Talk:Congress of Estonia

Revert waring
Ive left the POV tag in place but PLEASE! reach a consensus before any more reverts/edits.--Alexia Death 12:53, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Disenfranchisement
Petri Krohn has repeatedly attempted to push disenfranchisement into this article, as he has done repeatedly before -- most notably in Bronze Soldier of Tallinn. A new twist is sliding the evaluative claim of "restrictive citizenship laws" in.

I have removed both of these claims. As of 2007, the idea that immigrants would be "disenfranchised" by "restrictive citizenship laws" is not even a notable WP:POV in Estonian politics anymore, as it was in 1992, or when Max van der Stoel of the OCSE made his infamous declarations. It mainly a private POV of Petri Krohn, and does not deserve Wikipedia as its soapbox. Digwuren 18:17, 15 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Disenfranchisement and denaturalisatrion (or what ever you want to call them) were not only the policy, but the cause of existance of the Congress. Disenfranchisement was achieved in two ways:
 * By pressuring the Supreme Soviet into accepting citizenship and election laws that limited citizenship to jus sanguinis Estonians.
 * By its existance as a shadow parliament elected among the enfranchised.
 * -- Petri Krohn 07:47, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * P.S This article is about an organization that existed prior to 1993. What ever Estonians of today think is "notable" in the politics of Estonia today, or whatever "truth" they now subscribe to, should have no bearing to this article. -- Petri Krohn 07:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Petri Krohn, do you have any reliable source for the "restrictive citizenship law" or "disenfranchisement" claims, or are you engaging in WP:OR? You have repeatedly reinserted them without referring any sources. Digwuren 06:50, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Personal comments
As you brought up the issue of my personality, I guess it gives me the right to respond. I have over 18,000 edits on Wikipedia. Very few are about subjects a have an opinion on, many are on subjects I did not even know about. You on the other hand registered to Wikipedia only after the Bronze Soldier controversy erupted. (If you are one of the editors from Estonia who contributed to the artilce under an anonymous IP, you do not seem to have any previous edits to your IP address either.) Your edits to Wikipedia so far seem to consist only of Estonian POV-pushing. Your chief concern seems to be removing any reference to the "disenfranchisement", or the rights (and lack of them) of Estonia's Russian minority from Wikipedia. Please stop. If you want to edit Wikipedia, please contribute something usefull.

As for pushing something into this article: I did not "push" anything into the article, I wrote it! You and your Estonian friends could (and should) have done it a long ago.

And now for the positive: Thanks for contributing the "Politics" section to the article. I fully agree with what you wrote. -- Petri Krohn 08:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I do not care whether you are good to your mother, club baby seals for fun, display generosity on obscure holidays or other aspects of your personality. I do not care about your edits on subjects I am not able to properly evaluate, and I do not consider them to give you an aura of respect.  I am not very eager to commit to major submissions, either.  However, I do care about bullshit on topics I'm knowledgeable of, I have special interest in understanding propaganda, and quite a number of your claims, assertions, insinuations, implications, hints and sleazy references quite frankly qualify under these technical categories.  Having been stimulated by the 9/11 effect in the events and aftermath of the Bronze night, I am now motivated enough to systematically go through the related Wikipedia articles.
 * I firmly reject your notion of my edits being "Estonian POV-pushing".
 * As for your thinly veiled claim of disinterest, this does not really hold. You have been involved in occupation denialism for a long time; see for example Requests for arbitration/Occupation of Latvia, dated January 2007.
 * As for Estonians having to describe all of their deeds in Wikipedia a long time ago, this is incredibly self-centered and short-sighted idea, even though somewhat defensible. However, it needs to be pointed out that during the Restoration, there was no Wikipedia, and when Wikipedia appeared, most Estonians with the resources to reach it were busy catching up over the infamous wealth lag.  Quite naturally, it took a whole generation of Estonians, and a lot of infrastructure-building, for Estonians to be sufficiently well-networked and to acquire sufficient combitions of free time and education to be able to routinely meaningfully contribute on topics that were mainly of historical significance, such as Congress of Estonia.
 * As for Politics, I can't really take any credit for it. I merely reorganised the article into a slightly more proper narrative than it was at the time. Digwuren 11:24, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

...some POV
Estonians had the option of following a "democratic" path to independence. The independence movement originated in the Communist Party of Estonia. The Supreme Soviet "affirmed" Estonia's independence on August 20. By September 17 it was a full member of the United Nations. The fast acceptance of Estonia into the UN, and the almost immediate acknowledgement of its independence was based on the premise, that the new Republic of Estonia was the successor state of the Republic of Estonia (1990-1991) (Oops! you deleted the article!) and the Estonian SSR, inheriting its liabilities and citizens.

