Talk:Human rights in Greece
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Francis are you on a mission here? This is getting ridiculous. --Avg 21:17, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
- You mean a mission to improve coverage of Human rights issues on Wikipedia? Then sure I'm on a mission — well, not really a mission, more like a short sojourn. What other kind of mission would I be on? And explain exactly what is ridiculous about this article (apart from the paltry size for such a large issue). - FrancisTyers 21:24, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- It is ridiculous (and infuriating if you ask me, but that's me) that you start the article by saying "Greece has been accused of varying degrees of human rights abuses" blah blah, as if Greece is a third world country with no respect to human rights whatsoever. The article should obviously start by putting things in perspective, namely stating that Greece is a DEVELOPED country with a VERY GOOD human rights record and praised for it by the international community. See the point? And then, of course you can mention your issues. You're just pushing your POV fanatically, this is what I see.--Avg 21:31, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- My apologies if it appears that I am pushing any kind of "POV". I searched for "greek human rights" in Google and just made the article out of the first stuff I came up with. None of it mentioned Greece being praised, incidentally. I have added an introduction taken partially from the Human rights in Romania article which I hope allays some of your concerns. I will work on a more comprehensive introduction shortly. - FrancisTyers 21:43, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Wikipedia is a collaborative effort after all, so I shouldn't direct my criticism to you. I can edit what I don't like and then you can edit what you don't like and so on. My guess is that in some days (or weeks or months, I don't know), this article will reach a good and mutually acceptable level.--Avg 21:47, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Cool :) - FrancisTyers 21:54, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- And since we both live in the UK, see what I mean: Human rights in the United Kingdom. This seems the way to go. It is more appropriate to compare Greece with another EU country and since I've lived in both countries for quite a few years, let me tell you that there are issues where the UK is far worse than Greece. --Avg 21:57, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Dude, don't get me wrong I totally agree. The government of the UK are largely criminals — unfortunately that is a minority position :( Not only do we export our bad record on human rights to other countries, cf. Iraq, but we do it at home too, cf. Northern Ireland. I think that article could do with expanding too. Its been on my watchlist a while, but I keep getting distracted into other things... - FrancisTyers 22:14, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- I'm not seeing any praise from Amnesty... [1] - FrancisTyers 21:46, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Yeah, thats a good report. They mention Macedonians/Macedonian issues ten times, and corroborate most of what was written in Amnesty. I'll probably take that source over to Ethnic minorities in Greece, I'd like to avoid getting too much of the Human rights stuff bogged down over there though. I was hoping for it just to be an introduction to the topic. Specific human rights issues can go here. - FrancisTyers 23:00, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Well I've actually read the whole report and not only scanned for the word Macedonia but you're welcome to take it wherever you want. I believe the phrasing of the report is excellent in terms of NPOV. It does present the issues but does not use hard verbs. If only the phrasing here was the same. --Avg 23:12, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
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[edit] HRW block quote
User:P m kocovski has been adding this to a number of articles, in an apparent POV push. I have removed it accordingly until it is properly summarized and referenced. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 08:53, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
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- Yes, i did add it to 2 articles. I did not mean for it to be a point of veiw push but it should be found as a whole on possibly one article and summarized on the others as you have done kekrops. That is a good point. —Preceding unsigned comment added by P m kocovski (talk • contribs) 06:29, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
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[edit] The "minorities" paragraph
BalkanFever you say that "current issues include the treatment of minority groups". What is that supposed to mean? The US Department of State's up-to-date report which I added explicitly defines the problem as "limits on the ability of ethnic minority groups to self-identify; and discrimination against and social exclusion of ethnic minorities, particularly Roma". This is much better than your vague paragraph since it specifies the exact problem and it is supported by an authoritative reference.Dexippus (talk) 13:19, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
- I think he wants each group mentioned separately and explicitly. I think the extra paragraph on the "ethnic Macedonians" is a bit much, though, apart from giving them disproportionate attention in comparison to the other groups. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 13:04, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
What was the point of mentioning the Bletsas case? That was a private initiative, in no way supported by the government, and he was finally acquitted. That shouldn't even be come into the picture.Dexippus (talk) 13:19, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
- Huh? a private initiative? It was a criminal case; he was charged by a public prosecutor and sentenced by a public judge. Like it or not, this case has (rightly, IMO) been cited in the international press as an example of human right problems endemic in the Greek state, and of course it was an event that is only explainable in the context of the public nationalist hysteria of the 1990s. The fact that the judges in the court of appeal had a bit more sense doesn't take away from the scandalous miscarriage of justice that was the first trial. Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:31, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
