Talk:France/Archive 2

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Pentagon or Hexagon?

The article claims France is referred to as a hexagon, but I always thought it was more like a pentagon. For comparison:

Pentagon

France

Hexagon

I guess the Spanish border and the Med coast are regarded as two sides, but they form a more or less straight line so conform more to a single pentagon side. IMHO anyway. — SteveRwanda 13:56, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

It does not really matter, this has been the nickname given by French people to the country for so many years that noone will change it now. FYI, yes the Spanish border and the Med are considered as two sides, and none of the other sides are equal, so lets call it an irregular hexagon, anyway this is an approximation. Perpignan is more South than Bayonne and Nice so that make two edges. Blastwizard 20:19, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it's not really rational, but note that mainly journalists use this term, as a synonym, to avoid using the word 'france' ten times in the same sentence. You often here on TV: "Les quatres coins de l'hexagone" (the four corners of the hexagon)...JeDi 09:33, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Also a few musician have been using this term to talk of France. Huygens 25 00:16, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Pronunciation

Fine in Firefox but gobbledegook in IE. Can someone make it more universal? Rich Farmbrough 08:19 15 May 2006 (UTC).

It looked fine when I was using IE...Do you mean you don't want to use the IPA? SCHZMO ✍ 20:03, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

"...Ah, French; the language the the french people use but choose to leave out half the sounds in their pronunciation and then annoys the rest of us..."

Language stats

It doesn't quite work. Next to the 102% you have the smaller of the two numbers (45,xxx) and then in the notes you have the larger number (46,xxx). But 46,xxx is clearly 102%, while 45,xxx is the 100%. So they should probably be swapped round. I think. I confused myself just writing that. Damiancorrigan 15:38, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Le Tour de France

Alright, I can't add anything since this I only set this account up a day ago, but I would like to make a suggestion for the page. Shouldn't there be some reference to the Tour De France in here? Most of my friends and some of my teachers know only a few things about France. 1) That's where the Eiffel Tower is, 2) That's were berets are from, 3) They like dogs(especially poodles), 4) Oui means yes, au revoir means goodbye, and 5) Every year in the Tour de France Lance Armstrong kicks all the European's butts. Since this is what pretty much 95% of the people I hang out with know about France, I think it should get at least a passing glance. Bobthellama9 01:58, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

If you are talking about the Tour de France, it is just a cycling comptetition, and I'm sure you can add something about it yourself. About Amstrong kicking European butts, maybe you can add a paragraph on Doping (sport) :). Just kidding. JeDi 21:16, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Year ! :) And this year Armstrong won't win ! - Lpn- 10:14, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

you are underestimating the culteral significance of the tour de france. think of it as superbowl sunday lasting a month.

Hmm... really? I would think the arrival on the Champs Elysee has to be one of the most watch sporting event, but the entire tour is somewhat boring, which I do not mean to undermine the performance of these guys. --WhiteEcho 17:46, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Kritik

Can we write about cited criticizm of the French government? .tg Tonyseeker 10:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Surely that should be in a different article, like "Corruption scandals of the Chirac presidency" or something? I don't think it belongs in the general page about the country.User: Jaganath 11:28 8 June 2006 (UTC)

"criticizm of the French government" do you have similar sections in the other countries? i don't think so, so there is no need to make an exception. this is not a movie review. Shame On You 14:02, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

[Removed because snobbish biggotry is hardly becoming]

There are plenty of blogs and forums left and right where you can criticize such or such nation or government. Wikipedia is about facts, not debates of opinions. You can debate the facts, but as far as criticizing, feel free to add factual information on such or such historical or cultural event about such or such nation, but try to document as much as you can. --WhiteEcho 17:48, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Removal of semi-protection

I wonder if it really was such a good idea to unprotect this article. This is the kind of article that will be vandalized very often and very frequently (there is a strong anti-french sentiment in some countries where English is spoken) if we don't protect it in one way or another. All edits that have been made since the protection was removed seem to be either to vandalize, or to fight vandalism. It's probably not a question of organized vandalism, but rather spontaneous things done by children and adolescents (as well as stupid and immature adults) who doesn't know better or have anything else to do with their time. And as long as they have access to the Internet, and some time to kill, the vandalism will most likely continue. Why not re-protect this article? It's really a shame that many editors and administrators here on Wikipedia have to take time to fight vandalism instead of doing more constructive things. /Magore 20:40, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Agree with User:Magore removing the semi-protection was like opening the Pandora box a second time. Blastwizard 22:24, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Agree with User:Magore there is such strong anti-french sentiment out there that soon this page will be trashed with "Go eat snails and die" or "Don't oui oui oui me punk!" The Holy Hand Grenade Attack Llama#42 01:51, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Agree with User:Magore. Read what I wrote below. Hardouin 23:57, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Agree with User:Magore. Francophobia is ridiculous but so real --Mgill 11:38, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

now its England's turn to be vandalized, Anglophobia is ridiculous but so real... Shame On You 14:05, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Edits by PierreLarcin2

I have removed recent edits by User:PierreLarcin2. Not only these edits were written in barely understandable English (please at least use an English dictionary if you intend to edit articles on the English Wikipedia), but they were full of inaccuracies and POV. Here are a few examples:

• this user described Vendée as "a subpart of French Britain"
• this user removed the fact that France was eventually victorious in both WW1 and WW2 and replaced the sentence with a lengthy paragraph about the Vichy Regime and its wrongdoings. The history section is only a brief presentation of 2000 years of French history. If you want to write more in detail about the Vichy regime, try Vichy France.
• in the following sentence (about France's birth rate), the user added what's in bold: "France is now well ahead of all other European countries (except for the Republic of Ireland), despite a pro-abortion legislation." I am surprised nobody reverted that earlier.
• this user added the following sentence (referring to French agriculture and EU subsidies): "This allow many conflicts in the European Union, due to the support of France to the European PAC (Politique Agricole Commune - Common Land Politics), which allows subsidiation of land farmers across Europe." That sounds like straight from the English tabloid press, although the English press wouldn't use the Frenglish word "subsidiation".
• in the economic section the user explained that the reason why the French GDP per capita is significantly lower than the US GDP per capita, despite France having a higher productivity than the US, is because of delocalizations to China. That's simply economic nonsense.
• this user wrote that the euro "replaced all major european moneys (except Norway and United Kingdom)". Beyond the bad use of English vocabulary (moneys instead of currencies), the sentence is also silly since Norway (not part of the EU) is mentioned but Sweden and Denmark (EU member states which haven't adopted the euro) are not mentioned.
• this user wrote that France's nuclear force is "spread between strategic submarines and conventional strategic missiles (located on 'Plateau d'Albion')", which is not true. The missiles on the Plateau d'Albion were dismantled in 1996.

Hardouin 23:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Famous French People

I don't think this section should be included, it is messy and long. It's much better as a link to the main article in the "see also" section. Jackp 09:03, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

When you eliminated the list here, did you assure that all of the folks on our list are on List of French people? If you did, then "Good work!", I think you made a useful change.

Atlant 11:07, 30 June 2006

French Revolution

In the History section, the reference to the French Revolution as it is gives somewhat a narrow view of the event: "The monarchy ruled France until 1789, when the French Revolution took place. King Louis XVI and wife, Marie Antoinette, were killed, along with thousands of other French citizens." Although the events described in the second sentence are true, using half of the text dedicated to the French Revolution (only two sentences) to remind the slaughtering of Kind Louis the XVI, Marie Antoinette and many French citizens, seems to reduce the event, which had such a broad impact on French and European history and culture, to a pathetic massacre. --DR.fr 20:29, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Agree, at least some emphasis on the enlightenment century that took place before and brought ideas to some idealist, in addition the role of strong famines (starvations) before the revolution was the kind of sparks that triggered the revolution. This would be a bare minimum. Then regarding the "slaughtering", the King and Queen tried to flee away instead of transforming the country into a constitutional monarchy (they preferred absolutism, well that's a quick and dirty shortcut, actually the King would not have mind too much, but the Queen and their suite did mind). As a consequence, they were put in front of justice and killed (just like nowadays, people can be killed by the justice in some countries). As for the French citizens killed, many were aristocrats or church representatives and for the rest, it is hard to make a revolution with out collateral effects Huygens 25 00:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

In my humble opinion, the thousands in the quoted statement makes it seem like much more than a massacre. I think of a massacre as anywhere between a dozen to a couple hundred, (300 works fine), but a number that large attracts some reverence. The Holy Hand Grenade Attack Llama#42 18:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

As someone whose family suffered horribly during the French Revolution, I say the horrors of the French Revolution need to be exposed in all their glory. The Vendee Genocide, the Terror, etc.

statement rather useless without proof. What do you mean by horrors? Why should the horrors of the French revolution be more emphasised than the ones of successive wars (like the Napoleonic, 1870, etc. wars)? During war or revolution, you cannot avoid death. But some of them are for building a better society or world. Huygens 25 00:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

My ancestor lost his head for one reason: he was a Catholic bishop. The French Revolution was a disaster. Let's avoid whitewashing one of the greatest tragedies in human history.--Pravknight 01:27, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

for one reason only, really? Being a catholic bishop at that time meant having loads of privileges (and money, etc.) not so catholic then ;-) sorry. In addition, this is an encyclopaedia, therefore it is not because of an individual ancestor being mistreated that an article should be build around. Perhaps, if he was a King or a major historical character, he could have his own page Huygens 25 00:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

As someone whose family was liberated from peasantry and oppression of a violent regime I wouldn't dare to think of the French Revolution as a disaster.

The Terror is something else. a period of chaos always ensues a revolution, no pride has to be found in that but it helped the development of a more liberal regime, which along with the US revolution led the way to Democracy as we know it now. Apart from that, i admit that not everything has to be applauded, there are crooks and cheaters everywhere. your ancestor lost his head for being anti-revolutionary, as many people back then... He happened to be on the wrong side of the fence, I am sorry about your family's history, but you have to admit we are all better off with that thing having happened.

So my dear friends who regret our King, I for one do not regret the beheadings of thousands of aristocrats, which were giving exactly the same treatment back to their subjects for a thousand years and letting them die with hunger when they were living in lavish conditions. For once the weak took the fight back to the powerful. I do not regret that. Too bad for "one of the greatest tragedies in human history" that it liberated a whole Nation from its King... I'm sure you regret the slaughtering of the Nazis too, don't you? please, stop repeating what your family taught you and look at the bigger picture. And remember that we are living in a different world nowadays, death penalty wasn't so frowned upon back then... Flo 16:22, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Flo, I'm french, living near Vendée and I can't no more stand those "The Vendee Genocide", what about the "revolutionary citizen" who were killed by the Vendée Army ? There has been a lot of death ... stop talking like a martyr. I could speak a lot more about this topic in french, sorry for my english. Lpn- 12:59, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

France in WWII

I noticed that the phrase "Invaded and subdued by German forces" has been removed a couple times. Isn't that exactly what happened? France was invaded by Germany and surrendered pretty easily, if I recall correctly.—BassBone (my talk · my contributions) 01:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

"Invaded and subdued" is a correct description, minor semantics aside, but the French did not surrender easily at all. There were hundreds of thousands of French casualties in the Battle of France. They were simply beaten very decisively and had no option but to surrender when it was said and done. The surrender contextually was very sensical; other nations had also surrendered to Germany in similar conditions. There was simply little else they could do.UberCryxic 17:28, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

"Pretty easily"? If I remember correctly, there were between 200,000 and 300,000 casualties in a few weeks of conflict. Ok, that's not the 1-2 millions of World War I, but it's still a lot. Additionally, I may mention that a number of French units and Maginot line bastions were still fighting when they were ordered to surrender by the new government (which came to power by a kind of coup d'état authorized by demoralized politicians). David.Monniaux 01:42, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

There seems to be no mention of France being invaded and defeated by Germany in World War II. What's going on here? This is a pretty big part of the country's history that it seems is being brushed under the rug. If it keeps getting deleted, then maybe something needs to be done about this, for credibility's sake. Dankostka 03:32, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah agreed. I don't think anybody is purposefully deleting it though. The History section is problematic in general because it is far too short. There's a lot of other stuff that has also been left out.UberCryxic 21:21, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

If I could contribute a personal anecdote here. My grandmother lived near the Maginot Line in 1940, and she said the French soldiers didn't put up much of a fight. They ran, half of them barefoot, as fast as they could to get away from the Germans. My grandmother, like other Frenchmen and Frenchwomen, was forced to live in hiding from the Germans until 1944. The pride of my French cousins is sickening, and I mean cousins by blood.

