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Propose returning name to West Papua

This article which has always been about Western Papua irrespective of which name you wish to call it; was about ten months ago against Wikipedia policy of using common English names, moved from 'West Papua' to 'Papua (Indonesian province)' in accordance with the Indonesian name.

As other people have pointed out; the region is no longer called 'Papua (Indonesian province)' by the Indonesians, but is a combination of the two Indonesian Provinces called 'West Irian Jaya' and 'Papua (Indonesian province)'.

As this article is about the combine region, commonly known as 'West Papua' and has extensive discusion & edit history ; I suggest this article should be returned to the name 'West Papua' to allow a different article about the current Indonesian Province to be written under the title 'Papua (Indonesian province)'. Does anyone disagree that this article is about western Papua, it's location, history, ecology, and other issues relating to it.; and not the Indonesian Province which a few months old. Daeron 12:10, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Yes, move article back to 'West Papua'

  • yes -- Daeron 16:19, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

No, move article to 'XYZ' because ... (please keep reason to one or two lines. Further discussion below).

Naming Discussion

Geez, not all this again. As a historical region then, the article would have to be severely pruned. For instance, ecological stuff should be moved to article about the island as a whole (unless birds and bees are now caring about the location of the borders). I should make you whack all the POV stuff before accepting any name change (everything Indonesia does seems to be "widely criticized", other countries have a "delicate and troubled relationship" with Indonesia which is just not true, and we seem to have remarkable insight into the secret minds of Indonesian politicians, even though we don't seem to have many of their own actual words quoted anywhere). I don't have any particular opinion on the whole subject, but I'm pretty sure the Indonesian government considers itself to be acting honorably in a situation made difficult by a handful of troublemakers, and this article still does not represent their POV accurately. Stan 14:45, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
You are again talking about some other article, not this one. This article does not talk about 'bees', nor does it contain your quotes of "widely criticized", "delicate and troubled relationship"; nor does it even talk about Indonesian politicians let alone their 'secret' thoughts. You attempt to slur with 'POV' accusations after all this time is ... remarkable but un-productive. Once the personal comments are removed, you do not seem to say anything; though you seem to suggest that this article is not about western Papua.
In short, you do not object to returning to the English name, just to 'POV' which you have not identified.Daeron 16:05, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)
How about "Indonesia conducted the widely criticized Act of Free Choice"? I note that Act of Free Choice, which I would expect to amplify on what "widely criticized" is supposed to mean (2 critics? 200? 20,000? 2 million?), but I see it's kind of vague on that point. Also, we have later "Frank expression of views is complicated by the delicate and troubled relationship many nations have with Indonesia.", followed by the lengthy quote from US govt which should have been a link to an article on Indonesia's government. And the ecology section is out of place if this is to become an article about a historical region rather than a present-day province. I think the fundamental problem with this article is that it's attempting to be an imitation country article, but despite all the wishful thinking, the region is not its own country, and the cause would be better served by more careful and neutral writing spread across multiple articles treating various aspects of the issue. Most readers won't even get to the end of this article, and those that do are not going to be convinced by the relentless anti-Indonesia slant on things - first-world readers tend to think of Indonesia as the oppressed, not the oppressor. Stan 23:35, 22 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I don't have any strong concern for what title this gets, but I see two possibilities here:

  1. We move this to some other title so that we can use this name for the present province of West Papua.
  2. We indicate at the start of the article that the province name "West Papua" referred first to a larger region and then to a smaller one, and that this article covers the history of the larger region down to the time of the split; thereafter it follows only the smaller one, and the subsequent history of the remainder is elsewhere, presumably at West Irian Jaya.

Does anyone have other suggestions? -- Jmabel | Talk 17:52, Jan 22, 2005 (UTC)

The article as currently designed seems to discuss the current province of Papua, and not the whole western half of the island.

How so ?
The article as currently designed seems to discuss the whole western half of the island, not just the current province of Papua. Please read the article to confirm this, before being sucked into a Bugs Bunny/Daffy Duck routine. -- Daeron 04:23, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
The article in the form that is not your preferred form specifically says that Papua is a province comprising part of the western half of the island. There is also a map showing the province. Indeed, the article provides a general history of the Dutch colony and the single Indonesian province up to when West Irian Jaya was split off. But it seems reasonable to organize things in this manner. It makes no sense to move this material to the highly dubious heading of "West Papua". john k 04:36, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • No, the article as written before your efforts to take private ownership of it was and always has been about the country "West Papua" - just check what Tannin & I had been writting.--Daeron 16:49, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what the best way to deal with the whole western half of the island is. I will say that there needs to be an article on the current province at the current location. And that a lot of the general stuff can be moved to New Guinea. In terms of stuff about the entire western half before it was split into two provinces, I'd say that this location is still probably the best place for it, rather than creating an entirely different article on that subject. And I still have yet to see any evidence beyond Daeron's assertion that "West Papua" is the most commonly used name. "Irian Jaya" has twice as many google hits as "West Papua". john k 00:57, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The subject of the name was extensivly covered ten months ago Quick Google Count.

Yes, you'll recall I was involved. The evidence remains highly ambiguous, and can be interpreted in various ways. I see no particular reason that "West Papua is the most common English name" is any clearer a conclusion to be drawn from the mess of google searches than anything else.

