separatism. And the municipalities with facilities as well as the Brussels situation have been major issues amongst the disputes in Belgium. Intended or not, that omission is not acceptable. That is why I insist on having the table: the purely factual information is there for the readers who have given the several ways to approach the Belgian problems a moment of thought; for others it will remain just as much gibberish as all information appears to a rather uninterested reader. As a sidenote: the contradiction between rights based on territory and rights based on persons, has become a growing international issue and, perhaps not coincidentally, Belgium has played a major early role in this evolution, see e.g. Universal jurisdiction.

In its present state, the by SandyGeorgia requested cleanup having been done and having tackled the issues brought forward here above by RelHistBuff later on ("Official services", "facilities" clearly existing only in few municipalities and clear checkmarks instead of "yes" and no longer mentioning "not required", clear checkmarks instead of confusing "x"s), it can certainly no longer hurt the article - even before all modifications and tweaks, it had not in the least been criticized by the eight reviewers and commentators of the first FAR that closed with FA status (Arnoutf, SandyGeorgia, Tony, LuciferMorgan, Vb (though here on talk page already opposing the table), Marskell, Casliber, maclean) - and it is not substandard, now not even below FA class any more. The high relevance to Belgium and the usefulness for possibly understanding what makes its federalization so complex (which is what a lot of people have heard about) and why, do not allow us to present the table only in the 'Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium'. If a very short introduction or explanatory sentence could help (I just tried it with a simple one), or something could still be improved about the precise wording of the table titles at the top, I remain open for suggestions, but the table should definitely not be ousted. — SomeHuman 22 Aug 2007 01:14 (UTC)

P.S.: The somewhat lengthy title in the table's left part, was chosen to accomodate for the main language and for the exception of the 'facilities', and does not suggest that the official language in a language area could be enforced on people for other matters than dealing with the authorities. The personal freedom on the language being used is constitutionally warranted by article 30: "The use of languages in Belgium is free; only the law can rule on this matter, and only for acts of the public authorities and for legal matters." — SomeHuman 22 Aug 2007 05:08 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman,

The goal of an encyclopaedia is to explain words. If serious sources use those words they have to appear in it. I agree with you that the wording "language area" makes more sense than "linguistic region" however the words linguistic region are used by authoritative sources (English translation of the Belgian Constitution on internet, CRISP, and others) so, while I agree we should use mostly the words language area we shouldn't forbit some editors to use the words linguistic region. In particular someone reading the site of the CRISP could wonder what linguistic region or communes with linguistic facilities mean. He would be quite surprised if he would not find any definition on WP. The goal of WP is to be usefull not to push some wording because they appear more often when googling around. Here I use the words "linguistic region" and "commune with facilities" because I cite the CRISP source: not because I want to push any French POV. You say the paragraph I wrote is meaningless. You may be right. My answer is: then your table is meaningless too, because IMO both things have the same meaning! I don't see any difference in contents. Vb 08:17, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Another note to SomeHuman. You have spent so much time and typing text in this talk page explaining the table. But so far no one (other than you) has found the table preferable. If you would put in the same amount of effort and work with your other Wikipedia colleagues, then you could be finished by now with a good paragraph acceptable by all. If this carries on much longer, then I would suggest that someone start with the dispute resolution process maybe by a Request for Comment or by bringing in a third opinion. --RelHistBuff 12:40, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

To Vb: If you would only use the French-derived terms here on the talk page, or in an important quote between "..." in a reference, I would not object. This is the article 'Belgium' and it does not need to have each common term accompanied with less commonly used terms for the same subject. The article on the language areas does mention 'lingusitic regions' to occur. If people do not know what a linguistic region or a language area is, they can find out by putting 'Language areas of Belgium' or 'Linguistic regions of Belgium' in the search box on the left of each WP page, both redirect to the same article. That is normal procedure for this encyclopaedia.
Not without reason, did I call the English version of the constitution 'abominable', in particular the relevant first paragraph of article 4: "Belgium has four linguistic regions: The French-speaking region, the Dutch-speaking region, the bilingual region of Brussels Capital and the German-speaking region. Each «commune» (county borough) of the Kingdom is part of one of these linguistic regions." Notice not only the continued usage of the French 'linguistic regions' and 'region' (causing ambiguity with the Regions in English as in French, though related to a language it is not the more common term in English, and neither the Dutch nor the German versions of the constitution introduce that problem), but it also uses the French 'commune', knowing it not to be a normal English word in the sense of a municipality: it would not be between quotes if it were considered as normal in English as commune is in French. The writer even found it necessary to put the 'translation' (and not even a good one) between parentheses. And even the details are pure French: that type of angled doublequotes is quite unusual in English but is the most common style in French. It is so bad that I would even suggest to eliminate it from the article, leaving only the official versions and for the readers who can only understand English rather provide a link to the article Constitution of Belgium that renders all the for our interest required articles in English (any mistakes there can at least be corrected). Already three people pointed out that 'commune' is not the proper translation for the French term, but I also know nearly all French-speakers to keep using it. It are not French-speakers here or at CRISP that determine what English should be like. It has enough French loanwords as it is, municipalité is French as well, isn't it? — SomeHuman 22 Aug 2007 20:25 (UTC)

To RelHistBuff: With Vb since months questioning nearly every edit to the article and endlessly coming back to topics that have been extremely extensively discussed earlier, the time it took me to write my comment yesterday is only about a hundreth part of the time I lost on this talk page, not to mention the continued rephrasing and edit-commenting at the article. If I would not have spent that precious time, most of what has been done to bring this article back to FA status would have been reverted towards Vb's far from NPOV wishes and often in poor English: even the linguistical improvements had been called POV etc and were reverted repeatedly.

The table that effortlessly passed a month of FAR scrutiny, apart from Vb causing me to make a few adjustments, only much later became criticized (one cannot pretend that no-one would have seen it, if not understandable, it sure was visible enough). This is what I had introduced, back then, and what was called ununderstandable:

Meanwhile it was moved from the end of the section where it could not be seen together with the Belgian structure at its beginning. "Provisions" and "obviously" disappeared, and out-of-context "facilities" in the table itself became shown there in a far more understandable way, according to one of the very earliest comments Vb had made. It was further tweaked and improved including a solution for Marskell's problem with the '×'s (which he could interpret like a red X-mark that means 'no' while here above it meant 'yes') and finally also your concerns of a few days ago were properly addressed. The table is now also introduced so as to say what to look for and indicating its relevance, and an undisputed sentence underneath it clarifies more:

The constitutional language areas determine the official languages in their municipalities, as well as the geographical limits of the for specific matters empowered institutions:

	Public services rendered in the language of individuals expressing themselves…			the Communities			the Regions (and their provinces)			the Federal State
				Flemish [1]	French	German- speaking	Flemish [1]	Walloon	Brussels- Capital
	…in Dutch	…in French	…in German
Dutch language area	Y	in 12 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-	Y	-	-	Y	-	-	Y
French language area	in 4 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	Y	in 2 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	-	Y	-	-	Y	-	Y
Bilingual area Brussels-Capital	Y	Y	-	Y	Y	-	-	-	Y	Y
German language area	-	in all 9 municipalities (limited to 'facilities')	Y	-	-	Y	-	Y	-	Y
	By Law, inhabitants of 27[4] municipalities can ask limited services to be rendered in a neighbour language, forming 'facilities' for them. 'Facilities' exist only in specific municipalities near the borders of the Flemish with the Walloon and with the Brussels-Capital Regions, and in Wallonia also in 2 municipalities bordering its German language area as well as for French-speakers throughout the latter area.

