Talk:Moldova/Archive 3

message: The language used in the song is Romanian. Anybody who knows Romanian can attest that. I don't know what they mean by calling the official language "Moldovan", however this is Romanian. The song is tought in Romania too (and not as a foreign language song) AdrianTM 21:18, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting how people that don't know how to spell "Moldova" and "Moldovan" troll this page and revert my work without good or any explanations. I don't think we should accept that the "Limba Noastra" song is not written in Romanian (whatever they call their official language they picked a Romanian song as national anthem) AdrianTM 22:18, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

text: More importantly: it doesn't matter how they call official language, if the song is the same in Romanian than no matter what is the official language of Moldova or Romania or any other country the language of the song is Romanian too, by any measures. Example:  Mark Twain writings will still be in English even if US declares that the official language of US is American. AdrianTM 22:32, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Anthem: Limba noastră

message: I suggest to make a POOL. Let's see who is the winner here. I can bet that Romanians. Romanians are more united and have better interests than this bunch of idiots. Iasi 06:21, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, Iasi or Bonaparte or whoever you are, I wonder if the latter part of ^this post is not ellaborate enough to get you a week's ban or so. My guess is that you are familiar with the procedure by now. Dahn 10:20, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

text: On principle, truth is not established by polls, let alone by pools. Dahn 09:16, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Actually, the goal of wikipedia is not reporting truth, but NPOV, which means that viewpoints must be reported/merged according to their perceived weight. Therefore, polls are meaningful. :) Dpotop 10:07, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Argumentum ad populum. Dahn 10:09, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Around here, it's called "official policy", and you accepted the terms of use of wikipedia. Dpotop 10:21, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  The fallacy in your approach here is that you assume social science and politics provide "theorems" in the sense of math and physics. There is no such thing as "proof" in ethnic-related issues. For instance, prove me you are ethnic Romanian and not a Romanian-speaking Moldovan/Hungarian/Rroma/Armenian/whatever. It's impossible. Dpotop 11:33, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Assuming is precisely what I didn't do. I CANNOT and SHOULD NOT vote on whether you or anybody are Romanian or Turkish or Tupi because I feel that you are or than another is. THAT is the fallacy here. And that is what Iasi was requesting. Dahn 11:36, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Actually, voting is the only way to do it in cases like this one. In theory, this should work, provided that enough independent bystanders will take into acount the pertinent arguments of the conflicting parties. Unfortunately, we are quarreling on such obscure subjects that nobody wants to get involved. Dpotop 11:41, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Again: this is not at all necessary, nor welcome, when we talk about objective facts. Objective fact no. 1: whatever percent of Moldova's citizens have declared themselves Moldovans, aware (as far as we may presume) that they had a choice. Objective fact no. 2: Moldova calls itself this and that in its laws, and it doesn't call itself that and this etc. You may note I did not "fall into the fallacy" of claiming these would be "exact science" - what I did was to reduce things to what we do know for sure. Voting on it is like establishing it will rain tommorrow because most people think it will. Dahn 11:47, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

text:  For Zserghei it's different. He promotes a very narrow POV, which is not OK according to wikipedia policy. Dpotop 11:33, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Pool