I'm a French-American whose great-grandfather fought on the Western front in a French uniform. My grandmother knows better or as well as any historian what happened there because she saw it first hand.--Pravknight 01:32, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

That's very true, I myself have been an expert in rocket science since I saw parts in a museum...

Most soldiers in the Maginot line did not "put up much of a fight" because their fortifications were away from the battlefield. In the cases of components of the Maginot line which did come under attack, fighting occurred, for the sorrow of the German units, and surrender did not occure until after the armistice, on direct orders from Vichy.

On the personal part, I see no reason to be proud of deeds that are not yours ; should you need to go as far as the deeds of your grand-parents to find your pride, though, I fear that even the most cowardly French soldier of 1940 saw more action that the bravest US soldier of the same time. On this respect, the USA should be very grateful to the Japanese to have been so kind as to hunt them up their lair. Rama 12:43, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Addressing Rama's second paragraph: You would be correct that in 1940 the most cowardly of French soldiers saw more action than the bravest of US soldiers in 1940. Uhmmm....the US did not go to war until December 1941. Can you restate/rewrite your last sentence? I understand that it is intended to be an insult of sometype, but it doesn't make any sense as written. MJCdetroit 13:34, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

This is what I meant yes. The 1940 thing, not the insult ; the fact is, whether or not this is to be taken as an insult is a matter of personal appreciation. Rama 21:23, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Rama is absolutely right. The 400,000 or so soldiers defending the Maginot Line put up stout and heroic resistance against the Germans. Despite how often it is ridiculued, the Maginot Line actually did its job: the Germans did not get through from there. Pravknight's little story is both uninteresting and we would have an anectodal logical fallacy if we were to somehow presume that French soldiers fled because your grandma happened to see a few them flee personally. Sorry...we don't care. Most French soldiers on all fronts put up a good fight, but one of the very important lessons of military history is that heroism usually does not compensate for tactical and strategic shortcomings, and France had plenty of the latter two in 1940.UberCryxic 05:06, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Keegan, certainly not the most pro-French fellow, writes this in the Second World War (1989):

[After the Weygand Plan, so we're in June now] Frenchmen in uniform were still fighting, often to the death. Like the Belgians, they found at the approach of defeat an outraged capacity for self-sacrifice. At Toul, behind the Maginot Line, the 227th Regiment of Infantry fought on long after it had been surrounded. At Saumur the students of the Cavalry School held the bridges over the Loire from 19 to 20 June until their ammunition ran out. The garrison of the Maginot Line itself, 400,000 strong, refused all calls to surrender; only one section of blockhouses was ever to be captured by German attack. South of the Loire an officer of the Fifth Army watched a 'small group of Chasseurs Alpins from the 28th Division cross on 17 June. They were 'led by a sergeant covered with dust, their uniforms in rags, marching in order and in step, the men bent forward, pulling with both hands at the straps of their equipment. Some were wounded, the dressings stained with dirt and blood. Some slept as they marched, ghosts bowed under the weight of their packs and rifles. They passed in silence, with an air of fierce determination'.

Comrades-in-arms of these mountain troops were meanwhile confronting Mussolini's attack on the Riviera across the Alpes Maritimes, Italy having declared war on 10 June. Four French divisions stood in the path of twenty-eight Italian divisions. They held their ground without difficulty, yielding nowhere more than two kilomteres of front, losing only eight men killed against Italian casualties of nearly 5,000. Eventually, in desperation, the Italian high command asked for German transport aircraft to land a battalion behind the French lines, as a token of success. 'The whole thing is the usual kind of fraud,' wrote Hadler. 'I have made it clear I won't have my name mixed up in this business'.

Hope that was helpful and cleared some misconceptions.UberCryxic 05:20, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

see also the article Military history of France during World War II Shame On You 22:52, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Population growth

" the population of the European Union increased by 216,000 inhabitants (without immigration), of which 211,000 was the increase in France's population alone, and 5,000 was the increase in all the other countries of the EU combined"

It does not make sense. The paragraph speaks as if France had the absolute majority of population growth, but that was not so. Some other EU countries had much population growth too. The statement that "5,000 was the increase in all the other countries of the EU combined" is misleading, because some other countries had more than a 5,000 population growth. The total growth is '216,000' only because some countries had decreased population. For example, France had a 211,000 growth, country B had a 211,000 growth, but country C had a 206,000 decrease. That still makes the total growth '216,000', but to say '5,000 was the increase in all the other countries of the EU combined' is false, because country C's decrease cannot be counted inside the increase. If the example of mine is true (which it is not) and if there are only three countries in EU, then the sentence should be, for example, "and 211,000 was the increase in all the other countries combined, though there is a 206,000 decrease in country C, causing a 5,000 population growth in all the countries in EU except France". Some sources are also needed. Aranherunar 07:03, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

exactly how many immigrants are in france???

A recent census study says 5 million, but we'd have to check the definitions involved. David.Monniaux 05:07, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Je pense qu'il est rediculous et inhumain pour que le Français indique que le RPF a tiré en bas de l'avion. C'est un mensonge. Les extrémistes hutus ont tiré en bas de l'avion, parce qu'ils ont voulu créer la propagande contre les tutsis et le RPF. C'est pourquoi les hutus ont blâmé le RPF « incitent » la fête de massacre. Les Français d'une part, sont justes blâmant le RPF de se briser de l'avion afin de s'excuser pour leur coopération avec le gouvernement hutu génocide. Le Français a coopéré avec le gouvernement hutu à éliminer les Tutsis ! Quand l'entente de paix a été signée entre le RPF et le gouvernement en 1993, le gouvernement hutu était fâché et juste a voulu trouver une manière de rester dans la puissance, parce qu'ils ont su qu'ils desserraient au RPF. C'est pourquoi le gouvernement hutu a fouetté dehors leur colère sur la population tutsie parce qu'ils ne pourraient pas défaire le RPF. Ils ont juste voulu employer la propagande et leur petite station par radio stupide pour provoquer la haine contre le Tutsi. Cependant, l'ironie de ceci est que le tutsi au Rwanda n'ont rien à faire avec le RPF. Le RPF a été basé en Ouganda. Ils consisited des Tutsis qui ont décidé de quitter le Rwanda pour se sauver l'Ouganda quand les Hutus sont venus pour actionner dans les années 50. Les tutsis au Rwanda étaient ceux qui ont décidé de rester. De façon générale, le tutsi et la violence de hutu n'est pas nouveau mais elle n'est pas vieille. Il y avait un temps que les Tutsis et les Hutus ont vécu ensemble dans la paix. Tout était untill correct allant que les Belges ignorants sont entré et ont pratiqué se divisent et conquièrent (une stratégie européenne typique). Les Belges ont divisé le Tutsi et le Hutu, et depuis puis, ils ont observé dans le divertissement comme Tutsi et combat hutu. Quand le Français « interviened » dans le génocide rwandais en 1994, ils sont venus pour observer, rire, et soutenir le gouvernement hutu, pas économiser le Tutsi et pour arrêter les massacres. Quoi qu'il en soit, le RPF étaient victorius, quoiqu'ils aient combattu tous par eux-mêmes. Le plus, le RPF ne devrait pas n'être blâmé d'aucun massacre. Le RPF a dû faire leur travail. S'il was'nt pour le RPF, tous tutsis et hutus modérés de l'été mort en raison du gouvernement hutu, des extrémistes hutus, et des troupes françaises ! ! !

Could you please translate it to English? Bigtop 21:02, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, I read and understand French, and this is what it translates to (it must be a random French Person): "I think that it is rediculous and inhumane for the French to say that the RPF shot down the plane. That is a lie. The Hutu extremists shot down the plane, because they wanted to create propaganda against the tutsis and the RPF. That's why the hutus blamed the RPF in order to "incite" the killing spree. The French on the other hand, are just blaming the RPF for the crashing of the plane in order to excuse themselves for their cooperation with the genocidal Hutu Government. The French cooperated with the Hutu government to wipe out the Tutsis! When the Peace accord was signed between the RPF and the Government in 1993, the Hutu government was angry and just wanted to find a way to stay in power, because they knew that they were loosing to the RPF. That's why the Hutu government lashed out their anger on the Tutsi population because they could not defeat the RPF. They just wanted to use propaganda and their little stupid radio station to provoke hatred against the Tutsi. However, the irony of this is that the tutsi in Rwanda have nothing to do with the RPF. The RPF was based in Uganda. They consisited of Tutsis who decided to leave Rwanda to flee Uganda when the Hutus came to power in the 1950s. The tutsis in Rwanda were those who decided to stay. Overall, the tutsi and hutu violence is not new but it is not old. There was a time that the Tutsis and Hutus lived together in peace. Everything was going okay untill the ignorant belgians came in and practiced divide and conquer( a typical European strategy). The Belgians divided the Tutsi and Hutu, and ever since then, they have watched in entertainment as the Tutsi and Hutu fight each other. When the French "interviened" in the Rwandan Genocide in 1994, they came to watch,laugh, and support the Hutu government, not save the Tutsi and stop the killings. Anyway, the RPF were victorius, even though they fought all by themselves. Plus, the RPF should not be blamed for any massacres. The RPF had to do their job. If it was'nt for the RPF, all the tutsis and moderate hutus would of been dead because of the Hutu government, Hutu extremists, and the French troops!!!" You know, it sounds kind of funny, but I think I agree with what is being said.