Although this would allow for seven parliaments and governments, when the Communities and Regions were created in 1980, Flemish politicians decided to merge both; thus in the Flemish Region a single institutional body of parliament and government is empowered for all except federal and specific municipal matters.^[1][5]

Notice also that the layout now fits a crosstab table (colour of the titles of rows like the titles for the columns, and the confusing "title" above the row-titles disappeared), which makes it a fare more conventional and for many a more familiar sight.
Just a moment ago (2007-08-23 00:52), I realized that the intro sentence allows for dropping the rather awkward top title above the empowered institutions and here above I'm showing this newest version.
Once people have made up their mind about something being ununderstandable, even after improvements, as the subject remains complex regardless whether one uses text or a table, you mustnot expect anyone to come forward stating "wow, now the Belgian structure is made clear at a first glance". Let me I remind you that even Marskell, who has been the most radical opponent of my edits in general, had placed the table in this section, giving it the title "Cutting the table for now" (my emphasis). The most recent eliminations of the so heavily adapted table by RelHistBuff, Vb and Marskell are no longer related to the claimed 'ununderstandability' of the table but must then be a camouflaged ensuring of not informing the reader in an understandable way about Belgium's structure and the ethical considerations that played, see my comment of yesterday. I'm not accusing all three of you, but it would surprise me if it would not apply to anyone. A few people horrified by a schematic overview in a table, mustnot play God, they are not the WP community, and should not censor something that could pass FA twice. If there is still something unclear about the table, it should be precisely pointed out as it had been before, which has allowed proper improvements of those points, and it could then be further improved instead of eradicated. None of the earlier criticisms find their cause back in the current table. — SomeHuman 22 Aug 2007 23:39 – 23 Aug 2007 01:08 (UTC)

I am very sorry SomeHuman but, while the table has been much improved, it is not clear yet. I think what is not clear is the meaning of the symobls "v". I don't mean I cannot understand this. I mean I think this is not easily understandable. I think the problem is that the symbols "v" are on the same level as "in n municipalities". Vb 06:35, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, Vb, that's a bit ludicrous: the checkmark symbol is created on WP even with a template to make it easier to apply it, precisely because it should be used on WP as everyone knows that symbol. One who does not understand one of the most common symbols in the world and being used in a most normal way, would't even be capable to surf to the article Belgium. The level being the same is most evident, each is in the single appropriate box on the cross section of the language area with a language that can be used there: either a green checkmark that means to everyone a full yes, or an explicit small number of municipalities and then still limited to 'facilities'. That makes anyone realize that for speakers of a neighbour language only limited services are available in a small part of the language area, one does not even have to know anything about 'facilities'. I can't make the checkmarks come popping up into the air in front of the PC screen. — SomeHuman 23 Aug 2007 17:08 (UTC)

Thanks to SomeHuman for pointing out to me that his 4-region subdivision is indeed official (art 4 of the Constitution). Now since my proposal follows the same subdivision, it is not hard to adapt. (...or so I thought.)

I maintain my point about the table complexity and redundancy which makes it harder to represent the big picture. Yet search for an accurate representation of the division, I found out a table representation has some virtues (e.g. it becomes heavy to explain in sentences that "the dutch language region coincides with the Flanders Region; hence the following table-form proposal below (with more text and less cells) :

(--proposal begins here--)

+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------
| REGIONAL SUBDIVISION | LINGUISTIC SUBDIVISION (1) |  OFFICIAL LANGUAGES (2)|  FACILITIES FOR OTHER LANGUAGES (3)
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------
| Flanders             |   "dutch language region"  |  Dutch                 |  French, in 12 municipalities
|                      |                            |                        |  next to Brussels or Wallonia
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------
| Brussels-Capital     |   "bilingual Brussels-     |  French, Dutch         |  None
|                      |  capital Region            |                        |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------
|                      |                            |                        |  Dutch, in 4 municipalities
|                      |  "french language region"  |  French                |  next to Flanders; German, in 2 mun.
| Wallonia             |                            |                        |  next to the German language region
|                      +-----------------------------------------------------+-------------------------------------
|                      |  "german language region"  |  German                |  French, throughout (9 municipalities)
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(1) named as per article 4 of the Constitution; you should not understand "dutch language region" as meaning that it is the only area where dutch is spoken;

(2) this column also determines on which areas the Dutch, French and German "Communities" have power

(3) "facilities" are public services rendered in other languages than the official one, in a limited area and under conditions

(--proposal ends here--)

(Random notes on terminology (sorry if some of these may already be obvious for everyone, I'd like to point out things if only for me since I'm jumping into this discussion):

• since "Region" has an official meaning in Belgium, we should take care to distinguish "Region" (Belgian official meaning) from "region" (other meanings) or avoid using the latter;
• from previous discussions on this page, it looks like "municipality" is a better english translation than "commune". It seems more natural not only in English: "municipalité" is also probably better understood in France than "commune".
• if "facilities" means "toilets", which less slippery translation could we chose ? ;-)

--FvdP 20:41, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Terminology: "Language area" is just as official a name in the Constitution (Dutch and German versions have equal legal weight as the French version), and it is the in English more common term (also outside Belgium). "Facilities" does not just mean 'toilets', it theoretically means 'things that facilitate' and in practice, 'the services and/or objects available, provided by an authority (one in charge, e.g. public authority or e.g. the local management of a shop, a department store, etc) in order to facilitate a visit to a place' - providing toilets is just one of such things that fall under the heading 'facilities', which made it a way to express 'toilets' in a less direct manner (only understood in clear context, it never became the usual term for 'toilets', another common usage is e.g. "facilities for the disabled" such as level access to the premises [having toilets or not] for wheelchair users) while other facilities are commonly referred to by the straightforward word ('beverages machine', 'elevator', 'separate smoking area' etc). But all the meanings for 'facilities' are still common English. The term mustnot be retranslated, all sources in English use 'facilities' for the Belgian thing.

