Talk:Belarusian language/Archive 1

message: From http://www.belarus-misc.org/bel-ling.htm:
:According to the 1999 census, about 38 percent of Belarusian residents speak in Belarusian in their every day lives, and 82 percent consider Belarusian their mother tongue. As mentioned elsewhere in this section, it is an overtly political, authoritarian decision by the current regime ruling Belarus to replace Belarusian with Russian (continuing the ignoble tradition begun in the Russian tsarist and Soviet Russian eras). 
:The fact that the Belarusian constitution guarantees that both Belarusian and Russian are the official languages of Belarus, does not seem to be relevant for the current Belarusian government. (They ignore the constitution as often as they follow it.)
:As far as the Belarusian government is concerned, the use of the Belarusian language is a political statement in today's (post-1995) Belarus--no matter if someone prefers to use Belarusian because it happens to be the language the person grew up using. To the government, the speaker (or writer) is a member of the opposition and thus a potential criminal willing to do anything to topple the government. "Smart" Belarusians who do not want trouble with the authorities only speak Russian, and especially so in public. The following are representative reports (it is very likely that most such events are never reported):
::On April 14, 1998, three youths who were speaking Belarusian as they were walking near Kamarovsky Market in central Mensk were first beaten by security guards and attacked by their dogs, then taken to a police station where they were beaten by police. (Using Belarusian identified them as "members of the opposition and troublemakers.") 
::In May, 1998, the newspaper, Nasha Niva, was threatened by the Belarusian government for using Taraskevitza rather than using the officially sanctioned Narkomovka. 
::In August, 1998, the newspaper Nasha Niva was in court, defending itself for using the "wrong" (sic) type of Belarusian (that is, Taraskevitza instead of Narkmovoka). In an irony that appears to have escaped the Belarusian bureaucrats, the proceedings were in Russian. 
::In August, 1999, two youths were convicted of a minor crime, even though there was no evidence to convict them. The judge ruled that the use of the Belarusian language by the youths in the courtroom was evidence enough. 
::In 1998: (1) The Council of Ministers issued more than 2,000 resolutions and only 30 of them were in Belarusian, and (2) The prime minister issued only one percent of his directives in Belarusian. In the first six months of 1999, 8 resolutions and one directive were issued in Belarusian and 1,000 and 190, respectively, in Russian. 
::On Dec. 15, 1999: A judge in Brest did not allow the defendants' request for a Belarusian language translator. (source: BelaPAN, No. 60; Wednesday, December 15, 1999; 3:00 p.m.) 
::Of the 250 schools in Minsk, only 11 provide instruction in Belarusian. Approximately 114,000 children went to school for the first time this year (123,000 in 1999). The number of first-year schoolchildren in Belarus' classes with instruction in the Belarusian language dropped from 726 last year to approximately 500 this year. (source: BelaPAN, No. 4; Friday, September 1, 2000; 6:20 p.m.) 
::The statistics require no comment. . . . 
It is said that the president of Belarus is not fluent in Belarusian, and that he needs to use "crib notes" while making speeches and statements in Belarusian. (Name another country where its leader is not fluent in the language of that country!)
::Perhaps using Russian only is a POV decision, because if 82% of Belarusians think Belarusian is their mother tongue and the so-called President of Belarus can't speak one of the official languages of that country (by the way do you know that no one can all themselves a president in Belarus such as the president of a corporation because it is against an edict of Lukashenka?). Even if one says that Belarusian is a minority language, other countries, Canada (French/English) and Belgium (Waloon/Dutch) are examples of bilingual states where conflicting linguistic groups attempt to operate together under the rule of law in a free and democratic society.  Clearly Lukashenka's policy in Byelorus show that he is not that interested in international human rights and civil society norms. Should we encourage him?  I think not, that is not very NPOV. I restate my opinion, both languages are relevant to the Belarusian nation-state unless Wikipedia wants to help extinguish the Belarusian tongue. — Alex756  talk 07:10, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Moved from [[Talk:Alexander Lukashenko]]