User talk:Ifdef

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Lithuanian-Polish disagreements on Wikipedia

Rather than try to figure out which talk page is most appropriate, I'm going to write my thoughts here and possibly put pointers to this page on some article talk pages.

I've learned a lot from Wikipedia. Among other things, I've learned a lot about the history of Poland and of Lithuania. This is relevant to me, because I am of Lithuanian ancestry, even though I was born in Canada and have lived all of my life here (except for a 7-month stretch in 1992, where I took my family to Vilnius so that the kids would learn the language of their ancestors better -- difficult to do at home, because my wife is not Lithuanian and has not learned the language well enough to be comfortable speaking it to the children).

I am also very interested in medieval European history, although I don't really know much about it yet.

For context, I should also mention that I am in my late 40's. My education was in nuclear engineering, but I have been working on software since I graduated. I currently work on embedded real time operating systems.

I have been disturbed and disappointed by what looks like childish behaviour on the various Wikipedia pages related to Lithuania, specifically the ones on Vilnius, on Lithuania, and on the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. What seems to be happening is that one side or the other side sees bias and perhaps even slander in how the articles are written. It appears that the Lithuanians change the text, and the Poles change it back, and the whole thing just keeps repeating. Comments appear in talk pages about how people should be sent to gas chambers. There seems to be no attempt at discussion, or, where there is, the tone of it is bitter, calling people liars and even worse names. In one case, possibly due to what I wrote, one of the people involved in these edit wars attempted to set forth some reasons for his point of view. His tone was belligerent, but I thought it was better than pure cursing and name-calling. But the response was to chop down and dismiss his words, which probably did not do much to encourage him to try that approach again.

Ifdef, It's a long piece of text that you've written here, let me address the respective paragraphs inline. Somehow I feel disappointed with your view of the situation presented above. It does not matter whether the vandal is Lithuanian, Polish, Russian or whatever. It's the way that he behaves that makes this situation. And it's not a dispute between Poles and Lithuanians - it's a number of wikipedia users (unsuccessfully) attempting to handle a situation, where a single anonymous user tries to terrorize the rest, ignores the discussion and repeatedly forces his changes. The contents of these changes does not matter as much as the way in which they are introduced, which is completely against the wikipedia spirit. In your paragraph above you see that "Lithuanians" (note plural) change the text and then Poles change it back. Take a closer look and see that this "Lithuanians" guy among his minor changes is deleting valid wikipedia contents without any consensus to do so. You write that there seems to be no attempt at discussion. Look at the history of the Talk:Vilnius page to see how many times this person was asked to discuss his concerns. Both by numerous Poles and Lithuanians. All the "gas chambers", "liars", "nazi" and such names originate from a single source - our anonymous vandal, who succeeded in making the discussion page a mess within few days. No wonder it's hard to recognize who said what now as he does not sign many of his texts and edits other people's comments. The only time that he appeared (probably because of what you wrote to him) as willing to join any sensible discussion, he started by addressing "to polish chauvinistess" and finished by threatening that if anyone does not agree with his edits, he'll continue to force them anyway (which he does). Do you see it as a way to discuss things or reach consensus ? Anyway, I don't think there's any Polish-Lithuanian conflict, the discussion on these pages has been quite civilised until this anonymous vandal appeared. Believe me, I have many Lithuanian friends and do not remember encountering such a vicious and nationalistic approach. For a moment I even suspected that this was a purposeful provocation in order to discredit Lithuanian POV. Now I think it's just some kid playing with us in his spare time. Wojsyl 07:28, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ditto. I'll add my two cents: there are lots of sensible Lithuanian wikipedia users around here and we've been collaborating successfully in the past, without any serious conflicts, be it with Poles, Lithuanians, Belarusians or whomever. Halibu tt 07:47, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

Oh, I ABSOLUTELY agree with you about methods and about the language used, and also about who is using those methods and that language. I was just trying to express a neutral POV here. :-) I have been making the same point in English and in Lithuanian on the Lithuania talk page, namely that the vandalism is not only extremely offensive but, perhaps more significantly from the vandal's point of view, it doesn't accomplish his purpose: it makes him look childish, he makes enemies, the changes get reverted anyway and, because he has expressed no *reasons* for his changes, nobody is convinced, and nobody is even likely to consider his opinion seriously.