The above French paragraph is an out-of-topic, badly written rant about the role of France is the civil war and genocides in Rwanda. I suspect that it was translated automatically -- "shoot down the plane" translates into "abattre l'avion", not "tiré en bas de l'avion" (which means "deliberately firing in the direction of the plane, as to miss it, the projectiles passing down the plane") Rama 11:16, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I do agree with Rama, I'm reading French fluently (I'm native), and this French is just like Google has translated it from English! Because if I take a English word for each French one,the translation the English formed sentences are almost perfect!!! So I would check carefully the source from this text... Huygens 25 23:42, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

The latest 2006 demographic statistics have been released in French and English by INSEE. The English link is here: http://www.insee.fr/en/ffc/ficdoc_frame.asp?ref_id=ip1118 Fertility has increased to 2.00 per woman. For the first time, the fertility rate for France is the highest of the G-7 countries, and is higher than the United States. I think this is important, should it be included? A more detailed link is here: http://www.insee.fr/en/ffc/ipweb/ip1118/ip1118.html

Map

Why is French Guiana not included in the map in the infobox? - Jack (talk) 22:27, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Furthermore, the article cites that "France also shares land borders with Brazil, Suriname, and the Netherlands Antilles", yet no mention is made in the article of French Guiana. The Dutch Antilles are even included in the article on the Kingdom of the Netherlands. As I don't know how to edit maps proficiently myself, would somebody else be able to amend the map? Liam Plested 23:44, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Spaceport

The article says France is "the only European power (excluding Russia) to have its own national spaceport (Centre Spatial Guyanais)", yet the spaceport pages does not include this in the list of European spaceports, and lists other European spaceports besides. One of the articles must be in error. 68.6.122.202 02:15, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

=Answer=: The Guyane spacesport is listed in South America, since it is on the south-american continent. So both articles are rights, we just have to remember that France has a colony in South America. ;) 82.127.252.108 22:41, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

France does not have a colony in South America. It has a part of itself in South America. Rama 23:07, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

France has two types of overseas collony, there are "teritory" where people have some autonomy and there are also department wich are ruled almost like a metropolitan place (same rule or organisation in normandie as in La Reunion), Guyane is considered as a department so you are applied to the same laws in Kuru spaceport as in a random paris subhurb market place. So it's not merely a colony, it's a part of itself :) . Esurnir 02:37, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Infobox

The consensus on the talk page some while ago was that the standard country infobox cannot accurately account for France's specific situation (metropolitan France vs. entire territory of the French Republic, including overseas France). That's why a specific infobox was created. This specific infobox copies for the most part the standard country infobox, but has specific entries to allow disambiguation between metropolitan France's figures and figures for the entire Republic. Before deleting this infobox, explain your reasons here, and give other contributors some time to express themselves. Hardouin 22:44, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

The Template:Infobox country has been changed to allow for these differences. Indeed, there is virtually no difference between the use of the Template:Infobox country and the single use template. --Bob 22:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Then in that case why does your infobox contains a "Water (%)" entry when French authorities do not report this figure? This sounds straight out of the CIA World Factbook. Your mention of the "Holy Roman Empire" is also inaccurate. 843 was the legal foundation of the French State, not of the Holy Roman Empire. You also deleted the land area as reported by the French Land Register. Why? You also deleted the INSEE reference for the population figure. Again why? Finally, in Internet Explorer at least, your infobox format is completely screwed up, whereas the specific infobox appeared neatly, with figures on the same lines as entries (whereas on your infobox many figures appear below or above their entries). If your infobox is not an improvement, I see no point in replacing the current infobox really. Hardouin 23:00, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

On my browser, it works just fine. I see no point in abusing the template namespace. The insee reference is there. The water percentage is something that is included in the other box but could be made optional, in fact, I will probably make it so. Finally, it is not my infobox, but one which is implemented on virtually every other country on Wikipedia. --Bob 23:04, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Format issues are important ones. This is how the specific infobox looked: Image:SpeInf.png and this is how the standard infobox looks now: Image:StInf.png (Ed note: the following images have been nowiki'd in order in show the talk page more clearly. Please copy and paste the Image:xxx.png into the search box to the left if you desire to see the images click the links.)16:06, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

As you can see, several things are screwed up. Many lines are broken and now appear as two lines (e.g. "Dominique de Villepin" appears on two lines, the total area also appears on two lines, with the superscript "2" awkwardly appearing alone on the second line). Also, notice how below "population" the "2006 est." entry and the "metropolitan France" entry appear as if there was a gap, or an extra blank line, between the two, whereas if you look on the right, "61,044,684" appears closer to "63,587,700" than to "110/km²". None of these problems happened with the specific infobox.

For population figures, it is also better to have a "Total" entry rather than a "2006 est." entry, because otherwise the 63 million figure will be quite puzzling for people used to metropolitan France's population figures. That's why in the specific infobox the date was put immediately below the word "population" in a separate entry.

Also note how some of the superscripts awkwardly appear inside parenthesis E.g. we have "(89th ³)", instead of the more logical way in which superscripts appeared in the specific infobox. Hardouin 23:34, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't see the wrapping... Maybe something wrong with your browser. Also, having the superscripts in the brackets is no more awkward than having them next to the ² of km². IMHO, there is no difference between saying 1 January 2006 and 2006 est., as, after all, it is an estimate based on the previous census. --Bob 23:46, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

This is how it looks for me: Image:France_screenshot.jpg (Ed note: the following image has been nowiki'd in order in show the talk page more clearly. Please copy and paste the Image:xxx.png into the search box to the left if you desire to see the images click the links.)16:06, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

The trick to have a link to an image is to add a column in front of it : ":Image:..." instead of "Image:...". Rama 08:17, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Rama. , —MJCdetroit 14:31, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Economic Power

"It is a developed country with the seventh-largest economy in the world." This is incorrect. Even the source referenced "Rank by nominal GDP" cites France as having the sixth larges GDP. I am changing it. If you have a problem leave me a message. --Mgill 11:23, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

République française or République Française

My french grammar is a little rusty, but shouldn't the F in française be capitalized as is the case shown within the article in the "symbol of the French government" image? It is after all a proper name. —MJCdetroit 15:40, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

The recommendation from the Lexique des règles typographiques en usage à l'Imprimerie nationale is not to capitalize adjectives within a compound proper noun (ex: École polytechnique and not École Polytechnique). However, if I remember well, there are common usages as exceptions to this; in addition, not everybody follows the lexique. David.Monniaux 15:52, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, the Lexique (2002 edition), page 154, writes République française. David.Monniaux 19:10, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. I thought that there might be a reason. That's why I asked first. —MJCdetroit 20:17, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Hey, you were quite right: many people don't follow the Lexique on this, especially since initial capitals give names an air of majesty... David.Monniaux 23:56, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Following the French Wikipedia article on France, it would be République française and not Française. Mar de Sin ^{Talk to me!} 02:33, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

"République Française" is "permitted" (it's not a crime!) because the two letters "RF" are used as Britons use UK or GB. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.102.244.100 (talk) 14:28, 22 February 2007 (UTC).

Protected tag

The tag should be taken off since this article has not been edited for three days now.UberCryxic 16:55, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Question

Can you tell me where did you read this? "In the 4th century AD, Gaul's eastern frontier along the Rhine was overrun by Germanic tribes, principally the Franks" My sources say 6th (VI) century AD. That's 2 centuries later. Mixremix 20:20, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Foreign Language

Despite popular stereotypes, many French people can speak at least one foreign language, especially in border regions such as the Pyrénées, Alsace, or the Alps. German, Spanish, Italian and English are spoken with various degrees of proficiency and many families living near the borders are perfectly bilingual. This is utter BS.. People in border areas can be bilingual, but it is used to prove that many French people can speak at least one foreign language (speak how fluently first of all??), which is clearly a falsehood.. Most French people cannot even string two foreign words together like aw R YOU? or Com 'Sitai?. I was an English assistant before, I know :)) This is not a stereotype, it is a fact - and to claim otherwise is propaganda. Can the person who wrote it, rephrase it so that it makes it clear that it is only the border French that are bilingual and that a majority of bilingual French have immigrant origins?? Baristarim 13:19, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Calm down, please. I'm not entirely sure what you are getting at, but the paragraph seems pretty good to me. Many French can speak at least one language other than French, especially teachers, those who work in the tourist industry and those with significant contact with foreigners, which would include those living in border regions. In addition, French of immigrant extraction would also be likely to speak another language. Maybe most French don't speak two languages, but many certainly do. Certainly most French folk I met during my last visit spoke enough English to get by. I was quite ashamed of my rusty old schoolboy French! --Jumbo 13:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

No that's not the issue, please also see above about the fluency by which they speak. Enough English to get by is not enough to label many French people can speak at least one foreign language - I live in France, have a look at my user page. :) I was also an English assistant (in France). Teachers/tourist industry, can only make the sentence some French people - they would only make up 5 percent of the population. Many of the TV presentors in France cannot converse directly with foreign journalists in news programs and they need translators, did you know?? The sentence must be rephrased so that it doesn't give the impression that France is a Scandinavian country where even the doorman speaks better English than an average American high school student :)) It was the first time I was reading this article, and it certainly gave me the impression that I was living in a different country.. Baristarim 13:53, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

If you have figures and can make the para more precise, then please rewrite it to give a more correct impression. We can't use ourselves as sources. --Jumbo 14:01, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

despite foreign stereotypes is POV, what is a foreign stereotype? It looks like the article is out to get those ol' fashioned French stereotypes.. The reason why French people don't like to speak a foreign language, or don't bother to learn another one is because it is such a big and great language - if your native language is a language spoken only by 3 million people, you are more likely to learn another language. The same argument is true for the US. But it still doesn't change the fact that the current phrasing seems way too POV.. Many is also a POV word if it is taken out of context - Yes, four million is many, but 4 million out of 60 is few.. BTW, French of immigrant origin don't speak a foreign language, they speak two native languages, maybe this is too technical, but usage of foreign language refers to languages that were learned after childhood, not to languages that were spoken by parents.. A different language would be more appropriate.. In any case, I will dig up some sources.. :)) Baristarim 14:08, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

In an article dealing with France, a reasonable person would take "foreign" to mean "non-French". The phrase "popular stereotype" implies "popular within France", whereas the exact opposite seems to be implied. We really shouldn't leave our meaning open to whatever the reader infers. --Jumbo 14:16, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Coming from English native speakers, who are for most of them English monolinguals, the eternal spread of stereotype of the French who can't speak any other language is close to French-bashing attitude. I'm sorry, but when I was young I has, as everyone of our citizens to learn AT LEAST TWO foreign languages, not even just one. As most of people here I choose Three languages : English, Spanish and Italian. German is often shoosena s second foreign language by a lot of people. The difference we have in this point with the other countries is that we usually don't think that speaking a foreign language means especially speaking English. We don't consider English to be "THE" language, and often we prefer to use French, German or Spanish with international peoples, and not always english. I think this is what upset a lot of English-monoliguals who misinterprets that as "not speaking foreign languages", even if the preson who is labbelled that way can speak fluently two or three other languages than french, if he doesn't use only English, he is labbelled as the "arrogant french who does'nt speak English".

Thanks. I hope I didn't come across as Anglo-centric or anything. My French is very ordinary, but much better than my Italian and German, so if I needed to go to another language once my French ran out, English was really my only other choice! For this article, I think it is important that we look at things from a French person's view in everything but the language we use to write the article. Wikipedia is an international project and writing it as if all the readers are American (or British or whatever) is going to raise the hackles of people in many subtle (and non-subtle) ways.

