Talk:Lech Wałęsa/Archives/2012/April

Old talk
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Lech Walesa es not Danziger

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I have two related concerns about this page: (1) Most important, I am unable to authenticate what Walesa is claimed to have said to the United Nations Security Council about attacking Iraq. Mr Walensa has made a number of comments on this subject and we should try to present a balanced view. (2) The article uses the word "recently", without indicating a date. Perhaps we should include date information when we speak of something's having happened recently.

user:BillBell

Two other concers: This page is completely NPOV. The most important information seems to be he was a "double spy" which has never been proved or documented in any serious way. Except this alomost nothing is said about his real political and social activity - the things which, contrary to his "double spying", are well proved and documented. The statement "a anti-communist puppy" is NPOV by itself.

user:Polimerek

Well - I have decided to change this page quite seriously. I have added the list of basic facts about Lech Wałęsa and have changed the "spy" story making its much more NPOV (at least IMHO). Sorry for my bad English.

user:Polimerek


 * Yes, it's much improved. There still seems to be far too much of the "spy" stuff.  All of the various theories are largely the same and seem to lack evidence.  Perhaps we join these together and make the section a bit shorter? -- Finlay McWalter 00:41, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I've done some fixups to the english spelling and grammar of this (otherwise excellent) article. I'll probably do some more, and perhaps some reformatting. In addition, I have some language questions which can hopefully be answered by Polish-speaking wikipedians:  -- Finlay McWalter 23:52, 29 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * Q1 The article is a bit inconsistent about whether "Gdanska Shipyard" is singular (i.e. there's one big shipyard) or plural (i.e. there are several shipyards). Which is correct?  -- Finlay McWalter 23:52, 29 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your help. Stocznia Gda&#324;ska is the polish name of a shipyard in Gda&#324;sk. There are some other like Gda&#324;ska Stocznia Remontowa or Stocznia Pó&#322;nocna, but Wa&#322;&#281;sa worked only in that one. Gda&#324;ska is polish adjective from word Gda&#324;sk, stocznia means shipyard.Gdarin 07:07, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * Q2 I changed "war state" and "war law" to "martial law", which is the common english idiom. Roughly, this means a state of military rule when normal governmental and judicial processes are suspended and citizen's rights severely constrained.  I assume this is what happened in 1982? -- Finlay McWalter 00:12, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * Martial law is ok. But it happened in December 13 1981. Gdarin 07:07, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * Q3 was imprisioned in a "luxury jail" since October 1982. I assume this means that he went INTO the jail in October 1982, right? -- Finlay McWalter 00:32, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)


 * He was internee (that word is the best one I think) from December 1981 to November 1982. Gdarin 07:07, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)

This is awful - the only part that's actually an article is about ridiculous conspiracy theories. Someone should turn the timeline into paragraphs. john '''k 08:09, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I've rearranged the points form into paragraphs as suggested. No information has been added or removed. jp

Movie
What was the film about him? Iron Man, or something? I remember it was notable. Must go into the article.mikka (t) 16:45, 19 October 2005 (UTC)

Andrzej Wajda's Man of Iron, is what i think you're talking about. Wajda's earlier Man of Marble, about Communism in the 1950's and 1960's, is also excellent.


 * "Man of Iron" (a sequel to "Man of Marble") takes place during the strikes of 1980. It features some stock footage of Wałęsa, but I wouldn't say it's about him; he's mainly there to provide historical background. --24.58.13.127 21:50, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I would. The central figure, i.e. the Man of Iron-whom the main character has been sent to slander-is Lech Walesa. mercruz (t) 16:45, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Spoken Version
This article is on the Spoken Wikipedia request list, so I am going to make a recording. If any of you want to add any significant changes, notify me now.

Markkasan 20:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

I see no reason to include a mispronunciation of his name in English at the top of the article, and for this reason removed all but the correct pronunciation. I am not very nationalistic but find it mildly offensive. Many Americans butcher many world leader's names - are we to start including phonetic mispronunciations at the top of encyclopedia articles?

-- Random Pole

Random pole is rights. It is utter madness to include the MISpronounciation - e.g. how it is read by an englishman with no idea about the Polish language 84.167.245.86 11:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Requested move
The reasons for move copied from the entry on the WP:RM page:


 * Talk:Lech Wałęsa &mdash; Lech Wałęsa → Lech Walesa – see Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English), especially #A Polish/French-English example and #A Polish-English example on that talk page --Francis Schonken 11:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation, then sign your vote with ~ 


 * Support --Francis Schonken 11:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose. This amounts to disinformation IMO. [[Image:European-Austrian flag hybrid.svg|20px]] ナイトスタリオン ✉ 12:08, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Lech Walesa would be pronounced differently from Lech Wałęsa in Polish. Not being Polish myself or knowing any Slavic language, I learned already as a child how to pronounce these Polish letters thanks to the name of this guy (just from listening to the news). I can't see why it would be a problem for anyone else to do so. up◦land 12:18, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose — the above link is to the talk page on a Wikipedia guideline, not the guideline itself. Naming conventions (use English) is the relevant link, and that says that the discussion is still open. Redirects are cheap, so no one can get lost by not bothering to type the correct letters. These letters are meaningful, suggest the correct pronunciation, and, dare I say, the more correct spelling. --Gareth Hughes 13:45, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose, as per Gareth Hughes. Olessi 16:48, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Diacritics are allowed as far as I know. Or they should be in my opinion, because that would be encyclopedic. I am all for using English whenever is possible on this Wikipedia. However this is a polish personal name, not an english one, there is no such thing as a translation (unless someone knows what the english translation of the name "Lech" would be). This is not such a serious case that it would warrant to be written incorrectly in my humble opinion. Gryffindor  22:16, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose of course. By dropping the diacrytes one does not create an English name. The thing he creates is "someone's name written without diacrytes". Nothing more. Halibutt 17:28, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose obviously. Compare Gerhard Schröder, Göran Persson, Wolfgang Schüssel, Dag Hammarskjöld, Halldór Ásgrímsson etc etc etc etc! Balcer 19:14, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose How dare you suggest spelling his name Walesa- I am Polish, Walesa and Wałęsa sound nothing alike. W is a v in Polish, ł is a w etc. This is Anglo-Saxon biggotry- How about we spell Winston Churchill will Polish diacritics?
 * Oppose Oh, come on... It's like removing the fact that Wałęsa is a Pole. Poles are really attached to their language and the diacritics and I think it's ridiculous to do such a thing to one of the the most well-known Poles.  Kubek15  write / sign 18:19, 15 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Support This is the English Wiki. I do not insist that Norwegian letters be used to render my name.  I realize that there are problems with rendering the name solely in ASCII Latin, but that's the standard here. Haakondahl (talk) 15:44, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Add any additional comments
 * I have an impression that this move proposal is in fact a splinter of the Talk:Níðhöggr/Archive 1 voting, in which Lech Wałęsa was used by yours truly as an example that the lack of diacrytes does not make an English name. Halibutt 02:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)


 * NOTE In North America, it is written "Lech Walesa", without diacritics. Arguments about it being not Polish should not be relevant, as this is not the polish wikipedia. The article title should be readable by anyone with *solely* English as their background. It should be written using solely English letters (which *should* mean ASCII only plus Æ and Œ ) All arguments about people being multilingual have no traction, as not everyone is multilingual, and this is the English Wikipedia, not the "every languange ever existing" version. The proper original language form should be noted in the article, and may even be used throughout the article following a "herein referred to as original name" clause, but it should not be an article title. 132.205.45.148 22:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Result
It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it to be moved. WhiteNight T 01:24, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Recentism?
Following section was added to the Lech Walesa article:

==Recent controversy==

Lech Walesa has recently had to face up to accusations that he was a paid agent of the Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa (state security service) for more than 10 years during his rise to the top of the Solidarity movement the in Gdansk shipyards (during the 1970's). Walesa, under the codename "Bolek" (Lech Walesa's father's name), is said to have been recruited to pass information to the SB, and was bumped into the top leadership position within Solidarity by other embedded agents of the SB in an attempt to control the movement. His subsequent break from SB control is attributed to a new arrangement Walesa made with the CIA, then headed by George H. W. Bush.

