Talk:Mandatory Swedish

message: When I stumbled upon this article the first thing I noticed was that the last paragraph of the overview section is a summary of the pro-position, but the anti-position is completely omitted from the overview. Either both sides should be summarised or then neither, the current formulation is hardly neutral. I didn't dare to edit it myself after reading this talk page. I have no doubt that this article has suffered from poor edits and that people would be vary of any edits by newcomers not well-established wikipedians, so I would kindly ask some person who hasn't got a vested interest in this to edit the overview section. The rest of the article seemed more balanced based on a quick overview so this section might just be a remnant from a more biased version.
How I would rebut the pro-arguments in the overview section:
The answer to the "easier to learn English/German" argument is that the best way to learn a language is to study it directly. We don't study Japanese if we want to learn Chinese, even if knowing one language helps the other. Time spent studying Swedish is away from the school time that could be spent to learn other languages, so this language learning argument lacks credibility in my view. The "need to get services in native language" argument kind of makes sense, but the Finland Swedes don't seem to buy it themselves. When boundaries of health districts were shifted in Ostrobothnia, the Swedish speaking area refused to join a Finnish district on the grounds that only native speakers would have sufficient skills to serve Finland-Swedes. There are special quotas for medical and law school for Swedish-speaking students specifically so that they can serve Swedish-speakers who aren't super fluent in Finnish (AFAIK these Finland Swedish people that aren't fluent up to or very close to a native standard in Finnish are a very small subset of the already small 5.5% minority). If only a native level of language skill is sufficient to serve this very small group (and when this clearly isn't achieved under the current system or even with languages which students really want to learn), it begs the question why to hypocritically insist on a token requirement of Swedish at universities and resulting mandatory Swedish education for every schoolchild? In the case of medical services the argument is also weakened by the fact that there are increasingly many foreign doctors with a poor grasp of even Finnish in hospitals and people still seem to get healthcare.
 
I know the point of an encyclopedia isn't to win debates, but as other sides seem to be acting so, I was also tempted to chime in. Plateinlynx 04:09, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I was just going to reply "aivan sama" here as this is probably one of the silliest articles on wikipedia altogheter with huge flame and edit-wars on an article read by like three people a day (see wiki traffic logs) who probably already know the deal anyway~(as most of them are from finland). I regret the time I've wasted on this article. However, if it makes someone happy then perhaps moving the last section of the overview into "current situation" is a good idea. As anything before that last section is not really argument for or against, but a summary on how it has come to this. Gillis (talk) 15:50, 24 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Neutrality of the overview section 

message: Should we maybe move this article to a page titled something like:
* Mandatory Swedish tuition in Finnish schools
* Tuition in Finland's two domestic languages
or?
/Tuomas 10:43, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  A title reflecting this article's limited scope? 

message: isn't a little strange to put a map in an encylopedia article, along with a whole paragraph explaining why the map is incorrect/biased, followed by a link to an apparently less biased map (which seems to be on the author's personal homepage... wouldn't there be a more official source for it??). if the linked map is indeed less biased, let's just but that on the page instead and get rid of the biased one.
 User:84.248.81.201 20:32, 19 Apr 2005 
:Wikipedia's copyright policies is one hinderness. But, in fact, although I think none of the alternative maps are to prefer, also the current map is somewhat questionable in the context of Wikipedia:Image use policy. Feel free to improve the article, for instance by a map made by yourself!
: :-)
:/Tuomas 13:30, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  the map 

message: Before the current reverting escalates, I find the edits of  acceptable. // Fred-Chess 16:54, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: After having had only a quick glance, I can certainly see both the merits of some of the changes, while it seems to me as if, in some other places, the original version was better. Rather than having to choose between the two versions, I think the changes should be discussed on a one-by-one basis. Myself, I won't go through them all right now, but I think some constructive discussion actually will help finding a way we can all agree on. / Alarm 23:43, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV 