From the point of view of the French, I am sure that the "foreign stereotype" mentioned above rings very true. --Jumbo 01:57, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

IMHO, Baristarim is a bit pedantic in his interpretation of what speaking a foreign language means, on the other hand the article could be rephrased. The article does not state that most French people are fluent in at least one foreign language which evidently is far from the reality, but it is true that most young people leave secondary education with basic command in at least one foreign language. There is also an attitude issue with most French people who consider that visitor coming to France should make an effort to speak French and not the other way round and therefore gives the impression that they do not speak a foreign language. Blastwizard 10:37, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

More helpful than this rather weasely "people can speak at least one foreign language", we could mention that foreign languages are mandatory in school, and fo how long they are.

last time I was in Paris, I saw a CRS (Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité) talking in English to a tourist who was asking for directions, I was like "wow". But this does not make a statistic. :) Rama 11:51, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

A couple of thoughts here. Firstly, I think it is somewhat misleading to describe people in border regions as speaking "one foreign language." Someone in Roussillon speaking Catalan, or in Alsace speaking German, or in the north speaking Flemish/Dutch, is not speaking a foreign language. These people are genuinely bilingual, and have been learning two languages as essentially "native languages" from childhood (there are probably some old people who do not speak French well or at all, but such people are also not bilingual, in that they don't speak French). On the other hand, I'm not sure what basis there is for arguing with the claim that "many" French people speak a foreign language. I've been living in Paris for the past four months, and here, at least, it's certainly true that "many" people speak English - I'd say that in Paris, a good quarter or so of people, if not more, have at least some command of English. I've no idea about other languages, but one would assume that there's various people also who speak some language other than English. Paris probably has more English-speakers than other parts of France, but even so, what evidence does Baristarim have for his claim that saying that "many" people speak a foreign language is wrong? So far he only has anecdotal claims, which my anecdotal claims, or Rama's, are, I think, sufficient to refute. Beyond that, some statistics would be nice. john k 12:05, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I am not under the impression that people in Alsace are typically French-German bilingual. This used to be often true, under German occupation, but not any more. Rama 11:46, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I was under the impression that most Alsatians spoke Alsatian dialect, if not proper Hochdeutsch. john k 03:39, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Not anymore, especially in cities. Elderly people might often speak it to some extend, but younger people will probably not know more than a few words. But you do find instances of people with awful accents. Rama 14:56, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

ALL French people speak French as there is an official language (this is not Spain). You can't really consider them as foreign languages but as dialects spoken by native tribes. However the country was assembled a bit like the USA (buying and conquering lands decades after decades) with many differents tribes living there in the Gaulish (Pre-France) era. These languages are mostly spoken by old people i think, but all of them speak French. Most of the french are bilingual in the metropolitan territory as well as in the oversea territories (former DOM-TOM now "Outremer"), i can count these dialects in metropolitan territory: Alsatian (must be kind of French-German coming from the French & German common Frank roots), Briton, Catalan (langue d'Oc), Occitan (Langue d'Oc), Basque, Normand ("chti"?). There is a "Langue d'Oil" batch but i don't know much about these dialects. i'm not sure if Corse is a dialect or just an accent (i think its much the latter). And that's all i think. People are not English bilingual though! those who understand english learned it as school as part of the 2 foreign languages education (other common learned foreign languages are German and Spanish). Dead languages are learned too by some (Greek & Latin). There are Creole language in the overseas territories (west indies) and the Cayenne (Central America) French is very odd form! Sounds like primitive French with a very basic syntax, structure is simple and short with missing words. seems like based on concept words rather than a proper syntax, gives something like: "voiture traverser route accident 2 morts" ("car to cross road crash two deads"). there is a such channel on the cable tv and it is subtitled in French!! this is a very strange form. also there must be other dialect in french overseas territory. from north to south, west to east people speak French with a specific accent. An accent can be spoken just in big cities, e.g. there's the Paris accent (sounds awful and snobish, Paris medias use many english words in french sentences to make sounds cool but its sounds stupid, Paris and suburbs considers themselves as the true French, all others are the "provincial" -plu. provinciaux- this is called "Parisianisme"), Marseille accent (sounds funny), Toulouse (sounds ridiculous), Narbonne (same) etc. There's a "Nord" (north) region accent too, sounds cool (Northern French are cool! -I'm from the South-) You also have different mentalities from north to west to south to east. from the inside, i can tell this is actually a very disparate (in the French/Latin meaning) people (as many US don't know) gathered together by one language and money (once the "Franc"), there is no religious link (once it was catholic religion) since 1905 as the state is agnostic (officially "laic") and ruled by king Jacques Chirac or another. Ask any university teacher about it! France still remains a monarchy with no king but a president with king power and privileges who don't ask much about his citizens (subjects). the country is filled with stubborn individualistic rational souls, it's pretty easy to consider anarchy and communism (in the meaning of equality for all) and probably socialism: "all people are good at birth but society rotten them and makes them evil" (this stupid thing was said by Rousseau) are born in France. Leftist people still believe this, still today French have this stupid utopist thought in mind but in the same time they are individualistic and liberals in their everyday practice (modern analysts have pointed this). medias want so much to be independent that they are actually antigovernmental! really! just check some online news channels like "I-Télé" (pro-left who claims to be neutral), "BFM TV" (news) or "LCP" (cool political/social channel). TV medias are largely responsible for public disorder, un-unified spirit and non-patriotic mind (unlike the US & the UK who strongly support their country and army). french tv news are only about bad and sad news, dead dogs news, and national sports results, its like nothing good ever happen in the world. tv medias and teachers (from school to university) are leftists. the people is probably 60% left/far-left and 40% right/far-right... you can't change nothing in a divided country as we're in the mess for decades. i've heard on tv news there's a new desease suffered only by Japanese tourists visiting Paris they get so sad and disapointed by what they experience that they are turning psychos or are coming back to Japan, yes, a brand new mental disease from people desillusioned from what they expect to be a perfect and romantic city as in fictitious works and past centuries. Well, this is big joke, an old rusty castle, i'm still happy to be in though (as most of the French actually are i guess since we have one of the lowest emigration rate), compared to other countries i'll not mention to be polite... hehe. Shame On You 07:45, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

As for the new disease, in fact there are 2 forms and it is not a new thing. The first form happens when people are deceived and the second one happens when they enjoyed too much. This disease doesn't happen just in France. In fact it happens everywhere in the world, especially Paris and Jerusalem. Scientists still don't understand why but it seems these people are just crazy but they were crazy before their holidays. Unfortunaly I don't know the name for this disease.

its called the "tourist disease" i've heard it on i-télé's news (a pro-left channel btw, part of leftist C+ group)

As for the immigration rates, I have to say we have one of the highest in the world. The highest in Europe, far higher than UK. It is easy to check it, go and see the figures to the OECD factbooks.

I said EMIGRATION stupid cunt, the french leaving france not the foreigners coming to france. please don't post next time you'll save my time. Shame On You 17:55, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

My mistake, it happens...

it happens for the second time you mean, prior "UTC" and now about this. forget about it you are a looser. Shame On You 22:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

As for the french president, he has little to do with a king but I'm sure you were awared about that.

pff what's your age 14? you're still a young grass hopper who have no idea how things work. come back in a few years. the king term, monarchy and privileges were used by my science politics teacher (who pointed out the similiarities with chirac's era and the pre revolution era, i've heard the same view by politics analysts since then) at the university and the castle metaphor was used by Frank Capra in 1943 he was goddam right and it still applies. Shame On You 17:55, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Very funny ! need I remind you the first article of the "code civil". Is it your interpretation of your so called king of France. Let me laugh! It seems you really don't know how the things work my dear french friend. The 80's are finished. Never heard about something called "cohabitation" ? is it something a king can deal with ? not sure, not sure... But I leave you with your myths. 1943 ? I think you are off topic...

i'm not your friend, don't call me like this, never! i have nothing to do with stuff like you (to remain polite). what? i don't know how things work and you will explain it to me? lol. you fool. i am not a green one like you. i saw things you haven't. and you don't even know what "UTC" is and you can't even make the difference between "immigration" and "emigration", and now i get why there are all these "----" everywhere... it is YOU! you who use them instead of the ~~~~ because you don't even know how signing your posts here... LMAO :D SHAME ON YOU!

about languages, the accents are just differents and some are weird, it is true but they are not ridiculous, I guess UTC is a bit condescending. To be honest with you the Frenchies don't speak other languages fluently. English is used a lot in the biggest french cities and in some parts of France such as normandy and french riviera (thanks to tourism). this situation has improved for the last two decades. Our youth go to UK to learn the language but we still are very bad if you compare these people to the total french people. Spanish is easier for the french people. the french people speak (IMO) a better spanish than english. I assume I don't speak a very good english I just hope you have understood my points. See you. (caseras)

french people speaking english in big cities? i'm currently in one of the biggest cities in the country and people speak in french (with the occasional arab dialects spoken in the streets) no one speak english outhere but the english. The French learning Spanish in mass? do you think the people in paris, brest, lille, or strasbourg care about spanish? young fool! they learn german! spanish is studied in south west by provinces bordering spain just in case of trade with spain. (by the way "Normand" is part of the Langues d'Oil i was talking about earlier). sure we have understood your point: you're green and naive and need to learn much at university and to meet adult people from outside your village. well don't make me waste my f****ing time next time. Shame On You 17:55, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Tu racontes n'importe quoi ! mais vraiment c'est hallucinant! les francais apprenent l'allemand ? mais d'ou tu sors un truc pareil toi ? tout prouves le contraire. Renseigne toi auprès de l'éducation nationale pour savoir combien de gens dans notre pays apprennent l'allemand plutôt que l'espagnol.

les français parlent espagnol? c'est toi qui es à l'ouest complet. pour quoi faire l'espagnol a part pour aller vendre des clopes détaxées à andorre... :D ne me fait pas rire! d'ailleurs les jeunes se mettent au chinois maintenant. et on les comprend. Shame On You 22:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

You are completly daft my friend, the french don't learn the german language anymore but they often very often choose spanish as the third language after english of course. And when I say it is easier to learn spanish than english I'm sure you can go against that, it is an obvious fact. If they don't choose german anymore the reason is simple, the german speak a very very good english the most of the time. So tell me why the french would learn this hard language whereas the germans speak english ? you are very far from the reality in fact. In another word you're wrong. BTW Do you work ? When I said in the biggest cities the french speak english, it is of course, not in their lifes, they speak french ! but it doesn't change you will always find some people, in hotels, restaurants or any kind of places whose welcome people, an english speaker. No ? are you fool or what ? How do we make buisness ? in french ? lol you really make me laugh, you tell me to growth let me tell you that the world have a little bit moved since 1960. :-)

in your dream! spanish is useless. who cares about spanish when you have the german market as the 1st euro power. pff! and for the 2nd time don't call me your friend, you have not such people outhere. most of the french people are lame at english even after having class during high school and stuff. in restaurant people don't speak in english they speak french, same in hotels, you have never been in such places or you are just stupid. and i think you are both. why do you know about the 60s you don't even get a damn thing about the 00s. Shame On You 22:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

My village is Rouen half a million :-) and about 100 kilometers (maybe less) from paris, so it is time for you to go out from your village, turn off the TV and hang around in a city and find a work and maybe, one day, I say maybe, you will be aware about the things I explain here. Well maybe I won't spend my time with you anymore. Let me tell you that you username fits you very well :-) caseras

you're such a trouducul, my "village" is x4 the size of your own town kid! :D get a life pauvre cave you are a looser for life. wikipedia doesn't need trollers like you. Shame On You 22:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to have to ask both of you to calm down and continue your arguments somewhere else. I'm also warning you for personal attacks. This page is for discussing changes to the article (preferably in english), not for anyhting else. yandman 14:50, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

alright dude, but this grass hopper can't handle english this is why he started to speak in french. he don't get a damn thing but claims he can teach me how things works, see he started to call me "UTC" as he thought it was my name... what can i do with people like him? nothing i guess, there's nothing to do anymore. Shame On You 22:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

My two pennies in this debate. Due to school system, you learn at least 2 languages (some exception though) in France. Although most people choose English (sorry I don't have any figure) as a first language, many go for different ones: Italian, Spanish, Russian, etc. but it depends a lot of what the school in your place is offering which can greatly vary. Now, there is one aspect (and it was applicable to many of my school mate), French is a latin language such as the Spanish or Italian one, therefore those last two are much easier to learn. Whereas, one could choose to start with English and later add Italian, when one is in age to go to university, one might be more fluent in the latest. As for why French do not speak foreign language when a foreigner comes in? If you do travel, there are a lot of countries where you seem to encounter the same problem. So I don't think it is something to be notice about France in particular or about any country. This is just a fact that we are living in a World made of many history, dialect, etc. and we have to live with this cultural differences, which might make travelling more difficult, but it is the spice in your plate ;-) Huygens 25 01:11, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi everybody, I'm a french guy so i will try to answer. In our contry we have to learn 1 or two different language (sometimes 3). For example now i am learning english and german (because i live near germany) and i learnt italian and spanish. In france it's very important to know other language. I hope I help you! A french guy. 06 april 2007

Europe map

I find the map image somewhat misrepresentative, perhaps an equal-area map projection would be better? Naphra 14:31, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Size

France fits into Canada 18 times, not 13 times. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Aronlevin (talk • contribs) .