Prior to the 2000 presidential election, Walesa was cleared to hold political office by a special "vetting court" (lustracja), which held that photocopies of documents pertaining to agent "Bolek", including signed receipts for payments from the SB, were inadmissible. The original documents, if they in fact existed, are said to have been pulled from SB files and destroyed during Walesa's term as the first president of a newly-democratic Poland, 1990-95.

Poland, unlike most other former soviet satellite states, never publicly opened the records of the state security apparatus following the disintegration of the Soviet block. While unproven and hotly contested, this version of Walesa's past is being increasingly discussed in Poland (as of December 2005). Walesa has been accused of this on numerous occasions on Polish television and radio shows, and responds in an increasingly angered way, threatening to take libel action if the accusations continue. Whether true or not, the allegations underscore the immense political savvy, however opportunistic, of a man who went from shipyard electrician without a high school degree to the president of his nation and international anti-communist mascot.

I moved this section to the talk page for following reasons: --Francis Schonken 13:20, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Isn't this recentism?
 * Sources re. the introduced information seem to lack: could user:Jak lefataliste (who introduced the section) or anybody else give some references, preferably reliable sources, to back this story? I mean, I have no idea whether this is tabloid level, or better, or worse?
 * The section is hardly wikified, so if it would be OK to keep it in the article, at least some lay-out improvements would be recommended.

Jak_lefataliste, 31st December 2005:
 * Sources? He's been on Polish TV countless times over the past year, facing up to the accusations. If you have no idea of the current situation in Polish politics then you have no right to be deleting things such as this. It is 'every tv channel, radio station and newspaper (broadsheet and tabloid)' level. The section on 'lustracja' is not mentioned anywhere else in the article - leaving it out makes the entry 5 years out of date.
 * How is putting something back (with substantial changes, i might add) that was there 2 years ago 'recentism'?
 * If it's not 'Wikified' then why don't you 'wikify' it, rather than deleting the whole thing?

Reasons, significance of his actions?
The article seems to be missing the reasons he opposed the Soviet Union, why he supported the strike in the first place, and what was so bad about living under the Soviet Bloc (and no, it isn't enough to assume his actions speak for themselves). Why did he support Margaret Thatcher? Why did he go to Reagan's funeral (and why did he support him)? I know why, and plenty of others know why, so why isn't any of this in the article? Kamikaze Highlander 20:54, 11 August 2006 (UTC)


 * This man is the greatest Pole since Piłsudski; he ended communism without a shot. I only hope he runs for President again as he has hinted.

are you joking - he was terrible president.

Pictures
The main picture is extremely pixelated and the other pictures are missing captions, can anyone who knows more about this guy work on that ?Mbisanz 23:58, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Medical
From New York Times, Sept. 5, 2007:


 * Poland: Walesa to Get a Pacemaker


 * By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE


 * Lech Wałesa, the Solidarity leader and Poland’s first president after Communism, said he would be having surgery to have a defibrillator fitted for an irregular heart beat. "I am nearly 65 years old and I have to be careful," he said. "The only thing that remains of my virility is my need to shave."

Too much information, Lech! :-)

Sca 16:28, 5 September 2007 (UTC)


 * You have to admit, it IS funny. He was just discharged after having a couple of procedures  for his heart and feels better. Even had the good humor to taunt dictators.  As he gets older, perhaps this might be relevant on his article?  --Hourick (talk) 14:15, 5 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Much wittier and respectable than current American television's endless stream of aphrodisiac commercials. Lech deserves praise!  Richard David Ramsey 21:47, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Honorary Doctorates
The honors section says that Lech Walesa has received 32 doctorates and is supported by a reference from Walesas official website. This information is faulty. His 33rd doctoral reception was in Trois Rivieres in Quebec, Canada. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stanleymilgram (talk • contribs) 18:49, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

What institution is meant by "Connecticut State University"? Is that supposed to be Central Connecticut State University? Richard David Ramsey 21:42, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

WTF!!! Wałęsa has coat of arms? since when, who said so?
any proves for that, I've never seen before such a coat of arms, he isn't nobile - it's enough to take a loo at his name... besides let someone xpand article with section 'falandyzacja prawa'...

Iznogud —Preceding unsigned comment added by Iznogud (talk • contribs) 14:26, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Cooperation with communist secret services
This is a hot topic now in Poland, I think it should also be included in the article. I do not have the book published by the IPN and I am not interested in Walesa as such, however, perhaps some editor would add information on his cooperation with the communist secret services in the 1970s as well as destruction of compromising documents, ordered by him in early 1990s, when he was president. Tymek (talk) 17:20, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

To jest wszystko kłamstwo i pomówienia, Pan Prezydent Lech Wałęsa nigdy nie współpracował z SB - to jest polityczny atak na wielkiego polskiego wodza.

--- Member of Civillian Platform ---

_______Facts_______

It is not true that Lech Wałęsa cooperate with communist secret services. There is no evidence that he cooperate. There are only some fake materials made by communist secret services to discredit him. book published by Institute of National Remembrance about cooperation contains substantive errors and can't be reliable scientific publication. Without Mr Wałęsa we wouldn't be here now.

One of the young generation (Poland).

Golitsyn comment
Because Golitsyn comment has nothing to do with Walesa's alleged cooperation with communist Secret Service and the book published by Centkiewicz. Many people said many things about Walesa, you just can't list them all here.--Jacurek (talk) 16:23, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Why not? Golitsyn was a notable figure, although a bit crazy. The section is about conspiracy theories surrounding Walesa, not about one book. --84.71.43.224 (talk) 17:22, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, but this page is about Walesa and not Golitsyn. If we start quoting here everybody's opinion about Walesa we will run out of room, right? Why don't we add this info into Golitsyn page if there is one?--Jacurek (talk) 18:08, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * How can one sentence mentioning Golitsyn's claims mean that the whole article is about him? This section is about conspiracy theories surrounding Walesa. Golitsyn is the only notable person outside of Poland who promotes such theories. --84.71.43.224 (talk) 18:40, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Cristicism section
I've removed that convoluted section that looked more like a blatant copy and paste than an encyclopedic entry.

In my opinion, the accusations of anti-Semitism by that Israeli institute should not be included, as they seem to be Fact picking, and even if they were true as such, the proportional volume of the hand-picked facts drowns other information, giving a false impression to the reader.

We must also be very careful with articles about living people. Likeminas (talk) 01:50, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Communism's polish defeat
Lech walesa is well known for recieving the nobel peace prize for bringing down communism in russia and organizing workers against the oppression. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.166.92.110 (talk) 21:40, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

MEP

 * Valensa is MEP for May 2004- Jule 2004  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.231.163.133 (talk) 04:48, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Move request

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: page not moved: no concensus in 46 days. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 07:01, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Lech Wałęsa → Lech Walesa &mdash; Not because either one is better, more correct or more accurate, but because "Lech Walesa" is more common in reliable English-language sources. See WP:UE for choosing between anglicized and local spellings. Dohn joe (talk) 01:13, 1 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Related requests currently under discussion at Talk:François Mitterrand and Talk:Gerhard Schröder. —   AjaxSmack   00:10, 4 December 2010 (UTC)