message: okay so here is the url to the difference between the old and new version that was introduced by 84.231.217.74
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mandatory_Swedish&diff=25009146&oldid=23414748
first of all
1. "For the 92% majority in Finland who speak Finnish, this means they have to learn an unusual dialect of Swedish"
A dialect is a difference in pronunciation, not in grammar. A school teaches grammar, the fact that many teachers do speak the Finnish-swedish dialect(due to living in Finland) is just like having an Irish english-teacher. There are certain small differences between Swedish and Finnish-swedish, but these are only sparse words (the difference is similar or smaller than that of British-english and US-english), in fact there aren't any spelling differences such as color and colour in english. The swedish language has allot of different dialects that are very different from each other (but not unintelligible to each-other) so could someone please tell me what is the correct Swedish dialect. this claim is exaggerated further with the phrase "It is the view of some opponents that this could actually be achieved better if those who do learn the unusual dialect of Swedish did so of their own free will."
2. why did this sentence have to be removed "Supporters maintain that such a claim is an oxymoron and that Scandinavians find it easier to learn e.g. German and English"
3. "Thus supporters of mandatory Swedish argue that the "ethnic origin", as defined in the directive, does not necessarily apply."
No this is also claimed by people with a neutral stance to the debate, due to it in fact being a historical fact.
4. "Supporters claim that mandatory Swedish teaching is also supported by one international treaty (by the now-defunct League of Nations)". It would be great to have a source here as to there being only one such international treaty. and otherwise, what does the defunctness of the league of nations have to do with anything? a contract is a contract. I feel the old "and to some degree supported by international treaties" worked much better.
5. This part also does not sound like good encyclopedia text to me "Those favoring broader choice in language teaching claim that most people don't have, or in any case have a limited natural contact with Swedish-speaking people, and that educational resources are wasted by forcing 92% of the population to learn the language spoken by 6% of the population, and that it is in Finland’s national interest to eliminate the outdated compulsory Swedish policy.". Too specific argumentations might be better addressed in different forums.
6. I found this edit brought very few new facts to the article. This edit contained IMO allot of uncalled for many<->some etc. changes in the authors point of view direction. I personally hate the way all parties try to lurk behind the words some and many and try my best not to use them myself. But it is hard to not use them at all. But for instance:
"Among some Finns the derogatory term pakkoruotsi, literally "compulsory Swedish", or even "forced Swedish""
to
"Among many Finns the derogatory term pakkoruotsi, literally "compulsory Swedish","
Well yes, it is a common term, i use it myself, but more as a joke. THe people really using it in a derogatory way are a small minority.
this article is also about mandatory swedish, that's why i think the parties involved should be referred to as "supporting/opposing mandatory Swedish" instead of vague wordings such as "Those favoring broader choice in language teaching"
Also, why are Finnish-swedes being claimed to be "so-called", this is also a vague formulation imo.
Please do not get me wrong, i found the contributor has had a few good points. But there is allot that's either vague or biased.
I would ask the author and maybe some neutral party to comment on these pointers and not put in any big edits before considering them thoroughly.
HAND
Gillis 17:15, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  10.9 npov debate 

message: the  is not for Your amusement of showing discontent with an article. It is intended as a guide for edits to improve the article. Slamming NPOV tags because "according to edit summary it was removed because it was there long enough" is NOT applicable. Edit summaries are not reliable evidence whether a tag should be there or not, the article itself is. So describe your arguments, or rewrite parts of the article. I will revert if you continue adding of the tag. Period. Fred-Chess 16:43, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe the fanatics are in quite another place, such as the people as you who come in arbitarily once every three months and edit the article completely to fit your personal POV. Whereas there are other people who have spent time on this article and discussed all changes here on the talk page, and also set this article up for peer-review by completely neutral parts to the debate on the issue, that's why i have a hard time getting why in the world the article should be completely re-written. And let's pose your question the other way around: what critisicm of mandatory swedish is missing in the article in your oppinion? best regards Gillis 17:29, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV again 

message: Anyone else who finds this useless? i mean a EU directive that is six years old is not exactly new.
I think that it has been legally proven that the argument given by "some" (as the article puts it) does not have an effect, since as teh article explains it swedish-speakers are not considered an "ethnic minority".
Gillis 18:33, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This is a rather brilliant play on semantics, that is usually employed in situations like this. Swedish-speaking Finns themselves like to talk about their identity and their culture as something special and specific and worth preserving -- just watch the next svenska dagen again. Now, the spirit of the EU directive is perfectly clear on these matters, but of course it does not apply as the ethnicity of Swedish-speakers disappears handily when required. I bump into this a lot in discussions with my opponents -- they don't seem to be able to decide, as sitting on both sides of the fence has its benefits. The problem is that ethnicity according to the directive is probably self-defined, so you can switch it on and off at will as convenient. Language and sense of belonging to a subgroup which the Fenno-Swedes clearly display does, in effect, turn someone into an ethnic minority, in particular when their definition is in opposition to the general population -- which is a basic requirement for a situation as in Finland to ever even emerge into political discourse. Sticking to a definition of ethnic minority is useful when protecting the barriers around you; difficult if you want to convince everyone that they actually should be LIKE you. The sad part is that the whole language strife comes from forcing people to conform to a homogenous singular identity. HuckFinn 15:24, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  future-clause 