This was however unacceptable to the Congress, hence the constitutional changes of 1992. In fact Estonian school book list Lennart Meri and Mart Laar (written by Mart Laar, I hear) as the first President and Prime Minister of independent Estonia, signifying a revolutionary breach of legal continuity between the independent Estonia of Arnold Rüütel and Edgar Savisaar

-- Petri Krohn 07:47, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * It is rather dubious to claim that the international acknowledgment of Estonia's independence in August-September 1991 was based on the the premise that Estonia was the successor state of Estonian SSR (i.e. of a part of the USSR) "inheriting its liabilities and citizens". The very legality of Estonian SSR itself was not recognized by, e.g., US, PRC, and European Union, which all declared that Estonia was an illegally occupied territory (see, e.g., the 1983 resolution of the European Parliament). There has been no pressure whatsoever from other democratic nations on Estonia to inherit Soviet liabilities (e.g., commensurate proportion of the former USSR's foreign debt) or that Estonia should have granted automatic Estonian citizenship to all Soviet citizens who were resident in Estonia when USSR effectively ceased to exist on 1 January 1992. Acknowledgment by the mentioned fine and dandy organisation, UN, does not indicate anything whatsoever about any existing or new member state's democratic credentials. Membership in the European Union, on the other hand, tells a lot. Why the "poor and lowly" EU was so "naive" to let the "undemocratic Estonia" in as a member after having committed such "revolutionary breaches of legal continuity" is a question for people with Petri Krohn's "infinitely higher level of wisdom" to sort out. Cheers, --3 Löwi 11:27, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * A good question. I really do not know why. But I believe that the Finns and Paavo Lipponen had a lot to do with it. -- Petri Krohn 12:20, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Wrong answer. The question is rhetorical.  To properly answer it, you would need to first understand that the underlying assumption -- that of Estonia having behaved revolutionarily undemocratically in restoring its independence instead of starting anew, and despite that, being let into EU -- is absurd. Digwuren 16:13, 17 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I should probably explain that the very primary idea behind the whole Congress was that the occupation, and all fruits of it, were illegal from beginning to end. *Everything* else the Congress did was based on this tenet alone.  Thus, they rejected an idea of recognising the Estonian SSR as a legal entity and advocated legal continuity of the First Republic, and for the very same reason, they considered occupation-era immigrants illegal, and rejected the idea that such illegal immigrants could have any legal say in running the government.
 * They, however, did not make any ethnic restrictions on who should or should not be a citizen of Estonia, and they did not push for immediate and complete expulsion of the occupation-era immigrants. The latter position was actually proposed by some ultranationalists, but it was so unpalatable for the majorities of both legislatures it never gathered much strength.


 * Thus, the ultimate outcome was that occupation-era immigrants (excluding active military personnel, but including retired military personnel) were allowed to say, and granted long-time residency permits. Essentially, they got free choice between various identities: they could naturalise, provided that they could fulfill simple criteria and take the oath of loyalty, or they could apply for citizenship of whatever other country would accept them as citizens -- most commonly, it would be the Russian Federation.  Such application would *not* automatically revoke the residence permits, as some people have claimed.  Finally, the immigrants also have an option to emigrate -- again, mostly to Russian Federation, if they so choose. Digwuren 15:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Legality of propiskas
Petri Krohn has repeatedly attempted to refer to holders of propiskas in Estonian territory as "legal residents" in this article. This is incorrect and misleading, as the legality of the immigrants' residence, as well as the whole idea of Soviet Union's propiska laws being applicable in Estonian territory, is belied by the occupation's illegality. It could theoretically be feasible to explain this distinction. However, it is far too complicated for this particular article, so it is much better to just avoid using such a term loaded with obviously wrong, and not easily explainable, semantic content. Thus, I have removed the "legal immigrant" aspect from the reference to the propiska system.