If considering Metropolitan France then it is 18 times, if it is Metropolitan France and the overseas territories and dependencies it is then 14.79 times. I just worked that out from the comparison of land areas indicated in the infoboxes. Now, why doing this comparison and is it of any interest, why not comparing the size of France with the size of Russia, China or Monaco ? Blastwizard 09:59, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

So 13 is wrong either way. It should be changed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Aronlevin (talk • contribs) .

You missed the point of my comment, why do you compare the size of France with that of Canada ? I don't think it is useful at all, if people want to compare size of countries they can work it out themselves. Or if you want, I can make a beautiful triangular matrix of the ratio of all the countries against all other. I doubt anyone is interested.Blastwizard 00:52, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

I understand what you're saying, and it's a good point. But you seem to be missing my point, also. The currently posted size comparison to Canada is wrong, and it should be removed or changed. Why leave up obviously inaccurate information? Later, folks. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Aronlevin (talk • contribs) .

to little info

I`m a middle school kid doing a report 4 my school & I LOVE this site<but I couldin`t find enouf info on france so plz inprove this section. (:

Is there any specific information you want? If so, just ask here. I'm sure many people will come and help you.UberCryxic 16:41, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Re Map

The same user who alleges it is "not a standard" in other countries, is the same one who has made it not a standard, by changing all EU countries maps. See contribs. Someone should see to it... •NikoSilver• 14:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The map inserted in this page on 28 October, without due discussion here or elsewhere, does not meet the same standard as for all other Wikipedia country pages. Please comment, if you have the time, at the discussion at [Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries#Location_Maps_for_European_countries--_discussion_continues]. Thanks. JamesAVD 15:55, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Non-standard and potentially POV map should be reverted

The map for this country has recently been changed to a format which is not standard for Wikipedia. Each and every other country identifies that country alone on a contintental or global map; none of them highlight other members of relevant regional blocs or other states which which that country has political or constitutional links. The EU is no different in this respect unless and until it becomes a formal state and replaces all other states which are presently members; the progress and constitutional status of the EU can be properly debated and identified on the page for that organisation; to include other members of the EU on the infobox map for this country is both non-standard and potentially POV.

Please support me in maitaining France's proper map (in Wikipedia standard) until we here have debated and agreed this issue? Who is for changing the map and who against? The onus is on those who would seek to digress from Wiki standard to show why a non-standard and potentially POV map should be used. France deserves no less! JamesAVD 15:28, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

This user has decided to remove references to the EU from the page of every member state. See his talk page for more details. yandman 15:29, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Please do not discuss here, but at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries so a uniform decision can be reached. Kusma (討論) 15:38, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

The users above are seriously misrepresnting my actions. Certain non-standard items have been included in the infoboxes of the pages of some European states. I have removed the undiscussed and unsupported changes and started a discussion here on the best way forward. I have in no way 'removed references to the EU'! The EU is an important part of the activities of the governmenance of many European states, to the benefit of all. That does not mean that an encyclopedia should go around presenting potentially POV information of the constitutional status of the EU in the infoboxes of states which are supposed to be standardised across Wikipedia. I'm interested in what users here feel? Please feel free to comment at any of the various pages Yandman might suggest. JamesAVD 15:52, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

PLEASE DISCUSS THIS AT Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries#Location_Maps_for_European_countries--_discussion_continues as it involves more than just this country.

Thanks, —MJCdetroit 20:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I will restore the standard wikipedia format map. There is no need to highlight the other EU member states. The EU is *not* a country. Depicting it otherwise could amount to POV. I would appreciate if the people who are currently pushing for the alternative map do make the effort to discuss their views on the talk page mentioned above. Regards, Asterion^talk 17:40, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Suggestion

I think that this page should have a seperate article on kinship and family realationships that are shown underneath the "content" section. It would help the reaader to understand. Also, there are some mistakes in "history" talking about the monarchy etc.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.72.117.249 (talk • contribs) .

Update needed

Once again some of the info in this article, like so many others, are quite out of date. Many times I have seen updated information on articles with links from this one that havn't been updated here. If you are going to write/change an article, please make sure the info in the article it links from is also updated. It's often not too much trouble when it informs you when the information was gathered, but more and more often it doesn't.

Ethnic Groups Percentages

I thought it would be helpful to include the percentages of the ethnic groups of France because it never flat-out tells the reader what they are and this information is very useful. Without it, you have do do a lot of math to figure out the percentages. (It just tells the number of people.) I have done the math and here are the percentages:

"French" - 92.07% Immigrant Population - Total 7.93% : Algerian - 1.55% Moroccan - 1.32% Potuguese - 1.28% Italian - 0.77% Spanish - 0.62% Turkish - 0.44% Tunisian - 0.44% German - 0.26% Briton - 0.22% Belgian - 0.22% Polish - 0.22% Vietnamese - 0.16% Senegalese - 0.15% Chinese - 0.15% Malian - 0.13%

Ellasevia 00:40, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

source ? 84.103.217.218 19:29, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Questionable statistics

I have tried to update the section on immigration several times with accurate and reliable statistics based on the findings INED, the French institute of Demographics. I am very concerned about the unreliable numbers given such as the very imaginative 56% of the so called French of foreign origins. There is no evidence to back up that claim that seems pretty unreasonable. The official estimates of the INED put the number of French citizens of at least partly foreign descent at around 6 million, which is 9.6% of France's total population. I also posted the link to the article. I have edited that section several time but someone keeps reverting my articles back to its original form with the same innacurate numbers. Whoever wrote that France has 56% of its population being of foreign origins must either provide evidence of that claim or allows other people like myself to post accurate numbers. Immigration is a sensitive issues for the French and for the Europeans so please it is very serious to keep people well informed and not intoxicate them with untruthful stats like some on the French far right have been doing for the past few years. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Davdaott (talk • contribs) 02:35, 5 December 2006 (UTC).

The fact that only 10 percent of France are foreigners is wrong. It depends on how we define foreigner. Your definition above only includes recent immigrants in France. You are forgetting that there are 5 million Muslims in France[1] alone, almost exclusively North African Arab (8.33%). You are also forgetting that millions of Europeans moved to France. There is an estimated 4 million people in France with some Italian ancestry, more than 1 million Portuguese, and 1 million Spanish, hundreds of thousands of Poles, Germans, Turks, Armenians, Belgians, Russians, and Blacks. It is safe to say that at leat 1/3 of the France population are non-French. - Galati —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Galati (talk • contribs) 16:45, 7 December 2006 (UTC).

I respect your opinion but you have to provide reliable statistics to back it up. I only posted what the INED (the French national institute of Demographics) found in their research based on the 1999 Census conducted by INSEE.

Okay, it is true that INSEE states that only 5 million immigrants live in France (http://www.insee.fr/en/ffc/analyse.asp?theme=2 (Close to 5 million migrants at the end of 2004)). However, if you notice that this was a census done after 1999. Therefore these are recent immigrants and have nothing to do with non-French people. As I wrote above there 4 million Italians, 2 million Iberians, hundreds of thousands of Poles, Russians, and Germans, not to mention, 5 million people alone of Arab/Berber (Muslim) descent. That is more than 20 percent of the countries population right there.

The article is way too fat

And it is way too disorienting. Most of the info on the main needs to be moved to sub-articles like "People of France", "Culture of France" etc. Please see Canada, India and Australia (Featured Articles) for the neccessary structure and conciseness neccessary for country articles to meet encyclopedic criteria. Unfortunately I have no time to get involved in this article, however if regular contributors would help with cutting down the fat and add some references, it could easily be a Featured Article. For example, as a general rule, only the top six-seven languages and ethnic groups are mentioned (always under demographics section, and since France has only one official and domineering language, it should definitely be the case), and that always in a concise manner, and without subsections or graphs or je sais pas quoi, with concise references. That language table needs to be taken out and moved to "Languages of France" article, if there exists one. If it doesn't, it needs to be created.Baristarim 15:25, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

The whole lists are so long and simply confusing, unencyclopedic. Create another article "People of France" and carry all that stuff in there. There is no need to mention 145,000 Chinese for a country with a population of 63million. The correct form is this: "Major ethnic groups include ... (list of six-seven ethnicities)" That's it. Then the article should move on to something else. Then give the "People of France" article as the "main" article under the demographics section.. May I remind that Canada article, the biggest immigration nation per capita, lists only 9 ethnicities in one sentence then moves on to something else? That's why it is FA: it is concise. All those tables should be moved over to other articles. Hopefully I will one day find the time to take a look at this article. Baristarim 21:27, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

GA delisting

In fact it is so bad that I will proceed with the delisting of GA status. The article is not well-written, tons of references are missing, the whole article reads like some common trivia web-site and a poor tourism brochure. The mention of monarchists carrying black armbands on 14th July is so irrelevant and out of context that it barely deserves to be in History of France sub-article. All those tables need to be taken out, the article needs to be formatted, more and better images added as well as tons more of accessible and strong references. Please see Canada, India and Australia. Article Turkey that has been extensively formatted and extensively rewritten in light of those articles is still waiting its GA review and it cites approximately 70 references.. This article barely cites 15.. There is no place in a GA article a section titled "Misc topics", it can get delisted for that alone. In the culture section I can see no mention of the French literature, cinema or theatre: a simple see also list doesn't cut it, there needs to be a concise overview of the place of French culture in global context. The list of immigrants where it even lists 60000 Malians need to be moved and cut down to one sentence. The sentence "These unexpected results bear great consequences for the future" belongs to a high school student's term paper. The only picture for the economoy section is an A380, and full of anaytical sentences like "As many economists have stressed repeatedly over the years, the main issue with the French economy is not an issue of productivity. In their opinion, it is an issue of structural reforms, in order to increase the size of the working population in the overall population" - this needs to go to Economy article. The point of this article is to give an overview. The history section is like a whole book. "GA" means that the uninformed reader will not have to struggle through reading the article like someone walking in the snow on top of Mount Everest. There are even sub-sections that only contain a "see also:"... Thus the delisting... Baristarim 21:48, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

More suggestions: The structure of the article needs to be revamped: the geography section needs to come later, an etymology section needs to be right after the intro. Demographics section needs to be concise and needs to be reduced to one section without sub-sections, culture sub-sections need to be combined, public health and transport sections don't even belong in there, a "topics in France" template needs to be created (see Turkey, India, Canada articles for ideas), "misc topics" section shouldn't be there as pointed out above, history section should, if possible, be cut down to one global section without sub-sections. Baristarim 22:07, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

"the International Bureau for Weights and Measures in charge of the international metric system." is simply and utterly irrelevant compared to UNESCO and doesn't deserve to be there when there is not even a mention of the French literature in the article. Baristarim 22:08, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Demographics has been chopped. I will continue this later with other sections... --Bob 00:32, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Semi-protected status

I am curious as to why this status has been given to this page. Jackiespeel 18:19, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Constant immature vandalism. --Bob 23:41, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

What is France land area?