message: ===Law===
This law still aplies: 
Law regarding the usage of languages spoken on the territory of the Republic of Moldova): "Moldavian RSS supports the desire of the Moldovans that live across the borders of the Republic, and considering the really existing linguistical Moldo-Romanian identity - of the Romanians that live on the territory of the USSR, of doing their studies and satisfying their cultural needs in their maternal language." 
===Other official sources===
*Ministry of Education of Moldova
*Academy of Sciences of Moldova
*Consiliul Coordonator al Audiovizualului
*Ministry of Justice
*Minitry of Foreign Affairs
*Minitry of Health
*Ministry of Transports
and so on...
===Other encyclopedias or factbooks===
*Encarta
*CIA Factbook
*Columbia Encyclopedia
*US State Department
===Census===
In the 2004 census out of the 3,383,332 population of Moldova, 16.5% (558,508) chose Romanian as their mother tongue, whereas 60% chose Moldovan. But this procent varies from the cities to the country side. In the cities, 40% of the Romanian/Moldovan speakers chose Romanian as their mother tongue, whereas in the country side each 7th Romanian/Moldovan speaker chose Romanian as his mother tongue; that is even though only 2% of the population of Moldova declared itself of Romanian ethnicity. 
It is also important to note, that the group of international observers from the Council of Europe, that supervised the census, underlined that 7 of the 10 observer teams noted an important number of cases when peope were advised to declare themselves Moldovans or Moldovan speakers (more info here). 
For detalied information about the relation Moldovan-Romanian in the 2004 census see the table at :ro:Limba_moldovenească#Distribuţie_geografică or the National Bureau of Statistics of Moldova.
--Danutz
:: This is amazing! Are you serious? The communist anti-romanian government in chisinau said 16.5% of moldovans speak romanian? Wow! I would have never expected this. Then the real numbers were perhaps as large as the newspapers claimed with 55% of moldovans saying "romanian" and only 45% saying "moldovan". Notice how the census was conducted 2 years ago and it took the Commies more then 2 years to "process" the data -hahaha. 
:: I would say this is a great victory for the truth if even Voronin could not hide the fact that a great number of Moldovans do in fact consider themsleves Romanian-speakers. Notice how under "Languages usually spoken" (Not mother language): Russian is usually spoken by 541.000 people or 16% of the population while Romanian is usually spoken by 555.000 people which is 16.5% of the population, ("Maldavanian" of course being about 59% of the population). Yet what is important here is that the language of the imperialist occupier is in decline (Russian was spoken by 1.2 mil people in 89) while the native language is on the rise. Constantzeanu 17:13, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Can you, please, point me to the census results? I've been looking on the web page of the Moldovan institute of statistics, but I found no data on ethnic composition/spoken language. They probably hid it very well. It seems that the preliminary results were public at a certain time in the past, but the archive is no longer accessible. Dpotop 19:44, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just go to http://www.statistica.md Then click on "recensămînt" on the right part of the page. There you will find various stats.  TSO1D 21:04, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

text: ... and one of these users is Constantzeanu. the major point already discussed here, in the talk page is you cannot change official data. You can add comments about disagreements about its interpretation (but only if these opinions are published somewhere). `'mikka (t) 20:05, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Arguments in favour of writing Moldovan (Romanian) and not just simply Moldova

message: In the 2004 census out of the 3,383,332 population of Moldova, 16.5% (558,508) chose Romanian as their mother tongue, whereas 60% chose Moldovan. But this procent varies from the cities to the country side. In the cities, 40% of the Romanian/Moldovan speakers chose Romanian as their mother tongue, whereas in the country side each 7th Romanian/Moldovan speaker chose Romanian as his mother tongue; that is even though only 2% of the population of Moldova declared itself of Romanian ethnicity. 
It is also important to note, that the group of international observers from the Council of Europe, that supervised the census, underlined that 7 of the 10 observer teams noted an important number of cases when peope were advised to declare themselves Moldovans or Moldovan speakers (more info here). 
For detalied information about the relation Moldovan-Romanian in the 2004 census see the table at :ro:Limba_moldovenească#Distribuţie_geografică or the National Bureau of Statistics of Moldova.
--Danutz
:: This is amazing! Are you serious? The communist anti-romanian government in chisinau said 16.5% of moldovans speak romanian? Wow! I would have never expected this. Then the real numbers were perhaps as large as the newspapers claimed with 55% of moldovans saying "romanian" and only 45% saying "moldovan". Notice how the census was conducted 2 years ago and it took the Commies more then 2 years to "process" the data -hahaha. 
:: I would say this is a great victory for the truth if even Voronin could not hide the fact that a great number of Moldovans do in fact consider themsleves Romanian-speakers. Notice how under "Languages usually spoken" (Not mother language): Russian is usually spoken by 541.000 people or 16% of the population while Romanian is usually spoken by 555.000 people which is 16.5% of the population, ("Maldavanian" of course being about 59% of the population). Yet what is important here is that the language of the imperialist occupier is in decline (Russian was spoken by 1.2 mil people in 89) while the native language is on the rise. Constantzeanu 17:13, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Can you, please, point me to the census results? I've been looking on the web page of the Moldovan institute of statistics, but I found no data on ethnic composition/spoken language. They probably hid it very well. It seems that the preliminary results were public at a certain time in the past, but the archive is no longer accessible. Dpotop 19:44, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just go to http://www.statistica.md Then click on "recensămînt" on the right part of the page. There you will find various stats.  TSO1D 21:04, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Census