 *  Support . Interesting that this seems to be reversing an earlier, undiscussed move, see the original stub. Or can someone find and wikilink to the move or an earlier discussion or both? I haven't looked all that hard I admit. Anyway, the proposer seems to me to make a good case; In English sources, the diacritics are unusual in my experience. (But whenever we discuss diacritics there seems to be controversy.) Andrewa (talk) 02:56, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment alot of Europeans have been moved to names with accents from unaccented versions... so this is probably par for the course. 76.66.202.72 (talk) 04:33, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose (change of vote) under WP:IAR. Perhaps the time has come to clean up our usage of diacritics. Anyway, let's have a go. See below. Andrewa (talk) 17:20, 23 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support, his name is almost never written with diacritics in English-language sources. Powers T 03:26, 1 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support he is clearly referred to without diacritics for most English language publications. WP:UE and WP:COMMONNAME. 76.66.202.72 (talk) 04:32, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Sigh, not this again. Oppose. The standard Wikipedia convention is to include the diacritics. It's been that way for a long time. This comes up perennially, usually brought up by people unfamiliar with the standard practice. Also, why is it that it's always Polish (or other Eastern European) names that get chosen for these campaigns, rather than say François Mitterrand, Hermann Müller, or Erik Gustaf Boström. Someone always wants to pick on the Eastern European name, but nobody objects to diacritics for Western Europeans. Get those guys moved to Francois, Muller and Bostrom, first, then try here. Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:52, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * See also . Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:54, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * And The use of modified letters (such as accents or other diacritics) in article titles is neither encouraged nor discouraged; when deciding between versions of a name which differ in the use or non-use of modified letters, follow the general usage in English reliable sources (for example other encyclopedias and reference works). Here's Britannica  which includes the diacritics. Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:57, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * No ad hominim arguments, please. Andrewa (talk) 08:45, 1 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and Wałęsa is notable almost exclusively for actions in Poland and his name there is Lech Wałęsa.  Many non-encyclopedic English sources eschew most or all diacritics but Wikipedia does not.   Cf. pretty much any other notable figure with diacritics in his name, e.g., Éamon de Valera, Félix Houphouët-Boigny, Nicolae Ceauşescu, Gerhard Schröder, Slobodan Milošević, or every other of the hundreds of Polish politicians with Wikipedia articles.  —   AjaxSmack   17:45, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Per WP:DIACRITICS "The use of modified letters (such as accents or other diacritics) in article titles is neither encouraged nor discouraged;" For editors to decide what is correct and not to follow common usage in reliable English language sources, is a form of original research. As the content is meant to be sourced based, what is the justification of using a spelling that is not based on sources? -- PBS (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Support Other enclopedias including Britannica title their article on him without the diacretics (though they use the diacretics within the article itself, as we should continue to do). Other important sources not using diacretics include the BBC and the Nobel Prize website. The Celestial City (talk) 19:18, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Uhhh, your Britannica link shows clearly that they use diacritics in the title. Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:12, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't see any sign of the accent in the "http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/634519/Lech-Walesa" article title that was referred to. Jamesday (talk) 09:46, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Lech Wałęsa, (b. Sept. 29, 1943, Popowo, near Włocławek, Pol.), labour activist who helped form and led (1980–90) communist Poland’s first independent trade union, Solidarity. . It's right there. BTW, your link gives a weird message. Volunteer Marek (talk) 10:29, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Tht's not the tile, that's the lead (that's what I meant about Britannica using "the diacretics within the article itself"). Their actual title is "Lech Walesa (president of Poland)". The Celestial City (talk) 00:44, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure how you're getting that. The title appears to be under "History & Society::Lech Wałęsa" Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:13, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * In fact, when I type "Lech Wa" into the search box, it suggests "Lech Wałęsa (president of Poland)", diacritics and all. Are you sure (this is also a question for some of the others) that it's not just that you don't have the proper diacritics enabled on your browser or something? Then yeah, you'll get that "other sources use "Walesa"", but it's not really true. Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:16, 6 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Also, that the Nobel prize website NEVER uses diacritics no matter the person. For example, for the French Economist Gérard Debreu (note the accent in the title of the Wikipedia article) they use "Gerard Debreau" without the accent . So they're consistent. Of course there's no reason why the practice of the Nobel prize website should be adopted at Wikipedia (and it hasn't) - but, like them, we should be consistent. If we have Gérards,Büchners, Øyvinds etc. then we should also have a Wałęsa. Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:26, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * You may not like it, but Romance language and German diacritics are far more frequently reproduced in English than Polish ones. We cannot and should not treat them as equivalent. john k (talk) 05:58, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not so sure that that is true anymore, maybe 20, 30 years ago. Note the Nobel prize website doesn't use any kind of diacritics, Polish, Romance or German ones. It most likely doesn't apply to Nordic diacritics either. And anyway, the standard practice on Wikipedia is to keep diacritics where they exist, be they German, Romance, Nordic, or Polish. Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:20, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Standard practice is to follow the sources, not to use diacritics indiscriminately. Powers T 15:50, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the web page source code will help to make it more clear: " Lech Walesa (president of Poland) -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia ". You may find this visible in as the window or tab title in your browser. As with this proposal the entry there uses a different page title and article body form of the name. Jamesday (talk) 03:28, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
 * That just affects how the title shows up in your browser address bar I believe, that's it. The actual title of the Britannica article is "Lech Wałęsa". Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:53, 16 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support as nom. DIACRITICS, cited by Volunteer Marek, says to "follow the general usage in English reliable sources." It then gives examples of where to look: 1) at the sources used in the article itself; 2) a Google Books search since 1980; and 3) a selection of other encyclopedias.
 * Looking at 1), over 90% of the English-language sources in the article itself use "Walesa". Likewise, looking at 2), over 90% of English-language Google Books results since 1980 use "Walesa". As for 3), encyclopedias are split, but "Walesa" seems to predominate (see here for encyclopedia.com search results). Also, not that it necessarily matters what the subject calls himself, but I think it's interesting that the English-language version of the subject's own foundation is the "Lech Walesa Institute", and his own autobiography uses "Lech Walesa" as the author's name.
 * As for the "everybody else does it" argument, that in itself shouldn't matter here. Perhaps some of those articles should be renamed; perhaps not. Let's look at this article on its own and decide whether "Lech Walesa" better suits Wikipedia guidelines. Dohn joe (talk) 19:30, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * If "everybody else does it" doesn't apply, fine. But how is this case different from all of the other important people with diacritics in their name?  (Think Slobodan Milošević).  And if this case is not different, shouldn't this be dealt with systematically rather than piecemeal?  —   AjaxSmack   23:39, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * What Ajax said. If you want to change this, change the policy and general Wikipedia practice. You can't single out a single article for different treatment. If nothing else, consistency across Wikipedia articles matters. Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:13, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Disagree. Consensus can change, and if we valued consistency above all else we'd never be able to change, an unacceptable situation IMO. There are two ways that guidelines and policy can change: We can discuss it at the policy and guideline level, or we can apply WP:IAR at the practical level and disregard what no longer reflects consensus. Wikipedia is healthiest if both of these are happening. Andrewa (talk) 17:00, 11 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support per WP:UE, DIACRITICS and WP:COMMONNAME. Flamarande (talk) 23:31, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Those policies support the use of diacritics. Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:13, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * These policies allow the use of diacritics. Essentially, what they say is that where English-language sources use diacritics, then use diacritics. Where English-language sources don't use diacritics, don't use them.