As an aside, I'm pointing out (here, not in the article) that the whole utility of propiskas wrt citizenship was only evidentiary. In the political discourse of the time, the primary question of enforcing citizenship was "What shall we do with the *residents* that wouldn't qualify under jus sanguinis?", not "Shall we recognise the propiskas?". Digwuren 16:08, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * If you insist, I will remove the reference to the propiskas. We have reference for legal residency. Linking "legal residency" to propiska was my disambiguation. -- Petri Krohn 04:43, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The problem with such a reference is that it refers to Soviet Union's laws, not laws of Republic of Estonia, and unqualified "legal" does not disambiguate between these two. Specifically, the immigrations were unlawful under pre-war Estonian laws; the reasons many of the new residents were given long-time residence permits relatively easily were mainly grace, display of non-revanchism and realpolitik.
 * (I'm pointing out that the No hard feelings displays have been a very significant part of Estonian post-1991 politics. A number of people think that the lack of hard feelings goes too far, and, for example, insist the government should demand Russia to pay reparations for damages inflicted on Estonia during the occupation years.  The government's policy has been one of silent forgiveness instead.) Digwuren 06:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh, and I have no problem with the propiska reference. This is factual, even though slightly indirect, and has no potential to mislead, save for minor linguistic concerns that can be easily rectified if it becomes an issue. Digwuren 06:58, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Weird manipulations by Petri Krohn
Petri Krohn has repeatedly attempted to attach a number of weird WP:POVs into this article. I'm listing them here, as I did with Bronze Soldier of Tallinn (see Talk:Bronze Soldier of Tallinn/Archive 4).


 * He has attempted to claim that not providing automatic citizenship to extralegal immigrants of 1940-1990 "was", "meant in practice" or otherwise amounted to disenfranchisement, and "restrictive" as citizenship laws go. While this WP:POV has sometimes also been pushed by the local ethnic Russian representatives, and the government of the Russian Federation, he has not referred to these sources, which indicates private WP:POV, possibly WP:OR.
 * He has attempted to assert that such "disenfranchisement" compares to the Nuremberg laws. (See also User talk:Petri Krohn.)  This is done most disingenously; first, "combining" the number of the "disenfranchised" in Estonia with that of Latvia to make the count bigger, then wrongfully supertaxon-classifying both events as "disenfranchisement", and discarding the important distinctions based on illegality of Soviet occupation, and non-ethnic nature of this "disenfranchisement" process.  Apparently, he has attempted to convey the Nazi connotations of the Nuremberg racial purity laws onto Estonian restoration-era citizenship policies, in attempt to sneakily deliver the non-supportable position that Estonian policies were, and by extension, are Nazi-minded.
 * Apparently in attempt to support the idea of "disenfranchisement" and the Citizens' Committees' criteria for citizenship (which later became the recognised base for citizenship of the Republic of Estonia) as peculiar, unsupportable, or a whole-cloth invention, he has repeatedly inappropriately added double quotes around "citizens of Estonia" in the context of voting eligibility.
 * He has repeatedly replaced "Estonia regaining independence" with "Estonia separating from Soviet Union". While it was I who first introducted the latter wording, I consider it a poor choice, and the first wording is a better summary of the events.  Repeatedly reverting to the second amounts to pushing an occupation denialist WP:POV.
 * He has repeatedly attempted to refer to post-WWII immigrant residence in Estonia in 1990 as "legal residency", although this legality is at the very crux of the primary question faced by Congress of Estonia, and got resolved differently. Such a sneaky attempt to recognise Soviet Union laws as valid in Estonian territory amounts to pushing a Soviet imperialist WP:POV.