Yet there be Western United States, Eastern United States, Northern United States, Southern United States; even Western Sahara. But for some reason we are not to be allowed to discuss or reveal the history or ecology of Western Papua? Or as you would prefer to call it Western half of the Island of New Guinea; I and everybody in Australia says its commonly known as West Papua because that's what it is, it not a political statement, not a foreign language - the english description is simply West Papua. It saves having to explain where 'Irian Jaya' was, or where 'Irian Barat' was, etc.

Both the United Kingdom and Sweden offer precedents, in the form of "traditional counties" and "historical regions" - territories no longer officially recognized as such. (Not a perfect solution, those distinctions were also a source of argument for people interested in those areas.) Another possibility is to treat as a purely political article, about where the concept of a "West Papua" came from and has developed over the years, which is independent of the Indonesian governance. Stan 05:51, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for that informative input.
To clarify, I believe you are addressing the issue of which Wikipedia category the article should be listed in - a good and valid item to consider - but because the majority of countries are now also nations with their own rule Wikipedia has List of countries redirecting to List of sovereign states. The Country article does not even both to distingush the difference until the end of that article. The main difference in those two lists before WW-II were the colonies I think; these were countries which were not sovereign states. The UN had a decolonization program; which ended around 2000. West Papua's name was on that list; then it disappeared one year without explanation & not allowed back on; so the program is finished & West Papua is one of only three (I think & can't recall the other two) colonies left. 'Economic Colonies' do not count.
In short, this article is about a country (in the literal sense), not the story or ecology of a soverign nation; though funny enough by Wikipedia definition it would be Nation as all the West Papuan people especialy Bird Head & outside it consider themselves 'West Papua' and aleigence to one flag (Morning Star), one ethic code (Melanesian culture). But I'm sure the Wikipedia Nation is incorrect in accepted legal terms - so I would have to stick with the article being about a Country, not a Nation. That Country being the non-PNG part of Papua. -- Daeron

Ah, some nice utter speciousness from Daeron about Western Sahara. Western Sahara is recognized as a sovereign country by many countries around the world - I am not sure that any legally recognize the Moroccan annexation. No country in the world does not recognize the western half of the island of New Guinea as being part of Indonesia, for better or worse. The whole situation is fairly confusing. West Papua is not particularly a traditional or historical region of Indonesia. It is a name used by nationalists. So an article detailing the history of the western half of the island since the Dutch period should not have such a name. In that period, the western half of the island was officially known by several names - Netherlands New Guinea, Irian Barat, Irian Jaya, and finally Papua. A smallish part of the island has since been cut off from this province and made into the new province of Western Irian Jaya. So it's awkward. But if we want to do an article on the western half of the island as a whole, from a standpoint unrelated to current provincial boundaries, I'd suggest a neutral, non-political name like Western New Guinea. This is wholly accurate, and seems like the natural English way to designate the region, anyway. I would have no objection to Stan's suggestion of an article at West Papua on the subject of the concept of West Papua, and West Papuan political movements, and so on and so forth, in addition to such an article (or in addition to this article, if it's decided that the other stuff should stay here). john k 06:39, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Again John Kenney is in a world of his own. -- Daeron 07:13, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I assume I am in a world of my own because, despite months of your asserting it, I do not believe that West Papua is the predominant name for this region in English? You have yet to provide any particular support for this claim. Given that we disagree on this point (which, I will admit, is not very clear one way or the other - I don't think I've ever stated that I know for sure that "West Papua" is not used, just that you've never convincingly demonstrated that it is), what of the rest of my post suggests that I am living in my own world? Western Sahara and Western New Guinea are viewed in completely different ways by the international community. This region has been known by several names since the colonial period. Beyond that, I made no factual claims at all - just expressed my opinion on the issue at hand. So am I off in a world of my own simply because I disagree with you on this one issue? john k 08:45, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well that must be the difference between you & I; you believe Wikipedia should list your opinions on the status of people, countries, etc.; even excluding facts in order to maintain your moral judgements about people. Where as I believe Wikipedia should be more like an Encyclopeadia and explain facts and their context without voicing a moral judgments. -- Daeron 09:32, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Daeron, please stop with the ad hominem, you're not helping yourself here at all. You've got two people here who are interested in what you have to say, and there's no Wik to unilaterally rescramble everything. I can speak for myself when I can say that I'm neutral almost to the point of indifference, and I suspect John is of similar mind, so accusations of bias are just not going to get you anywhere, and indeed they damage your own credibility. Anyway, the most famous precedent for difficult regional nomenclature is Palestine, which has gradually been hammered into a complex of articles including Palestine (region), Definitions of Palestine and Palestinian, Views of Palestinian statehood, etc etc. People have done all this as a way of explaining the situation more thoroughly, and because (in some views), assertions like "Palestine is a country" are at the heart of the real-life conflict. So when you say something like "this article is about a country", you are yourself taking a particular POV, as with "all the West Papuan people especialy Bird Head & outside it consider themselves 'West Papua'", which seems unlikely to be true, since people are never 100% on these kinds of things (in the US, you can find a few thousand people who think we should give ourselves back to the British!), and there hasn't been an unbiased election or poll even to give us a general idea of the numbers. Stan 14:56, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
Incidentally, about the only printed source I have the mentions the issue is the Lonely Planet guide to PNG. They have a sidebar mentioning naming, and say "In a last ditch attempt to keep it out of Indonesian hands, the Dutch renamed it West Papua, but it was too late.", and then mention the Indonesian names. LP guides are not authoritative, but as guidebooks are perhaps the most widely-distributed source of information on remote places, they are certainly in a strong position to define what is "most common in English". Stan 15:04, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)
So when you say something like "this article is about a country", you are yourself taking a particular POV - why do you say this, because you imagine the word "country" means "nation", or because you believe the article is about some other subject? And yes I do think the article always was about the country, its people, history, geography, etc.--Daeron 15:57, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Stan - not sure about how elections would work, but I do recall looking up the data on the most recent Indonesian elections by province. The two main Indonesian parties got the vast majority of the votes in Papua, with nationalist parties receiving only very small numbers. Of course, I have no idea how fair such an election was. As to whether this is about a country, you'll note that that article essentially defines a country as a sovereign state. Which this area is not.If West Papua is a country, then what about Bavaria? Or Catalonia? Or, I don't know, South Carolina or New South Wales? All of these almost certainly have more common history and sense of group identity than the various peoples of the western half of the island of New Guinea. You actually have a better case for nation, which is much more loose and involves imagined communities and so forth. But the nation would be something like "West Papuan people". I would add that, given the level of development of the area, with many ethnic groups still engaged in hunting/gathering ways of life, I would find it hard to believe that any sense of nationhood is held by anything but a very small elite. Although any evidence showing the contrary would be accepted with an open mind. john k