Table design: Too much attention for the Regions, by letting them by themselves form the titles for the horizontal lines: Communitities would only be part of a series of titles (and in your proposal only by a sidenote). That may even be considered POV towards separatism. The language areas do not, as is the case for the Regions, Communities and Federal state, exercise power; there is no contest against their having a dominant place in a table because they cannot be a party in the discussion or competition about which level of government has or should have authority on particular matters. Constitutionally and historically, the language areas form the basis 1) to decide whether a municipality is French-speaking, German-speaking (with facilities for French), Dutch-speaking, bilingual, and 2) to form the boundaries for the Regions and for the Communities, not the other way around.
Your proposal concentrates on the language aspects alone (as if for an article on the facilities) from the viewpoint of Regions [one might create a similar one with Communities on the left](as if for an article on the Regions), while the current table is intended 1) to clarify what language areas are about (not elsewhere in the article), and 2) to show the relationship between all Belgian constitutional subdivisions (hence fitting this article), and the language areas are (undisputedly) the one-and-only common factor. — SomeHuman 24 Aug 2007 09:58–12:11 (UTC)

Well, obviously one can reorder columns and rows in my table, it's not a problem to put the 4 linguistical regions column first. We should perhaps order Wallonia before Brussels as it is greater and more populated. If needed, we can even keep the original order (NL-FR-BRU-GE) by splitting Wallonia. This should easily fix your POV concerns.

There's a column with languages, you can add "communities" in its title, since the subdivision is the same (something that's not that obvious in _your_ table).

See my solution looks really near to what you want to express.

"Language area": I'm not discussing this. Area, region, territory, I have no strong feeling about which to chose. OK for area.

"Facilities": OK.

--FvdP 18:04, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

You misunderstand my point. A table has two dimensions. In your table the Regions take one dimension (horizontally) all by themselves, all other subdivisions have to share the vertical dimension. Only the language areas (because not competing with other subdivisions, and because they are the only common factor forming the basis for the other aspects) can alone take an entire dimension. That is the table design, other aspects such as the order amongst the Regions (or Communities, or language areas), or the order of these groups of vertical columns, are mere details.
Please follow a convention on talk pages, of putting one more ":" in front of your paragraphs in an additional comment, than the comment above yours has; I just put this extra indent in your latest comment. — SomeHuman 24 Aug 2007 18:54 (UTC)

Taking a closer look at your suggestion of putting the language areas' column first (thus forming the horizontal dimension), you come close to the current table. But it leaves your table the problem that the Federal State can not be presented, or requires a different presentation style for it. The wordy style makes it also harder to follow each row, hampering the purpose of an overview. Also your "title" on top of the first column, like I had put there as well in my earlier version, appears to make it more difficult for some people to immediately understand that there are rows depicted with their (language) area related to all the aspects shown by the columns. Kind regards. — SomeHuman 24 Aug 2007 20:35 (UTC)

P.S.: Your simple header "Official languages" can mislead readers, see my P.S. of 22 Aug 2007 05:08 (UTC). To this respect, I would advise to avoid mentioning "legal matters", because even for several municipalities without facilities within the Flemish Region there is still the problem of the judicial arrondissement BHV (apart from the electoral arrondissement more commonly known by that name) which is a tough legal matter and one of the causes of the King having had to interrupt his holiday yesterday and fly back to Belgium so as to accept Leterme's resignation from his job as formateur. — SomeHuman 24 Aug 2007 22:46–23:13 (UTC)

There is no need to add a "federal state" column, except for the sake of being pedantically complete. Isn't it obvious enough that the Belgian federal state has authority everywhere?

I agree the "official language" header is misleading, I had my qualms about it, but that's surely not an argument against the global form of my table.

My wordly style IMO improves global readability, indeed at some cost, since search for _some_ _specific_ information becomes more complex. But remember, this is an introductory article, and the information is still in the table.

If you think my table is hard to read, perhaps you should consider that someone who has not authored your table, might find it even harder to read?

Anyway I'm on leave now for a few days. Good luck...

--FvdP 17:06, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

The "search for _some_ _specific_ information becomes more complex", indeed; that is not what a table is intended to do. It is an overview and thus must show that also the federal level exists and exercises its authority. Your table having a problem to depict that is a weakness of the table design, not a reason to even further weaken the overview purpose of the table. And I really do not see where its advantage would lie. Never mind, just have a very nice holiday, FvdP. — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 02:15 (UTC)

I utterly agree with the table suggested by FvdP. This is clear and easily understandable. I also agree with FvdP that the column Federal State would be pedantic. Vb —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.79.220.176 (talk) 15:32, August 27, 2007 (UTC)

No argument, as always. You just want to make readers skip a cluttered overview, like you wanted to cripple the table by elimnating any mentioning of facilities before, by stating anything. In an overview omitting the federal level while showing both regional levels exercising power, would be POV and definitely not an NPOV presentation. But that's OK for you when it fits your POV, is it not? I hope that FvdP and Funnyhat are clever enough to see how you deliberately continue to troll and upon the arrival of newcomers opportunistically jump to getting the article present what fits your POV instead of what proper sources, proper balancing and careful NPOV editing can accomplish. — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 21:06 (UTC)

SomeHuman, I can understand that discussions and disagreements can increase wikistress levels and I can understand that you don't agree with Vb. But is it really necessary to accuse him of trolling and that he wants to push some POV. As far as I know, he only supports the table and the arguments of another contributor and he does that on the talk page (instead of an edit war - remember: a talk page is meant for discussion and arguments - and opinions can differ) This is not really a constructive or respectful approach. Did anyone consider to drop the idea of a table and replace it with a map? For instance Flanders is dark blue and the (area of the) facilities are light blue, Wallonia is red and the facilities are light red, Brussels is purple, German areas are brown? The image caption can explain the rest. Sijo Ripa 21:29, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Sijo Ripa, did you count how many times Vb started yet another section on an identical topic, and even pushed the table under the nose of the FAR reviewers on the latest FAR page? That is TROLLING and I have repeatedly warned Vb against using that trolling technique. One normally ignores a troll, but as experience has shown, Vb than pretends to assume he's got the way clear to tamper with the article as he pleases and by now realizes that such renewed edit war gets him the troll fun again. This has been going on for about four months now. Vb is also back to his old behaviour of not signing in before making edits to articles, knowing that his IP address changes after a couple of days. For a long time we could recognize his edits by the 84.175.nnn.nnn IP and, realizing we knew, Vb had started to sign in but still skipped that occasionally. But now he's got an entirely new set of IP addresses like 87.79.99.139 and here above (probably really forgotten he hadn't signed in) 87.79.220.176, Vb has started again to edit articles without signing in and thus his changing IP makes article histories appear as if several contributors agree with the contributor signing in as Vb; that is Wikipedia:Sock puppetry. Whenever one starts to give Vb a little credit by assuming he's making progress and actually doing a few truly constructive edits, his behaviour quickly switches and makes clear that a re-assumption of possible good faith was premature. Can you honestly believe Vb as he had first (months ago) maintained not to be able to understand 'my' table, but now he would easily understand FvdP's table that was not even shown with all the modifications that FvdP agreed on to be desirable? Or that Vb can as yet not find 'my' current table equally easy to understand? Or that Vb finds the mentioning of the Federal State 'pedantic', after my explaining to FvdP why it is necessary, whereas Vb's suggested table of 2007-06-01 mentioned it?
There are already 6 maps that show the geographical location; and that is all a map can do. The four constitutional types of institutions (language areas, Regions, Communities, Federal State) all overlap 100% and thus their relationship cannot be shown on a map. Some of the municipalities with facilities are also too small for any map of a reasonable size. Kind regards. — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 22:32 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman, I am not making any sock puppetry because I have never pretended all those IP addresses were not mine. I do this only for pratical and technical reason and I have the right to do so. I had added some ideas of yours in the table I once wrote (including this column about the federal state) in order to find a compromise with you. Now that I read FvdP arguments I got convinced this column was not usefull and a bit pedantic. I also personally think it is not usefull to tell in this general article how many municipalities have facilities. However if FvdP and you agree with this presentation I am ready to join this compromise. Vb 08:02, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