 * As to the systematic vs. piecemeal issue: We already have the broad framework to address this issue: WP:UE, DIACRITICS and WP:COMMONNAME. The implementation has to be article-by-article. Why? Because the usage will differ from subject to subject. Some will clearly require diacritics; some will clearly not; and others will be debatable. Of course, that's just my view; anyone's welcome to compile a list of subjects that should be titled without diacritics and try to do it by mass move request. It seems likelier to me that consensus can be reached on an individual basis, though. Dohn joe (talk) 00:30, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but this framework and these policies support the use of diacritics in this case. Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:17, 2 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose (GA author). And here we go again. Per Volunteer and Ajax, Wikipedia uses diacritics. And dumbing down is not good (I might support this move on Simple Wikipedia). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 03:15, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Do you have a source that says not using diacritics is a form of dumbing down? Is writing "hotel" instead of "hôtel" or a "U.S. army general" instead of U.S. army général" a from of dumbing down? Most people call it anglicisation. You may not like it but it is common in English and in many other languages to recast a borrowed word into a more familiar form rather than keep the word in the form used in a foreign language. -- PBS (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. Usage of diacritics is decided by the conventions found in reliable sources; in this case I believe they support Lech Walesa.Erudy (talk) 06:09, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Make that a "Strong" Support; the man himself uses "Lech Walesa" in English; see the website of the institute he founded, where you can toggle back and forth from Polish to English, Lech Wałęsa to Lech Walesa. See also  his English language autobiography Erudy (talk) 15:54, 12 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose per Volunteer and Ajax. I also don't see how not using diacritics is much more common in the sources given above. &mdash;innotata 17:43, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Do you agree that "Walesa" is used in over 90% of the English-language sources in the article itself? Dohn joe (talk) 18:34, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes. And I agree that "Milosevic" is used in most news articles on Slobodan Milošević.  So why this one?  How is Lech Wałęsa sui generis?.  If he's not, let's discuss all names with diacritics.   —   AjaxSmack   22:10, 2 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose - primarily, because Wikipedia uses diacritics for foreign names. We don't remove ł and ę just because they look funny to some people (while always keeping ç and ö): they happen to make a difference in how the name is pronounced, if one knows basic Polish morphology. And we don't do it because "everybody else" does it either: here, we have always been inclusive of diacritics because of our international outlook, and that should continue. Plus, why only this biography? His name is indisputably Wałęsa, and our usage should reflect that. - Biruitorul Talk 05:01, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia should use diacritics for foreign names when English does. When English does not, we should not.  This is because we are bound to reflect the verifiable reality of English usage.  This is also why we have Mao Zedong (not Máo Zédōng), Ho Chi Minh (not Hồ Chí Minh), Novak Djokovic (not Novak Đoković), Saddam Hussein (not Ṣaddām Ḥusayn), Junichiro Koizumi (not Jun'ichirō Koizumi), and so forth, even though in each case leaving diacritics would make a difference in pronunciation.  Wikipedia does have an international outlook--that's why there are so many language versions.  English Wikipedia has an English outlook, and English conventions are what we should follow.Erudy (talk) 16:35, 12 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support. First, I must disagree in the strongest terms possible with the argument that an overall general policy or guideline has to change or at least be discussed before any exceptions like the one that has been proposed here can occur.  In fact, exceptions like this often form the main basis for change in guidelines/policy (since guidelines are supposed to reflect what happens more than dictate what happens).  So, no matter how ill-conceived a proposal might be, it should never be opposed on "all or nothing" grounds. If we are to move away from using diacritics, then we have to start somewhere, and this title seems as good as any.Second, as to this particular proposal, I support it because as others have noted this subject is almost always referenced by name in English sources without diacritics, so the title of the article should reflect that. Finally, as to how other articles should be treated, like Milosevic, let's take one step at a time.  --Born2cycle (talk) 18:56, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment: Very well put. No change of vote. Andrewa (talk) 18:31, 12 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support. What normal English typing and usage produces, though formal sources might well use accents in body text. No problem to take care of other articles as consideration of those is requested. Jamesday (talk) 09:46, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
 * "Normal English typing" (I have no idea what "normal English usage" is - in fact, there's no such thing, we're not the French with an academy to determine such matters) also produces "Francois Mitterand" instead of François Mitterrand, "Hermann Muller" instead of Hermann Müller, "Erik Gustaf Bostrom" instead of Erik Gustaf Boström, "Slobodan Milosevic" instead of Slobodan Milošević, and many many many other similar examples. Why single out (perennially) this particular article to make it an exception to general Wikipedia practice? Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:20, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Normal English usage is what native English speakers normally use. I'll be happy to be in favor of moving those articles as well, with one possible exception, so we can also have them consistent with policy. Not sure that there's enough English usage of "Erik Gustaf Bostrom" in either form to have a well defined English usage, so I'd think more about what to do with that one and might go with no English form for it, hence leaving it where it is. Maybe. Jamesday (talk) 10:37, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * You are absolutely wrong on umlauts, at least in German. "Muller" is just wrong.  It is either "Müller" or "Mueller".  With a few exceptions like "Zurich" (which is, at any rate, the long-standing French name) it is quite standard to use the "e" if one cannot use an umlaut.  john k (talk) 05:54, 7 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Support, in this case. I said over at François Mitterrand that "ç" is not an unfamiliar diacritical mark in English - people generally know what it means and it is used in English in words borrowed from French, like soupçon.  The Polish ones are entirely unfamiliar and their meaning is unclear to all but Polish speakers. john k (talk) 05:54, 7 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose, for the excellent reasons given above by Volunteer Marek, Ajax Smack, Piotrus, Biruitorul and others. Nihil novi (talk) 07:35, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose This would be a step backwards for an encylopaedia, which is supposed to supply accurate information. There are a few cases where a name is so thoroughly anglicised we drop the accent, e.g. "Napoleon" not "Napoléon", but this isn't one of them. Looking round Wikipedia the place seems to be able to cope with Nicolae Ceauşescu (or should that be moved to reflect the common mispronunciation Chow-Chess-Koo?), Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, Antonín Dvořák and so on. This discussion reminds me of the Not the Nine O'Clock News sketch "Hollywood Salutes Lech Wałęsa", mocking US attempts to cope with "funny foreign names", where he was referred to throughout as "Leech". Can anybody honestly say that they do not recognise "Lech Wałęsa" is the same guy as the "Lech Walesa" they have been reading about in some rag? --Paul Marston (talk) 12:09, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * "some rag"? Look at the citations for the article itself.  The references section is chock full of newspapers and associated media, almost all of which use the unadorned version of the name.  I find it hard to swallow when the same sources we trust and depend on to provide the actual content of this article suddenly become unsophisticated "rags" when they do not use accents.  Right now our article is not supplying accurate information about the conventional rendering of this name in English.Erudy (talk) 04:05, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Ideally this should be sourced from academic or similarly authoritative books. Those should set the standard we follow, not "lowest common denominator". As far as I can see all the Wikipedias in other languages use the form "Lech Wałęsa". I can't believe so many people are putting so much effort into making the English Wikipedia less accurate. --Paul Marston (talk) 10:36, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Accuracy is not at issue here; no one is proposing to change the way his name is rendered in the article itself. This is only about the article title, and "accuracy" is rather low on the totem pole of WP:TITLE criteria.  Recognizability and naturalness take precedence.  Powers T 13:59, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Why should the title differ from the way his name is rendered in the article itself? —   AjaxSmack   22:17, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Because they serve different purposes. Powers T 22:23, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Lol. Like one serves the purpose of informing and the other of misleading? I'm sorry, but this makes absolutely no sense what so ever. You're saying that we should follow one standard in naming articles and a completely, diametrically opposed standard in the text itself. Does that make an iota of sense? It's schizophrenic and it would just make articles look amateurish and badly written. Consistency, if nothing else, within an article, if nowhere else, is important too. Can you articulate this strange notion somehow? Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:04, 10 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose, serves no purpose except to "dumb down" - the form with diacritics is equally recognizable and more informative; people know that diacritics are not always used in English sources (because not all sources have the technical capacity or care very much) so we don't really mislead anyone by including them, whereas we may do so by omitting them (since WP generally uses original diacritics for foreigners who haven't been naturalized in another country).--Kotniski (talk) 13:27, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * No, we follow the English-language sources. Where did this idea come from that we generally use diacritics without reference to sources?  Powers T 15:50, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Observation of reality.--Kotniski (talk) 16:00, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment - It would be nice to see a list of move requests involving the addition or removal of diacritics from individuals names. What's written at WP:DIACRITICS may or may not reflect reality; I personally think that reading policy and guideline pages is bad for Wikipedians. Consensus exists in the field, not on a page somewhere. Consensus is also determined by choices made in active discussions, and not by inertia. If we use (or omit) diacritics in many cases simply because nobody has thought to remove (or add) them, then that would seem to carry less weight than decisions that have actually been considered by Wikipedians in conversations such as this one. The idea that we need to change policy prior to making individual case-by-case choices is completely anathema to how we work. The day that becomes true, Wikipedia dies. -GTBacchus(talk) 04:24, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose English-language sources are not as important to this article as he is a Polish politician. If he were a British, American, etc. politician who happened to be born with a traditional Polish name, then there might be an argument for anglicizing his written name. As it is, he lives and works in Poland and an encyclopedia should recognize the proper Polish lettering. Wikkitywack (talk) 01:55, 11 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose We should be following the example of other encyclopaedic sources, which appear to use the diacrytics, when usage is mixed.  It really does seem that someone is on a bit of a mission with all these requested moves to remove diacrytics.  Try writing or improving a few articles instead.  Skinsmoke (talk) 18:09, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
 * You may have missed this above (unsurprisingly, given the volume of discussion), but many encyclopedias actually use "Walesa". That, plus the extremely wide usage of "Walesa" in reliable sources is what prompted me to request this move. Please try to consider it on its own merits, and not as part of a vast conspiracy to move two whole other articles (which are also being considered on their own merits, hopefully). Dohn joe (talk) 18:34, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
 * As User talk:Dohn joe mentions it's common to use the form without accent in encyclopedias and similarly authoritative sources. But this is also an area where we need to be cautious because formal sources like encyclopedias are likely to have copy editors that will use normative usage instead of common usage and as a result not be representative of normal English usage. Blogs and similar sources would be more representative of normal English usage than sources with copy editors. Jamesday (talk) 03:28, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Umm, that's actually standing things on their head. We do in fact want to use sources with copy editors, and the relevant policy reflects that by suggesting looking at how other encyclopedia, including Britannica does it. Blogs do all kinds of things we do not want to emulate on Wikipedia. Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:53, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
 * "You may have missed this above (unsurprisingly, given the volume of discussion), but many encyclopedias actually use "Walesa"" - hilarious. If you click on the top link it takes you to the list of encyclopaedia articles: 3 of 4 of which use Lech Wałęsa.  This is unfortunately representative of the level of evidence given in favour of the move. Knepflerle (talk) 22:36, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Those three of four do use "Wałęsa". But if you look again at the original results, under "Encyclopedia entries related to "Lech Walesa"", you'll see that all five of those use "Walesa". The Oxford dictionary result also shows "Walesa". That now adds up to 7 of 10 results which use "Walesa". No one's ever said that "Wałęsa" is not found in English. And this is an inexact science; "Walesa", however, does seem to predominate in general reference works, and is used overwhelmingly in other reliable sources, as shown above. Dohn joe (talk) 00:17, 17 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose: Wałęsa seems reasonably common in works of general reference. Knepflerle (talk) 22:39, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Of all the reliable sources that use Wałęsa which one would your cite as the best example? -- PBS (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Support We follow what is used in reliable English language sources, if they use diacritics so do we if they do not then we don't in this case the overwhelming usage in reliable English language sources is without. A useful check that was recently introduced into DIACRITICS] is "In general, the sources in the article, a Google book search of books published since 1980, and a selection of other encyclopaedias should all be examples of reliable sources; if all three of them use a term, then that is fairly conclusive. If one of those three diverges from agreement then more investigation will be needed." in this case no further investigation is needed. -- PBS (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Further discussion
 Copied from User talk:AjaxSmack