message: I think this article definetly needs a cleanup. It repeats same statements in different sections and all the sections cover loosely the subject they have, often getting lost in wrong directions. Different views on the debate have scattered around the article in places where they do not belong. Shubi 13:17, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup 

message: The logo apperently has been removed from Wikipedia. The person who applied for this or did this, can you explain? Or does anyone else know? EDIT, apparently it was in Commons where logos are not accepted, I have uploaded to enwiki again. --Pudeo (Talk) 16:04, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image 

message: Currently the article says this: "These requirements are justified by referring to the status of Swedish as a national language along with Finnish." However, it does not say who justifies those requiments with those reasons. I searched for the education plan for Finland by Finnish Ministry of Education (http://www.oph.fi/info/ops/pops_web.pdf page 118), and their page says something like this when translated into English: 
"The goal of Swedish tuition is to give the student the ability to communicate and work with our Swedish-speaking minority and the Nordic countries. The mission of the studies is to get the student used to using other languages and raise the student to appreciate the bi-linguality of Finland and the Nordic way of life. The student also learns that as an art/skill and a way of communication a/the language demands focused and complex/rich commuticational practicing. As a school subject, the Swedish language is a skill and cultural subject." 
(As you can see, I'm not so good with English). But anyways, I would rephrase the current sentence to something like "The Finnish Ministry of Education justifies these requiments by referring to the status of Swedish as a official national language and a tool to cooperate with the other Nordic countries."81.175.134.236 22:29, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mandatory Swedish justified 

message: How do we translate the text "pois pakkoruotsi" in a pro-freedom logo? Is it "away with forced Swedish" or "away with mandatory Swedish"? And how is Swedish word tjängsvenska translated in English? Majji 16:21, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd translate it something like mandatory, compulsory or something like that. "Forced Swedish" would translate as "pakotettu ruotsi". Finnish word "pakko" does not indicate that someone or something is always actively forcing (as the word "forced" does, to my knowledge). "Sinun on pakko syödä" for example would be best translated as "you have to/must eat", not as "you are forced to eat".81.175.134.236 22:26, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: How does pakkoruotsi translate?

message: "Analogously, this may sometimes be called 'forced Finnish', in Swedish tvångsfinska."
Yes, it may be sometimes be called that, but how often, by who and on what occasions is it called that? As I said earlier, the only times I have heard someone speak about mandatory Finnish is when someone uses it as an argument to support mandatory Swedish. I think it's not a term that you hear so often that it should be mentioned in the article.Shubi 23:10, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As a Swedish speaking finn i hear it about as often as the term Forced Swedish, if i remember correctly the Swedish language wikipedia even has an article on the term. You might want to remember that the most Swedish-speaking municipalities(which are few and small) in Finland probably are more swedish-speaking than the most Finnish speaking municipalities, so learning Finnish might to some seem allmost as odd as learning Swedish for some. Also you might also notice that for someone such as me, who has grown up with both languages and speak them allmost equally well, the very basic Finnish tuition can feel just as, if not more, frustrating (i can still remember the "Kimmolla on pallo. Mikä Kimmolla on?" tasks in grade three). But getting back to the article, I can't really get how mentioning it can hurt the article anyway. Gillis 01:06, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The wording is just odd. It says that it may be sometimes called that, and does not say is it actually called that. Like "I may eat this apple" does not say am I actually eating the apple. It then would be better rephrased as "Analogously, this is sometimes called 'forced Finnish', in Swedish tvångsfinska, by the Swedish speaking students."81.175.134.236 14:03, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Forced Finnish 