However, I detect in the tone of his posts a certain desperation: "I keep correcting the facts and they keep erasing my work. I have complained to the administration, but they don't answer." I don't know how seriously to take this.

I guess that, in my experience of consensus-building, I've found that it is important for people to feel heard. When one feels listened to, even if not agreed with, one is less likely to resort to vandalism (unless, of course, one's purpose was just vandalism in the first place). Of course, calling people names and using real and implied threats is a very bad way to get anybody to listen to you.

Ifdef 12:45, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I just re-read Talk:Lithuania, and it seems like there are quite a few Lithuanians taking issue with various issues which seem to have a Polish POV. Both tamulis and Linas seem to agree with Arturas, although they do not use vandalism or call people names, nor do they believe that the facts are presented in a biased manner deliberately.

I think I will just excuse myself now, and let you guys settle it among yourselves. I know less about the subjects involved than the other participants. Ifdef 17:09, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Examples

Let's look at a few examples.

Terrible occupation

Vinius was the capital of Lithuania from medieval times. I think this was both before and after Jogaila became the king of Poland. However, in the early years of the 20th century, it appears that many or most of the inhabitants of the region were Polish-speaking, and voted to be part of Poland rather than Lithuania. I don't know how this demographic came about, as Wikipedia doesn't seem to have an explanation :-) However, it appears that the Polish army implemented this decision. From the point of view of the Poles, it was no doubt a liberation. From the point of view of the Lithuanians, it was an invasion.

So how can this be explained from a Neutral Point Of View? Writing about the "terrible occupation" is not neutral. Writing that "Lithuania did not accept that Vilnius is a part of Poland" seems no better. It is interesting to read this rhetoric, but it's not exactly what I want from an encyclopedia.

I could not agree more. It's inappropriate to write about "glorious liberation" or "terrible occupation" in the article. Let's stick to the barebone facts. But this is how it was actually phrased in the first place. Wojsyl 07:59, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Just referring to Vilnius as a part of Poland is a Polish POV. What is de jure a part of which country is a concept even more slippery than that of sovereignty (de facto is easy enough, usually). Just like ethnicity, especially in that region (as was actually pointed out on some page I read within the last few days). But usually the disputed regions have names of their own, such as Suvalkai, by which they can be referred to without calling them "eastern Lithuania" vs "the Suvalkai region of Poland", even if you feel that that is the *proper* name (Arturai, if you're reading this, this is directed at you).

Ifdef 12:45, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I don't think that any reasonable person would doubt that Vilnius is a Lithuanian city. Poles don't claim that it's a Polish city under Lithuanian occupation or such. On the other hand for centuries it used to be Polish by ethnicity. Vilnius and the area around (which is called "Wilenszczyzna" in Polish) used to be extremely important for Polish culture and no wonder there are still many sentiments and nostalgia about this in Poland. This however has not much to do with nationalism. Overall I believe that there's much more sympathy among Poles towards Lithuanians than the other way round. Sometimes Poles are quite surprised and shocked when confronted with national hostility from a nation that they consider as their "brothers". Luckily this is not happening frequently nowadays. Wojsyl 13:36, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

(con)federation

Similarly, there is a question about whether the PLC was a "federation" or a "confederation", where it appears that the difference between these where the "sovereignty" lies: in a confederation, the individual states are sovereign and the union is a supra-national association; in a federation, the union forms the sovereign state, and the components are more like provinces or regions. It appears to be important to the Poles to make sure that the PLC is referred to as a "federation", i.e. one state with constituent parts, and to the Lithuanians to emphasize that Lithuania was still sovereign during this time and not just a part of greater Poland. This is more than just a question of facts, it is a very emotional issue, related to one's feelings about national identity.