Hello - I agree that if Walesa should be moved, then Milosevic would be a good candidate for renaming as well. I'm not trying to single out Walesa - his was just the first article where I noticed this issue. This is also not a crusade against diacritics or "foreign-sounding things". There are many articles where I think WP:DIACRITICS means the diacritics should remain. You mentioned the hundreds of Polish politician articles. I would imagine that the vast majority of those pages would keep the diacritics, because they're either written that way in English-language sources, or there isn't sufficient info to determine a common English-language version.

And I understand your concern with the piecemeal approach and the inconsistency it breeds as articles are changed one by one. My concern with the mass renaming proposal is that while there are many clear candidates for renaming, there are bound to be many borderline cases, and I'm afraid of getting bogged down in a massive Wikipedia debate fest that accomplishes nothing tangible, which is why I'm trying an incremental approach. If you have any suggestions for an alternative approach, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Dohn joe (talk) 23:39, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that a comprehensive approach risks "getting bogged down in a massive Wikipedia debate fest that accomplishes nothing tangible" — it usually does. But the "incremental approach" implies avoidance of a wider discussion with the goal of changing policy by stealth.  I don't see a problem with WP:DIACRITICS either and that guideline specifically mentions usage in other encyclopedias as a yard(0.91-metre)stick to decide such cases.  In the case of Wałęsa, Britannica uses diacritics.  (Incidentally, in cases where a person is notable for actions in an English-speaking country and/or did not personally use diacritics on his/her name, I oppose gratuitous use of such marks.  See Talk:Ahmet Ertegun and Talk:Manny Ramirez for such cases.)


 * I just don't see where the line should be drawn according to your reasoning. Which people would retain diacritics and which wouldn't?  And also, why is the partial elimination of diacritics needed?  Except for something like a German eszett (ß), diacritics can be "read through". i.e., those unfamiliar with them can ignore them and pronounce the name just as they would have anyway while those who are familiar with them will be able to (hopefully) pronounce the name correctly.  Such usage would mark Wikipedia as a serious encyclopedia of a higher calibre than news wire services and the like and bridging the gap between them and scholarly works.   —   AjaxSmack   02:31, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
 * The line is drawn not by my reasoning, but by WP:DIACRITICS. It gives clear guidance on which articles retain diacritics and which ones don't - look to usage in English-language sources. That's it. It's an objective set of criteria. And without having investigated the matter too closely, my suspicion is that relatively few articles would need to be moved. Well-known (in English-speaking places) politicians, places, and so on. The result of applying WP:DIACRITICS will not be a purge of ł ę ß, etc. Not to mention that the diacritics will still appear inside every article. As LtPowers says below, our goal is to have articles at their most-recognizable English-language title. Sometimes that includes diacritics; sometimes it doesn't.


 * With Walesa, I think I've shown that the vast majority of reliable English-language sources (Britannica notwithstanding) use "Walesa". That's the yardstick explicitly given for us to use by WP:DIACRITICS. Dohn joe (talk) 19:05, 3 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with everything Dohn Joe says above, but would like to add never-the-less that if we are talking about change, Wikipedia works by a blend of the comprehensive and incremental approaches. What usually seems to happen is a few changes are attempted using an incremental approach with one of three possible outcomes: either none, some, or all attempts to change one at a time incrementally succeed.  If none, there it ends.  If there are sufficient successful incremental changes, then a more comprehensive approach might be pursued, which often includes incremental changes to the guideline as well as "mass change".  I suggest Wikipedia has to work this way because it is almost impossible to get a true measure of overall consensus in any one discussion (no matter how many places the discussion is advertised and with how many tags); so establishing general consensus can only happen in a piecemeal fashion. Only if consensus in individual discussions like this one repeatedly and at least fairly consistently supports change in a given direction do we establish general consensus for comprehensive change. In short, focus in this discussion should be on what the relevant guidelines say and whether readers are better off with the article at Lech Wałęsa or Lech Walesa, regardless of what may or may not happen with use of diacritics in other titles.  --Born2cycle (talk) 19:16, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

I note that WP:DIACRITICS also says "Beware of over-dramatising these issues". Remember our goals: to place the article at the title that most readers would most immediately recognize. That's all anyone is trying to do. Powers T 13:08, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Any evidence that someone hasn't recognized the current title who would've recognized it without diacritics? —   AjaxSmack   00:00, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
 * That's not the criterion laid forth. Powers T 14:56, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
 * When did editing Wikipedia become primarily about meeting set criteria and rigidly applying a manual of style? From what I can tell, that's all this spate of diacritic-eliminating move requests is about. It is not about improving the encyclopaedia. To Ajax's reasonable question about the recognisability of the current title, we get the response "That's not the criterion"! And who says? The guidelines? Those are just guidelines! The whole reason to have a move request process (as opposed to a board of article namers) is so that we can make up our guidelines by convention and consensus. Those voting "support" based on their reading of the guideline have totally missed the point. 216.8.134.7 (talk) 21:21, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that guidelines are just guidelines, and not commandments. And guidelines are merely meant to help implement principles. But the guidelines didn't write (and edit) themselves; they're already the product of consensus. And that consensus changes and is reevaluated all the time. In this case, WP:DIACRITICS reflects the current consensus on how to implement one aspect of the principle, "Place articles at the title most readers would recognize." The way to do that, as regards diacritics, is, "Look at usage in English-language sources." The guideline then goes further to suggest where to find those sources. If the sources indicate that a name without diacritics appears in English-language books, articles, reference works, etc. ten times as often as the name with diacritics, then the name without diacritics should be the title. Not because "the guideline told me to do it", but because when a name is used ten times more often than another, that's strong evidence that it's more recognizable. That evidence is then weighed by other editors in light of various guiding principles, and consensus is (or isn't) reached to move. Dohn joe (talk) 22:45, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I said our goal was to place the article at the title that most readers would most immediately recognize. Then AjaxSmack tried to refute that by asking for evidence that a reader failed to recognize the current title but would have recognized it without the diacritics.  That's called a strawman; I said "our goal is A" and AjaxSmack replied "prove that B has ever happened".  I never claimed that readers would be completely unable to recognize Walesa's name if we continued to use diacritics, so AjaxSmack's request for proof of that claim is spurious and unnecessary.  That's what I was attempting to convey with my brief reply on the 4th.  Powers T 13:50, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
 * One goal is A, i.e. recognizability. Other goals are to be an encyclopedia, not a newspaper, and to be accurate without being obtuse.  Why should these goals be thrown aside for the unproven argument that someone recognizing "Lech Walesa" would be less able to recognize "Lech Wałęsa".  This is a solution in search of a problem.  —   AjaxSmack   22:17, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