message: I think that in this case Wiki rules on official data "have to be used with care" as argued by the international observers to the census. In fact the sentence "have to be used with care" is taken verbatum from what those observers said. They ment it exclusively in cases like these when we try to provide a reader with info on Moldova. The CIA world factbook seems to have taken the advice. Why can't we?
A number of users have engaged in a very unproductive revert war. Please, if you have some disagreements please post them here first and we shall try to adress them one by one. Constantzeanu 00:46, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ... and one of these users is Constantzeanu. the major point already discussed here, in the talk page is you cannot change official data. You can add comments about disagreements about its interpretation (but only if these opinions are published somewhere). `'mikka (t) 20:05, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: On the issue of ethnicity

message: In your last edits on the Moldova article, you have marked the changes as a minor edit. This is not right. A minor edit generally implies trivial changes only, such as typo corrections, formatting and presentational changes and rearranging of text without changing any content. Therefore, any change that affects the meaning of an article is not minor, even if it involves one word. The distinction between major and minor edits is significant because you may decide to ignore minor edits when viewing recent changes; logged-in users can even set their preferences to not display them. No one wants to be fooled into ignoring a significant change to an article simply because it was marked "minor." So remember to consider the opinions of other editors when choosing this option. --Asterion 14:31, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cool down, Alexander 007 

message: Asterion, I urge you to reconsider reverting the page and criticizing the other users, especially Alexander. The problem is that the language issue has been discussed numerous times and finally we seemed to have reached a consensus on leaving Romanian in parantheses but not going any further. You can see the more recent round of the discussion at the top of the page. The issue is very controversial, and we have spent a great amount of time trying to find the best solution. Alexander did not even support the inclusion of Romanian in parantheses in the beginning, but he fights for it now because that is the conclusion we reached. Do not become angry with him if he is a bit frustrated, but the issue absorbed much effort from numerous users and now you appear suddenly and revert the page without even reading the long discussion above. TSO1D 15:41, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree. Asterion, I would likewise ask you to reconsider the matter at hand and try to view this from all angles. I would also like to point out yet again something which I find is being ingored by those who advocate this Stalinist and communist theory, that a Moldovan identity separate of a Romanian one exists. What I would like to point out is the adivice by the International observers, which states that data from the referendum should be used with care since some of the question (especially langauge and ethnicity) were not conducted fairly. Many organizations have taken this advice already :). I don't see why Wikipedia should be an exception. Constantzeanu 18:12, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I understand what you are saying. Yet Wikipedia rules have to be taken in light of the warning issued by the international observers Constantzeanu 19:23, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sophistry alert. Is this about people "declaring themselves Moldovans" (under alleged pressure), or about the Moldovan language being described as official (with or without ambiguities)? Because the two issues do not appear to be connected (and, again, the first is subjective and likely exaggerated). And, again, the language issues go on language page (you make no extra point when you copy-paste from there). Dahn 19:29, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

text: Not really. People talk here about language, not ethnicity. And again, writing "moldovan (romanian)" simply states that a controversy exists. You cannot bury this essential point under a reference, assuming readers will take it. Dpotop 22:27, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

text: And why oh why is it that it should remain here and not there? Dahn 21:37, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  To Asterion 

message: GDP of Moldova is not the one expressed by the Gov. of Moldova. --Bombonel 08:02, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The data used currently represetns the CIA factbook estimate for the end of 2005. It is probable that some changes have taken palace since then. If you have updated information, please indicate the new values and the source. TSO1D 20:29, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Could you have a source to back that information? TSO1D 20:07, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: GDP

message: Can one please explain me more in details what is this all about? A user named User:Khoikhoi just reverted a reasonable text bringing this argument. Is it really so? Are the readers well prepared to make the difference/decide whether Moldovans and Romanians are the same people or not? --Hassion 17:56, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ...and a user called Bonaparte is being disruptive. Give it up already, will ya? —Khoikhoi 18:46, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  STOP pov-pushing - it's up to readers to decide whether Moldovans and Romanians are the same people, not for you to shove it in people's faces