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- "Public nationalist hysteria of the 1990s"? His case was pursued by a small group of Vlach leaders; it barely rated a mention in the Greek media. You should know that that kind of holier-than-thou rhetoric doesn't really register with Greeks, especially coming from a German. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 00:57, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- I believe you when you say that the Bletsas case barely rated a mention in the Greek media, although that may be more telling about the Greek media than anything else. It was featured in French, Belgian, British, Swedish, Finnish and Swiss media at the very least, probably in other countries as well. It did much to shape the public influence throughout Europe about the treatment of minorities in Greece and is clearly worth mentionin. JdeJ (talk) 08:01, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- Really? I'd say less than 1% of people in Europe would have any inkling of the existence of the Aromanians, let alone Bletsas. But include it if you must. Maybe the article should include some colourful artwork too, such as this poster plastered all over Skopje in recent days. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 08:17, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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May I recommend that we stay on topic. That poster, certainly in very bad taste, has no relevance to this article. JdeJ (talk) 10:48, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- Why restrict ourselves to the opinions of NGOs and the US State Department? The municipal authorities of neighbouring countries also have something to say about the subject, apparently. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 11:05, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
FP said "The fact that the judges in the court of appeal had a bit more sense doesn't take away from the scandalous miscarriage of justice that was the first trial". My reply is: Apparently it takes something away, what we are debating is how much it takes away. In my view the response comes from the more recent sources, which choose not to even mention that fact. This is logical; I mean at some point, after, say, 15+ whole years, those isolated incidents, especially when rectified, especially when initiated by private individuals, should be taken away. Shouldn't they? NikoSilver 12:10, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- Well, first of all, please cut out the "initiated by private individuals". In a functioning liberal democracy under the Rule of Law, the complainant would have been laughed out of the prosecutor's office within five minutes. The fact that he wasn't, says a lot. The responsibility for the persecution lies squarely with the public prosecution and the judge. Second, the fact that those sources no longer mention the event is understandable, but those sources have a different scope from ours: they focus on following the current state of affairs exclusively, our task as an encyclopedia is to give a full overview, including past developments. As for how long ago it was: the event happened in 1995, and it took the Greek state a full six years, until 2001, to rectify it. That's not long ago in my book. Fact is that as recently as a few years ago, it was apparently conceivable that a person could face jail, for saying what were incidentally the same things we are saying about Greek minority languages here in Wikipedia all the time. Is that not noteworthy? Also, the incident points to a wider issue, because the law that was (ab)used to justify the conviction had been previously identified and criticised by European institutions as incompatible with human rights. (Heck, will you help me find a good lawyer when I visit Athens next time? I'm sure that by publishing that minorities map here on Wikipedia, I've run afoul of that same paragraph. Is it still in force?) Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:15, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- (To FP:)
- "Laughed out": I give you that. Times change though.
- "Different scope": In WP too, it is the current state that matters. If you want a history of the human rights, then you'll have to start from 1821, and not selectively from 1995.
- "Not so long ago": The scope of all those sources includes "not so long ago". The fact that it excludes the incident shows that the incident is enough long ago.
- "Noteworthy": Certainly not. If it were worthy, it would have been noted in the recent ones. It isn't.
- "EU criticism": It does not exist anymore. Therefore, either the issue is considered closed, or the law/paragraph is fixed, or... EU changed their policy. :-)
- "Your Map": See? You would have been arrested already. NikoSilver 15:41, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I think the Bletsas case may have been related to the company he may have kept. Bletsas is a member of the Greek EBLUL committee. Another member is the journalist Abdulhalim Dede from Thrace; see here at 00:35 to see what he has to say about Greece, Turkey, PKK etc. If a gang of people with views like that were spreading propaganda (or what may be perceived as such) at the same time that things were so unstable in the Balkans (for the first time in decades), you can understand that the prosecutor may have had public interest concerns. In any case, academics have been freely discussing minority languages in Greece for years long before the Bletsas case. This is a one time thing and happened a long time ago, it doesn't belong in this article which is about human rights in Greece as they are today.--Dexippus (talk) 16:14, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- I just noticed the EBLUL map has no indication whatsoever of the huge Russophone minorities in the Baltic states. Wtf? False information, indeed. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 16:30, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- That map doesn't reflect the situation as it is, it reflects the situation as EBLUL feels it ought to be. Why else would it show Corfu 100% Albanian-speaking (!) and Ireland 100% Irish-speaking, it's fiction. EBLUL supports policies such as discrimination against people living in arbitrarily-defined minority zones who don't learn what they deem as the language of the place. In the Basque Country in Spain, you can be dismissed from your job if you refuse to learn Basque (so much for Article 14). Imagine if the 2/3 Greek majority in Thrace was liable to dismissal from their jobs if they didn't learn Turkish and Pomak and Romany (of course, if Turkey had their way, the only compulsory language would be Turkish).--Dexippus (talk) 16:48, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- Here I have to agree with our Greek colleagues to a certain extent. The EBLUL map is almost spectacular for how bad it is. I particularly like how 3000 Cornish speakers out of 300.000 in Cornwall make the area Cornish and how my own dear French language seems to have disappeared from 60% of the area where it's spoken. Strange, I had no problem speaking French last time I was in Toulouse or in Marseille or in Lyon. Come to think of it, I've never even heard anyone speak Occitan in any of those cities. So yes, the map is pretty bad.