John, Daeron: it appears that any reasonable solution is going to involve more than one article related to this region. Can I ask each of you to list what articles you think should exist, and a one- or two-sentence description of what you think should be the scope of each? It is extremely hard to tell from the discussion above, which makes it almost impossible for the group to reach a consensus. -- 21:37, Jan 23, 2005 (UTC)

There has to be an article at the current location which discusses the current province of that name. I remain highly uncertain beyond that. To be honest, I see little problem with the article as it was in the version I've been reverting to. If I must, I'd suggest that each of the different political units which this has consisted of be given their own article - Netherlands New Guinea, Irian Barat, Irian Jaya, and Papua, which cover the history of the period in which the province was named that. The last article would discuss how this province used to be bigger, and how the West Irian Jaya province was split off. More general information about the region could be at Western New Guinea. General information on wildlife and geology could be moved to the New Guinea article, as appropriate. Discussion of the name West Papua could be in an article of that name, which would describe the history of the term and its use by West Papuan nationalists. john k 22:03, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, if we went that way I would certainly support also having (1) some overview article for the region and (2) some kind of template to let people navigate among these closely related topics. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:18, Jan 23, 2005 (UTC)

Agreed - I think Western New Guinea would be the best location for an overview article. A template would also be sensible, although the exact details would be up for debate. john k 00:43, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Hmm. I'd be more inclined toward Western Papua, or West Papua, because "New Guinea" tends to connote the country of Papua and New Guinea. What, if anything, would be the problem with such a naming? And Daeron, would you please weigh in, it looks to me like we might be headed toward a mutually acceptable solution to this contentious fight, at least about what articles should exist if not what they should say. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:51, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

Concerning New Guinea yes you are correct it is my experience that most American visitors tend to think you are talking about PNG whenever they hear New Guinea and so West New Guinea would mean west PNG to them.
Concerning the common english name for any object or subject; such names only exist IF you talk about those subjects; that is why jaggon sounds like gibberish to people from outside the field or area. In this case Papua & West Papua being part of the Australian environment; they have their common english names in common useage here, as is seen in news reports and NGO reports about the region.
For example, you might have a name for Mexicans or Canadians; or for Mexican mountain folk, or Canada. And even hearing such a word I wouldn't be able to judge if it were just its full implications, that would require someone with considerable local knowledge.--Daeron 06:24, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)
However US NGO's and the US State Dept. and others also quite familiar with West Papua as the common name; one of John's arguments last year was that Australian names do not count as English; well what about American reports? People writing about Patsy Spiers, what do they call the place where her husband died?
No, the island as a whole is generally known as New Guinea, that's much more common than Papua, which usually means either the southern part of Papua New Guinea, or the Indonesian province. Gzornenplatz 02:11, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Gzornenplatz on this. New Guinea refers to the whole island, and does not imply anything to do with Papua New Guinea only that I am aware of. Papua can also refer to the whole island, but is not the common term. West Papua, specifically, is a term with strong political connotations, and shouldn't be used as a generic term. john k 03:34, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The idea that anybody would think that "Western New Guinea" refers to the western part of Papua New Guinea seems odd to me. One might just as easily assert that people would confuse "West Papua" for either the southwestern part of Papua New Guinea, or the western part of the Indonesian province of Papua (or, perhaps, that it is an alternative name for West Irian Jaya, given that Irian Jaya was the old name of the province now called Papua). In fact, either of these interpretations makes far more sense than thinking that "Western New Guinea" refers to only the western part of PNG. Papua is a term which, while sometimes used to refer to the whole island, is also used to refer either to the Indonesian province of Papua or to the southern half of PNG. On the other hand, New Guinea is a term which is pretty much always used to refer to the island as a whole. As to use of West Papua, I'd ask Daeron for some citations of US government and NGOs using the term. The Lowenstein Center at Yale seems to use West Papua. Amnesty, on the other hand, uses "Papua". I would add that I certainly have never said that Australian usage does not count as English. I would say that article titles should be based on usage throughout the English-speaking world, except for things that are specifically Australian. If Australian usage differs from general English usage (I'm not sure that it does in this case, I'm just making the hypothetical argument), general usage should win out. I'd add, Daeron, that I'm open to being convinced. The evidence you've presented so far has been rather meager, and seems to rely more on assertion than evidence. If you could, perhaps, find citations for how the region is described by governments and NGOs, that would be extremely helpful. I will say that I don't find links to sites that seem to be supporting the West Papuan nationalist agenda to be very persuasive in determining what terms we should use - clearly, they have an agenda, and we can't take their explanations as being authoritative in any way. But a good summary of international usage would be very useful for determining how to do this. john k 07:03, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Goodness, you're still a funny pair of people, after all this time. And yet again I have to wonder, why, if "West Papua" is not the common english name does it keep creeping into even US Government pages, documents: http://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Agov+%22west+papua And they like the NGO's even include West Papua inside brackets, as if, they were explaining to people, what place they were referring to. And why do people keep explaining what 'Irian Jaya' is by saying 'West Papua', strange isn't it ;-) http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Irian+Jaya++west+Papua+%22 --Daeron 07:22, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