Digwuren 08:11, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Citizenship: later developments
I have tentatively restored the later developments on citizenship, as I feel it's tangentially connected to the article, and important to understand the general narrative and what might be felt as easter-egg discrepancies between the current laws and the original citizenship laws, especially since the original citizenship laws didn't get published on Estlex and thus, aren't available on the current legal repository at eRT. (I wouldn't have added citizenship issues to the article in the first place, though.) I feel unfirm in my position, though. What are the opinions of other editors on the subject? Digwuren 09:43, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Relevance of Russian Federation's citizenship
Petri Krohn has expressed concern that describing Russian citizenship laws in this article may be irrelevant. I disagree, as history has shown several editors would incorrectly conclude that Estonian citizenship law contributed to statelessness if the availability of Russian citizenship wouldn't be pointed out. Digwuren 15:46, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The text was inserted under elections of the Riigikogu. The relevant issue here is disenfranchisement, not the possibilty to apply for foreign citizenship. -- Petri Krohn 23:36, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Then, relocate it to a better place. Don't push obscure pet POVs.  Even bots' patience is bound to end eventually. Digwuren 23:40, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * No, you are the one who wants to discuss Russian citizenship, you find a better place for it (possibly in some other article.) Please do not use it for censorship/blanking, as you are doing. -- Petri Krohn 23:48, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * You mean, like this? Digwuren 23:51, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I see you already found a better place for this point-of-view. I have no objection to this. -- Petri Krohn 23:56, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Protection
Petri Krohn has repeatedly reverted to a bad version without bothering to discuss it. This has gotten quite disruptive. I have applied for protection of the page. Digwuren 16:35, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Now that the article is protected, we should sit down and discuss what, if anything, needs changing. Petri Krohn: what are your suggestions? Digwuren 10:30, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

The three-day protection is about to end. You have not made any suggestions. If you will, despite not having any suggestions now, start making undiscussed edits -- especially reverts -- once the protection runs out, it will be a clear indication of intent to power-play rather than develop a consensus, and, I would dare to say, a clear indication of bad faith regarding the matters discussed in earlier sections. Digwuren 23:19, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

less than 6% of Russophone community in Estonia
I want to know what is the source of that %, because less than 6% is mighty obscure.If you want it to stay it must have at least SOME accuracy, at least to the level where it can be said "approximately". Point me to a text where this percentage is given. If you have no such source then this is WP:OR.--Alexia Death 16:41, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Source of the %? To be frank with you, that's middle-school math. Were there approximately 450,000 Russophones in Estonia in late 1980's (30% of 1.5 mln population recorded by last Soviet census). Approximately 85,000 emigrated, so they probably should not qualify in our calculations (although an argument can be made that their immigration was almost as voluntarily as a Serb's migration from NATO-administered Kosovo or previous population transfers within former Yugoslavia, but I'll cut you some slack). That leaves us with approximately 350-370K of Russophones who chose to stay in Estonia after USSR broke up. 23K of this number is 6%. As you evidently incapable of making this calculation yourself, I'll just add total number of Russophones in Estonia today to the article and will hope you will be happy about it. RJ CG 17:47, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * This math is still obscure and constitutes OR. I will not remove the total number, but its still subject to the same fallacy. You are comparing two values not in the same class.--Alexia Death 18:15, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * The problem isn't the math; the problem is RJ CG's boneheaded attempt to present the pre-restoration citizenship applications as a significant source of naturalisation fairydust. Digwuren 17:51, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Also please assert how inserting this obscure % is a) relevant and b) not undue weight? The procedure is meant for minors, so it cannot have a large audience. If it did not have a larger audience, it was because parents did not wish for their children to be Estonian citizens... --Alexia Death 16:43, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * "The procedure is meant for minors" I want to ask you for a favour. Would you please be so kind to familiarize yourself with the topic you responding to before lashing out? Procedure we discuss was NOT meant for a minors (in English minor is an underage person). It was meant for citizens of USSR who lived in Estonia when USSR started to shake and were not eligible for Estonian citizenship by blood. RJ CG 17:55, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Im sorry, I confused this debate with another, concerning the simplified procedure for minors born in Estonia. The argument stands tho. Only relatively small number of people were ever eligible so compairing it to a total number of people is wrong.
 * There was NO debate about "the simplified procedure for minors". Not with my participation at least. You were caught red-handed by me while trying to switch topics and deny Estonian restrictions on citizenship. So it wasn't a dispute, it was "denial exposed", if you wish. RJ CG 18:30, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I did make a mistake, and apologized for it.This post is a failure to  observe WP:AGF and an attack on my person. Please refine from posting attacks like this in the future and stick to the question at hand. --Alexia Death 18:41, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Moved from my userpage:

Aryan Math at the Congress of Estonia page?
Hello Alexia. You reverted my edit of Congress of Estonia page as WP:UNDUE. Could you please explain your rationale? If you studied math in high school you should know that number itself (23,000 or 23,000,000) is meaningless without a context. Are 3 hairs "a lot"? Yes in a bowl of soup, not on a person's head. So I see statement "23,000 got something by following this rule" meaningless. 23K out of what number? You are not happy with a percentage? You want to post aporoximate strength of Russophone community of Estonia to give to a reader an opportunity to judge by his/herself? Be my guest, do it. But as it is now, you're just hollowing a statement out. And to clarify the header of this section, I do see attempt to present some random number out of context as a way to influence public opinion with numbers convenient to certain ethnic POV. RJ CG 17:04, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * This percent you are trying to push in is tendentious because due to to the audience of the law it can NEVER be 100. It is irrelevant in the context. --Alexia Death 17:13, 8 August 2007 (UTC)-


 * I wonder if "Arian Math" is a newly discovered civil greeting that I have not yet been familiarised with.
 * As for Alexia Death, she does have a point. This particular expedited naturalisation clause pertained to one, causally relatively isolated set of circumstances, and is due to that bound to be relatively insignificant.  It shouldn't probably even be mentioned in the article.  Attempting to take this, one, specific naturalisation number out of its context and compare it against the total population count, however, constitutes demagoguery; an insinuation that very few Russophones naturalise in Estonia, with the additional insinuation -- brought on by extra sauce you've also been fighting for -- that this is because of discrimination.  It's not even WP:POV anymore, it's plain Estophobic vandalism. Digwuren 17:40, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * To be frank with you, if that is so "causally relatively isolated set of circumstances, and is due to that bound to be relatively insignificant", why bother to mention it? If you insist on mentioning it, let's put it in context. Anyway, I added numeric strength of Russopone community to the article and that should make you happy. And spare you rabid accusations, please. RJ CG 18:00, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * whole number of people is only in context if you also show how many were eligible in the first place.--Alexia Death 18:15, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Looking at any other country in FSU but Estonia and Latvia, ALL permanent residents were eligible for citizenship. Feel free to insert claims that only selected few could be honoured and look at reaction of a Western reader. RJ CG 18:37, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * This is not an article about any other member of FSU. It is about a country named Estonia that the soviet union had acknowledged as an independent state with Treaty of Tartu and then annexed while in pact with Nazi Germany.--Alexia Death 18:45, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Do I smell request for preferencial treatment? Why should I judge Estonia different from 14 other countries in similar circumstances? And sorry to burst your bubble, but Soviet Union (created AD 1922) had nothing to do with Taru Rahu (signed AD 1920). Bolshevist Russia signed this paper and why should we give it more weight than to request by Estonian parliament in 1940 to join USSR? Former was signed by a gang of nationalists used and military protected by a foreign superpower and a gang of communist thugs, latter by a puppet parliament. Are you happy with this view? :) RJ CG 19:05, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Do I smell sarcasm and Ghrila style provocation? Sorry, i refuse to react. If the situation would be the same there would be no difference in the current state of things. There are differences because backgrounds are different. --Alexia Death 19:22, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * P.S I stand corrected, it was Soviet Russia, legal predecessor of Soviet Union that singed the treaty of Tartu.--Alexia Death 19:22, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
 * P.S. I resent the the "Aryan math" insinuation, it sounds like a round about way of calling someone a Nazi. Please don't insult people like this.--Alexia Death 18:15, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

More than 38%
This is so cute. Anyone with the slightest scent of common sence will know that statements like "more than 50%" can refer to anything from 50% + 1 unit to 75% or more, but "more than 38%" is almost never more than 38%+1 unit. Statement kinda sorta defends it's purpose. RJ CG 14:26, 14 August 2007 (UTC)