- On the other hand, I don't see language knowledge as discriminatory and don't see any problem with employers in the Basque Country rewarding learning Basque. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it might be pretty hard to find a job in Greece if you don't speak any Greek, right? It certainly is hard (not impossible, but much harder) in France without speaking French. And I were to employ someone and had the option of one applicant speaking one language and another speaking four languages, of course I would hire the one who could speak with as many customers as possible, probably the one who speaks most languages. So nothing discriminatory about that. JdeJ (talk) 18:59, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- What's discriminatory is that in most cases, it's a language that very few people speak and it puts everyone else at an unjustifiable disadvantage. I'm not saying that it shouldn't be recommended to employers that they hire multilingual people, I'm saying that it's discriminatory that you require them to without good reason (and preserving a language that is practically dead at considerable waste of time, money and resources, in order to further what is usually a separatist agenda is not a good reason). You brought up Cornish, imagine for example if the 297,000 inhabitants of Cornwall who do not know Cornish would have to learn at their own expense (either directly or indirectly via further taxation) it in order to be employable in the public service (and further the separatist agenda of a few hundred people). That's ridiculous considering that it's likely that there are more Urdu and Arabic-speakers in Cornwall than Cornish-speakers (the same is true for Occitan in south France). I found out about the Basque case from this article that was in the Wall Street Journal in which the Chief Basque Promoter admits that it is discrimination (only positive discrimination, as if that makes it all right).--Dexippus (talk) 19:57, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- As you rightly points out, it would be ridiculous to demand Cornish knowledge in Cornwall. On the other hand, it's not that uncommon that bilingualism or multilingualism is required for some professions. If you're a doctor, a police, a judge or even working in any public sector, bilingualism is often required in bilingual countries. It would be quite disastrous if a Dutch-speaking patient would die in hospital in Brussels just because the doctors only spoke French. This has to be proportionate, and the case of Cornish clearly isn't. The case of Basque is a bit different, since it's quite widely spoken in parts of the Basque country. I would also treat anything the Wall Street Journal has to say on language matters with extreme scepticism. I usually enjoy their reports on business (that's what they know) but they have far too often been eager propaganda-makers of the "English-only" policy. Everybody should speak English and those who are silly and uneducated enough to speak smaller languages should stop immediately. Given that policy of the WSJ, it's hardly surprising finding an article such as this. The article is, in my opinion, so bad that it's absurd. Consider the following statement "it is an ancient language little suited to contemporary life." As a Greek, you are presumably proud of the long history of Greek language and culture. Rightly so, as the roots of European philosophy and literature are solidly founded in Greek. But just because Homeros and Socrates wrote in Greek, an ancient language, it doesn't make it any less suited for modern life. All languages evolve, and Basque has done so as well. Trying to disqualify a language with kind of patronising nonsense is rather typical of the "English imperialism" at the WSJ. JdeJ (talk) 20:30, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'll have to agree with you re the Basques. I can see why they would be as defensive as they are about their language. Apart from being indigenous to the region where it is spoken, Basque is an endangered language. I'm sure the fear is that if people are "allowed" to stop speaking it in the Basque country, it will simply disappear; the same can't be said for Turkish and Slavic in Greece. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 02:16, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- As you rightly points out, it would be ridiculous to demand Cornish knowledge in Cornwall. On the other hand, it's not that uncommon that bilingualism or multilingualism is required for some professions. If you're a doctor, a police, a judge or even working in any public sector, bilingualism is often required in bilingual countries. It would be quite disastrous if a Dutch-speaking patient would die in hospital in Brussels just because the doctors only spoke French. This has to be proportionate, and the case of Cornish clearly isn't. The case of Basque is a bit different, since it's quite widely spoken in parts of the Basque country. I would also treat anything the Wall Street Journal has to say on language matters with extreme scepticism. I usually enjoy their reports on business (that's what they know) but they have far too often been eager propaganda-makers of the "English-only" policy. Everybody should speak English and those who are silly and uneducated enough to speak smaller languages should stop immediately. Given