It should be noted here that WP:DIACRITICS is not representative of actual practice on Wikipedia, nor of consensus - it would be accurate if it reflected the fact that we can all easily observe: that diacritics are used much more commonly on Wikipedia than they are in English sources as a whole (because we're an encyclopedia doing the boring job of conveying information to people), but any attempt to make it say that is reverted by one of a handful of guardians of that page. In other words, what's written there is just a few people's ideas, it shouldn't be treated as authoritative in any way.--Kotniski (talk) 13:32, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
 * So you are saying that when we decide on the usage of WP:DIACRITICS, we should not base our usage on reliable English language sources, but on the preferences of some Wikipedians who happen to like them. Does this not contradict the move in the last 6 years or so to move over to using sources to decide on article content and article titles? If you follow that argument why do you want things like the names of monarchs to be sourced based and not based on a set of rules constructed by some Wikipedians who happen to like them? The huge advantage of using reliable English language sources is that it does not come down to a personal preference. "Because I like it" leads to endless instability, Kotniski and I can disagree on which we think is more preferable, but usually we can agree on whether one form or another is more common in reliable English language sources. -- PBS (talk) 18:57, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Several people have said that using "Walesa" would be "dumbing down" WP, or be "inaccurate". But if "Walesa" is a case of dumbing down and inaccuracy, why does WP tolerate Solidarity (Polish trade union) instead of Solidarność? Poland instead of Polska? Aren't the latter ones the "accurate" names as used in Poland? Dohn joe (talk) 18:27, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
 * The case of Poland is easy; it is acceptable and totally uncontroversial to translate most nouns, including state names. Organizations are sometimes translated; in case of Solidarity I guess we had a discussion and it was shown that the translated name is much more common. Before you say "but this is the exact case as here", note that there is, in my experience, written or uwnritten exception for people's names; with preference to local spellings. Perhaps we could codify it as some Wikipedia;Naming conventions (given names) or such (note that localities are governed by WP:Naming conventions (geographic names); I was involved in drafting that and let me tell you - it wasn't easy, nor quick...). To an extent, all namings are touch and go, and exceptions abound, compounded by national sentiments. With redirects, I believe it is better to use local, more correct (if less widely used) names; encyclopedias are supposed to be educational, and people looking for Lech Walesa will be redirected to the more correct diacritic-using version used by the person in question himself... to a certain extent, consider this also a sign of respect for the notable people - they have their own, real names, and by not dumbing them down, we show our respect to them. I wonder if a BLP argument could be made in favor of using original spellings for names... hmmm :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:50, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
 * But the person in question here uses "Walesa" himself in English versions of his foundation and his autobiography. Isn't that an indication that sometimes there can be a "correct" spelling of a name in English that differs from the local spelling? Dohn joe (talk) 19:12, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
 * If we accept that argument we need to rewrite a great deal of policy. Up until now, we have avoided making or supporting any such concept of correct spelling in article names. See prescriptive linguistics. Andrewa (talk) 16:23, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Written policy is an afterthought. Try your best to ignore it, and then you'll be approaching Wikipedia the right way. I'm not taking any side in this argument; I'm just commenting on the role of written policy: It has none, except as an indicator of what people thought in some previous instance. -GTBacchus(talk) 19:42, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Very good point, but it's a very big except. The policies and guidelines are a generalisation of past consensus, and in a project this size are essential to reduce reinventing the wheel to semi-manageable proporions. We don't always get the generalisations right and Consensus can change but we also have WP:IAR to cover this. While on this meta-policy tack, and for what it's worth, the only difference between a policy and a guideline IMO is that it's best to justify breaking a policy before doing it, but to break a guideline you should just be prepared to justify it afterwards if asked to. In either case you should have the same level of justification, it's just a matter of when you need to produce it. Andrewa (talk) 00:30, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok. That last bit sounds awfully formal to me, but if you find it helpful, that's cool. I try my best not to know which ones are policies and which ones are guidelines, and I don't find that I get into trouble this way. I don't think I end up reinventing many wheels, either. As always, YMMV. Back on topic, I would very much like, as I mentioned somewhere above, to see some statistics regarding how move requests regarding the addition or removal of diacritics from personal names have gone down over the last few years. Who among us can claim that we really know what the general consensus is, or whether one exists at all? -GTBacchus(talk) 00:46, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Since this is where the action seems to be, I'm copying my belated Oppose down here to hopefully stir up some discussion: "English-language sources are not as important to this article as he is a Polish politician. If he were a British, American, etc. politician who happened to be born with a traditional Polish name, then there might be an argument for anglicizing his written name. As it is, he lives and works in Poland and an encyclopedia should recognize the proper Polish lettering." Cheers, Wikkitywack (talk) 02:04, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I have sympathy for both points of view. Following English-language sources makes sense to me as a general rule, and I think it generally leads to the clearest exposition for the most readers. The academic purist in me does, however, cringe at the idea of "dumbing down," not that I think anyone advocates that in the literal sense. To what extent are we a mirror of our sources, and to what extent do we try to correct those sources' tendencies against orthographic rigor? -GTBacchus(talk) 06:21, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

Recapitulation
I think I can safely say that the facts about usage of "Wałęsa" vs. "Walesa" are more or less accepted by all the participants in this discussion. Namely, that a large majority of news and book sources use "Walesa", while reference works are split to some degree. From that common factual foundation, there are nevertheless two strongly divergent, good-faith camps of support and oppose. Which means that there are philosphical differences that go well beyond the scope of this particular article.

The support arguments, generally speaking, are:
 * WP:UE (Use English), WP:COMMONNAME, and WP:DIACRITICS support the use of "Walesa".
 * Many reliable English-language sources use "Walesa". (proportion? scholarly v. popular?)
 * The subject uses "Walesa" when referring to himself in English-language sources.
 * Well, sort of. There's no hint that Wałęsa himself is referring to anyone in the mentioned sources or that he even approved of such usage personally.  —   AjaxSmack   06:20, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Polish diacritics are unfamiliar to many English speakers.

The oppose arguments, generally speaking, are:
 * Many reliable English-language sources use "Wałęsa". (proportion? scholarly v. popular?)
 * Therefore, the title including diacritics is consistent with WP:UE and WP:COMMONNAME.
 * WP:DIACRITICS does not reflect actual WP practice, which is to use diacritics.
 * Singling out this article shows anti-Eastern European bias.
 * Changing this article's title would show inconsistency if done alone.
 * Since the subject is from/notable in Poland, we should follow local usage.
 * Not using diacritics is "dumbing down" the article; Wikipedia should be more "accurate" than news organizations.
 * Polish diacritics, like others, may be "read through", and do not affect the recognizability of the title.

Discussion
Does that sound about right? If not, feel free to edit the list. If so, given the volume of discussion already, unless someone has something groundbreaking to add, I'd suggest leaving it as is for the closing admin to evaluate. Dohn joe (talk) 23:30, 17 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I have highlighted one major flaw with a strong potential to mislead.
 * It should also be noted that the readability or unreadability of various diacritics to readers has been raised several times before in similar discussions, but is usually ignored as a rather subjective and untested (untestable?) supposition. Knepflerle (talk) 11:58, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * He invited you to edit the list; why not just fix it instead of adding an objection? I'll try it. If I get it wrong, please correct my work. In my experience this sort of thing works best if people edit the list impersonally, as if it's an article, and then talk about it down here in a discussion section. Does that sound okay? -GTBacchus(talk) 17:43, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Either way works. Knepflerle (talk) 17:47, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Diacritics in general
There are several move discussions current concerning omitting or including diacritics from article names similar to the one above.