With the first link, you have indeed shown that various US government websites sometimes use "West Papua". But this is not a significant piece of information unless we have some way to ascertain how prevalent it is. A google search doesn't seem like a very good way to go about this. If you are so sure of yourself, certainly you can find better evidence than a google search of .gov sites? The second search proves absolutely nothing. john k 08:15, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • You can not ascertain how prevalent it is because you do not live in its environment and can therefore not see how regulary it is used in preference for English language audiences.
  • What you need to do is figure out WHY they include 'West Papua' - not count how many people on earth say x without understanding it.

--Daeron 08:41, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Let me add that here the US State Department consistently refers to it as "Papua", occasionally clarifying that it was formerly known as Irian Jaya. This is from 2001. The one from the year before, when apparently Irian Jaya was still in use, refers to the independence movement as "Papuan" - although West Papua is also mentioned as an alternate name. The 2003 one just uses "Papua" - no qualification, as does this 2004 report on religious freedom - from only a few months ago. I think that State Department reports, rather than google searches of .gov sites, should be more conclusive as to what term the US government uses - it is Papua. Amnesty also uses Papua, as I noted before. The British Foreign Office, here, also used Papua. john k 08:34, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • 'Fine, lets use your document'.
It's first use of the word "Papua" anywhere in it is this sentence that probably explains what place they are later referring to. (fair ?).
"Security forces were responsible for numerous instances of, at times indiscriminate, shooting of civilians, torture, rape, beatings and other abuse, and arbitrary detention in Aceh, West Timor, Irian Jaya (also known as Papua or West Papua), the Moluccas, Sulawesi, and elsewhere in the country."

Again the US Dept. of State also seem s to use 'West Papua' as a means to explain what place they are talking about. Indonesian readers would not require that. --Daeron 08:48, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Daeron, I mentioned that in my summary. Furthermore, this is the oldest of the State Department documents, dating from the time when the province was still Irian Jaya. Since it's become Papua, Papua is the sole name used by the State Department - never West Papua. Even when it was Irian Jaya, West Papua was the second, not the first, alternate name used. Plus, a parenthetical name doesn't mean that they're trying to "explain what place they are talking about" it means it is an alternate name. It implies nothing about which name is more common - in the report right after the switch to Papua, the report says "Papua (formerly Irian Jaya)". By your logic, that means that Irian Jaya is the more common name. john k 15:48, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • No the words "Papua (formerly Irian Jaya)" mean "Papua (formerly Irian Jaya)" -- that's why they include the word formerly to state why they've include the title 'Irian Jaya'.
    • Agreed. They include the words "Irian Jaya (also known as Papua or West Papua)", because the province of Irian Jaya was also known as Papua or West Papua. This doesn't imply that the last name given is the most well known in English. john k 20:41, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • You found a document where they don't bother to bracket an English meaningful name... Could that possibly be because they are already using the English common name (Papua) for the Island? And that the western half is the only half that Indonesia has possession of. Indeed I agree with you and the US Dept. of State, West Papua is the logical name for the geographical area.--Daeron 16:49, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)
No, Daeron, you clearly didn't even look at the links I made. They are using "Papua" to refer to the Indonesian part of the island - these reports are on the human rights situation in Indonesia. They have nothing to do with Papua New Guinea. john k 20:41, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Current Form of the Article

I'm not going to revert again just yet, since the main concern I previously listed has been sort of addressed in the latest edit. I will ask why Daeron is sometimes editing as Daeron and (from what I can tell) sometimes editing as an IP address. Is this purposeful, due to negligence, or is the 211.IP guy not actually Daeron? I will say now that I am pretty dubious about the other changes being made. Firstly, I don't think we should say that it is believed that genocide is occurring there. Who believes this? Amnesty International ([1],[2] ,[3]) seems to report that the human rights situation in Papua is not very good, but nothing there suggests anything near genocide. Looking up "Papua" and "genocide" in Google brings up a large number of results (~45,000), but I'm not sure this is a very good measure. Surely the assessment of a well-known human rights organization like Amnesty should be worth more than the assessment of random websites of uncertain provenance. The Allard Lowenstein Institute of Yale Law School [4] seems to have done a study that there is evidence of genocide. This is more useful, but one report does not seem to me to be enough to carry the kind of narrative that is trying to be introduced here. The report itself seems to rely on a holistic view of Indonesian actions over several decades to make its case of genocide. This makes me tend towards thinking that the definition of genocide used here is a rather expansive one - the study itself states that no single act of the Indonesian government could really be seen as an act of genocide, but only looking at the whole pattern of Indonesian actions makes this work. We should be very careful about the way we introduce the idea of genocide. Certainly, the kind of low-level, long-term actions that the Indonesian government has been engaging in is quite different from the kind of genocide one saw in, say, Rwanda, or even in Darfur. As to the material in the history section, I am quite dubious of the relevance of Papuan contributions to the allied war effort, and so forth. The only purpose to these paragraphs seems to be to create a narrative of how the West Papuan people were betrayed. john k 22:03, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