About Sijo Ripa's arguments about a map. I agree with him this would be simpler and nicer than a table. However we have already this. My conclusion is (as Marskell) that the table is not required AT ALL. However we need a compromise with SomeHuman, we therefore need an understandable table or text with more or less the same content (i.e. an explicit definition of the linguistic regions. Vb 08:06, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

All points of criticism have been addressed in the current table, don't invent new ones. I had already claimed from the start that all you wanted to obtain was eliminating the mentioning of the facilities for your POV reasons, as I later explained because you apparently wish to show Belgium as a country that has no respect for its minorities. At least, now you admit what you really want out, and that has absolutely nothing to do with being understandable. The table meets the highest standards and shows Belgium's regionalization with a federal level and its finer-tuned responsability for minority languages, as it really is. — SomeHuman 28 Aug 2007 16:50 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman, I am really happy you say now explicitly which POV I am supposed to have. I don't want to say that "Belgium as a country that has no respect for its minorities" because I don't believe so. I am ready to mention the facilities in the article in order to avoid this impression of that this POV might be expressed. I am however against mentioning the exact number of municipalities with facilities because I believe it is a too detailed info which is not interesting in this general article. I thought the point of the table was to explain the reader what are the linguistic regions and not explain what the facilities are. Vb 08:14, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

The picture gets clearer all the time. You can allow Belgium to be shown as what it is, except that it must not allow an unlikely attentive reader to spot for him/herself that in the French-speaking area there are 4 municipalities with facilities for Dutch-speakers, while the other way around there are three times as many, and the French-speaking area offers facilities for German-speakers in only 2 places though the German-speakers offer facilities for French-speakers in their entire Community consisting of 9 municipalies. In other words, there are far more municipalities (21) with facilities for the 40% of French-speakers, than the latter offer for the 60% speakers of other languages (6 for their both languages together). Well, the article does not draw any attention to this, but it is a most NPOV fact, and only unacceptable POV reasons could steer to eliminate this: as you admit that the facilities are intended to respect speakers of a neighbour language, you apparently only want to hide that this respect might be seen not to come equally from all sides. I don't think that such elimination would be proper with the impasse in forming a federal government being strongly linked to the French-speakers' demand to make the Flemish Rode instead of a municipality with 'only facilities, a full-fledged bilingual part of the strongly French-language dominated bilingual Region Brussels-Capital (making the unbalance in showing respect even stronger). The table is not POV (neither subconsciously intended as I had devized the table and started to put the figures in before realizing their spread, nor in any way causing a breach of NPOV), and it was created with the numbers of municipalities with facilities, in tempore non suspecto. The idea that the table was "ununderstandable" appears by your continued attempt to remove its information not to have been, certainly not now, the point of view at which you pay most attention. Of course, the numbers of municipalities with facilities were most likely not a matter of politicians saying "We want so many municipalities" but rather a consequence of French-speakers moving into a Dutch-speaking area not adopting the local language, whereas the many Flemish people that came to live in a mainly French-speaking area wouldn't have thought of maintaining their own speech for generations or to use it in public. That does make the argument of respect stick, it's not a false impression (as far as anyone would do the maths, which I think to occur very rarely). By the way, I do not think that many people could be surprised to see numbers in a table. — SomeHuman 04 Sep 2007 19:46 (UTC)

Well nobody will ever try to compare the number of municipalities with facilities in the different regions because nobody knows how big the municipalities are! And how the facilities are really applied in practice in each region. The interested reader definitively needs to read the subarticles on the topic. This general article is not the place to discuss this. If your intention is to show the reader how open minded the Flemings are in according so many municipalities a special status then it is clear that putting those to detailed numbers in the table is a simple POV pushing strategy. Vb 12:07, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Last sentence of the lead

I don't understand why the sentence:

Upon its independence Belgium participated in the Industrial Revolution,[12][13] bringing wealth that further increased during the era of its African colonies.

has been replaced by

Upon its independence, Belgium eagerly participated in the Industrial Revolution,[12][13] generating wealth and also a demand for raw materials; the latter was a factor during the era of its African colonies.[14]

Why do we need the word "eagerly"? Why do we have to discuss the "demand of raw material" in the lead? I think the goal of this paragraph is to shortly summarise the history of Belgium. I have already tried to edit this but all my edits are systematically reversed by SomeHuman. Vb 09:01, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The modification had not been introcuced by me, and when I looked for sources before possibly reverting it, I found it easy to have the statement properly sourced. That includes the eargerness. Must I remind you that the very early industrialization in Wallonia not having been strongly enough supported by William of the Netherlands, was the main economical cause of the Belgian Revolution? That is the relevance of the term 'eager', they had a revolution for it. In general, sentimental revolutions do not last for long without an economical interest that brings support from the people with financial means. For the article it suffices to let the sources show that Belgium was indeed one of the earliest countries to put its money on the industrialization. And with a risk. Or did you not know that only five years after the revolution, and still threatened and invaded by Dutch military forces, four years before the Netherlands would recognize Belgium's independence, there already was a railroad built and in use between Brussels and Mechelen (the very first in the world, apart from Britain) and only one year later trains ran till Antwerp (having the harbour that had to be reached for the industry in the southern part of the country) though Antwerp lies dangerously close to the Netherlands. That is more than eager, even today and with by now lots of experience, such work would not be finished more quickly. And with a booming industry, is it not interesting to realize what economical interest Leopold II had in Africa, rather than letting the earlier sentence drop Africa from the blue sky? It's a much better sentence than the one that didn't give any information at all. It rather explains how that "wealth" increased during the colonial time; the earlier version sounded slightly like a POV towards the colonial time because it had no context (and was not sourced). In fact, it is all the more valuable an addition because the raw sources would remain the core (or should I say, copper ore) interest during the entire Belgian colonial rule. — SomeHuman 22 Aug 2007 19:03–19:16 (UTC)