message: There was a large edit again by an anon ip (192.100.124.218), i changed a few things, this is why:
-There is no note in the constitution of Swedish being the SECOND language of Finland. Only that it is a official language of Finland along with Finnish.
- The Swedish people's party has many main agenda's except language, i sourced this with their website.
-I reverted the overview part, not due to content, but due to the factt hat content is already mentioned in two other places in the article.
-When does an international treaty expire? i've never seen a "best before" marking on an international agreement. Just because the league of nations that signed that treaty is as a organisation defunct does not mean the signatories are not responsible for their deal. Note that the same treaties stipulate Åland as a part of Finland and not Sweden.
- Åland has 26 000 inhabitants, and a very slim minority of finnish-speakers, if they are not packed in one place then a finnish-speaking school is pretty hard to achieve. Some Ålandians are assholes with their language stuff, but i'd like to see those claims about discrimination sourced.
- Yes Finnish got the theoretical equal rights during russian rule but the first law of that type was from 1860, that's pretty late into the less than 100 years of russian rule, so i rewrote it to point that out.
- Yes there was Swedish oppression of the finnish language during swedish rule. But it was notthing as other similar situations during the same time. For isntance in Scania you could be convicted to death for speaking Danish, whereas it never was illegal or anything like that to speak Finnish in what later became Finland. So i would not call it active oppression. The point that finnish became a official language during russian rule is pointed out in a multitude of places in the article already. And i'd like to see the source that Swedish was the only official language during Swedish rule, as sweden to this day still does not have any official language defiend in their constitution (so swedish is only a official national language in finland).
- Try to get it into your head: Finland was never occupied by Sweden. Anyone with a basic knowledge of history is aware that there never was an independent state Finland before Swedish rule, therefore you cannot say Finland was occupied by Sweden. In fact the NAME "Finland" is just a few hundred years old! So the claim is a anachronistic claim however you turn it.
- I put back in "Also modernizations typical for that era in Europe were introduced" is this was done in fact clearly earlyer in Sweden (as this otherwise would imply Russia was somehow more liberal against the lower classes than Sweden, which is just dung, look where the revolution took place fifty years later.).
-In the section regarding the peruskoulu reform there was just a lot of information removed that was not noted elsewhere, why?
-Hmm i think discrediting Suomen GHallup is here a bit unnecessary. First of all it not being realted to another firm with the name gallup in it does not discredit it, using the name gallup is quite natural and not a copy. Also in fact taloustutkimus is the one that is more speculated into. YLE has stopped using taloustutkimus for political surveys due to the odd results that did not correlate at all with the last elections, source. http://www.niinisto.net/blogi/2007/03/19/17. Suome gallup on the other side is older company that is pretty respected in Finland, there is a source for that where people can look at the study. Also the studies are in chronologic order as can be seen: there seems according to one of the studies to have been a clear change to more positive attitudes towards mandatory swedish in the last ten years or so. This study is also ordered by a neutral part, yle, any claims that the finnish public service broadcaster would determine the result of the studies is just paranoia.
-For the foltinget study the source says academic, not highly educated.
-Humm there are other studies there that also give certain support for mandatory swedish.
- The Finnish educationplan (oppisuunnitelma) is revied about every 10 years. And it is taking it to more abstract and general knowledgeable levels whole the time.
-"oppressed by the swedish-controlled media" Oh give me a break? are we going to deny the holocaust next? its also a clear myth that the swedish govt. wants a swedish minority in finland, few swedes even know there is swedish spoken widely in Finland.
Please do discuss these thigns and retort before changing again. Also sources are good to add.
Gillis 18:57, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  14 august 07 edits 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: There are plenty of sentences and words making this article extremely biased and skewed. Here are som examples:
"However, the requirement to study Swedish is often referred to as pakkoruotsi, a somewhat charged term in Finnish meaning "mandatory Swedish", or "enforced Swedish". "
No, pakkoruotsi can not be translated as "mandatory Swedish". That would be "pakollinen ruotsi" .
"The employees of the national government and the bilingual municipal governments are required to be able to serve citizens in Swedish."
No, they are not, but the institution need to make sure they as an institution can provide service in both Swedish and Finnish. Single civil servants are not required to speak Swedish/Finnish, but they need to fetch someone who speaks the language they don't have proficiency in, should the need arise.
"Currently, it is possible for Finnish citizens to report a different mother tongue for themselves at any time, and as many times as desired, by submitting a form to the Population Register Center. "
How is this relevant?
" Military service is not required in the autonomous region of Åland."
How is this relevant?
This is just from the first two paragraphs, and I suspect it won't be any better further on in this lengthy article. Romuruotsalainen (talk) 10:07, 7 November 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article needs to be remade from scratch 

message: Although this article already covers the opposite for Swedish speaking Finns, I believe that it's not broad enough.
Therefore I propose that this article be split into two, mandatory Swedish and mandatory Finnish. The opposite needs broader coverage. Metric Supporter 89 (talk) 02:18, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Splitting the article for broader coverage of mandatory finnish for native Swedish speakers