If the article is to take the form of articles on other Indonesian regions (which seems best for this particular article), then perhaps the Ecology section can be moved to the New Guinea article.
Apart from that, a good structure might be to start with information about the formal position of the province, and have a subsection on the independence/nationalist movement that would also discuss the varying views on the name, etc. There is precedence for this in the article on Aceh. I also agree with John K that the history section seems a bit long-winded and parts of it are of little relevance or are too-POV for this article. I would have thought that this article should have a relatively brief overview of the history of the area, which could be fleshed out in a separate History of Papua article if it was thought necessary. Also, while there are numerous External Links, the article is not well referenced, i.e. there are no references given within the article for the material presented, nor is there a good references section at the end of the article. Mistertim 04:30, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks very much for input :) Actually, despite it's wacky title; as you can see from its content it is in fact about the region of West Papua and not a political state. That's why the history, ecology, geography are all primarily limited to West Papua and not the whole of Papua, but time-wise is unlimited -- for example I confirmed which parts of Papua certain animals lived in; and the monkey invasion is unique to West Papua because they've been introduced by the Indonesian settlers & no monkey colonies have not yet reached PNG. Also the mountian ranges, I took some hours to study reports & compared them against maps to confirm it was correct for West Papua - it is not generic and the eastern mountain range is on average lower without the high peaks and I think mostly without snowlines.Daeron 06:50, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Daeron, the "region of West Papua" is, in fact, almost coterminous with the Indonesian province of Papua, and was coterminous with it at the time the article was written, so I'm not sure what you are getting at with the "wacky title" business. However, if the ecology and geography information is specific to the western half of the island, it should not be moved to the general New Guinea article, I would agree. john k 07:08, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • Because as I pointed out at the time; the article would probably out-live the then-current political name &/or boundaries. And goodness me, it has ! --Daeron 07:22, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Huh? What's your point? At any rate, only a small part of Papua has been split off into West Irian Jaya. This is not a reason for your desire for a move, it is a pretext (a moderately decent reason to start discussion, I'll agree, but you are concealing your motives). And I'm still not sure why the Papua article can't discuss the whole half-island up to the split, and then discuss what remains of the province since it got split up. Only if they go all the way and split the current Papua in two would I think it necessary to really rethink. john k 15:51, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • What ? "only a small part of Papua" ? It's the Bird's Head. Yes, it is kinda hugely important part of West Papua, and no, its post 18th century history can not be separated from the rest of Papua.; and yes it is subjected to the same logging & many other factors affecting the rest of West Papua which are not factors in PNG.,--Daeron 16:58, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Okay, fair enough. I will freely admit that I don't know nearly as much about New Guinea as you do, and am not aware of the specific importance of the Bird's Head Peninsula. It is a relatively small part of the total area of the Indonesian half of the island, however. At any rate, an article on Western New Guinea could deal with the general material on the western half of the island, while the stuff on the specific provinces can be dealt with in Papua (Indonesian province) and West Irian Jaya. Brief articles on Irian Barat and Irian Jaya could deal with those administrative unites and their histories. I continue to object to West Papua as a name for the general article, because I think it's actually considerably more confusing than Western New Guinea. Are we to explain that West Papua equals the province of Papua plus the province of West Irian Jaya? That seems weird. One would imagine that West Papua would be the western part of Papua, or to the west of Papua. Now, I know that in this case West Papua means the western part of Papua in the sense of Papua=New Guinea. But this is not particularly clear. West Papua also has specifical political connotations which might make its use POV. However, I can understand that Western New Guinea is not ideal - it is a somewhat artificial name, which is not in specific use. I'd note that Indonesian New Guinea would actually make more sense, but this seems to have just as many POV problem as West Papua - I'm sure you would object, and is probably even worse in that it is not frequently used either, so it has many of the disadvantages of both West Papua and Western New Guinea.

Again, I will ask why the current arrangement is so problematic. Treat the area generally in the Papua (Indonesian province) article, since until quite recently Papua was the whole of the island. Be careful to discuss the recent split, and add any material that is also applicable to West Irian Jaya to that article as well. No need to worry about creating new articles - just make sure the ones we have make sense. john k 21:33, 24 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Naming, redux

As promised, I'm checking back in.

Daeron: above John gave an indication of what combination of titles -- and breakout of articles -- he would use for this and related articles. It would be very helpful if you would do the same. -- Jmabel | Talk 19:22, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)

If people like I will add and amend my above listing of three titles.

  • In accordance with other Wikipedia titles I believe the names should be:
Papua Province, Indonesia -- a New title not yet written
West Irian Jaya Province, Indonesia -- moving of current sub.
West Papua -- current Papua (Indonesian province) returned to its original name with history & discussion pages intact.
Papua -- current disambiguation page
West Papuan Genocide -- page that separates that subject from the main West Papuan page
  • In addition, I have LOTS more information I have been waiting ten months to expand the West Papua page with -- in all likely hood I will be splitting it into another new page or two.. But I can not name or make those until the root document is back into its easiest geographical name West Papua. I would greatly appreciate some cooperation on this. Thank you.--Daeron 02:09, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please be aware that the article as Tannin and myself were working on when Wik began this whole edit/revert/re-naming war; was prominently listing the related geographical article Papua, and political state articles Indonesia and Provinces , as no-one had yet started one about the individual provinces. Which is when a war broke out between those trying to write this article; and those wanting to change its subject to the political state/province.