What you say is utterly correct but this is an analysis - a correct analysis (i.e. that I share with you, not that everybody must share with you)- of the Belgium history. As such it is a judgement of the reason why Belgium got independent and why it got colonies. This is a POV - maybe a correct one - on Belgium history. It belongs to the history or economic section: not to the lead. The lead is just a summary that must be very neutral. We don't need an analysis of the importance of the demand for raw materials in the lead. We need just a very short summary of Belgian history (as it stands in most textbooks). I once introduced in this article a statement about the role of Katanga's Uranium on the postwar development of Belgium. I removed this statement because it was much too detailed for his general article. You are making the same mistake than I did. About the word eagerly. Of course you are right: Belgium participated eagerly to the industrial revolution but IMO it should be expressed with less hype so that this statement does not appear to the reader of this article as the expression of a national pride, i.e. a non neutral POV. Vb 06:16, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Your concepts of POV and of NPOV are completely different from what WP warns against and strictly holds on to, respectively. And I have already explained that WP is not neutral: WP should not describe Hitler as "the most inhumane devil of all times", but it must describe the Holocaust with all the horror that topic deserves; one cannot and mustnot leave out properly sourced and highly relevant facts simply because their being mentioned might cause the reader to chose a side. The proper sources make the statement in the article relevant, not my explaining to you why it is relevant enough to touch the topic very briefly in the lead; my comment here only serves to show to you that what the sources tell is already good enough to support the sentence, and that one could easily bring forward dozens of sources that go much further but such extensive sourcing would not be in balance with a short mentioning of the undisputed and to historians wellknown fact of raw materials to have played a (major) role. Your Katanga needs an entire article (apart from uranium, there were far more and economically more important raw resources there and it was not incidentally chosen so as to have the elected prime minister of Democratic Congo murdered there, etc) and cannot occur in a general article. In fact, entire books have been written about such. Important as these things are, they are still only details in the entire history of the colonial Congo. But that entire history and the fact of Belgium having had a colony and why that could happen, is far too relevant to Belgium for it not being mentioned. The properly sourced sentence certainly does not give the subject undue weight, and that is what I have shown. — SomeHuman 23 Aug 2007 17:47 (UTC)

Every detail in the lead has a huge weight. A short POV-like statement in the lead will have an undue echo: the normal reader will have the feeling the whole article is written in a POVed style. The sources which are cited are correct ones but nobody understand from the lead that the reader needs to read the sources to convince itself that the article is not biased. I ask you simply not to mention raw materials in the lead. This is not the place where this need to be done. If you want expand some part of the body of the article. The lead is the summary of the article not of the sources! Vb 08:23, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

You refuse to accept WP:NPOV, it does not mean an article cannot state what is the general consensus amongst notable sources, at the contrary. The fact of it being in the lead, should indicate to the reader that raw materials having played a role, is indeed the general consensus. The sources are there for the reader who might doubt this to be the case, so he/she can verify it. You appear to think that a statement can be made that would not be POV; I must disappoint you: any statement is a POV. By your standards, each single sentence in the article must be tagged 'POV' (the ones you don't see, will be spotted by others), and unfortunately, that is what you nearly have been doing for months now. See also the section hereunder, and please re-read WP:NPOV very carefully (in particular "From Jimbo Wales (...): If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts; If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents." — that means these POVs are then IN the article; and the part stating that this is not negotiable.) — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 01:40 (UTC)

I just changed "eagerly participated in the Industrial Revolution" to "quickly industrialised." The word "quickly" can convey the same idea as "eagerly" without any potential POV issues. Meanwhile, "participated in the Industrial Revolution" is just an awkward phrasing; "industrialised" is shorter and simpler. Funnyhat 01:35, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Both edits are incorrect. You appear to be making the same mistake as Vb regarding POV. See here above (2007-08-23) and the section hereunder (2007-08-27). 'Quickly' is good enough for a sudden response; 'eargerly' is the term for such after having waited and strived for it, in this case by having a revolution. The Soviet Union may also have quickly and even eagerly "industrialized" at some point, be it nearly a hundred years later than Belgium. But between these countries, only Belgium did so in the Industrial Revolution. It's an era (with a state of mind), not just an industrialization. Please read sources before modifying a sentence, e.g. one says "the cradle of the European industrial revolution - mightily aided after 1830 by the mercantilist policies of the new Belgian state." (my emphasis). — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 01:49–01:59 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV in language section

Editor FunnyHat made the following edit [3] with the comment NPOV. Why did the paragraph get back to its preceding POVed version? The phrase "Economically significant for a further globalizing future," is a POV which must be removed. By the way: Does someone know the percentage of Germans, French and British who is able to speak more than one foreign language? The Flemings may be very proud of their multilingualism and that they are therefore well prepared "for a further globalizing future" but they should state this in a neutral tone without insulting their neighbours. Vb 07:18, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

According to this Eurobarometer survey, 74% of the Belgians is able to speak at least one foreign language (UK: 38%, France: 51%, Germany: 67%), 67% at least two (UK: 18%, France: 21%, Germany: 27%) and 53% at least three (UK: 6%, France: 4%, Germany: 8%). That means Belgians are, in comparison with the EU average, very good at speaking foreign languages. However, this study only takes into account Belgium as a whole.--Ganchelkas 09:38, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Ganchelkas. So, if both surveys would have used the same investigation method, Wallonnia fares very bad with 7% able to speak two foreign languages, not only in comparison with Flanders but also in comparison with UK, France and Germany. This does not change the fact that a NPOV tone must be used to say this. Vb 10:04, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Can you still not understand that the phrase you keep disputing at again another section of this talk page has been discussed at length and no-one (apart from Marskell of course) could see your point of view here. It were not proud Flemish economists who pointed out the importance of the knowledge of languages for the future. The report had been written for the EU, not for the Flemish parliament, proud or not. France, Germany and Britain can do relatively well with one language because most jobs there do not require contacts with speakers of a foreign language. Do you consider Wallonia a part of France? That view will definitely not come in this article; la Francophonie gets little attention outside its own language-related culture that happens to be loosing its international importance with English clearly having taken the lead. An area with just 4 million speakers of one language and 6 million speaking another one in a country with many dozens of official international institutions and numerous private organisations and firms that seek the international environment, and that prefer a comparatively low-powered state (or region or whatever) above a large country that can afford to set its own demands, requires a high percentage of people speaking several languages; the others are bound to be left without a job. Do you think the multilingualism in Flanders originated from someone's idea, Let's impress the world by showing how many people can learn not just one but several languages? It grew out of economical necessity. That is what the Walloon politicians and by now at least some of the ordinary people have become aware of and what has drawn a European interest upon this on a European scale small and by now even poor region. It can't pretend to be France, or behave like it. Di Rupo's Walloon Marshall Plan and this report have gotten wide media coverage, and Vb, the report was published in Regards économiques, not revealed by the Taalunie: it's all about economy, not about linguistics, though it belongs in the 'language' subsection. Believe me, for the general article on Belgium one does not expect that subsection to pay a lot of attention to the intricacies of French or Dutch, but rather to the usage of the languages and how that is seen to play a role in the country. Do you not realize that merely showing the Walloons to be the least willing to learn languages (or capable at learning those, like the presently resigning formateur once suggested), is far more devastating to the respect for Walloon culture, than showing that one is already aware of the consequences. — SomeHuman 23 Aug 2007 23:41–23:59 (UTC)

