Talk:Belgium

Folklore

Your affirmation "A major non-official holiday is the Saint Nicholas Day, a festivity for children and, in Liège, for students" is not correct. Saint Nicholas Day is also celebrated for students in Brussels. Many drivers stuck in the traffic would confirm it was because of the Saint Nicholas students's procession in Brussels. Eva. 23March2010

British or American English

The Belgium article has always been written in Oxford English. Look at this link : [1] which dates from the first promotion of this article as featured article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.0.180.87 (talk) 12:46, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

• agree I don't care deeply about the issue. However English is being taught in secondary schools in Belgium. While the classes usually point out the differences with American English, the correct answers on exams are typically British English. It makes sense to use the variant of english spoken most by those who can contribute, peer review, and promote the articles. Additionally the United Kingdom has played an instrumental role in the history of Belgium. Notably treaty of London (1839), which provides a compelling historical reason to use British english on top of the practical ones. Pinfix (talk) 17:48, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
• Agree: English seems more logical for an article on a European country than American English. Our colleagues in WP:LUXEMBOURG stipulate English-English and the same is true of the Germany article [2] ---Brigade Piron (talk) 20:03, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
• Not only is that assertion false; both the first/early and current versions of the article are in American English, I am also strongly against blanket painting all articles about anything in Europe to be in British English. WP:ENGVAR makes it clear that strong national ties must exist for a certain variety of English to be the preferred one; see that page for examples. When an English variety's consistent usage has been established in an article, it is maintained in the absence of consensus to the contrary. Also, the page stays in the English variant in which it was created. "With few exceptions (e.g. when a topic has strong national ties or a term/spelling carries less ambiguity), there is no valid reason for a change." Being on the same continent is not a strong national tie. Oreo Priest ^talk 17:06, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

I certainly see your concern, but Belgium and England have had strong ties since 1830, whereas to my knowledge, any US interest in Belgium began in 1917 and ended in 1945 only...Brigade Piron (talk) 18:53, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

International relations do not constitute a strong national tie to a topic. The topic must be directly and fundamentally related to the country in question; Belgium is not fundamentally linked to the UK in the same way that Usain Bolt is linked to Jamaica, for example. Oreo Priest ^talk 19:32, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Oreo Priest that the decision whether British or American should not be based on political reasoning. However the Oxford English banner has been on the talk page for years (at least since 2008). I therefore do not understand why this had to be changed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.0.177.221 (talk) 09:49, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

You're right, the banner had been there for years. But it only got there because someone placed it there with no discussion or even rationale. The page started in AmEng and is in AmEng now, so it's the banner itself that was the strange part. Oreo Priest ^talk 15:35, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Political crisis

The leads indicate : "This ongoing antagonism has caused far-reaching reforms, changing the formerly unitary Belgian state into a federal state, and several governmental crises, the most recent from 2007 to 2011 being the longest."

What does it refer to ? I assume it should be written from June 2010 to December 2011 and we should precise the months. Pluto2012 (talk) 09:05, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

No. It refers to 2007–2011 Belgian political crisis Pinfix (talk) 09:56, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

2007–2011 Belgian political crisis is a little bit WP:OR. It merges 2 crisis in 1.

Sources 2 and 4 in the article talk about a 18 months crisis in 2010-2011, ie what I refer to.

What are the WP:RS sources that make this crisis go back to 2007 ? Pluto2012 (talk) 13:32, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes it's not ridiculous at all to claim WP:OR because it doesn't fit your argument. A crisis can be composed out of several smaller crisis. It's not original research if some of your sources only talk about parts. You're more at risk of WP:RECENT than that this is a WP:OR issue. From an encyclopaedic point of view, and since this is a general article it makes more sense to group it. It's right after eachother, it's the same people, arguing about the same thing. Pinfix (talk) 22:00, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Where is the source that claim the crisis is 4 year long ?

Sources state claim it is 18 month long and refer to the period from June 2010 to December 2011.