Daeron - could you explain briefly to me what you feel the purpose of your proposed West Papua page that would consist largely of the material on this page would be? Would it be an article about a geographical region? Or what? john k 03:09, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Certainly, it is an article about the region of West Papua; its location, extent, geography, ecology, history, and any information which may be important for anyone wishing to visit or understand about the region.

It's history, which I hope to break up into a couple (but unfortunately may require several) covers three main periods, each of which is a contradiction between its title and what was & is happening, even within each. For example the Dutch era can be called a 'Colonial' period because that was what they officially termed the relationship as; but they never implemented a proper colonisation by either settlers or exploitation -- yet, in a period when most westerners would there to have been a de-colonising effort, was also the only time when there was a Dutch colonisation effort (even if it was not fully backed by the Dutch government & was a complete failure). The pre-Dutch period was also a contradiction as is the post-Dutch. Also the Dutch did help West Papua towards independence just because the Dutch are so wonderfull, but mostly because they were honestly horrified by what happened in Java.

  • Reason the history can not be separated into neat era's is partly because they have complex transitions and strong legacies, also because they directly tie into the ecology & biology & geography of the region -- some because the geography, but also because the Indonesian claim was in part based upon the claim that Papuans were Asian, as was the ecology and biology of Papua which was itself part of the Malaysian peninsula.
  • BTW: your statement the other day about the apparent conflict between so many groups, and the ability for them all to want one national identity. - Yes I agree it is ..odd.. in comparason to say.. the United Nations which in fifty years has failed to achieve what the West Papuans did in thirty IMO. my hat's off to them on that one; they haven't got much further, but they sure are united from the cities to penis gourd wearing mountain folk.--Daeron 07:36, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm finding myself confused because there seem to be a lot of issues in the air. I'm going to make some suggestions and ask some questions based on the above, but I'm not sure I'm tracking well enough that this will be comprehensive. At worst, I may be doing nothing but illustrating my own confusion. Because this is so complicated, I'd appreciate if people do not intersperse their remarks in my bullet list. Instead, Daeron and John, could you respond to the questions I've asked below the bullet list?

  • What I think is uncontroversial, though I may be confused:
    • Papua - current disambiguation page
    • Netherlands New Guinea - former Dutch colony: mostly history
    • Irian Barat - former Indonesian province; I'm not sure if this really needs to be a separate article of just a redirect to Irian Jaya, and have the first paragraph there mention the renaming. Mostly history
      My understanding is that Irian Barat was not actually a province, but had some sort of special status, and became part of Indonesia at the same time it became Irian Jaya. But I can't recall if that's exactly right. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • Irian Jaya - former Indonesian province: mostly history.
    • Papua Province, Indonesia (or keep this present title Papua (Indonesian province); I have no opinion between the two) - current province; I gather this would be partly a new article; presumably it is the correct place to move some basic geographic information and to discuss the splitting of the province. Probably needs to discuss both the pre-split and post-split geography.
      Greatly prefer the current location. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • West Irian Jaya Province, Indonesia (or West Irian Jaya (Indonesian province); I have no opinion between the two) - Daeron says "moving of current sub". I'm not sure what "current sub" means, but in any event at least some basic geographic information belongs here.
      We already have an article at West Irian Jaya. That seems a perfectly appropriate title. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Controversy 1
  • The article currently called West Papuan Genocide - I'm not sure whether this is an appropriate title, given that as far as I know nothing more official than a few NGOs calls it genocide. That is not a word to be thrown around lightly. I'm not knowledgable enough to say for sure, but I suspect that a more NPOV title would be Human rights abuses in West Papua.
    I'm not sure this is the best place to discuss this - this is really a different issue from the question of how to have articles on this stuff. However, I'd strongly oppose having the article at the genocide title. The current stuff going on in Darfur isn't at Darfur genocide, for instance, and that's been called genocide a lot more widely. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
  • Controversy 2
    • West Papua - Clearly an article with this title should exist. The question is whether it should just discuss the contentious use of this name, or whether this should be the "main article" that ties the rest of these together. I personally favor this being the "main article": it is certainly what I have usually heard used to refer to the place generically, but I have to admit to a complete lack of expertise.
      I am not sure on this, as I've said. My sense is that there is no good term to refer to the area generically, since, up to the end of last year, it always had a specific name. As far as I can gather, Irian Jaya was by far the most common name to refer to it by until it became defunct. Papua was then the main name by which it was known. It is only now that there is some need for a generic name, since it's been divided into two provinces. West Papua only remains as a potential name because it was never used officially - it is the name used by nationalists. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • If the article West Papua is just a discussion of the name, then the "main article" would presumably be at Western New Guinea (though just possibly at yet some other title).
    • Either way, (1) the "main article" should correspond roughly to the present article and (2) there should be a corresponding template (either Template:West Papua or Template:Western New Guinea), matching the name of the top-level article and included in all of these articles as a means to navigate among them.

SO... Now some questions. It would be greatly appreciated if you can each reply briefly to these, and not reopen lengthy debate here.

Have I characterized this basically correctly?

Yes, I think this is basically correct. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

In particular, am I correct about what I characterize as uncontroversial?