Dear SomeHuman, the saddest in what you say and our dispute in general is that I almost agree with everything you said. Surprising enough : we have almost the same POV. Of course mine is sometimes a bit pro Walloons and yours is a bit pro Flemings but that's normal (and that's fun). I don't believe Wallonia is a part of France neither am I any separatist or whatever. I think we don't agree about the definition of POV and NPOV. I was disagreeing with your words "undoubtedly well known" because they were no correct citation. Now the citation is correct (I still don't agree with the wording "demand" but I so fed up fighting with you on details that I prefer concentrating on the main points). However the second part of the paragraph, while of course conform to the content of the source, does not belong to a correct encyclopaedia entry. I am personally able to speak at a very high level two foreign languages. I therefore belong to those 7% of the Walloons. I am of course ashame of that so low number. However I now so many people (and friends) who only know French and are proud of this. I disagree with them on this point. However I would never call them stupid or idiot. This is simply their point of view. Telling them they are not well prepared "for a further globalizing future" can be done in the source we are discussing because this is signed by some authors. This source express the POV of several academics with whom many including myself share the concerns. Giving an urgent advice to the Walonian population is their right. This is NOT the right of the authors of any encyclopaedia and of WP in particular. I think editors FunnyHat and Marskell, who have really no POV on the question, do agree with me. Vb 07:56, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Your idea about people "who have really no POV" is not funny, it's sad. Your and my definitions of POV or NPOV is irrelevant; WP:NPOV is the definition we both have to follow when writing an article. The admission in the article of the POV of the authors, is not depending on it being a POV or not, but on whether these authors are notable and whether their POV report has been given considerable media coverage. As there cannot be doubt about such, because even national and international media coverage is sourced, while the report is most relevant for the subsection and for Belgium and does not weigh less than other statements that are in the article, WP:NPOV determines that it must be correctly presented in the article, that is by attributing the POV to the source. That makes your POV-tagging is totally inappropriate: You use a POV-tag for a properly attibuted POV that according to WP:NPOV belongs in the article; the tag on the contrary, is meant to question a point of view of a contributor or contributors to be expressed. It had been discussed before and the tag had been there before, it was removed because of the (over-)sourcing having proven your assumption not to hold. Stop trolling. That is what you insist on doing: You never stop coming back on the same issues that have been handled comprehensively and exhaustingly before. You always do it in a new section, especially if you think some recently shown-up contributor may come to your rescue based on your apparently honest concern, and thus hoping he/she will take a stand before this contributor is realizing what has already been discussed. I further remind you that applying WP:NOPV is not based on consensus. — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 01:15 (UTC)

I can't believe this is being debated. I made that edit without even giving it a second thought. Of course it's POV to say that learning foreign languages is "economically significant for a further globalizing future". This is an encyclopedia, not an op-ed piece. You may have a point that the failure of the Walloons to learn second languages is holding them back, but that's something for the reader to decide on his/her own; it's not the job of an encyclopedia to make arguments like that. Funnyhat 01:38, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

READ WP:NPOV, I do not have a point. The sources do. And they are notable, and their statement is noticed as media coverage proves, and that is properly sourced, and the POV is attributed to the sources (scolared, scientifical ones, not an editorial), as WP:NPOV explicitly demands for such cases.
P.S.: See the Jimbo Wales quotes in the section here above. — SomeHuman 27 Aug 2007 02:05–02:59 (UTC)

Explanation for my edit: (1) It's better to attribute the citation to the authors, rather than to the UCL. (2) Also, I would only keep the part that is potentially controversial as a quotation. A long quotation is thus unnecessary. (3) The use of square brackets [ ] to clarify something in a quotation is an accepted custom. My [ ] do not change the content of the quotation in any way, and improve readability. Sijo Ripa 09:02, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Not the professors' report itself, certainly not in particular because of the professors' notability, but it being published in a notable journal of the very well-known French-speaking university, with an eye-catching introduction that stated " devoted to the demand for knowledge of languages in Belgium and in its three regions " is what caught all the media attention. And that high profile is what made this a must for this section. Yesterday, I had followed you in mentioning the name of a professor as well, but as there are two and the sources do not explicitly name one as the author of the report, while mentioning both behind the univ would sound a little pedantic and make reading unnecessarily harder, both are best left out. Their prominent place in the relevant footnote reference gives them proper credit.
You apparently do not read edit comments in the edit history, or you should not have called the figures for Brussels a conclusion, they are mere data.
The conclusion of the report (apart from advise given), is in the only part that is still contested by Vb: the relevance of knowing languages for the economical future, which for the Walloon Region appears dimmer than is already the case. It is very mildly stated in the article (compare with the about eight quotes from the report I had put on this talk page earlier, before judging). The part of the paragraph you edited, was agreed upon by Vb and myself and passed FA without a glitch, leave it be. In fact, your opening phrase is most likely a false statement: probably, the professors did not survey anyone but worked on it only afterwards; they analyzed the raw data that had become available, reported on these, drew conclusions with respect to the economical future, and (still very cautiously) gave a policy advice towards changing the Walloon mentality. Which is why Vb's idea that mentioning the significance for the future would be POV, is utterly ridiculous. It is not the survey or the knowledge of languages (regional differences were already well-known) that stirred the media and the people, but the now also in Wallonia clearly seen consequenses for the future balance of Walloon/Flemish economies that caused so much attention. In that respect and with actual phrases like "Le chauffeur de l’ambulance est endormi, et il est temps qu’il se réveille" ("The ambulance driver is fallen asleep, and it is time he wakes up") in the report, the hint now in the article cannot possibly be more low-key. — SomeHuman 28 Aug 2007 18:22 (UTC)