I think that, regardless of the outcome of the move request above, it would be good to have some brainstorming of the issue in general.

I mean, we're spending a lot of time on this issue, and getting quite heated at times, and to what benefit? Does it matter all that much, and if so what is the damage? It seems to me that we're doing more damage in wasting time and discouraging some editors who lose these heated battles, or even who win them but then lose another similar next time around.

It's a distraction from more important tasks.

Most of the other damage involves Wikipedia taking a quotable stand. We have a standard that says we generally use common English, and so if we spell Walesa or Mitterrand's christian name or Hokkaido with a diacritic, then that's a statement that this is current English, and a highly influential one in my opinion. And that's one reason for the heat in the debate... Some nationalists want English to reflect their own national conventions.

Another factor is the concern about dumbing down Wikipedia. This is more complex than it might seem. In my opinion, Wikipedia's long-standing commitment to usage rather than rules is just the opposite of dumbing down. It reflects the 20th century attitude to linguistics, as pioneered by Wittgenstein, Ayer and Whorf to name just a few, and as opposed to the linguistic prescription which will always have followers but, academically, is a 19th century viewpoint.

There's no evidence that the 21st century will go back to prescription, but it will always be a battle, and Wikipedia can't avoid being part of it! But there is also some evidence that Wikipedia is changing, and that the consensus in favour of common usage is not so strong and general as it once was. Probably all institutions become more conservative with time. Arguments in favour of accuracy which would once have been rejected out of hand are becoming more common and more acceptable. We're becoming more academic, and less populist, and whether that's good or bad, it may be unavoidable.

One possibility that occurs to me is to introduce a standard for diacritics that says in essence when in doubt, and when they don't affect the underlying roman spelling, put them in.

I propose this for discussion as an addition to the general article naming policy.

It is a bit of a turnaround, and doesn't cover all cases. But it does cover most cases and would in my opinion benefit Wikipedia by saving a lot of time and trouble, and even simplifying some of the more detailed guidelines. It represents reverse instruction creep in fact.

It makes the article titles more informative, at no cost so far as searching goes. Any search program worth its salt will find the version with diacritics if you search without them, and people are also quite capable of recognising the version with diacritics as a match even if they didn't expect the diacritics for whatever reason.

The downside? We won't be quite as much a part of the leading edge of the information revolution. We'll be a little more conservative and less radical at a time of radical change. Perhaps that's not even a downside.

And we should get expert technical advice as to whether there are any browser issues that might make diacritics in article names a problem. Probably we should double check that anyway, in view of the large number of article titles that already include them, and find a technical solution if there's any problem. I hope there are no issues but with the proliferation of browser platforms to mobile phones etc. which will continue it's a good thing to double check.

Other opinions? Andrewa (talk) 20:43, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

(If there's any interest please feel free to link from other forums, or copy my post to them, or both, but please don't remove it from the page to which I've posted it until it's eventually archived. Caught before! Links to other relevant discussions also good whether this is quoted there or not. TIA) Andrewa (talk) 20:43, 19 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the thoughtful post. I would add that I don't conflate my accusations of dumbing down with prescriptivism.  By dumbing down, I was referring more to the (seemingly increased) reliance on non-encyclopedic sources and web counts rather than sources that approximate an encyclopedic approach.  To me, an encyclopedia is a bridge between the scholarly works of a specialist and a general audience.  It is not a mere newspaper or blog or a aggregation of web statistics but a higher form of prose that should be fully accessible to a general audience but enlightening as well.  As part of this, Wikipedia should still follow descriptive approach but, in the case of diacritics, those that "don't affect the underlying Roman spelling" are perfectly compatible.  I support the addition of something like "when in doubt, and when they don't affect the underlying Roman spelling, put them in" to the naming conventions.  —   AjaxSmack   04:23, 20 December 2010 (UTC)


 * It's not a bad idea. From a completely different angle... We follow sources - great. Which ones? When sources differ, should we give more weight to the popular press, or to scholarly and professional publications? My !vote (or whatever we call them) would be for the latter, because I'm an academic at heart, and I think an encyclopedia should be a stepping-stone to true research and scholarship. In practical terms, I think we end up in the same place. The above suggestion, "when it doubt, leave 'em in", probably agrees in almost all cases with a principle of following scholarly sources. This more broadly construed principle might be helpful in other disputed areas of article titling as well. -GTBacchus(talk) 06:08, 20 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I concur. Excellent points, made with admirable clarity.  Nihil novi (talk) 06:33, 20 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the support above. So far there is strong consensus that it's a good idea. There are still many hurdles of course. Most good ideas don't work.


 * My hope is not to provide a complete solution that will satisfy everyone, but rather to provide a pragmatic one that will turn most of the currently contentious and controversial decisions into easy, formal decisions, with no serious consequences. It may even make some of the remaining decisions harder and more complex, but it will give those committed to Wikipedia rather than to sectional interests time to better deal with the hard ones, and by reducing angst overall should help us to spread the Wikipedia ethos, even to those who come here initially mainly to promote these sectional interests.


 * I think this is possible. Andrewa (talk) 18:58, 20 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I do notice an ambiguity in my initial proposal. I intended the two conditions... that there is doubt, and that the underlying roman spelling is unaffected... to both be met for the clause to be effective. But it could also be interpreted as saying if there is doubt, or if the spelling is unaffected. This was not the intended meaning.


 * Perhaps it would be better for clarity as follows: When the underlying roman spelling is unaffected, accents and diacritics that are often used in English and are accepted as correct in (all) the source language(s) should be included in article titles, even if in English they are more commonly omitted.


 * If there is disagreement as to which the source language is, and their diacritics differ, then this isn't any help and isn't intended to be. I'm not sure whether there are any specific current examples but there may be future ones in any case.


 * That to me is just clarification. Does anyone prefer the original? Or can it be simplified? Andrewa (talk) 19:53, 20 December 2010 (UTC)


 * It seems that the diacritics debate boils down to deciding which sources we use, which means dealing with the populist/scholarly tension within Wikipedia that GTBacchus has highlighted. One of the main precepts of Wikipedia is to follow usage in reliable English-language sources. Which begs the question of what's reliable. Only reference works and scholarly articles? That's certainly a defensible position. But if we disallow media sources for articles, that's a change from current Wikipedia practice. And if we disallow media sources only in the naming of the subject, while allowing the body of the article to use them, well, that seems like a strange and inconsistent stance to take. As to the proposal itself, I have a couple questions. What do you mean by "Roman spelling"? Obviously, the original Roman alphabet had no "J" or "W". And other Latin-based alphabets, like German and Icelandic, have letters like "ß" and "Þ" - do we accept those letters? Or only English alphabet letters with dots and squiggles? And as for the spelling being "unaffected", "Gerhard Schröder" lacks the "e" of "Gerhard Schroeder", and would seem to affect the spelling - how do you account for umlauts? And how do we figure out what's "correct" in the source language? Dohn joe (talk) 22:25, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Good questions. I was hoping to bypass the question of which sources to use or even prefer, to arrive at a way to decide an article title in most cases without wasting time on things that don't really matter so far as the title is concerned... which is there mainly to get people to the right page. The information they seek belongs in the page, not in the title.

(Off-topic: WP:Reliable sources explicitly allows mainstream news services, and prefers academic sources in some contexts and not others, and yes this is likely (certain!) to be a continuing topic of discussion.)

Roman spelling: Yes, I think I should have said English alphabet, see below.

Do we accept ß and Þ and similar - different issue. This proposal deals explicitly with extra marks added to ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ and corresponding lower case letters - English alphabet letters with dots and squiggles if you like. See below.

How do we decide what's correct in the source language(s)? I'd take the attitude that if there's doubt, we should assume we don't know and that this new rule simply wouldn't apply. This is the bit I'm most struggling with. The whole idea of the proposal is to minimise wastage of time and energy. Maybe better to just leave the clause about source language(s) out. The reason for putting it in is that in most cases there would be no controversy as to the spelling in the source language, and where there is such controversy we probably should take it into account. But unless someone comes up with a good way of phrasing it, for now let's leave it out. See below

Schroeder - The effect of this proposal would be that the choice was between Schröder and Schroeder (and not Schroder), but we'd still need to decide which of these was the better to use in the article name, using other criteria. (I think in this case, there's little support for Schroder anyway.)