Pluto2012 (talk) 09:26, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

There were 4 governments and 2 years of no government in 4 years time. You can not sanely claim that this Must be viewed as two seperate crisis. What exactly splits them up? The van rompuy 1 government lasting 11 months? Encyclopaedic it's the same "crisis" or "political instability". For example the Dutch wikipedia similarly groups the events in this article nl:Regeringsformatie_België_2007. Just because you can't immediately google a source that calls it "The" crisis. Most likely because the word crisis has been used for everything this past half a decade. Does not mean it's not verifiable. In 10 years time. It is clear that we will remember the whole mess as one instable/crisis period. Making your obsession about this clearly WP:RECENT. If you have 4 governments in 2 years time. Where a term limit is 4 years, you by definition have a political crisis. Pinfix (talk) 10:36, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

and here is a source that calls it "the crisis" [3] Now can we stop this ridiculous nonesense? or are you really insisting on pushing some moronic agenda? Pinfix (talk) 10:42, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

This will be my first and last warnning regarding WP:AGF.

Is this the only source ? I found this too from google. If it is the only one it is not enough because it is rather anecdotical. The time that was named crisis was from June 2010 to December 2011.

So, if there are no reliable sourcess, this should be corrected. Pluto2012 (talk) 13:06, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

I assumed good faith. You just keep insisting on pushing your agenda. Despite the fact that i refute all your arguments. WP:V Does NOT require it to be googleable. It is a fact that you have a political crisis if you have 4 governments in 2 years and no government for the following 2. There are googleable sources. And they are not anecdotal (which is how you spell it). You don't go splitting up the article about hamburgers buns in an article about the top bun and the bottom bun. WP:RECENT. It is one crisis with connected events, and about the same thing. ANd to be clear I did not write the article. And i did not link them. As you can see in the edit history. They are linked by causality, content, and actors. Their linkage is inherent. And not Original research. As observed by the published article i linked before. And more sources that you can't instantly google. I appreciate your threats on my talk page and i encourage you to go for it. You will never accept you are wrong no matter how much evidence i present. This article talks about the period from 2007-2010 but only names 18 month a "crisis" [4] This article groups them as "crise nationale belge" [5] it does state that it consists out of 2 smaller crisis but it names the whole "crise nationale belge". Do you really need me to continue ? There is absolutely nothing wrong with naming the whole period a "political crisis". Or grouping the two. this article speaks of it in this way [6]. Written in 2011 "since 2007 both sides have been quarrelling". There are ample sources. You can give up on this. Or you can desperately try to get your own. Resort to as many threats and as you want. It will not change anything. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pinfix (talk • contribs) 13:32, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

I am also not alone in this as you can see in this edit [7] Same people same topic, not WP:OR Pinfix (talk) 13:39, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

You write : "I assumed good faith. You just keep insisting on pushing your agenda." Comply with WP:AGF. You also deleted my message on your talk page without answering. That is not the way wikipedia works.

What you provide are not sources for the claim that was added. The political crisis was from June 2010 to December 2011 as stated in the Figaro. Unless you can provide reliable sources, this will be corrected.

Is there any other mind ? Pluto2012 (talk) 14:18, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

I can do on my talk page what i want. that is how wikipedia works. you accuse me of 3RR when i revert twice; you accuse me of AGF when you just ignore all my arguments and require more from me. This is not how wikipedia works. you are the one that lacks an open mind. i refuted your claims adequately. and posted on the talk page of the page in question all the arguments required. You ignore all my arguments and just keep claiming i need more. This is not how wikipedia works. Stop trying to pretetend you are the one who knows how wikipedia works and trying to educate me. And instead finally realise that you will need to give up on this point. I will not back down because you act like you own this place. Wikipedia requires you to be bold. You can accuse me all you want. The fact of the matter is that it is not WP:OR. that it was not 3RR and that there is nothing wrong with grouping the two. and the reference is not aneqdotal it's an article written by somebody from the KU Leuven. a top university in belgium and published in a respectable journal. so please stop harassing me and just try to find it in your ego to accept that you may be wrong. Pinfix (talk) 14:38, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Another source that groups the crisis is electoral language of the ROSSEM party stating "en de huidige crisis (2007-nu)" which translates as "the current crisis (2007-now)" [8] written in 2012. I'll be the last one to defend their program, but as a source to back up the fact that several sources consider the 4 governments and other political instability between 2007 and 2011 it is valid. The crisis was never resolved and simmered on all the time between 2007-2011 you can distinguis periods of relative calm and extreme crisis but they are all part of a whole. And it is not wrong to name it as such. as proven by multiple sources. invalidating the WP:OR and negatively answering your question.Pinfix (talk) 16:01, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