But sovereignty seems to me to be a philosophical concept, not unlike the question of "substance" in medieval philosophy. It's related, perhaps, to whether the unit has the right to secede from the union. But even the question of "right" is kind of vague. In theory, the southern states had the right to secede from the United States, but the US civil war prevented them from doing so. I'm sure the Russian army would have done the same to any of the Soviet republics that sought to exercise their similar "rights" (as a matter of fact, they did do so). Or, in the late 18th century, the PLC itself was an independent state, yet the Russian army on its borders ensured that the Sejm made the "proper" decisions.

Can the political situation in the PLC be explained in any way that acknowledges what the situation was, yet without making anybody feel bad about how it is explained? Or, to put it another way (forgive me!), acknowledges that Lithuania did not have the independence it once had, but without rubbing everybody's nose in it?

Any idea how this could be phrased ? Anyway, PLC was a voluntarily union of two equal nations. It was not Polish occupation of Lithuania or vice-versa. Nothing was enforces. I believe that in these times both Poles and Lithuanias were happy and proud of the PLC. Or look at the insurrections of 19th century, where Poles and Lithuanians fought hand-in-hand for the independence of PLC. I think that these were later tsarist and then soviet intelligence and propaganda actions that attempeted (so successfully) to present Poles as enemies of Lithuanians. All this nationalistic fuss started only in 20th century. And it's likely that these actions are continued even today with KGB trying to win Polish minority in Lithuania against Lithuanians. It's so disappointing that people are so easy to manipulate with their nationalism. Wojsyl 07:59, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The more I read about history, the more shocked I am at the distortions that have been presented as fact, to the detriment of the Poles. And, as you say, most of this distortion was probably deliberate, by Russia, in either its imperial or its Soviet form. Interesting, isn't it, how most western history books don't mention much, if anything, about how Poland-Lithuania was a major world power in medieval times, how the May 3 Constitution achieved by bloodless means what was done in such a bloody fashion in France, how Poland-Lithuania was a shining example of religious tolerance throughout the Middle Ages (contrary to almost all the rest of Europe), or how the Polish people were betrayed in WW II. I find, of course, that the people of Lithuania now (or at least, 12 years ago), have grown up being taught about how those Lithuanians that left for the West during WW II were all fascists, and that the resistance fighters who continued their clandestine fight until the 1950's were terrorists, but of course I don't take any of that seriously because I know it's only propaganda.

Ifdef 12:45, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I hope that in countries with history like Lithuania or Poland people were taught never to believe what they are told to. In fact people may be more prone to nationalistic propaganda nowadays, when they are less alert on what they're told. Again, I do not have anything against Russian people, but to me they always seemed quite naive in a way (I'm generalizing, I know), e.g. believing in the 1980s that Soviet economy is stressed because they have to economically support disobedient Poland. Wojsyl 13:45, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Lithuanian POV

For any Poles reading this, consider the following view of history. I'm not saying you have to agree with it, or even that it is factually correct (not that I'm saying that it is incorrect), but only that it is a point of view, and a point of view that probably more than one person has. Think of it as a difficult-to-undertand point of view, but which will colour how some people will read your words, whether they are right or wrong.

In this view, Jogaila was a traitor. He was willing to give up the independence of his own country for the personal glory of becoming a king (yes, maybe military alliances had something to do with it as well). He broke the co-operation that his father Algirdas and his uncle Kestutis had, when they ruled Lithuania together. Vytautas, Jogaila's cousin, was the great Lithuanian leader of Jogaila's time, ruling over a land that stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea, and even taking an army up to the gates of Moscow once. Vytautas was the military genius of the battle of Zalgiris/Tannenberg/Grunwald, retreating to draw the forces of the Teutonic Order in to where they were outflanked by Jogaila's army and ambushed. Vytautas would have been crowned king of Lithuania, except that the papal emissaries bringing the crown were ambushed by the Poles, and the crown was stolen. A second crown was sent, but Vytautas died before it reached him.