Thanks for the contributions! Andrewa (talk) 00:35, 21 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay - I thought I saw where you were going with this, but then you proposed "Tokyo" as a name that would not change, because the diacritics are not often used in English. Isn't that the case with "Walesa"? That the diacritics are not often used in English, by a pretty comfortable margin? Which leads me to ask - what's your definition of "often"? It seems like that opens up the possibility for debate all over again. Maybe a better solution would be for the policy to be more explicity "live and let live - and don't mess with the titles" - i.e., let São Paulo stay where it is, and let Tokyo stay where it is. Of course, people will always make move requests, but at least the guideline won't encourage it one way or the other. So, enshrining the WP-wide status quo, without an underlying rationale other than that time spent on researching Google Books for "São Paulo" vs. "Sao Paulo" is less important than time spent improving the content of the article. And maybe a note in the guideline that efforts should be made to include both local and English spellings and pronunciations in the lead. This would save the most time and angst, while ensuring that all versions of a title are up front in the article. Dohn joe (talk) 01:31, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't think the diacritics are used often enough on Tokyo to make the change possible, we would never get consensus IMO. Happy to be proved wrong!

Nor do I think there'd be any support for live and let live. Andrewa (talk) 03:13, 21 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, I guess I'd have to ask again what guidance people would have for "often" - isn't that a subjective determination? Some people might put it at 10%, 20%, or 40% - of whatever sources they chose to look in. I don't see how that would prevent move requests for Walesa (or Milosevic, et al). On another note - do you think there should be different guidance for places and people? My experience over the last month or so is that more people feel strongly about keeping diacritics in personal names (Walesa, Mitterrand, Schroeder), and not so much in place names (Zurich, Hokkaido). Is that a distinction you'd care to make? Dohn joe (talk) 17:45, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
 * This is the effect of seeing only the last six months; Zurich has been as controversial as most of these, and more than most. We are simply closer to consensus there, finally. Since the consensus is to leave out the dots (on the ground that English usually does), I would oppose reopening the question by installing guidance in favor of the less common spelling.
 * We have been around this merry-go-round before. I see no point in complicating what is now a simple standard to re-introduce old issues: here the complications ignored are that there are two spellings of Schroeder (Americans, such as the Peanuts character, don't by and large use umlauts); and that the different languages of Switzerland spell Zurich differently (English usage happens to align with one of them, a minority language in the city itself). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:35, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Agree that it's a great shame to reopen the discussion on Zurich, but it's a far greater shame that this proposal wasn't adopted five years ago, think of all the heated discussion it would have saved. And is it really over? It's not a very strong consensus, and see Talk:Zurich. See below for more on Zurich. See above for Schroeder - this proposal would be neither help nor hindrance there. Andrewa (talk) 19:43, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * The move from Zurich to Zürich was more than five years ago. It was moved during the month of January 2004 after a debate on Talk:Switzerland (now archived under Archive 1 Archive 2) involving about 3 editors people. It was moved back in late January 2004 to Zurich a move that was then reverted. There was then a debate (see Talk:Zurich/Archive 1). Not one person then thought to see what was used in source, but that is not surprising as WP:V did not come into existence until 6 March 2005. -- PBS (talk) 14:17, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I actually thought it was pretty strong consensus: 9 out of 11 people who expressed an opinion favored "Zurich", and the request was closed by an admin who apparently preferred "Zürich". Dohn joe (talk) 20:17, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I've certainly seen better. IMO it was correct to move it in view of the clear majority vote and valid arguments on both sides, but I'd have called it a rough consensus, and note that even without this proposal, there's an ongoing discussion. Andrewa (talk) 01:15, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting observation regarding people versus places. I'd prefer to keep it simple, but happy to consider the idea. We already need to heed WP:BLP, which is another difference between the issues for personal and place names. Andrewa (talk) 19:49, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
 * We have a simple rule WP:DIACRITICS "when deciding between versions of a name which differ in the use or non-use of modified letters, follow the general usage in English reliable sources (for example other encyclopedias and reference works)." this is in line with the usual philosophy in WP:TITLE of using reliable English language sources to decide the issue, with guidance in Naming conventions (use English) of what to do when there is no clear common name. -- PBS (talk) 14:17, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

I do not quite understand this discussion. On plWIki, the first line, in most of the articles state the name in Polish and in parentheses, the name in original language. Therefore, why not use it in English as: Lech Walesa (Polish: Lech Wałęsa) => Lech Walesa (Polish: Lech Wałęsa). --WlaKom (talk) 10:52, 28 December 2010 (UTC)

Consequences of the proposed change
Please continue discussion both of whether the change should occur and exactly what it should be above. These sections are to explore the detailed consequences of the initial proposal when in doubt, and when they don't affect the underlying roman spelling, put them in, possibly as clarified to When the underlying Roman spelling is unaffected, accents and diacritics that are often used in English and are accepted as correct in (all) the source language(s) should be included in article titles, even if in English they are more commonly omitted.


 * Latest update :When the underlying spelling using the English alphabet is unaffected, accents and diacritics that are often used in English should be included in article titles, even if in English they are more commonly omitted. Andrewa (talk) 00:40, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Please add and discuss specific impacts of the proposed change below. TIA Andrewa (talk) 19:53, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Changes to policy and guidelines

 * Article titles add the general clause.


 * Naming conventions (use English) considerable rewrite. Note that DIACRITICS redirects to this section.

Current and recent move requests

 * Talk:Ngo The Linh - Proposal to add diacritics. See Naming conventions (Vietnamese) which is still at the proposal stage, and WikiProject Vietnam/Style Guidelines which seems at an even earlier stage of discussion.


 * Talk:Hokkaidō - Latest round in a particularly heated and repetitive debate on whether to put the macron on the final "o".


 * Talk:François Mitterrand - The cedilla was retained there being no consensus to remove it.


 * Talk:Zurich - The umlaut was removed after five years of bitter and recurrent discussion. See also Talk:Zurich for ongoing discussion.

Changes to names of specific pages
I don't think there will be many of these, because I think the proposal just reflects where Wikipedia is heading anyway. But there will be some. Many, perhaps most, of these would be changed in time even without this proposal, just with more discussion. Andrewa (talk) 00:46, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Zurich is a possible exception... it seems a great shame to reopen the discussion, but IMHO it's an even bigger shame we didn't have this proposed convention in place five years ago. Andrewa (talk) 19:37, 23 December 2010 (UTC)


 * I disagree with your argument that Wikipedia is moving towards rule based naming of articles. The move in the last three years in many areas has been moving the other way. This change has taken place since we introduced the concept of naming articles after the name used in reliable English Language sources. Many of the formulas put in place before that change took place in the policy, were put there because popular usage (on the web) and more formal usage differed. This lead to interested editors putting in rules to emulate the usage in reliable sources (the two with the most formalistic approach were WP:NCROY and WP:NC (flora)), but inevitably there were exceptions to the rule that lead to endless debate. For example Elizabeth II. However in the last year both NCROY and flora have been altered to take more account of reliable sources. I think that this proposal which AFAICT would lead to moving away from relying on reliable sources to decide the issue is a retrograde step and contrary to the policies of WP:AT and WP:V. -- PBS (talk) 14:17, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Pages that would not change

 * Tokyo - diacritics are not often used in English. This has been challenged above. What do we mean by often? How do we measure it? Are we opening a new can of worms that will see a push to add the macron to this title too?


 * Yes you are opening up a can of worms. Why not just stick to: "use the spelling as commonly used in reliable English language sources"? If we do that then the problems you are presenting over Zurich and Tokyo go away. The mess with Zurich originally occurred because people did not look at reliable English language sources to decide the issue (WP:V had not been written and it was not part of WP:AT). If they had, the subjective arguments about which spelling looks better would not have existed and the arguments all the arguments about "correct" would have been negated. -- PBS (talk) 14:17, 25 December 2010 (UTC)