Yes, SomeHuman, you are right. But you may not write this in an encyclopeadia article about Belgium. I am sorry but you are ballantly wrong. Of course a POV may be cited in WP but not this way. Look for example at the very disputed lead of Vlaams Belang. There two POV are correctly cited on the question whether VB is far right or not. Here you cannot find a serious source telling that knowing French only is not an handicap for the future of Wallonia because this is not politically correct to say so. Therefore you cannot balance the source. However many Walloons think so. This is their right to think so. This is also the right of the authors of the source to tell them they are wrong. This is not the job of any encyclopaedist to tell them. FunnyHat is right: we are no editorialists : we are encyclopaedists. That's all. Vb 11:33, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Somehuman, (1) I must have overlooked the "concluded" for Brussels and I agree with you that "surveyed" is not verifiable. I aplogize for changing those things. I do think that the part is currently not very readable. The first part of the quotation can be trimmed and [ ] brackets can be used to add some info about the Marshall pact. (2) The emphasis on the publisher could (and most likely does) constitute a POV. The right way to attribute is to mention the authors, not the publisher - and this guideline should not be altered because of readability concerns. The section is about the linguistic situation in Belgium, NOT about the reasons why a certain report gained media attention and others did not. The report was notable whether or not it was published by the ULC, as it is one of the few academic research reports about the language knowledge in Belgium. So, the emphasis on the publisher (UCL) and a characteristic ("the largest French-speaking university") is unnecessary and most likely POV. (3) I never objected to "economically significant" - that's a discussion between you and Vb, not me. (4) I strongly object to the statement that a part cannot be edited because two editors have made an agreement. See: WP:OWN. Sijo Ripa 17:26, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't see why you should feel compelled to follow such agreement, but if you consider the debates between Vb and me having stirred a few people e.g. during last FAR, I suggested to leave it be. Whether mentioning of the report is proper for this article, depends on the weight of the report as it was seen by the public: 'Belgium' is not an academical article. And that was in particular the case precisely because it came from the UCL, to which both professors are connected anyway. As the names of the professors are relatively unnotable (sorry profs) in a general Belgian context, a publication elsewhere by anything other than the famous university would most likely not have caused the attention that made this report worth getting into this general article. The clear specification of the university being French-speaking, is correct because a same report from the KUL would have been waved aside by French-speaking media and it would in that case be considered a Flemish POV to shove it into this article. Belgians know the univ's language and do not need it mentioned, but this is the English-language WP (where not every reader can distinct French from Dutch in a name) and thus we need to clearly state that the report's viewpoint is self-criticism, a viewpoint shared or at least having the attention in important parts of both communities; it would otherwise by readers be assumed very likely one-sided POV, it is our task to prevent that assumption in order to present WP to be NPOV. Another reason for the attribution to the publisher, is that the quoted phrase in the introduction is from the univ's journal, and its phrase about the demand for knowledge of languages in Belgium helps to show to the reader that it is not just a WP contributor who found the report relevant for Belgium but that this is of a general interest in Belgium (again ensuring the reader that the mentioning of apparently hard statements is NPOV).
Whatever is going on at other WP articles, is not to be our guide. Though it is funny, if not alarming, that according to Vb the discussion is now whether the Vlaams Belang is far-right. Not long ago the discussion was wether it was extreme right. The WP policy on NPOV, verifiability, proper balancing of the weight (importance), and proper attribution (thus in this case attributed to what caused that weight), are to guide us.
As the dates of the Walloon Marshall plan and the date of publication of the report in Regards économiques are relevant (as is apparent if one reads the report), intersecting those dates also between [ ] within the quotation would make the latter unreadable. Be aware that there was a recent FA review that accepted the sentence that you intended to modify, it cannot be considered hard to read then. Yesterday I did insert the family names of the professors (the report has been referred to as the Ginsburgh-Weber report, though not generally in the larger media), partially because of your concern, and because it offers a style benefit by no longer having to use the (also slightly weaselry-sounding) passive tense. I also assume that by their specialisation being mentioned, the reader will not feel as much supprised by the otherwise sudden between Vb and me contested subphrase about the economical significance: it rather helps to prevent the punch or sting that Vb apparently felt by the switch from languages (education) to economics (though this was already, perhaps too early for some readers to be actually noticed, taken care of by mentioning 'Regards économiques'). Kind regards. — SomeHuman 29 Aug 2007 22:21 (UTC)

Vb, I'm sorry but it appears to me that you are rattling on... If you think (correctly or not: note that WP:NPOV is not about 'The Truth' but about verifiability and weight) that a lot of people have other opinions than those in the report and to my knowledge anywhere having drawn attention in the media, then the only way to corroborate your assumption of this matter not to be shown correctly the current way in this encyclopaedia, is by you delivering proper sources that show these assumed other opinions 1) to exist and 2) to be notable (having sufficient weight so as to express them in the article). Any other deliberate attempts to have the article showing your viewpoint are called POV-pushing. That is WP:NPOV policy, which every contributor must abide; I did not make the rules, and this one is not even made by WP community consensus either. We, contributors, are not the owners of WP. (Btw, have a look into my reply to Sijo Ripa here above.) — SomeHuman 29 Aug 2007 22:48 (UTC)

To both Sijo Ripa and Vb: Only once, Vb rose the question[sic] of the demand for knowledge of languages being a proper translation of la question des connaissances linguistiques. I have never been entirely happy with this "demand" either, because there is a slight difference: this is not a matter of 'demand and supply', of people or companies asking for (more) knowledge of languages. It is rather the (apparently at the time clearly noted) demand for paying attention to the assumed or suspected importance of the knowledge of languages, as to ascertain whether one should take the (economically motivated) demand very serious. But at the time I had tried to find a less ambiguous term, and failed to find one. I had even looked into other translations as how la question de/des was handled and even found a paragraph (I forgot where) on that particular translation topic. It did nevertheless appear that 'demand for' was the way to translate this. I do not wish to introduce a free translation of the then contested phrase which sticks as close as in proper English possible to the French original, and I still don't think there is one that keeps the phrase as short as the original. But on this particular term, I gladly keep an open mind for suggestions, as long as those do not say the question of knowledge of languages. — SomeHuman 30 Aug 2007 00:06 (UTC)

[edit] Cultural or linguistic frontier?

