Talk:Lech Wałęsa
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[edit] Old talk
An event mentioned in this article is an August 14 selected anniversary
Lech Walesa es not Danziger
I have two related concerns about this page: (1) Most important, I am unable to authenticate what Walesa is claimed to have said to the United Nations Security Council about attacking Iraq. Mr Walensa has made a number of comments on this subject and we should try to present a balanced view. (2) The article uses the word "recently", without indicating a date. Perhaps we should include date information when we speak of something's having happened recently.
Two other concers: This page is completely NPOV. The most important information seems to be he was a "double spy" which has never been proved or documented in any serious way. Except this alomost nothing is said about his real political and social activity - the things which, contrary to his "double spying", are well proved and documented. The statement "a anti-communist puppy" is NPOV by itself.
Well - I have decided to change this page quite seriously. I have added the list of basic facts about Lech Wałęsa and have changed the "spy" story making its much more NPOV (at least IMHO). Sorry for my bad English.
- Yes, it's much improved. There still seems to be far too much of the "spy" stuff. All of the various theories are largely the same and seem to lack evidence. Perhaps we join these together and make the section a bit shorter? -- Finlay McWalter 00:41, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
I've done some fixups to the english spelling and grammar of this (otherwise excellent) article. I'll probably do some more, and perhaps some reformatting. In addition, I have some language questions which can hopefully be answered by Polish-speaking wikipedians: -- Finlay McWalter 23:52, 29 Sep 2003 (UTC)
- Q1 The article is a bit inconsistent about whether "Gdanska Shipyard" is singular (i.e. there's one big shipyard) or plural (i.e. there are several shipyards). Which is correct? -- Finlay McWalter 23:52, 29 Sep 2003 (UTC)
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- Thank you for your help. Stocznia Gdańska is the polish name of a shipyard in Gdańsk. There are some other like Gdańska Stocznia Remontowa or Stocznia Północna, but Wałęsa worked only in that one. Gdańska is polish adjective from word Gdańsk, stocznia means shipyard.Gdarin 07:07, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
- Q2 I changed "war state" and "war law" to "martial law", which is the common english idiom. Roughly, this means a state of military rule when normal governmental and judicial processes are suspended and citizen's rights severely constrained. I assume this is what happened in 1982? -- Finlay McWalter 00:12, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
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- Martial law is ok. But it happened in December 13, 1981. Gdarin 07:07, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
- Q3 was imprisioned in a "luxury jail" since October 1982. I assume this means that he went INTO the jail in October 1982, right? -- Finlay McWalter 00:32, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
This is awful - the only part that's actually an article is about ridiculous conspiracy theories. Someone should turn the timeline into paragraphs. john k 08:09, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)
I've rearranged the points form into paragraphs as suggested. No information has been added or removed. jp
[edit] Movie
What was the film about him? Iron Man, or something? I remember it was notable. Must go into the article.mikka (t) 16:45, 19 October 2005 (UTC)
Andrzej Wajda's Man of Iron, is what i think you're talking about. Wajda's earlier Man of Marble, about Communism in the 1950's and 1960's, is also excellent.
- "Man of Iron" (a sequel to "Man of Marble") takes place during the strikes of 1980. It features some stock footage of Wałęsa, but I wouldn't say it's about him; he's mainly there to provide historical background. --24.58.13.127 21:50, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Spoken Version
This article is on the Spoken Wikipedia request list, so I am going to make a recording. If any of you want to add any significant changes, notify me now.
Markkasan 20:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
I see no reason to include a mispronunciation of his name in English at the top of the article, and for this reason removed all but the correct pronunciation. I am not very nationalistic but find it mildly offensive. Many Americans butcher many world leader's names - are we to start including phonetic mispronunciations at the top of encyclopedia articles?
-- Random Pole
Random pole is rights. It is utter madness to include the MISpronounciation - e.g. how it is read by an englishman with no idea about the Polish language 84.167.245.86 11:50, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Requested move
The reasons for move copied from the entry on the WP:RM page:
- Talk:Lech Wałęsa — Lech Wałęsa → Lech Walesa – see Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)#Diacritics, South Slavic languages, especially #A Polish/French-English example and #A Polish-English example on that talk page --Francis Schonken 11:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
- Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation, then sign your vote with ~~~~
- Support --Francis Schonken 11:01, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose. This amounts to disinformation IMO.
ナイトスタリオン ✉ 12:08, 4 December 2005 (UTC) - Oppose. Lech Walesa would be pronounced differently from Lech Wałęsa in Polish. Not being Polish myself or knowing any Slavic language, I learned already as a child how to pronounce these Polish letters thanks to the name of this guy (just from listening to the news). I can't see why it would be a problem for anyone else to do so. up◦land 12:18, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose — the above link is to the talk page on a Wikipedia guideline, not the guideline itself. Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)#Disputed issues is the relevant link, and that says that the discussion is still open. Redirects are cheap, so no one can get lost by not bothering to type the correct letters. These letters are meaningful, suggest the correct pronunciation, and, dare I say, the more correct spelling. --Gareth Hughes 13:45, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose, as per Gareth Hughes. Olessi 16:48, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose. Diacritics are allowed as far as I know. Or they should be in my opinion, because that would be encyclopedic. I am all for using English whenever is possible on this Wikipedia. However this is a polish personal name, not an english one, there is no such thing as a translation (unless someone knows what the english translation of the name "Lech" would be). This is not such a serious case that it would warrant to be written incorrectly in my humble opinion. Gryffindor 22:16, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose of course. By dropping the diacrytes one does not create an English name. The thing he creates is "someone's name written without diacrytes". Nothing more. Halibutt 17:28, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose obviously. Compare Gerhard Schröder, Göran Persson, Wolfgang Schüssel, Dag Hammarskjöld, Halldór Ásgrímsson etc etc etc etc! Balcer 19:14, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose How dare you suggest spelling his name Walesa- I am Polish, Walesa and Wałęsa sound nothing alike. W is a v in Polish, ł is a w etc. This is Anglo-Saxon biggotry- How about we spell Winston Churchill will Polish diattricts?