More references that people consider the two crisis as a whole is when there was popular protest. The morgen for example published the rationale of academics to protest. [9] "Reeds sinds 2007 wordt de politiek volledig" Since 2007 politics is dominated by .. failures. Again indicating that people protesting the impasse at the time even group all the failures into one "crisis". And not just protesting the crisis that started in 2010. The first crisis was never resolved, it was only pushed to the background a bit, the second was a continuation. It is far more accurate and honest to consider them as a whole of connected events. Pinfix (talk) 16:30, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Another source or reference is the book "Émulations n°10 : Belgique : sortir de crise(s) By Stéphane Baele" .Which has on page 89 "mot de clef" or keywords " Psychology, Belgium, politics, charisma, negotations, zayan, rosoux, Belgian political crisis (2007-2011)". if you're lucky you can catch the page in books.google.com If not i can provide a screenshot. or you can look at this page [10] which has the text " la crise politique qu'a traversée l'État belge entre 2007 et 2011." .Pinfix (talk) 17:04, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

I'll just add another for good measure. [11] In an article named "belgique-en-bref" You would find the sentence "La popularité et l’influence de la NVA de Bart De Wever, qui fut au centre de la dernière crise politique belge (2007-2011)," which translates as. "the popularity and influence of Bart De Wever's NVA, which was at the center of the last belgian political crisis (2007-2011), ... novopress] is not a personal blog but a press agency.Pinfix (talk) 17:30, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

I didn't accuse you of 3RR but I informed you of 3RR.

I am sorry but I am not convinced by what you say and I am still convince that per WP:V and WP:NPoV (ie the majority of the sources on the topic) the merging of both period is WP:OR. The criis lasted from June 2010 to December 2012.

Other(s) mind(s) would be welcome ! Pluto2012 (talk) 17:05, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

You don't have to be convinced. WP:OR only states that it isn't original work. You can't use it to get your way. And just always ask the other person to provide more proof. there is ample proof provided. You now have to prove that it is wrong to claim it as a crisis. else you are the one making NPOV chages and violating WP:OR. You can't seem to understand that "a period of consecutive crises" is known as a "crisis" and that it is perfectly correct to name it as such. And that it is more accurate and honest by the definietion of crisis. You provide me a source that says you can not consider them as the crisis. I provide you sources of universities publishing a hundred pages on the topic calling it "the crisis". i provide you with articles. i provide you with everything. You are being stubborn and that is not the wikipedia way. Not being able to accept that i refuted all your objections. and not providing any arguments. All you say is "i'm not convinced" this is just weak. No other word for it. It is weak and disruptive. There is nothing wrong with grouping the events. as evidenced by *BOTH* sides in several publications of the highest quality. Academics in respected publications, and valid news sources. Why don't you provide me equal quality references that state that it is wrong to consider it a political crisis. seriously. WP:OR is not a stopgap argument that you can use to win arguments. There are already other opinions. The people who created the article under this name, the thousands of people who read the article, which has been in this state grouping the events for 3 years, and well integrated and linked throughout wikipedia. From the moment i prove it's not WP:OR it is your task to provide evidence that it's wrong to name it a crisis. It isn't sufficient to point to sources that consider parts of the crisis to claim that it's wrong to label the whole thing a "political crisis". They are clearly connected. It is really really poor to just dismiss all my arguments. All the proof is delivered. The president of the Flemish political institute calls it "the polical crisis" the Walloon university in louvain published a book calling it "the crisis" (over and over). There are press articles. There is absolutely nothing you can expect from me beyond this. Let me also point out that you are also wrongly using WP:OR here [Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Sexual_abuse_cases_in_Brooklyn's_Haredi_community] Let me suggest you reread the policy. After having milked the WP:OR and WP:V you seem to now accuse me of NPOV. They are inherently connected. There is no reason to pretend they are disjoint. It would be dishonest. inaccurate and wrong. Here is another reference of media [12] "Vier jaar politieke crisis is slopend geweest" Where the most important commentator (and co-editor-in-chief) of Het Laatste Nieuws refers to "the crisis" in an article titled "four years of political crisis have taken their toll". You can insist on trying to revise history. However i will not back down just because you accuse me of NPOV, AGF, OR, V. You can go through my edit history. This is the only argument that i advocate strongly, not because i enjoy it. but because your claims are wrong, as been amply proven, despite your stubbornness to accept this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pinfix (talk • contribs) 19:50, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