CIA Factbook says that France's total area is: 547,030 sq km. But Wikipedia France entry says that it is 674,843 km². I am confused. Becasue if Wikipedia is right then France becomes the second largest country in Europe (after Russia), but if CIA Factbook is right then Ukraine (not France) becomes the second largest country in Europe. I welcome anybody commenting on this. Kazimostak 16:52, 14 December 2006 (UTC) Sharif

The area mentioned as the total in the article includes French Guiana and all the other parts of France outwith Metropolitan France. The CIA factbook excludes all that which is outwith Europe. --Bob 17:12, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Military conscription and Nuclear Weapon

The current (15 Dec 2006) wikipedia article mention that Mr. Chirac abolished military conscription in 1996:

Military age is 17. Since the Algerian War of Independence, conscription has been steadily reduced and was abolished under the presidency of Jacques Chirac in 1996.

I'm pretty sure it was in 2002 instead of 1996, because until my 25th birthday, I had to regularly justify a postponing of my conscription period. Then I got off doing my military service, and I do remember I learned about it in summer of 2002. And if 1996 refers to the presidency period of Mr. Chirac, this is wrong also, as it started in May 1995 Huygens 25 01:35, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

In addition, I am surprised so little was said about France as Nuclear Power. There really are few countries with such a power to be notice. Also, sadly, some citizens around the World will remember the nuclear tests either in Algeria (when it was still a French colony) or in the Pacific, maybe this could be mentioned as well (or perhaps it is just a detail). Huygens 25 01:35, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

It was 2001 (the last lot finished in November to be precise), not 1996, modified accordingly. --Bob 02:58, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

The nuclear tests are definitely a detail, and do not merit to be in this article. There is no need to be politically correct, what is important is how important they are to France. It might be important for Algeria or the Pacific, but it is not for France in context. I am sorry if that offends anyone. Nuclear tests are not the only preoccupation of France, they can be mentioned in other seperate articles. In fact, the mention of the nuclear capability of France should not even pass half a sentence: ex. "... and France has been a declared nuclear weapons state since ...". Please read my notes above, the country articles should stick to a brief overview. Baristarim 11:24, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Agreed with your statement. This is a better approach than what I thougt. Thank you for the clarification Huygens 25 12:47, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Just a suggestion: The easiest way to find extremely reliable sources for general information is to go to BBC News website at news.bbc.co.uk and typing what you are looking for in the search box. BBC articles are very concise and easily accessible. So type in "France" and "conscription" and you will find the exact date along with an extremely reliable source. Just a pointer :) Baristarim 11:36, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip, I will remember it. I did not thought of using a British media to verify the source. But I will remember it for future reference. Huygens 25 12:47, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Abolished is not the good word, adjourned is maybe better but I'm not a good translator(!), the french word is 'suspendu'. The law is not abolished and the President can restore the conscription without a parliament's vote if he consider that the situation need it.

Gavarnie

For the record I added a picture of the Cirque de Gavarnie in the gallerie. As it is a UNESCO world heritage site and a real natural wonder (I may be biased since I live close to it, but as there is a picture of the Riviera and of the Landaise beaches so why not Gavarnie?). Matthieu 14:56, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I actually added two more, because the pictures are aligned 4 by 4 I was a bit annoyed at leaving the last line only half-filled. So I put Carcassonne and Carnac. Matthieu 15:24, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

All of them reverted since they are not relevant to this article and do not fall in the scope of a country article: overview. There shouldn't even be a gallery, and it will be removed soon. Please add that information to the relevant sub-articles. This article should not be some kind of a tourism brochure. See my posts above. Baristarim 15:34, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

No problem, but then please remove them indeed because it is confusing. These sections were not of my fact in the first place. Matthieu 15:42, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I will do the best I can, however I am not a regular contributor to this article. I was asked by someone over e-mail to take a look, so I just got involved three days ago. I tried to restructure a bit per standard. I removed the gallery section all together. However, as much as I live in France and all, I have tons of projects that I am involved in. But I will try to do the best that I can. Don't get me wrong, it was nothing personal - it is just that I am kinda off surprised how this article has degenerated over a period of time (it was GA at one point). There needs to be some iron-fisted cleanup work done :)) Cheers! Baristarim 15:57, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Hey Baristarim, all of this stuff that you took out.....did you actually put it in other daughter articles?UberCryxic 16:29, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

If you look closely, you will see that I only moved the stuff around. I deleted the transport section, but it didn't contain anything in any case :) I also deleted two comparisons from the economy section, however there was not much to be done about moving them either. As for the stuff that was taken out as mentioned above.. I didn't, but I couldn't figure out where it would go either. As for the gallery.. Well, there is not much that can be done about "moving" it. Most of them were present in their respective articles and if they were not, there were alternate pictures. I didn't want to try to find the relevant articles, otherwise the misc topic section would be there. Baristarim 18:52, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

I put the transportation section back and I wrote some stuffs in. I understand there's no point in keeping an empty section but transportations are an important issue for every countries around. So I put it back in with a few stats and an introduction to the various transportations available and future big projects.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by MatthieuN (talk • contribs) 12:52, 24 December 2006 (UTC).

I removed the content and placed in relevant subarticles if appropriate. However, much was duplicated in the subarticles. Other data which I removed was POV and/or confused. I merely did housekeeping and added references. --Bob 19:36, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Image:France Lyon2.jpg

Image:France Lyon2.jpg seems too small, too poor and too watermarked for inclusion in the article. Thoughts? --Guinnog 18:37, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

The Bayonne Cathedral picture should be removed. It's a bit irelevant and that's not even a nice cathedral (nor even remotely important). It's seen it myself and it doesn't worth to be mentioned here, if no one has objections I'll replaced it for a really important one like Chartres, Amiens or Rheims. Matthieu 18:40, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

WP France proposal

Have a look at the Wiki Project France proposal and sound off! Baristarim 05:01, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Transport in France

There has been no(or very little) reference to Transportation in France in this article i think this is something that need improving. L blue l 23:38, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

No, this shouldn't be the roll call of every france related topic :) Subtopics as such should be treated in their respective articles and/or sub articles. The correct solution would be to give a see also in one of the articles listed as main who correspond to the section titles of this article. I apologize that I couldn't write the Law section yet, I will do it soon. Baristarim 09:59, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Acknowledged Nuclear States

I have changed the beginning of the article so that France is named among the five acknowledged nuclear states. There is no acknowledgement of Nuclear Weapon States outside the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). If you say that France simply are among the eight countries that have undertaken nuclear tests you diminish the responsibilities belonging to the NPT (in other words comparing France nuclear arsenal to that of a rogue state: the Peoples Republic of North Korea). That did not seem right. Also, now it matches the UK article, there five is also the number given for nuclear powers. I hope you do not object. Besides, if you do not view NPT as the standard to use for counting nuclear powers eight is somewhat arbitrary as it does not include Israel and a few other states suspected of having nuclear armament (or have the technical capacity). Miyaeymistro 10:53, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Saying that France is one of "only 5" acknowledged nuclear states makes it seem like there are only 5 states that publicly have a nuclear program. Without making it clear that a) this status is bestowed upon by the NPT, and b) that "acknowledged" means something more than everyone knows it, saying France is one of 5 is misleading. As for the importance of belonging to the NPT, while I agree that North Korean nuclear program is not on the same level as the French program, India and Pakistan also are nuclear powers whose nuclear strengths aren't connected to being "acknowledged" by the NPT. As you pointed out, it is pretty arbitrary to then designate 8 nuclear powers as well. Because neither 5 nor 8 accurately depicts the true state of nuclear countries, the whole business of trying to count them is a moot point. I changed the phrase to read that France "is also an acknowledged nuclear power." This conveys the openness and acceptedness of France's nuclear program without getting muddled down with exact arbitrary numbers. Jodan2007 20:44, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Clarification on Occitania requested: Vandalism or Classification sharpening?

A large number of articles on French personalities have been edited to include "<region>, Occitania," as part of the place of birth. My understanding is that Occitania is not an administrative division of France. For example, Georges Pompidou curently states: "He was born in Montboudif, Cantal, Auvergne, Occitania, France. "

• This contrast sharply with the same arcicle in the French wiki: " né le 5 juillet 1911 à Montboudif (Cantal), "

my understanding is that the French usage is to indicate the Département where the person was born. Not even the French administrative region

• I would expect persons that are on the Category:Occitan personnalities category to actually be native Occitan speakers. Not just born is the general area
• There is no corresponing categories or extensive mention of occitan as are of birth in the french wiki
• French wiki Occitan is currently semi protected because of vandalism, can a francophone take a look a the discusion page and clarify?

Let me know if there is a beter place to discuss this. Thanks,

--JuanPDP 06:22, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Over promotion of Ocitania from pro-Occitania users. These should be modified accordingly, ie the mention of Occitania removed. They are promoting the position of Occitania (and Arpitany) above that which it ever had - Occitania has been divided between the various counts etc since the 5th century, and then divided into departments and regions, which should be the official designations used in the Wiki. Most of these additions have been carried out by the anon. IP 81.67.178.49 and User:Évangéline --Bob 18:07, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Occitania should be removed from the places of birth, because it means nothing like this. Occitania is about culture, not geography nor administrative divisions. This is comming from someone who was born in Toulouse and is of a Gascon family. I think that Bob (Grcampbell who wrote just over me) makes a weak case here though. His point that Occitania was divided between Counts and Dukes is egualy true for everyone in France, starting by the Langue d'oil area itself. That's not a valid statement, the correct point being that Occitania is not an administrative division like France as a whole is. But, for example, using terms like Auvergne, Languedoc, Midi-Pyrénées or Aquitaine (depending of the era they can be regions or provinces) are correct instead of Occitania

Matthieu 13:53, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Foreign relations and EU

I am the one who added the section about the "conservative perspective", but someone added Britain, Italy and Germany in this. So I am putting it back only to France because the article here is just about France. Beside of this I somehow doubt it is seen, even from conservatives, that UK is trying to build an antogonistic EU to the USA. Finally the source I used is Schnabel, the former US embassador to the EU (therefore a decent source) and he only mentions France in this context so I don't him to be associated with ideas he didn't back Matthieu 14:35, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

That paragraph was atrocious and was deleted. The American conservative perspective in this context is too heavily biased to just insert as fact. Furthermore, the foreign relations of France and any other country should be analyzed in accordance with a wide array of prominent viewpoints and ideas, not just those emanating from one side.UberCryxic 22:24, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I can understand it is biased, though the source being the former Republican ambassador to the EU it is therefore representative on an influencial political current, but if you disagree then so be it. Matthieu 13:30, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Frangleterre

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6261885.stm BBC (january 15 2007), see also commonwealth/entente cordiale talk pages. Cliché Online 07:48, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

rank s

i'm sorry to admit but basically this article is a worthless piece of shit. no offense people but this is how it feels really. Cliché Online 15:58, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

light edits trying to get french soon-featured article's standard. Cliché Online 18:22, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

history is too short

the XXth century episode's decades are way too long compared to feudal age, the golden age under Louis XIV, the hundred wars where the french led by joan of arc kicked the british asses, the french involvment in the conquest of england at hastings, napoleon bonaparte's empire, etc. the decolonization episode is way too long and there is no mention about the conquest but the independence wars, you call it neutrality? nothing about the french involvment in the united states against the british, lafayette et ali. as a comparison the french article's history section is much more detailed and complete but i don't know if the linked articles about the different republics, empires, kingdoms are available in english yet. Cliché Online 19:45, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

I think it's a bit short too Matthieu 14:53, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

health

I'm trying to find, for a long time, how important this sentence is: France, as all EU countries, is under an EU directive to reduce sewage discharge to sensitive areas. As of 2006, France is only 40 per cent in compliance with this directive, placing it as one of the lowest achieving countries within the EU with regard to this wastewater treatment standard[4].