message: In the demographics table I changed the heading "Moldovan and Romanian" to Daco-Romanian as the latter is a term that encompasses the two categories. It makes sense to use this term instead of simply repeating the subcategories, and I don't think there's any contrvoversy that Moldovans are Daco-Romanian. (Even Stati agrees). TSO1D 20:18, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because I was always for discussion and compromise, I am going to agree to this. Constantzeanu 23:26, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Demographics 

message: In external links perhaps there should be the link to the Moldovan Embassy in U.S. http://embassyrm.org/
That is the official website where U.S. citizens would get some information about Moldova and mainly, the application for a visa to Moldova.
NOTE:
When searching for "Moldova Embassy" on Google, the first result that appears is http://www.moldovaembassy.org/ which is not the embassy's address, but instead is a gateway to Consular Assistance, Inc. (www.consularassistance.com) a company based in Virginia. The WHOIS records clearly shows that both  www.moldovaembassy.org is registered by the founder of Consular Assistance -- Radu Bujoreanu, also the former Consul of the Embassy of the Republic of Moldova in Washington, DC. according to the http://www.consularassistance.com/who.html
The business model of Consular Assistance consists basically in re-mailing the applications for Moldovan visas to the actual Moldovan Embassy for a $60 surcharge (normal visa fee is $40, they charge $100). This business model is probably not illegal, but is certainly deceptive. The deception is twofold: 
1. Even though they claim to be "... gateway to Moldovan Embassies" they do not provide a link to the actual embassy page, that shows the intent to prevent individuals from finding the actual embassy visa application page in hopes that they would use their re-mailing service.
2. The web page and the url moldovaembassy.org shows an attempt to disguise themselves as the Embassy of Moldova in U.S.
Given those reasons, it seems that there should be a link to the official website of the Embassy of Moldova in U.S. 
Also perhaps add the address of the U.S. Embassy in Moldova - http://moldova.usembassy.gov/
--Ccabal 06:19, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Add  a link  to Moldovan Embassy in U.S. 