more sources [13] quatre ans d'une crise politique. UNE crise. So many sources. Pinfix (talk) 19:58, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

(←) I am another mind on the topic. First of all, you both need to start being civil, as of right now. Among other things, any explanation of policy need not be interpreted as talking down to you.

I'm not sure I will be able to cut the Gordian knot here. Pinfix has provided a number of sources grouping it as one crisis. This shows that it isn't absurd or OR. On the other hand, it may very well be that a majority of serious sources count them as two crises (I haven't checked), this would mean that the two crisis view is the appropriate one under WP:WEIGHT. Whether or not there is resolution or consensus, the other view should be mentioned in the article in proportion to its weight; for example a sentence saying "The crisis is often separated into two separate crises, one from 2007 to [whenever] and one from 2010-2011." or of course something similar if the page is changed. I'm a bit surprised that Pluto's changes haven't been anything more substantial than slapping an OR tag on the page and then protesting its removal. At the very least, you should be working towards acknowledgement of the two views on the page itself. Oreo Priest ^talk 21:05, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

The 2007–2011 Belgian political crisis already clearly states that it consists of sub-crisis.(which made the WP:OR completely ridiculous) I do not appreciate that I am force to provide solid sources, and you accept pluto2012's claim at face value. His claim btw is false. None of the sources, zero, 0, nada, nobody ever claimed that the two crisis *have* to be considerate separate. There are articles that only deal with sub-crisis, especially news outlets, because people's attention span is short and people get fed up with the depressing word "crisis". Virtually all news outlets have summary articles that chronicle all the events as "a" or "the" crisis. Btw it doesn't really split up into two pieces nicely.To my knowledge there is no book published the "two political crises of Belgium." If you have a fight with your wife in the morning, go to work, come back and pick up where you left off at night. You will not consider this two fights. This is exactly what this was, the same people fighting over the same things, with only short (multiple)hiatuses.

• I do not object to mentioning that the crisis can be split up, i would even argue that this goes without saying. And hence I don't see why this couldn't be accomplished with just a wikilink to the 2007-2011 article. Which already accurately explains the nuances.
• I do strongly protest adding anything that insists that there is a different view on the events without any published reliable sources. Show me the WP:OR evidence of people stating that they have to be considered separate and disjoint. It is not sufficient to provide sources talking about parts of the crisis as a crisis. This in no way implies that they do not consider the whole period a crisis. See First-order logic
• I however strongly object to the false WP:OR claim, which he insisted on post evidence.
• I further object to your interpretation that he wasn't talking down to me.
• But most of all I object strongly to any attempt to remove references to the entire event, and replacing them with only a mention of the 18 months of failure of forming a government post 2010 elections. This is a false betrayal of events. Which was his original request. and clearly not WP:NPOV.