In this view, the theme running through the history of Poland and Lithuania is the gradual loss of Lithuanian glory and independence, from being part of a personal union with Poland, through the Union of Lublin, to the final indignity of being made part of the Russian empire. The Lithuanian nobility may have started out as the local war leaders (isn't that how nobility got started everywhere in the world?); they were generally pagans, following the traditions of their ancestors, but they were tolerant of the religions of the subjects they ruled, and often the ones ruling Belorusan and Ukrainian lands became Orthodox Christians. Of course, later the majority of them became Catholic. However, they, too, started putting their personal love of luxury ahead of the interests of their country, until eventually they identified much more closely with the Polish nobility (i.e. the others of their class) than with their countrymen. They forgot that they were Lithuanians. This love of luxury (of all of the nobles of the PLC) ended up crippling the country, as the nobles refused to either fight or to pay taxes to support the army, which is part of how Russia ended up conquering the PLC. During the difficult times of the Russian occupation, the peasants were the ones who kept the Lithuanian language and traditions alive. Mothers taught their children to read Lithuanian at home, using books smuggled in by brave book-runners from Prussia. Then, towards the end of the 19th century, when there was a rebirth of national consciousness, the nobles did nothing to help, and it was the peasants who ended up rebuilding Lithuania in the years after WW I.

This may not have been entirely factually correct, but it is the national story, the legend, the myth, the point of view which colours how one interprets history. Or, at least, it is how I always understood it. There's more (mostly about what happened earlier), but this gives you the gist of it. If you contradict this legend, even with facts to back you up, you can expect a strong emotional reaction. If you want to avoid people accusing you of falsifying history and vandalizing your writing, even more important than having facts, you need a way of explaining them that saves face and keeps the legend intact.

Just a small sidenote before I have enough time to address your comment above: you might want to take a look at Ethnic composition of Central Lithuania. Halibu tt 07:50, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

I understand and respect the above view of history, even if I do not share it. The article is attempted to present a NPOV. If there are any pieces that you feel that violate it, please point them out and discuss them :-). Wojsyl 08:58, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Of course :-) Hey, I'm not the one who has resorted to vandalism. I'm just trying to present what I think might be his point of view. Of course, it's difficult to speak for someone who does not engage in civil discussion. I suppose that, if I had realized that all of the different IP addresses were probably the same "Arturas from Vilnius", maybe I would have left him to speak for himself.

I guess, though, I wanted to argue for attempting to understand his view even if, as you say, you do not share it. An analogy might help here (or it might blow up in my face, but I'll try it anyway): If you were absolutely convinced that historical evidence showed that Jesus Christ was the illegitimate son of Mary and a Roman soldier who raped her, yet still, when talking to a Catholic, you might want to think extremely carefully about how you phrased it. Just stating it as a "fact" on a Wikipedia page would FOR SURE get a strong emotional reaction, EVEN IF you had all the evidence you could want. Of course, it would be better to discuss it, but nobody would find it surprising if the "fact" was changed by some hot-headed person to something equally unacceptable to (hypothetical) you.

Okay, I just re-read what I wrote, and I realize that it's offensive. Sorry. I know that you are trying to present a NPOV here, and are open to correction.

Hey, Arturai, if I am totally misrepresenting your point of view, come over here and discuss it yourself like an intelligent person, instead of vandalizing the Wikipedia. If you have something to say, this is the ONLY way that will work! Making changes without discussion will only get you banned (if you aren't already banned) and your changes will be erased anyway. You are wasting your time doing anything else, besides making a bad reputation for yourself. Discussion is the ONLY way you will be able to achieve your goals (unless your goal really is just vandalism).

Yeah, I know, it probably won't help. He doesn't participate in discussions.

Ifdef 12:45, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ifdef, again, thanks for sharing the "Lithuanian POV" above. In the meantime, do you see any things in the article that are wrong or incorrectly phrased ? I know it could benefit from some better grammar and removing some redundancy, but thought this could wait until things cool down a bit. Wojsyl 07:16, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

No, I don't see anything wrong there. As a matter of fact, I think I sound kind of ignorant in what I've written above. :-)

What is considered proper Wikipedia etiquette? Can I delete my talk page after the discussion has died down and a decent time has passed?