Although I can understand it should be mentioned in a specific topic on water health, I somehow doubt it is important enough to be mentioned here on this page. Matthieu 13:36, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

EU map

The EU map showing, on this page, France highlighted, is now in use on every single EU page apart from, you've guessed it - the United Kingdom! It was there, but User:TharkunColl persists in removing it, even breaking 3RR. I would be grateful if editors interested in the EU pages could go along and fix it as I will myself be in breach if I do again. Thanks for any help! MarkThomas 19:31, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

what's wrong with TharkunColl? he doesn't like europe? Cliché Online 18:36, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

plainly not true, a little higher there was no consensus and nothing has changed since, also in Luxembourg, NEtherland and Belgium articles the current is against the new maps. Just changing them all in one go is NOT an argument Arnoutf 14:09, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I am myself doubtful of the point of putting the EU on this article's map. We're talking of the French republic here. Matthieu 14:55, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Matthieu. —MJCdetroit 18:04, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

So do I. There is a map with just France highlighted (in the same style as the EU map) on wikicommons. However, the whole series may be up for deletion as the copyright tags are restrictive and contrary to commons. Another point, on that map it uses the Mercator projection making Sweden look very much bigger than France - clearly not the case. --Bob 18:13, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Please refer to Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Countries#A_short_overview_of_the_story--Asterion^talk 17:35, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

In response to Bob, could you provide the name of a projection where all European States will be all proportional? I would be interested to hear about it. --Huygens 25 15:51, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Matthieu, MJCdetroit, and Bob. This article is about the French Republic, not Europe. What's more, the map failed to show overseas France which is an integral part of the French Republic. It is disrespectful for the 2.5 million French citizens who live in overseas France and who represent 4% of the total population of the French Republic. That's why I have replaced the map with a map found on the French Wikipedia which shows the entire territory of the French Republic (although the so-called Iles Eparses in the Indian Ocean as well as the island of Futuna are missing, but I guess for such a small resolution map it doesn't make a big difference). Godefroy 00:27, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

I do agree with Wikipedia policy to be bold, but that was perhaps a bit too bold ;-) The map you put is already shown in the article in the Geography section. I think that the previous map was showing where the French Republic was within Europe, just like most European countries in Wikipedia. Also you should read before doing such change the discussion that Asterion as pointed out. I mean reading it all. There was a consensus (I mean a majority) that voted for using the new PNG images (just like it is already the case in many other Wikipedias, like the French or German ones). However, it seems that the one analysing the pole was not happy with the result and concluded that there was no consensus x-(. Furthermore, the complete possessions of France and its main territory are usually refer to The French Republic and Overseas Territory. So I do not mind seeing just a map of France (metropolis). I'm undoing your modification. First, we should try that everyone find a common ground, and then we take action. As for the image licence, I think the problem is now solved. --Huygens 25 15:39, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Godefroy, I have check, at the time of writing, United Kingdom, The Netherlands and Belgium have also this map of Europe with the EU highlighted (I did not modify anything on these pages). So please do not change it back to something else, it should be consistent with other articles. Try to get first an agreement if you really disagree. But I think that there is much more to bring to this article than losing time again and again on such a topic. --Huygens 25 15:55, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

You should notice that there is also the same map but without the EU highlighted. In my opinion, France is part of the EU, and this ought to be shown, whether you are for EU or not. On this topic, do not try to guess if I am for EU or not, because either answer would be wrong. But, France is part of EU, this is a fact, so it ought to be displayed. --Huygens 25 15:51, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

The overseas départements and territories are fully part of the French Republic. To not show them is like having a map of the USA not showing Hawaii or Alaska. Even INSEE is now including the population of overseas France in its total population of France, after people in overseas France complained that they were treated as 2nd class citizens. Why would Wikipedia still be treating them as 2nd class citizens, as if they were not part of France? As I understand feelings about this EU map are running high (cf. the controversy and reverts in the UK article), I have left it in the infobox but I have also added the map showing the entire territory of the French Republic. There are now two maps which should make everybody happy. Godefroy 02:47, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Sounds fair enough :-) --Huygens 25 23:30, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

This map is absolutly horrible, better not to show any map than removing the oversea departments from it. That's just unacceptable. Matthieu 07:08, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Continuded Interview

Me: Now in our last Interview (Titled "Interview") you interviewed me, now I'm going to interviw you.

Me: You got to go to France, now, would you visit Paris?(Your dad said that you would have to pay $200 dollars if you went to Paris, but if you went anywhere else in France, and didn't go to Paris, YOU would get $200, since Paris is so expensive.)

You: I would go some place else...there are so many places in France...and SO many places are SO beautiful!!!

Me: Okay...so you don't get to visit Paris. Where to now?

You: I would either go to Rome or Italy. Italy for the food. Rome for the sites.

Me: Good pick...what food would you eat in Italy?

You: All the food I could find.

Me: What sites would you visit in Rome?

You: Everything I COULD see...DUH!!!

Me: Thanks for reading our interview...I hope you can check out our other interview!(Titled: Interview) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.0.139.126 (talk) 02:50, 18 February 2007 (UTC).

Location maps available for infoboxes of European countries

This is quite a short notice :( as the poll is closing tomorrow... Why such a hurry? --Huygens 25 10:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

The outcome of the survey cannot offer a perfect solution, which is why it is given a short run-time. The reason for a very short notice here is more complex: the maps are available for Europe and as such it concerns mainly European countries, but also readers from other countries have some interest as the questions ask what to do if maps for those might become available and some prefer an identical style for all countries; notifying all countries of the world would be rather time-consuming and might not be fair towards the question on indicating the European Union (not their concern and thus not very likely to be considered or supported). Thus the survey was given sufficient time after calling in people that had been involved in the previous poll and discussions. But as the number of votes remained under what some may consider a decent treshold for drawing conclusions, addressing the population of European countries including several at Europe's periphery, may deliver a sufficient number of varied responses: the larger part of reactions usually follows shortly after people being called. — SomeHuman 19 Feb 2007 22:40 (UTC)

France economy and Airbus industry

Lear21 removed the picture of Airbus in section Economy because Airbus is not a French company but "European". This is a fact, but I do not think that if a picture of an Airbus in Toulouse in the economy part of France means that Airbus is 100% French. This article shortly speaks about Airbus, and thus the photograph is relevant. One should notice that this same photograph can be also used in other articles related to Airbus (incl. Airbus, UK, Germany, Spain, etc. articles). Furthermore, France has a significant history in avionic it is worth noticing it, and this picture of the A380 is a good illustration. I hope that you're going to discuss your point of view here before removing it again. --Huygens 25 16:37, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Airbus is an explicitly European company. Having the A380 image in economy section implies that it is a unique French product. Thats not accurate and misleading. Lear 21 11:38, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, it is based in Toulouse, and it is by law a french company (it's a "Société a Actions Simplifiées", I think). Even if it wasn't, it's still a sign of French Industry, wouldn't you say? yandman 11:53, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Without massive involvement of three other major countries Airbus wouldnt exist at all. Factories in multiple other cities contribute to Airbus products other than Toulouse. Lear 21 12:27, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

So? Who said it has to be 100% french to be mentioned? It just has to be important to France. And Airbus is one of the major players in the french economy. yandman 12:46, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Toulouse was only the assembly place of the A380, we all know that. But as such, it can figure in the economy of France. Toulouse rely heavily on the economy brought by Airbus! This is an important part of France economy, and of other European economy, and should be mentioned in all involved parties. --Huygens 25 16:33, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

To Lear21, I do not like your idea of talking, you change things and then argue that you are in your own right. This should be done the other way around, first you argue, then we find a common ground and finally we act! Then stating "Having the A380 image in economy section implies that it is a unique French product" is simply wrong! Did you read what I wrote just before. Instead of saying such a statement with out explaining why it is so, is not arguing but imposing. As you might have read, I said the opposite of you, but I started my sentence with "I think". Much different! So please, be open mind and we start the discussion. So the point is, I gave you my arguments, could you bring counter argument and argument as well. Statement like your are not argument because they do not rely on any demonstration, you just in a way say "it is like that. period" The article mention Airbus and states clearly that it is a European consortium where France plays a role in it. So why not an illustration of the Airbus industry facility that France has in its economy section? The other country (that I have already mention) can do that too. Germany could have a picture of the Airbus installation in Hambourg, or the flight of the A380 over Hambourg. This is relevant to the article. So please, I am going to restore the article before you came in, and get a consensus first before enacting! You should notice that I am defending the work done and acknowledge by other. I did not put this picture myself. So first we talk and get an agreement, and then we modify. --Huygens 25 16:33, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Just browse through other articles related to Airbus, and I found this in the article about Hambourg:

"Hamburg follows third after Seattle and Toulouse in the list of the most important locations of the civil aerospace industry worldwide."

It seems that Toulouse is the second most important location worldwide. So mentioning it within the economy of France is relevant. And illustrating it with a picture seems a logical next step. --Huygens 25 16:51, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

This is the article about France. Airbus Industries is neither founded nor seated exclusively in France. The A 380 image is suggesting just that, and its wrong. Lear 21 17:20, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Please, are you really Lear21? Because I would expect a much better argumentation from someone starting a Phd in political science... I will report my worries to the user talk page to clarify this. Could you say why the A380 picture suggests just that? You still throwing this fact with out backing it up! Anyway, if this was true, I would agree with you that this picture should not be displayed, however I think not. And as for you two first sentences, I already just say it twice in my own comments. So why 'o why do you argue with this. I agree (and I would be fool not to) that Airbus is part of the EADS pan-European corporation. As such, any image or related information to Airbus can be found in pages related to Airbus, EADS or its founding states. For example, one of the most famous painting of Le Louvre is Mona Lisa. If this article about France would mention Le Louvre, I would not be surprised that it talks about Mona Lisa and that a picture of it is displayed too. And of course, this does not mean that Mona Lisa is a French painting (btw it is Italian, made by Da Vinci). In addition, on this article about France, there is a painting from John Trumbull of the American revolution, a satellite picture of France made by NASA satellite Terra, a picture of the Tour de France in a German part (Bad Herrenalb) (sic.) and a painting from Dutch painter Frans Hals of Descartes, why not arguing about them too? If you go to the French version of this article you even find a picture of Concorde aircraft and the Spanish one displays Ariane. Btw, in the article on Paris, there is a picture of Mona Lisa, does this means that it was 100% made by a Parisian painter? --Huygens 25 18:13, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

The combined amount of involvement (research/manufacturing/subsidy/location) is not significantly enough to call it French or to display it in French economy. Put in L´Oreal, TGV or Renault. Lear 21 18:49, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I think this is where the misunderstanding is. Could you in details show where it is stated that Airbus is French. Basically, France has 33% interest in EADS which in returns has at least 80% of Airbus. Airbus head quarters are in Toulouse, the assembly of the A380 was done in Toulouse. Toulouse, because of Airbus, is the second world location in terms of civil aerospace industry. Now, I am not saying that Airbus is French nor does the article. But Airbus has a major installation in France (39% of Airbus workforce, about the same as Hambourg). According to Forbes, Airbus is going to base the production of the A350 and A380 in Toulouse. Therefore it is significant enough to be mentioned and illustrated in the economy part of France. What would be "significantly enough" for you then? In addition, you did not object to half of my argument, do you agree with them then? --Huygens 25 19:29, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