[edit] Discussion
- Add any additional comments
- I have an impression that this move proposal is in fact a splinter of the Talk:Níðhöggr/archive1#Article should have English title voting, in which Lech Wałęsa was used by yours truly as an example that the lack of diacrytes does not make an English name. Halibutt 02:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
- NOTE In North America, it is written "Lech Walesa", without diacritics. Arguments about it being not Polish should not be relevant, as this is not the polish wikipedia. The article title should be readable by anyone with *solely* English as their background. It should be written using solely English letters (which *should* mean ASCII only plus Æ and Œ ) All arguments about people being multilingual have no traction, as not everyone is multilingual, and this is the English Wikipedia, not the "every languange ever existing" version. The proper original language form should be noted in the article, and may even be used throughout the article following a "herein referred to as original name" clause, but it should not be an article title. 132.205.45.148 22:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Result
It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it be moved. WhiteNight T | @ | C 01:24, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Recentism?
Following section was added to the Lech Walesa article:
==Recent controversy==
Lech Walesa has recently had to face up to accusations that he was a paid agent of the Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa (state security service) for more than 10 years during his rise to the top of the Solidarity movement the in Gdansk shipyards (during the 1970's). Walesa, under the codename "Bolek" (Lech Walesa's father's name), is said to have been recruited to pass information to the SB, and was bumped into the top leadership position within Solidarity by other embedded agents of the SB in an attempt to control the movement. His subsequent break from SB control is attributed to a new arrangement Walesa made with the CIA, then headed by George H. W. Bush.
Prior to the 2000 presidential election, Walesa was cleared to hold political office by a special "vetting court" (lustracja), which held that photocopies of documents pertaining to agent "Bolek", including signed receipts for payments from the SB, were inadmissible. The original documents, if they in fact existed, are said to have been pulled from SB files and destroyed during Walesa's term as the first president of a newly-democratic Poland, 1990-95.
Poland, unlike most other former soviet satellite states, never publicly opened the records of the state security apparatus following the disintegration of the Soviet block. While unproven and hotly contested, this version of Walesa's past is being increasingly discussed in Poland (as of December 2005). Walesa has been accused of this on numerous occasions on Polish television and radio shows, and responds in an increasingly angered way, threatening to take libel action if the accusations continue. Whether true or not, the allegations underscore the immense political savvy, however opportunistic, of a man who went from shipyard electrician without a high school degree to the president of his nation and international anti-communist mascot.
I moved this section to the talk page for following reasons:
- Isn't this wikipedia:recentism?
- Sources re. the introduced information seem to lack: could user:Jak lefataliste (who introduced the section) or anybody else give some references, preferably reliable sources, to back this story? I mean, I have no idea whether this is tabloid level, or better, or worse?
- The section is hardly wikified, so if it would be OK to keep it in the article, at least some lay-out improvements would be recommended.
--Francis Schonken 13:20, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
Jak_lefataliste, 31st December 2005:
- Sources? He's been on Polish TV countless times over the past year, facing up to the accusations. If you have no idea of the current situation in Polish politics then you have no right to be deleting things such as this. It is 'every tv channel, radio station and newspaper (broadsheet and tabloid)' level. The section on 'lustracja' is not mentioned anywhere else in the article - leaving it out makes the entry 5 years out of date.
- How is putting something back (with substantial changes, i might add) that was there 2 years ago 'recentism'?
- If it's not 'Wikified' then why don't you 'wikify' it, rather than deleting the whole thing?
[edit] Reasons, significance of his actions?
The article seems to be missing the reasons he opposed the Soviet Union, why he supported the strike in the first place, and what was so bad about living under the Soviet Bloc (and no, it isn't enough to assume his actions speak for themselves). Why did he support Margaret Thatcher? Why did he go to Reagan's funeral (and why did he support him)? I know why, and plenty of others know why, so why isn't any of this in the article? Kamikaze Highlander 20:54, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
- This man is the greatest Pole since Piłsudski; he ended communism without a shot. I only hope he runs for President again as he has hinted.
[edit] Couple
Microsoft word says it should be has both in UK an US English. Dan D. Ric 05:47, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Agent
myślę, że wypadało by napisać co nieco o tym jak obecnie postrzegają go Polacy, a opinię w swoim kraju ma wręcz fatalną
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Umedard (talk • contribs) 14:24, 25 October 2006) (UTC)
[edit] Scaling the wall
The article states that Wałęsa scaled the wall in order to return to the shipyard. Other sources say that he was brought there by boat, apparently bt the secret service. It seems that Wałęsa admits in his memoirs to cooperating with the secret service and doing some not fully honourable deeds.
This is related to the point brought up under Recentism above. I understand that rumors may come up quickly and some may even be similar to character assassination. On the other hand, this does not justify the inclusion of irrecentist, i.e. older, rumours. It would be nice if knowledgeable people, preferably from Poland, told us, if either of the claims -- scaling the wall vs. being brought by boat -- has any evidence. -- Zz 11:15, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Central Inteligence of America
- Anyone knows how many bucks he received from CIA during the 80's? Thanks!