message: :{moved from user talk:Irpen)
Irpen, I noticed that you removed the Daco-Romanian super-category in the Moldova article. A few weeks ago the header read Romanian/Moldovan, and I replaced it with Daco-Romanian because that is what the definition of the latter word is. Nobody is trying to mislead the readers that the census had that category, however in my view it is logical to leave the two categories apart as the census was conducted this way, but to show their aggregate due to the close de facto relation between the two groups. As some members of various families declared themselves Moldovan, whereas others declared themselves as Romanian the difference between the categories is blurry, and simply presented their sum in addition to preserving the category used in the census makes sense. Once again, I did not introduce the super-category, just the name, and for about a month that seemed to work, even Mikka did not display any opposition to the design. I do not wish to enter into a revert war, and I would hate to see one between you and Contanteanu on this subject, I simply urge you to reanalyze the situation. TSO1D 20:28, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: TSO1D, thanks for your message. I have no objection against letting readers know that M and R belong to the Daco-Romanian category. By all means elaborate on that right after the census results. However, census results themselves have to be presented in unaltered form, so that the reader doesn't infer from the census something that wasn't there. I take no position on whether Moldovans are Romanians. What I want is to see the facts presented and have the readers judge them on their own themselves. Facts are that Census presented them as two ethnic groups. Facts also are that some dispute that view and some even criticize census as objectionable. The way to go is, present the census results and right after them present a referenced criticism. The lumping together what census considers separate and presenting such lumping as census results actually distorts the results we are trying to present. Again, we are not trying to say that Moldovans are not Romanians. We simply let the reader know that the census didn't view them as such. --Irpen 20:33, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I understand your point, however I don't believe that by including a super-category the census results are altered. Furthermore, in my view the previous version  might have presented more POV as Romanians and Moldovans were lumped into an arbitrary category with no explanation. Writing the word Daco-Romanian as the top category in my view does not change the presentation of the census, the same results from the INS is presented only a category is used to indicate that the two groups that are part of a closely knit category. The term Daco-Romanian is not contested by the Moldovan government, it is universally accepted that Moldavans and Romanians belong to the Daco-Romanian group which is simply the Eastern branch of these Romance groups. Although the Moldovan government might dispute whether the Moldovan ethnic group constitutes a separate ethnos or is part of the Romanian ethnos, virtually no one decides that Moldovans are part of the Daco-Romanian grouping. Therefore in my view then, as both of these groups can be classified into this category without introducing POV and thus presenting a more clear picture to a reader, using this format is a good idea. After the table further analysis can be provided, that would discuss the disputed attribution of Moldovans to the Romanian ethnos, however the information in the table would make no such link directly. TSO1D 21:07, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I tend to agree with this point of view, official results are official results, however we have to remember that here we don't talk about categories like "Ukrainians, Russians and Bulgarians" grouped as Slavs, a better example would be if we would divide Russians from Transnistria in Russians and "Transnistrans" or "Dneparskis".. or something similar. Romanians call themselves Moldovans in Romania too, it doesn't mean that they are a different nationality. AdrianTM 02:18, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I understand why Irpen doesn't want to add another category that would include Romanians and Moldovans as that would in fact alter the format of the official published census results, the only problem is that an analysis or a small caveat would in my opinion need to be provided whenver this table is included to provide an explanation for the situation, because many sources such as the CIA factbook completely fuse the two categories under the term "Romanian" without preserving the categories used in the Moldovan census results. I suppose a sentence could be added at the end detailing the problem though. As for the Slav analogy, I also have to agree that there is virtually no controversy from the Moldovan government or other sources that Moldovans are closer to Romanians than Bulgarians to Russians for instance. TSO1D 20:18, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  THe OSCE observers said that the "census results should be used with extreeme care", exactly because of the issue of Moldovan/Romanian. The CIA world factbook seems to have followed this warning. We should too. If the Communist and neo-Stalinist government in Moldova and their few Russofile sympathysers on this forum want to use Moldovan only (for their own political purposes), then I am sorry but WIkipedia is an encyclopedia and what an ecyclopedia does is offer information and information should be given from a neutral point of view. The OSCE observed that in 7 cases out of 10, censors pushed people to say "Moldovan", and this is why the CIA world factbook puts Moldovans and Romanians in one category. Constantzeanu 14:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with that, Wikipedia needs to present information and most importantly the whole information (partial information is useless). It's true that people in Moldova declared themselves as Moldovans, however Moldovan = Romanian (in Romanian language, just like Texan or Yankee = American in English). So we have 3 important reasons to show this info: the fact that Moldovan=Romanian in Romanian language, the fact that OSCE as noted above said that census results were influenced by censors, and to make it consistent with other sources: CIA factbook, the map that's displayed in the same paragraphAdrianTM 15:30, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Daco-Romanian 

message: I see that a new template has been substituted for the old "country infobox" template. The new design apparently causes some problems. I don't believe, however, that the new template will stay for long, so I urge you not to make radical changes yet. I just moved the portal down for now as that added an unnecessary new column under the new design. TSO1D 02:54, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New template 

message: The usage of the terms Romanian and Moldovan are directly interchangable, even in official use by the Moldovan government. Nevertheless, in this article it makes sense to choose the more suitable nuance of the word in various instances for historical or political reasons. In the case of the poem Limba Noastra, it was written in Romanian, before the development of a theoretical Moldovan language by Soviet linguists. Therefore in this case it is much more logical to use the term Romanian language. TSO1D 22:28, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, I agree with that. Thanks for the explanation. What I don't approve of is people switching around offical census statistics so Wikipedia can be platform for the România Mare cause. I guess I can live with Constantz's compromise however, even though it's still borderline POV-pushing. —Khoikhoi 23:52, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks Khoikhoi. It's important not to confuse this sort of sensitive issue with Boni's nationalism!  I am not a supporter of România Mare, the party or the notion in itself. I think that at one point you were ok with the comprimise to put both the added numbers and the official data since this issue is very, I repeat, very controversial and the organization which monitored the census explained in a very detailed manner that the census results should be used with care, which is what i think this compromise between us does. Constantzeanu 18:43, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Moldovan/Romanian 

message: Thank you for granting full points to Romania. We did the same to you. Soon, we will reunite, and then there will be no need for exchange of points. --Candide, or Optimism 13:58, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, this is crap, can you please don't add irrelevant discussions to this page that's already too big.AdrianTM 15:27, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Syntax error. --Candide, or Optimism 15:34, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Eurovision