To summarise, the question we have to ask ourselves before inserting the image is not "Is France important to Airbus?", but "Is Airbus important to France?". And to the latter I'd say yes. yandman 20:26, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

@User:Huygens You stated it correctly... 39% workforce, and most of A380 manufacturing is outside Toulouse. That is almost two third non-French involvement. Other companies and products have certainly more French input. @User:Yandman I would assume that Microsoft-France or McDonalds have also importance to France. Please start inserting other representive images. The A380 is not suitable. Lear 21 20:49, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

In this age of globalization, almost any large industrial project is some sort of cross-national undertaking, so your argument is not valid I think. Airbus is incorporated and headquartered in France, its largest assembly plants are in Toulouse, France, and it plays a big role for the French economy (exports in particular). Furthermore, the picture was taken at the A380 reveal event which took place on French soil, in Toulouse, so it seems perfectly legitimate to have this picture in a section about the French economy. Godefroy 14:42, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Lear, I have been honest by giving all information. You are dishonest by retaining only the one you like and by being vague ("most of A380 manufacturing is outside Toulouse" you said, then I ask you how much?). Please, act and think as a responsible person. Stop playing the politician (in the bad meaning)! --Huygens 25 20:37, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

How can you said "most of A380 manufacturing is outside Toulouse" when I said "According to Forbes, Airbus is going to base the production of the A350 and A380 in Toulouse." This is in contradiction. And furthermore, read what Godefroy wrote, it is interesting --Huygens 25 20:37, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Lear, you're stating "Other companies and products have certainly more French input". So you mean that a picture needs to have a major input from French things to be put in a French article? If this is so, why do you accept that a painting of Mona Lisa is on the article about Paris? It was 100% italian made! Why do you accept on the article about France the painting of Descartes? It was 100% Dutch made! Please reply to this and the 3 previous posts! Don't ignore them. --Huygens 25 20:48, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

To be quite honest why would an Airbus A380 would be picked to represent the French economy? I don't quite see the relation, AXA or Total logos would be more appropriate to be quite honest. I suggest to only keep the La Defense picture. Matthieu 16:37, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

And why wouldn't it be picked? Judging from the news in recent days, Airbus is certainly at the center of the French economic debate. Besides, the event pictured took place in Toulouse. A French city you know... Godefroy 19:51, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I was born in Toulouse you know... but if the Airbus is part of the European actuality (not just French), why would it picked? Don't answer me "why wouldn't it be picked?" because a picture is put on a page because it is picked and not because of the lack of counter-reasons. Matthieu 11:38, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Sorry Matthieu, my answer won't please you, but you should read all the posts I have been writing. They are quite lengthy I know, but they answer your question and I don't want to repeat myself yet again. So please instead of coming fresh to the discussion, try to argue on the already proposed and numerous arguments if you disagree. I hope I am not too rude ;-) that is not my point, but I'm starting to get tired of justifying again and again the point. I hope you will understand --Huygens 25 10:45, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

I believe you are being more rude than you mean. I've re-read your comments here and you use the verd "to argue" in place of "to discuss". I assume this comes from the French verbs "argumenter" but in English "to argue" involves a more conflictual way of debating than it does in French. Just check Princeton Wordnet to see that: "contention", "disputation" and "disacceptation". "To fence" (from fencing, "escrime" in French) is even given as a synonim of "to argue". Of course it's not a big difference from our perspective but I can assure you your posts come arsher than you mean them here and that may be (in my opinion it is) a cause of tension in the answers you got as when you say "we should argue before editing" people may read you want some heated debate. On the point itself, as important as your answer is the point in essence does not seem answered. I ask: "why picking the Airbus A380 to represent the French industry?" and you say because "Toulouse's second city about areospace industry", to this I can answer why then areospace industry? Toulouse is an important city but it's only 4th in France (counting in urban area). There are other sources of wealth in France, Lorient and DCN are important dockyards as they built the Queen Mary II and got 2 orders on 4 hugh packet boats (maybe 5 as there is an option on one, and 2 or 3 of them would be bigger than Queen Mary II). Loreal's stock are highly rated and gets benefit from emerging asian markets etc... In a page that already has a lot of pictures we need to only go to the most relevant ones and to me the most relevant one for the French economy is La Defense's. I also removed the picture of the Millau Viaduct in the Infrastructure section and the Mirage 2000N in the military one just to keep the Charles de Gaulle and the TGV, although I love the Millau Viaduct (I'm in Millau right now) the TGV is just much more representative of transports in France. Matthieu 20:39, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the English lesson ;-) I was, as you guessed, meaning "argumenter" (except on one post). But I will have to find a better word than discuss which in my opinion is too "light" to represent the "argumentation" concept. As for the relevance or not. I only said that this picture is relevant in this article because Toulouse is an important aerospace centre worldwide. I did not say that this picture is the most relevant one could find for this section. If you find one better, I would not object changing it, especially because I probably won't be able to judge if it is more or less pertinent, so I will trust you. However, my "argumentation" was against the fact to simply remove the picture on the basis that this is not relevant to the French economy. I hope we understand each other better. --Huygens 25 20:23, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

"To discuss" in English means more than "discuter" in French but as you want, maybe "to debate" is what you're looking for :). Matthieu 08:24, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Matthieu, why would La Défense be more relevant for the French economy section than Airbus? La Défense is just the business district of Paris after all, it is not the business district of France. A very Paris-centered vision of France you seem to have... Godefroy 02:01, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

La Defense isn't in Paris, that's for the technical detail. There are many important French company based in La Defense such as AXA, GAN, Areva, EDF, Société Générale (and it's possible to see nearly all of them in a single good shot) and overall it's just the economic hard-core of the French economy. Toulouse isn't. I'm not overly pro-parisian, I'm not even Parisian, but let's not because the opposite extreme, La Defense's role in the French economy as the epicenter can't be denied IMO. Matthieu 08:24, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

AXA, Areva, EDF, and Société Générale are not "based" in La Défense. AXA and EDF's headquarters are in the 8th arrondissement of Paris. Société Générale and AREVA's headquarters are in the 9th arrondissement of Paris. As for Gan, FYI it is not an independent company anymore. It was bought by Groupama in 1997, and Groupama's headquarters are in the 8th arrondissement of Paris. Keizuko 01:34, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Since when is Airbus French? UK,Germany,France,Spain and others make it European! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lear 21 (talk • contribs)

Sigh. Nobody cares about the "Frenchness" of Airbus. The pic was included because of the "Airbusness" of France. There's an A380 that was put because Airbus was deemed important for the economy of France. You object because you don't deem France important for the economy of Airbus. Your complaints are therefore off-topic and irrelevant.

That isn't to say that there couldn't be other images just as valid as that plane, just that your opposition to it is illegitimate. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.56.205.99 (talk) 22:34, 18 March 2007 (UTC).

I've requested unprotection

I don't edit this article frequently(mostly just to revert vandalism), but it is on my watchlist and has been semi-protected for several months now, and I've grown seriously concerned about the legitimate edits that could be missing from this article because it denies anonymous users. A good 40% of new information brought into wikipedia(by one metric, and sample set. I'll get a link to the data if it becomes relevant) is by anonymous users. Blocking all of them from editing the article because some are nationalistic idiots is not in the spirit of an encyclopedia anyone can edit. I've put in a request at pages for protection for the semi-protection to be removed already. i kan reed 20:01, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Your metric may be right overall, but it looks like this article is a magnet for idiots and gets mostly vandalism when not semi-protected. Proof is, that since the removal of semi-protection this article has been overwhelmed by vandalism. I would argue that semi-protection is a good incentive for people who genuinely want to contribute, to create an account. In regards to this article, the legitimate anonymous edit are in great minority compared to vandalism, you are assuming that the probability of vandalism is the same for all articles in wikipedia, but is actually skewed by the nature of the content. A proper statistical analysis of vandalism would be a very interesting study. Blastwizard 07:47, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm for leaving it closed Matthieu 08:24, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Just some statistics Wikipedia talk:Don't protect Main Page featured articles/December Main Page FA analysis. Blastwizard 21:41, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Country calling code(s)

I have added the country calling codes for each of the overseas départements/régions as well as the territories, as some users insist on using the French region infobox, which makes no provision for this, nor for different time zones. I know that the constitutional status of the overseas départements/régions is identical to that of the metropolitan ones, but there are peculiarities, like different country calling codes and time zones, which should be mentioned. Can you call Réunion using the +33 code? No. The code is +262, allocated by the International Telecommunication Union, and this should be clearly stated. Not even the French regulator is proposing using the +33 code[2], at least for now, so why should people try and suppress this information? Quiensabe 17:01, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Changes by user Lord Vader to the infobox

User:Lord Vader has recently added 11 dates in the country infobox in the "Formation" section. Yes, you're not dreaming, 11 dates! I removed these and left the only two dates that the infobox contained before his edits (843 and 1958) and asked him to open a discussion on the talk page here and reach consensus before bloating the infobox with his 11 dates. Unfortunately, this user not only did not open a discussion here, but he's also apparently willing to engage in an edit war to maintain his 11 dates. So I'm opening the discussion here. Do you guys think these 11 dates make any sense at all? The French infobox is already quite long due to the dual nature of the country (metropolitan France vs. whole Republic), and now with these dates the infobox is getting even longer. Not only that, but these dates, which list all French constitutions, are quite useless. The section is about the formation of the country, not about each and every consitution and regime the country has had. Mr. Lord Vader even added a formation date for Celtic Gaul which he places at 1200 BC !! Not 1199 BC, not 1201 BC, but 1200 BC ! Nice orignal research isn't it? And what relevance does it have to modern France? Last but not least, I don't know if Lord Vader realizes that adding 11 dates and thus getting to a total of 13 dates (!) for the formation of France is totally conter-productive. It doesn't inform people better, it simply drowns them in a sea of figures. Comments from other users would be appreciated. Godefroy 18:35, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

On a funny side note, Mr. Lord Vader forgot the Constitution of 1791 which established the short lived constitutional monarchy, the Constitution of 1795 which established the Directory, and the Constitution of 1799 which established the Consulate. So I guess we could even reach 16 dates for this very special "formation" of France. Lol. Godefroy 18:41, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Less is more! I'd even get rid of the Accession to the EU date, but that might cause world war III. —MJCdetroit 11:48, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Contrast and Diversity

I'm not so pleased with that section. Does anyone else think it should be divided into several already present sections? Matthieu 08:06, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Since no one answered me I removed the "contrast and diversity" subsection. There also were a lot of unbacked claims which, although may be true (yet I always figured Europe's highest point was in the Ural) needed backing and, most importantly, to be put in their relevant section. Matthieu 08:59, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Politic

"French politics are characterised by two politically opposed groupings: one left-wing, centred around the French Socialist Party, and the other right-wing, centred around the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR) and its successor the Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (UMP). The executive branch is currently composed entirely of the UMP."

I think that's really a short paragraph, to explain the french political area.

Indeed, there are almost 5 main kind of groups : the Right-Wing (UMP), the Socialist Party (PS), the Centrist (UDF), (all these 3 groups are each folowed by more than 20% of population) ; the extreme-right (FN), and the minorities like ecologic group or extreme-left.

I don't develop more, that's just to point that political area is not as manichean as this paragraph seems to say. Aquila4 00:37, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

20% for the UDF is a gross overstatement. You are referring to high estimations of voting intentions for Bayrou. This is different from people in the general public who identify with the UDF.

The PS-UMP figure is quite accurate in terms of representatives at the parliement, they are the only parties to have three-digit figures for their number of seats. Rama 07:07, 6 April 2007 (UTC)