Talk:Seán Russell

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I am very concerned that my fellow Irishmen are engaging in something of a "soft soap" regarding both Sean Russell and the Irish Free State's engagements with Nazism.

The fact is that the overwhelming majority of people in the IFS were indifferent to the world war, and only such indifference could explain how a statue of a Nazi factotum such as Russell would remain in a European capital city for almost 55 years without controversy. To use the term "naive" is POV, and an offensive one at that to those many millions who suffered so horrifically during those benighted years.

Some of the words above are very similar to those on Russell's page, and in the hopes of averting a revert war, I am anxiously soliciting opinions from the wider Wikipedia community regarding this matter.

Please respond at your earliest convenience.

Thanks!!

Brandubh Blathmac 03:19, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

  • I'm very concerned you're yet another sockpupper of Robert Siegel (see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Rms125a@hotmail.com) just spreading your sectarian POV about the place. Please respond at your earliest convenience! - Ali-oops✍ 07:29, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
  • Revision as of 12:39, 27 April 2006

Dont see why the change from "King of England" to "British King" was made. The wikipedia entry has George VI in 1937-1940 as: "King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the British dominions beyond the seas, Emperor of India and King of Ireland."

I've never heard the phrase 'British King'. Changing it to 'British Monarch' or 'King of the Britons' doesn't make sense either; its not how Americans phrase it, even if they are Congressmen.

I got the anecdote from Enno Stephan's book. I think I will quote what he has to say. Fluffy999 06:44, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] King

I'm going to deal with this silly issue once and for all as it seems to be clouding User:Fluffy999's ability to think straight and is keeping him awake at night.

Quote Fluffy999: "When he introduces a phrase like "King of Britain" into an article the onus is on him to explain it."

First of all. I did not use the term "King of Britain". I substituted a reference to George VI from King of England to British King. Why? the king in question's full and correct title is King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. There has not been a King of England since 1707.

The reason I choose British king is that the term is commonly used for British monarches. Just as we refer to the British queen, we can also refer to the British king. English is far too narrow a term for an encylopaedia - Tony Blair would never be referred to as the prime minister of England, but British prime minister is most commonplace. Providing the full UK title is too cumbersome and is avoided on Wikipedia as elsewhere. The adjective British is the most commonly used term used to denote the prominent personalities from that state. English is not.

Fluffy999's reference to a king of England in this context is simply sloppy, just as his references to the "Treaty of 1922" and the "Irish Free State" after the years 1937 are.

Fluffy - whose first edit to Wikipedia was to tell us that the "United Kingdom [was] not in existence" in 1916"[1] – needs to come down off his high horse and needs to recognise the fact that he is not infallible, has made his own share of mistakes and is rude to boot. --Damac 18:22, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

There has not been a "King of England" since 1707. Since 1801 the monarch's title is "King of the United Kingdom". "British king" is an adequate substitute. "King of England" is 100% wrong. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 18:37, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Failing to see the point doesn't validate the change to King of Britain or British King or "whatever" backs up Damac in his flame war.
Accuracy in this matter lies in reporting how the congressmen & media of the time referenced the "Russell case". That is what is being laid out in the article- not the pedantic rights and wrongs of the title assumed by monarchs throughout history. Should I reference Eire as the Republic of Ireland despite Hoare's understanding of it as 'Eire'? According to your logic that would also make sense.
Certainly I can make mistakes, and its fine if Damac chooses to correct inaccurate spelling/punctuation to accurate, but I do stick to what I know. What speaks volumes to me that the articles on IRA/German intelligence & S-plan have laid untouched by Damac since he signed up. He has only shown interest in them after I corrected his work. Fluffy999 19:30, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
Bullshit, complete and utter bullshit, particularly the last paragraph. What did you "correct in my work"? Show me proof of wild factual inaccuracies in the articles concerned.
You augmented what were already sound articles on a number of topics. These articles are on my watchlist, meaning I can see whenever a change is made to them. I started the articles that you decided to build on and like with all subsequent additions, I consider the merits of each one and make changes where I deem them to be appropriate. Since writing those articles - Seán Russell, Sabotage Campaign (IRA) and others, which are on my watchlist, I've had to deal with all kinds of nuts adding POV and utter crap. Had I sat back and let novices edit where they saw fit, the articles would be in a terrible state. I've always sought to maintain Wikipedia's credibility and standards by ensuring that additions to articles that I've an interest in are correct, factually and grammatically.
Fluffy999, take my advice and cool down. This is nothing personal. Don't contribute to Wikipedia if you have a problem with people correcting your mistakes.--Damac 19:50, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