I don't find any of it particularly controversial. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Can we lay aside Controversy 1 as a separate issue that we can postpone, or take up elsewhere?

Yes, I don't think it should be taken up here. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That said, it seems clear to me that for Daeron the use of the name West Papua for the "main article" is a matter of principle (but in the unlikely event that I'm wrong on this, Daeron, correct me). John, do I understand correctly that it is also a matter of principle with you that that not be the title, and that this is where the real disagreement lies? I thin I know where I want to go next with this, but I'd like to see these answers before I proceed further. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:46, Jan 25, 2005 (UTC)

  • -As explained below - it is so non-controversial that Indonesia itself changed the regions province from 'Irian Java' to 'Papua' in deference of the Papuans preferred name for Papua (instead of Irian or New Guinea (Guinea being some African country ;-) )).
  • - for over two years we had no complaints about the name, not even from Indonesians let alone English readers. Not one Indonesian tried to edit or rename, yet many probably read it.
  • - most items which Newspapers report as "genocide" are not; and they make no effort to get a legal opinion about whether they should have been calling the mass-murders in Rwanda or the Sundan by a name that should be reserved for those who are victims of 'genocide' which requires both attempts to injury the community (e.g. mass murder is one method), and prevent the community from seeking justice &/or relief from said damages. These also have to be intentional, not just bad management.--Daeron 10:05, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

On your last question, Jmabel, it is not necessarily a matter of principle for me. As I have admitted in the past, I don't feel that my knowledge of the region is at such a high level that I can say with any level of certainty that West Papua is a controversial name which we must avoid. However, I think the burden is on Daeron to show that it is noncontroversial, and I haven't yet been convinced. I remain fairly open-minded about it, though. Putting that aside, I also have a practical objection to using West Papua. Currently, the area that Daeron describes as "West Papua" consists of two Indonesian provinces - Papua and West Irian Jaya. Which means that "Papua" is part of "West Papua". This seems to me to be inherently confusing, and should probably be avoided out of practical considerations. john k 18:39, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • How about this, would the US Dept. of State deliberately insult one of its longest standing allies?
  • Regarding 'Papua Province' being smaller than Papua; a Province has to be smaller than the thing it is a Province of; and I don't imagine many people would have too much trouble understanding that a Province could be less than half the area. Look at the Australian Capital Territory, less than 1% of Australia.--Daeron 21:51, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Could we maybe agree to let the article sit at West Papua for now, aware that the issue is not finalized, and maybe (1) archive some of this 175K (!) of discussion and (2) start a section on this talk page for specifically laying out the case on each side of the argument about that name (I won't be surprised if that discussion eventually forms the basis for an article or section in main article space about a controversy over what to call this region that goes well beyond a Wikipedia decision) (3) plan to look in 30 days at which case is stronger? Meanwhile, we can proceed on the actual work of the articles. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:36, Jan 25, 2005 (UTC)

I'm happy to archive most of the discussion - certainly the material before the last few days should be archived. As to having it at West Papua, I'm still dubious, but I'll abstain for the moment. Daeron: if the name "West Papua" is uncontroversial, why would it be an insult to Indonesia for the state dept. to use the term? john k 23:21, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Political Resonances

John, I think you have gotten the wrong impression some where. I've seen both John Ondawame and Australian reporters talking to the Indonesian Ambassador to Australia about "West Papua"; and he's neither offended or up set by that name/description. He seems to accept that when talking to westerners that words like 'Irian Jaya' are less meaningful than 'West Papua'; and as for talking with John? As a OPM leader, irrespective of which language they were going to speak the Ambassador knew he would call it 'West Papua' and John knew the Ambassador would call it 'Irian Jaya' as it was at the time. They had no trouble talking on that basis.--Daeron 08:01, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)

BTW: can you remember where you got the impression that the words 'West Papua' had such meaning? For both the Papuans & non-Papuan Indonesians, its a trivial matter which is why the government renamed 'Irian Jaya' to 'Papua'. 'West Papua' has no strong 'political' meaning.

That's interesting, Daeron - could you provide any citations on that? As to the issue of my view that it is controversial, I'd say that it largely came, well, from you insisting so strongly that we call it West Papua, and then from looking into it a bit and noting that West Papua is the name used by nationalists. Now, I have no problem with nationalists using that name, and it certainly makes a lot more sense than just "Papua". But it is a name which seems to have connotations that might be POV, and I think it's a bit problematic to use it as the principal name of the article, since that is like stating that the name of the region is West Papua, which I'm not sure is accepted. As a question, Daeron, why did the Indonesians rename the province to "Papua" rather than to "Papua Barat"? john k 18:45, 25 Jan 2005 (UTC)
    • Without the Indonesian government explaining it's thoughts; I can only hazard a guess. That either it's simply because it was the Indonesian Province of Papua so they called it 'Papua Province'; otherwise because they wanted to cause confusion. Example: News reporter says there were another ten towns destroyed in Papua -- some people might think he means PNG; which is why reports normally clarify it by saying West Papua.