Also note that i'm not defending my own work, all the current versions were edited and authored by other wikipedians. I am only safe guarding their efforts from revisionism. Meaning there are at least two people who agree on the current state of the text. In addition to the thousands who have read it and not made any WP:OR claims the 3 years that the article has been up in its current form. Pinfix (talk) 23:35, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

O, yes .Qdfr (talk) 14:36, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Walloon

It is written : "Walloon, once the main regional language of Wallonia". Does someone know when ? It is so old that maybe it should be stated precisely. Pluto2012 (talk) 13:51, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

That would be until it was replaced by more standard French. It was a long and gradual transition so it's hard to put an exact date on it. Oreo Priest ^talk 16:52, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Really not all that hard, or long ago. Orbilat has this to say "Though the bourgeoisie adopted the standard French in the 18th and 19th centuries, until 1900 most of the population used only Walloon in everyday life. But the number of speakers fell sharply between 1930-1960 and so has the functional and social range of the language." orbilat.com. So from around the 10th century until the start of the 20th. Similar and identical quotes can be found here by wa:Laurent Hendschel. (presumably quoting from the same source)

For the record if you are really concerned with WP:WEIGHT you can probably ask yourself if enough weight is given in this article, let alone wikipedia as a whole, to the classical view calling Walloon a dialect, rather than a language. The latter of which is apparently mostly inspired by recent local conservationist efforts. Saving a language is a lot more jazzy that saving a dialect.Pinfix (talk) 01:42, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Hi, if Walloon is a dialect, from which language is it ? Latine ? I learnt 10 words of Walloon when I was young and hear sometimes some speech : there is not a single link with French... Pluto2012 (talk) 13:06, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure a linguist would agree with your assumption that there is "not a single link with French". Just one example: the phrase "Je suis fier de ma petite patrie" (in French) becomes "Dji su fir de mè p'tite patreye" in Walloon. I don't think one needs to be a professor of linguistics to note the similarity, particularly considering the phonetic pronunciation of the French phrase... Rather like Picard.Brigade Piron (talk) 15:12, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

"I am very proud of my little patry" is not much farther than the French translation...

I doubt very much that Walloon is considered as a French dialect but I am not at all an expert. Pluto2012 (talk) 16:15, 22 September 2013 (UTC)

See fr:Langue d'oïl. For example, ethnologue.com classify Picard and Walloon as dialects of French, multitree.org classify Norman as dialect of French. Visite fortuitement prolongée (talk) 20:39, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

Thank you Vfp,

So it should be stated in the article as such and not as a language. Pluto2012 (talk) 21:08, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

No, it should not. Only a few are claiming that Walloon is a dialect of French. See WP:UNDUE (Wikipedia:Neutral point of view#Due and undue weight) or fr:WP:PROPORTION. Visite fortuitement prolongée (talk) 20:32, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

I don't understand.

Is Walloon considered to be a language or is it considered to be a dialect ? Pluto2012 (talk) 12:23, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

1. I was replying about Walloon being a dialect of French.
2. A language.

Visite fortuitement prolongée (talk) 21:07, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Thx. :-) Pluto2012 (talk) 21:10, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

According to Le Petit Larousse, Walloon is a dialect of the Langue d'Oil. According to the Meyers grosses Taschenlexikon, Walloon is the name collectively given to four French dialects spoken in Belgium. So that I believe the wording dialect should be used for Walloon.

Mercator

According to the Wikipedia article on him, Mercator was born in a place that is in either modern Germany or the Netherlands. Why is he mentioned as a famous Belgian so prominently? — Preceding unsigned comment added by CWB001 (talk • contribs) 23:55, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

It says he was born in Rupelmonde, now Belgium. He also did a substantial portion of his mapmaking in Leuven. Oreo Priest ^talk 13:49, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

The mystery of the missing map

Could someone perhaps explain why, among all the pictures and and other illustrations, there is no map of Belgium? Maps of language regions (extending into other countries), maps of this or that aspect of Belgium, but no map of Belgium. Why? Saintonge235 (talk) 23:32, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

All those maps are maps of Belgium. Every map will show some aspects, and not others. What aspect do you think is missing? CMD (talk) 16:46, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

I am aware that there are several Belgian maps at this page, but indeed, a map with indication of the largest cities and rivers and depiction of (part of) the neighbouring countries and sea could be welcome. Is there anyone who has a good map including these aspects? Kareldorado (talk) 17:29, 28 September 2013 (UTC)