You are being grossly unfair to Damac. And no, just because some constitutional ignorant fools at the time use the wrong term does not entitle an encyclopaedia to replicate such ignorance. They could make fools of themselves. We cannot do so. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 19:40, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Fine, change the goal posts to suit. No problem. Considering the support he can whip up for his agenda, i'll do my best to make future contributions "Damac proof" before posting. Just don't be suprised if more of his bogus edits of serious contributions cause problems. Fluffy999 19:47, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
Unless you can back it up with evidence, I demand that you withdraw the allegation that I have made "bogus edits of serious contributions". I've had enough of this and am seriously considering reporting you to the relevant Wikipedia authorities.--Damac 19:58, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Calling Damac's edits "bogus" is uncalled for. Please read WP:CIVIL before you end up getting yourself blocked from editing this site. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 19:56, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Threats to block me from editing wikipedia now. Well done Damac- your baiting and harassment campaign paid off! Oh, when you block me? please revert all the articles i've contributed to back to the state they were in before I completed work on them. Be Bold!
Blocking me would have the bonus of somewhat preventing Damac exercising his flair for harassment and baiting of serious contributors however. Of particular enjoyment to me where his accusations of copyright infringement and plagarism- mentioned on wikipedia:civility? Funny though how Damac's allegations, the campaign of officious & inaccurate 'editing' (really just rearranging my efforts) he unleashed, the spamming of my talk page desipte requests not to, and the constant snipes aimed at baiting & harassment seem to be perfectly acceptable. Fluffy999 20:29, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Since you seem to have no interest in paying the slightest heed to the WP rules on any matter, just engaging in personalised abuse, a request will now be made for admins to intervene and deal with you and your behaviour. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 20:38, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Further example of Damac's campaign to bait & harass under another article I created Operation Lobster I. He/she added in redundant information to break up the flow of the article naturally Damac was careful not to be signed in when the change was made. Fluffy999 21:11, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
I was signed in when I made the changes, which are here. Please identify the the "redundant information" I added and specify how this broke "up the flow of the article.--Damac 21:41, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
RE: Damac's claims not to have used to phrase "King of Britain"
Lie. Check my Talk page where he apologises for using the Phrase "King of Britain" and admits it was wrong and I was right to remove it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fluffy999 21:25, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

There is nothing on that page. If you do not stop making accusations of lies, deceit, baiting, harassment and bogus edits you will be blocked from editing this site. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 21:35, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

I repeat - I never used the term "King of Britain" in the Russell article. I used it once on the talk page inadvertently in response to your persistent demands to explain the change from King of England. You created a storm in a teacup over that change and now turn the whole argument around to deal with something written on a talk page. I may have mentioned it on the talk page but YOU WILL NOT FIND IT ON THE ARTICLE. Use the HISTORY function within Wikipedia to compare versions. It's becoming clear to me that you don't know how to do this which is resulting in this unnecessary condusion.--Damac 21:41, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

To Brandubh Blathmac. It's a bit late since your post, but let me add this comment.

Considering the Irish struggled against enormous odds and resources against the British to win against them in the '20s, I think you can cut Sean Russell some slack. Here's a guy with a beef who was struggling to grab any weapon he could to free the last of Ireland from the British. The Nazis offered one. Yes there was evidence even then indicating what a pack of evil bastards they were. But Herr Russell was among the 90% of the world that ignored it either out of wearing rose colored lenses or the belief the communism was worse. It's likely he honestly couldn't tell based on his interaction between the British and the Germans who constituted a greater threat to liberty. He probably figured out the Germans made better sausage and left it at that. If given a summary of Nazism circa 1940-45, chances are he would have cast about elsewhere for another tool. As for the rest: King of Britain, English King, Rex Brittania - whatever and who cares? The legitamacy of every title can be contested. Gandhi, for one, seems to have settled the "Emperor of India" part.

[edit] Russell and the Holocaust

There is not one jot of evidence that Russell was aware of the Holocaust, much less that he was in any way complicit with it. The quote from the allegedly "anti-fascist" group needs to be referenced, or it should be removed. In such a short article, this section seems to outweigh everything else. I have removed the following paragraph, and bring it here for discussion:

Of course, Seán Russell died in August 1940, over a year before the Wannsee conference of January 1942. Never the less, Germany under Nazi rule was overtly anti-semetic and had already implemented the racial Nazi Nuremberg Laws of 1935 and perpetrated the largescale Kristalnacht pogrom (9th and 10th November, 1938). Though one could, depending on one's point of view, argue as far as saying that Russell was guilty of compliance with Germany's anti-semetic laws, it is by no means possible, as evinced by the timeline of events, to state that the holocaust was a price "Russell was prepared to pay to end partition." There appears to be no question that Russell had foreknowledge of the Wannsee conference and the impending murder of "Six million Jews, thousands of political dissidents, homosexuals, Roma people, Soviet prisoners of war and the disabled".(See Wannsee conference for the evolution of extermination of the Jews as policy in Nazi Germany).

This paragraph attempts to have it both ways, and is, therefore, full of weasel words like "one could say". Yes, one can say anything they bloody well like, but in the absence of evidence, such things cannot be said in an article on Wikipedia. ---RepublicanJacobiteThe'FortyFive' 16:52, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I have asked the anonymous user to come here and comment on why he continues to add this unreferenced and POV material to the article, but he, so far, refused to do so. As I said above, and as I will reiterate, we cannot add speculative and unreferenced material to the article, or any kind of commentary on what Russell may or may not have known about the situation in Nazi Germany. As it stands, no evidence---not one jot---has ever been presented to indicate Russell in any way sympathized with Nazism. I would still like to see a source for the villainous, profane, and slanderous "statement" issued by the alleged "anti-fascists" who defaced Russell's memorial. ---RepublicanJacobiteThe'FortyFive' 17:40, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
You are right that he didn't sympathize with Nazism, overtly, but that still leaves open the question whether he had sound good judgement. I might disagree with American policy, but never to the extent of joining Al-Quaeda.86.42.208.89 (talk) 20:30, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
The implication of your analogy is that Russell joined the Nazis. There is no evidence whatsoever that he did so. ---RepublicanJacobiteThe'FortyFive' 23:04, 3 February 2008 (UTC)