If any proof is needed that any talk with Daeron is entirely futile, note how he repeats a flat-out lie he tried before on this very page, and was called on before: "for over two years we had no complaints about the name". If you look at the article history, it started in 2001 as Irian Jaya, was renamed Papua in 2003, and only in April 2004 Daeron himself, in conjunction with Tannin, tried to move it to West Papua, but thanks to Wik and John Kenney had to back off. If you think that may be an honest mistake on his part, look above on this page, where he also claimed the article was under "West Papua" all the time from 2001, and Wik contradicted him, and he then came up with a nonsense reply "oohhhh, 4months out" (no Daeron, over two years out!). I for one will simply revert any POV; anyone else is of course free to waste their time going in circles with Daeron. Gzornenplatz 17:58, Jan 25, 2005 (UTC)

How constructive. We seem to be getting toward consensus on the substantive matters, and you'd rather make ad hominem attacks. -- Jmabel | Talk 21:52, Jan 25, 2005 (UTC)
We seem to? Where? Everything Daeron says is complete bullshit as you would see if you knew the first thing about the matter; but go ahead, waste your time. Let me just state for the record that all relevant arguments backing my reverts are already on this talk page, and I have just demonstrated how Daeron is lying and going in circles, so I do not need to play along with that. I will simply revert any POV introduced either by Daeron, or you, since you're obviously fooled by him ("Could we maybe agree to let the article sit at West Papua for now" - no we can't, for the reasons you can read up for yourself), or anyone else. Gzornenplatz 23:10, Jan 25, 2005 (UTC)
Actually the West Papua article was created on 17 Nov 2001. Where it remained up until last year.

Fromm what I can gather, the current article was created on 13 Nov 2001 as Irian Jaya, and was moved to Papua two years later. Some months after that, Tannin moved it to West Papua, beginning the strife. john k 00:27, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Closer, I think this is the Irian Jaya article that became Papua that then got mistakenly moved to West Papua after West Papua got moved elsewhere. Current location unknown, though I'm sure either Wik or yourself moved it. I have no idea which discussion page this one was originaly.--Daeron 01:12, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, if you claim that West Papua existed for a long time, you'll have to find where it is. john k 03:00, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

  • I think it is irrelevant; unless you are now saying you will accept the 'West Papua' creation date as final arbitration instead of all your text issues above? which we've been through one at a time.--Daeron 06:59, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Again, Gzornenplatz, I just don't see what good it does to say you are going to fight over the location of the article rather than assemble a dossier of evidence. And, frankly, people have been banned for a period for saying things like "Everything User X says is complete bullshit", and if you continue in that tone, I'd encourage Daeron to consider an RFQ.

I see now that there already is an RFQ for a bunch of stuff like this. I have added this to the evidence list there. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:44, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

The article has to sit somewhere for the time that both sides spend making their case (by assembling citations) on who calls it what. And that is needed: I suspect that a lot of it is scattered over this page, but damned if I (or any other neutral party) is going to peruse through 175K trying to find it.

Daeron, John: since Gzornenplatz apparently intends to fight over this, can we just leave the material here at this current name for the 30 days or so we'll allow for assembling citations on who has used what name when for this region?

I believe that Daeron is correct that an article stood for some time at West Papua and that in the series of moves it is almost impossible to trace back where that particular article was moved to, or what present article(s) may derive from it. I also believe it is irrelevant. The issue is what we should do now. I think a disproportionate amount of time is being devoted to vituperation, rather than gathering and presenting evidence, for an article-naming issue that, assuming we have decent links and redirects, is of concern to very few actual readers, and that it is consuming time that could actually be spent on useful research and writing. -- Jmabel | Talk 05:34, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

Go ahead and encourage him. I can prove he's willfully lying and talking bullshit to push his POV, and I can call him on that. The evidence on the matter is right here on this talk page already, if you can be bothered to read it; if not, just stay out of this, I don't have to spoonfeed you. The whole discussion has been had and I'm not entertaining Daeron when he periodically tries to pull the same nonsense all over again. A parallel article titled West Papua existed for three months (November 2001 to February 2002) before it was merged into the existing Irian Jaya article and turned into a redirect, and as such it remained until Daeron's and Tannin's abortive attempt in April 2004 to move the Papua article to West Papua (for which they had to delete the existing redirect) - the history of this is RIGHT ON THIS PAGE. Daeron has now three times lied about this. Gzornenplatz 05:52, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying the history of West Papua, Gzornenplatz. Is there anywhere where one can view the history of all this? Deleting an article with a history for a move should be a no-no, shouldn't it? Jmabel - I am, of course, completely happy to leave the article as it is while we try to decide how to do it, what with not thinking it should go to West Papua at all, particularly. john k 06:30, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Ah, never mind - see it up top now. Is there any way to look at the actual history, though? Is it gone forever, even to sysops? At any rate, given that history up there, I would ask Daeron what the basis of his claim that the article was at West Papua for years is. john k 06:35, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Tannin himself posted that history, there's no reason to think it's falsified. It proves positively that West Papua has been a redirect since February 2002. An article of that title existed only for three months before that (and only as a duplicate, tagged for merging from the beginning), not the "over two years" Daeron claims. As a sysop, you should be able to restore the old revisions somehow, but it's hardly necessary. Gzornenplatz 06:43, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

Oh, I agree that it's probably not falsified, I'd just like to actually look at it. If, as a sysop I can look at the old version, I can't figure out how. West Papua doesn't show any deleted edits for me, and I even tried deleting it to see if that brought up the old deleted edits when I looked at them. But it didn't. john k 07:42, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

There are currently no deleted revisions; They get purged every once in a while however, I believe the last time was somewhere last summer. --fvw* 07:44, 2005 Jan 26 (UTC)
  • Thanks for info, by 'summer' do I guess right you mean end May - ealry August or there abouts? Unfortunatly the massive page movings were probably around end Apr - early May I think.--Daeron 08:57, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)
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