I think there are different approaches. I you ask my opinion, I would leave this online for a while, in case this proves useful. At least leaving it would not do any harm. Then either archive it as a subpage of your "talk" page, or leave and forget or delete. It might also be useful to copy/archive parts of the discussion here to the Talk:Lithuania page in order to save others repeating the same discussion elsewhere. For now I would certainly leave it for some time but it's up to you.

Looking back at what Arturas last wrote on the Lithuania talk page:

1) Vilnius: Regardless of the ethnic composition of the population in and around Vilnius, Lithuanians feel about it similarly to how Israelis feel about Jerusalem. Actually, the similarities in the situations are striking. I guess we need to remember both that "Vilnius is a Lithuanian city" (and the capital of Lithuania) and that "for centuries it used to be Polish by ethnicity" (and that the inhabitants wanted to be part of Poland). I guess, over there, where there is more history than geography (as compared to North America), that sort of situation happens a lot. :-)

2) (May 3 Constitution) and 3) (Confederation vs federation): Both of these seem to be related to the question of sovereignty during the PLC. Sort of saying "no, we were not assimilated, we were still a sovereign nation." I wonder if insisting on this is a reaction to being told at some time something like "you were a part of us", instead of seeing it as "PLC was a voluntary union of two equal nations". But in any case, since the Lithuanian nobles did end up speaking Polish and seeing themselves as Poles, it did end up being a kind of assimilation. But I don't have the historical knowledge to argue either way about what the specific laws were. Given the definitions and my limited knowledge of the situation, it seems to me that "federation" is probably more accurate.

4)Lithuanian empire vs. multi-ethnic state. It's probably true that Mindaugas "united in one state ONLY Lithuanian dukes", and that the Lithuanian dukes ruled the Ukrainian and Belorusian lands. But (a) I don't think it was really any kind of "conquering", it was more a question of whether each city wanted to be allied with Vilnius as opposed to, say, Moscow, and (b) it's questionable whether the dukes were any more Lithuanian (after they converted to Orthodoxy, and after generations of intermarriage) than the other people of those lands, who probably also considered themselves Lithuanian, or whatever that meant at the time.

Ifdef 12:48, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I think it's all matter of certain delicacy. Regarding (4) - I have removed the "Lithuanian and Belorusian" wording altogether for now, I think this way it'll be easier to accept for everyone. Personally I doubt if there were any Belorusians at that time. Rather northern Ruthenians, who incidentally also called themselves "Litvin"s even if they were Slavs. I believe that nationality in 13th century had quite different meaning than today. Though I don't consider this any tremendously important issue anyway.

Overall, thanks for your involvement and mediation attempt. I'm afraid that some Lithuanians, like Linas got scared off by all these recent nervous actions. Hopefully they'll be able to come back to discussion after some days if things remain calm. All this recent vandalism and reverts have done quite a lot of harm but I'm glad this did not go any further and that none of the Poles responded by similar ethnic slurs and names and that it did not escalate into a Polish/Lithuanian conflict which we don't really need.

Wojsyl 19:00, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

History of Vilnius

Labas. If you have some time, I'd like to invite you to take a look at User:Wojsyl/History_of_Vilnius page. This is a copy of the history section of the protected Vilnius page. I hope we could discuss its content there at User_talk:Wojsyl/History_of_Vilnius in order to have more NPOV article. I'm sure I don't need to tell you this, but just for completeness: first discuss, then edit. Wojsyl 18:34, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

If you do not mind, I would copy our little discussion here (or more relevant fragments) to Talk:Lithuania page. I think especialy your explanation of "Lithuanian POV" could give a good perspective there. This could also help avoiding the same discussion there in the future. But I would not do it without your consent (or you can do it youself ?) Wojsyl 09:49, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Feel free to do so. I say this with some fear, but if you feel that it will be helpful at all, go ahead. Ifdef 11:53, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)