Personnally, I think that writing it is cultural is misleading because language is only a part of a culture. And a same cultural area can be overlapping two linguistic regions. At least, it is not said that it is an ethnic border since Belgae are often considered as a partly German people and since Franks settled in Low Countries became sometimes roman-speaking (see map) and some latin people was germanized as in Tournai where all sepultures are germanic after Migration Period though this region is considered to have never been germanic-speaking. Also, french-speaking Belgians called Walloons (a germanic name with only a linguistic consideration, not cultural, geographic or ethnic, see fr:Walh article in French WP - english article is not really a good one) have more in common with germanic-speaking people of Low Countries than with Southern French, Spanish or Italians. Same for misnamed Flemish people (a Limburger or a Brabantine being called a Flemish is quite weird) have more in common with other Belgians than with German or Swedish people. Also, historically the cleavage in that part of Europe was not north-south but west-east with the border between French kingdom and Holy Roman Empire politically but also religiously, with Tournai and Liege Bishoprics overlapping roman and tudesc regions. Also culturally with the scaldian and mosan art style. For example, Tournai Cathedral (dedicated to Our Lady of Flanders) is a Flemish art masterpiece but not being in dutch-speaking part of Belgium, but Tournai was the religious capital of Flanders and was considered until French Revolution as a Flemish town, of Romance Flanders. This consideration can be used also for switzerland. David Descamps 07:42, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I think it's both cultural and linguistic. Belgium is located on the frontier between the northern, more Germanic cultures and the southern, more Latin cultures, and between the Germanic and Latin languages.--Ganchelkas 09:54, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Sure, a linguistic border imply always a cultural change, at least minimal. But the opposite, a cultural border doesn't imply always a linguistic change. So, it sounds more correct to use "linguistic frontier" rather than "cultural frontier". David Descamps 10:57, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It's not a matter of how it sounds. It is a cultural border of which the linguistic aspect is made clear by naming the Latin and Germanic Europe. Where did you get that "frontier"? It says "boundary", which does not sound[sic] as much as a front line. If you read the section on culture in the article, you find that Belgian culture is separated along that language border, and one can hardly claim French and German culture, apart from their languages, to be the same. The language is only one and a far too limited aspect of culture, for only that aspect to get all the attention. — SomeHuman 13 Sep 2007 18:09 (UTC)

So why put "cultural boundary"? Germanic and Latin Europes are linguistic denominations, not cultural. And you agree that languages are only an aspect of culture. David Descamps 20:07, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not at all agree that Germanic Europe and Latin Europe are merely linguistic denominations. The terms refer to distinct cultures. The only thing that they have in common is that they are both located in Europe, but in clearly separate large chunks of it. The ethnic origins of the people two thousand years ago was different, their histories were largely different with only a few short periods at which some common border areas have been under one rule [the now Belgian area is an exception as it was at several and rather long occasions more or less united, though as one still sees now, not quite becoming one culture]. After the comparatively very short period of the Carolingian Empire (too short to cause much cultural exchange), the Germanic 'Holy Roman Empire' till now Germany and several of its neighbours never united with the Gaullish or French realms. The philosophical schools always remained clearly distinct. The common Christian religion is split into Protestantism and Catholicism [Flanders being the exception purely by Spanish coercion, military domination and prosecution at the time of the schism]. Even their food is distinctive (e.g. the Latin countries' use of sauses is hardly common in Germanic areas, wine versus beer). One does not mention only one aspect while there are many aspects, one mentions the more complete term: calling it a "the linguistic boundary" is as accurate as calling it "the boundary between beer and wine drinking". — SomeHuman 14 Sep 2007 10:25 (UTC)

What you described in the first paragraph of this talk page section, and the exceptions I just mentioned, illustrate that Belgium is indeed on the border, straddling the boundary, between two culturally different areas. And that the language border (officially established in 1962) is not the exact separation line between all aspects of the larger areas' cultures; the languages having been or now spoken in e.g. le Tournaisis (area Tournai/Doornik) or in the Brussels area did not necessarily match a cultural switch, either in time or according to an individual's language. Thus the expression "Straddling the cultural boundary between Germanic and Latin Europe" is one of the most accurate and stylistically outstanding ones of the entire article. — SomeHuman 14 Sep 2007 11:04 (UTC)

You convinced me :-) Have a nice week! David Descamps 15:12, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "but the difference is considerable" does not do much good.

I would like to change

"The surveys show that Flanders is clearly more multilingual, but the difference is considerable : whereas 59% and 53% of the Flemings know French or English respectively, only 19% and 17% of the Walloons know Dutch or English."

to

"The surveys show that Flanders is clearly more multilingual: whereas 59% and 53% of the Flemings know French or English respectively, only 19% and 17% of the Walloons know Dutch or English."

The 'but .. considarable' does not do much good, especially 'but'. I know this sentence is the result of a long edit war and I do not propose my version as the final one. But please do try to improve and not to revert as the new version is undoubtly considerably clearly better than the old. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pukkie (talk • contribs) 08:07, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that clear improvement. Please go on. Vb10:02, 4 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.175.206.41 (talk)

The 'but' had become meaningless because an earlier edit had wiped the immediately preceding part of the phrase. I restored the entire original sentence, which is - between double quotes - a translation of a full literal quote, properly attributed and with the sentence in its original language quoted in the reference. One is not free to tamper with literal quotes. Vb knew this very well, as he participated in a long discussion that had only ended after this full literal quote had been given instead of a phrase that referred to it. Kind regards. — SomeHuman 14 Nov 2007 00:38 (UTC)

Your translation is very poor but since this article is your OWN please change it as you want. Or better keep it as it is with gibberish tables etc... I don't care. Vb 07:52, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Partition of Belgium

I recently created this article, in light of the recent political crisis; major newspapers have noted rising separatism in the country. As it has some bearing in history and modern Belgian life, I feel it is important to note this separatism in the "Government and Politics" section of this article - of course, I wouldn't do it without prior discussion. K a r n a 21:39, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] fwg

it is a good country —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.229.94.116 (talk) 01:36, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] History: Belgium founded as a catholique country ?

In the History section I read: "[..]establishment of a [..] Catholic Belgium [..]". Although the vast majority of inhabitants were catholic, I would say it is a bridge to far to call it a Catholic country, especially in the light of state-religion separation. Am I right, guys? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.39.76.53 (talk) 15:47, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Comment by 86.39.76.53 moved to the bottom, for clarity JurgenG (talk) 18:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, the Constitution of 1831 established a careful balance between Catholics and Liberals. So there was separation of Church and State, but the Catholic Church was, for instance, given the right to found schools (freedom of education). But I think that bit refers to the dissatisfaction of the Catholics in the Southern Netherlands with what were perceived as attempts of the Protestant King William I to interfere with the Catholic Church, such as the establishment of a Philosphical College in Leuven. This was one of the causes of the Belgian Revolution.--Ganchelkas (talk) 20:06, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please archive this page

432kB! This is unheard of! —Viriditas | Talk 09:46, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Believe me, there's worse. much worse. You should have seen Virgina Tech Massacre Talk Page. Sneakernets 01:59, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Done. I archived the talk up to 30 June 2007. JoJan 09:19, 2 December 2007 (UTC)