that policy of the WSJ, it's hardly surprising finding an article such as this. The article is, in my opinion, so bad that it's absurd. Consider the following statement "it is an ancient language little suited to contemporary life." As a Greek, you are presumably proud of the long history of Greek language and culture. Rightly so, as the roots of European philosophy and literature are solidly founded in Greek. But just because Homeros and Socrates wrote in Greek, an ancient language, it doesn't make it any less suited for modern life. All languages evolve, and Basque has done so as well. Trying to disqualify a language with kind of patronising nonsense is rather typical of the "English imperialism" at the WSJ. JdeJ (talk) 20:30, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- What's discriminatory is that in most cases, it's a language that very few people speak and it puts everyone else at an unjustifiable disadvantage. I'm not saying that it shouldn't be recommended to employers that they hire multilingual people, I'm saying that it's discriminatory that you require them to without good reason (and preserving a language that is practically dead at considerable waste of time, money and resources, in order to further what is usually a separatist agenda is not a good reason). You brought up Cornish, imagine for example if the 297,000 inhabitants of Cornwall who do not know Cornish would have to learn at their own expense (either directly or indirectly via further taxation) it in order to be employable in the public service (and further the separatist agenda of a few hundred people). That's ridiculous considering that it's likely that there are more Urdu and Arabic-speakers in Cornwall than Cornish-speakers (the same is true for Occitan in south France). I found out about the Basque case from this article that was in the Wall Street Journal in which the Chief Basque Promoter admits that it is discrimination (only positive discrimination, as if that makes it all right).--Dexippus (talk) 19:57, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- The map doesn't so much reflect what minority enthusiasts would "want" the situation to be, but (for the most part) simply the cartographic difficulty of handling multilingual situations. Of course, any realistic language map would consist of a hugely complex overlay pattern of multiple languages everywhere. But that would make it unreadable. In a situation where a smaller and a larger language are spoken on the same territory, perhaps with the larger one in a strong majority, but your cartographical purpose is primarily to show where the smaller language communities are, you have no choice but to simplify, and that basically means the smaller community "wins out", unless you want your whole map to end up striped and spotted and chequered to the point of absurdity. Fut.Perf. ☼ 19:35, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- That map doesn't reflect the situation as it is, it reflects the situation as EBLUL feels it ought to be. Why else would it show Corfu 100% Albanian-speaking (!) and Ireland 100% Irish-speaking, it's fiction. EBLUL supports policies such as discrimination against people living in arbitrarily-defined minority zones who don't learn what they deem as the language of the place. In the Basque Country in Spain, you can be dismissed from your job if you refuse to learn Basque (so much for Article 14). Imagine if the 2/3 Greek majority in Thrace was liable to dismissal from their jobs if they didn't learn Turkish and Pomak and Romany (of course, if Turkey had their way, the only compulsory language would be Turkish).--Dexippus (talk) 16:48, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Despicable whitewashing. Bletas case stays in, end of discussion. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:58, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- It's not whitewashing. I'm trying to show insight, understanding and sensitivity to the issues in question, that each individual case has its own unique mitigating factors... ;-) Dexippus (talk) 17:03, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- I don't think you're in a position to dictate the end of any discussion. You obviously have nothing more constructive to contribute than pathetic rhetoric about "nationalist hysteria" and your personal fears over whether or not you'll have to entertain the boys at Korydallos Prison next time you set foot in Greece. The discussion will go on as long as it needs to. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 17:10, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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- It was, in the context of the new information added. And, pray tell, why should your mob be given disproportionate attention at the expense of groups with real human rights issues, like the Roma and refugees? The types sipping frappé in Florina's main square dreaming of Obedineta Makedonija don't engender quite the same sense of sympathy, I'm afraid. ·ΚέκρωΨ· (talk) 17:23, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
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It's touching to see so many kind editors eager to refine this article. I'm sure they show the same zeal in the relevant article about their respective countries? -- Avg 02:33, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
