Talk:Taiwan/Archive 13

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Is it just my computer, or is it that there is this huge gap between the title of the page and the article? can someone like change it please? because although I have an account but it still doesnt let me edit the page. thank you.Vinsonshih (talk) 23:29, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

separation

I consider a possibilty of seperating the article, the current article (republic of China) would have the history in China from 1912-1949 and a new article which would retain the history from 1949-present which would be called Republic of China (Taiwan). Please discuss

MrJanitor1 1:42, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

This sounds like a good idea, but let's see what others think first.Utopianfiat (talk) 18:18, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

This has already been discussed to death and there is no consensus to spilt the article. nat.utoronto 18:39, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't support separation but support child articles when the section(s) of the Republic of China article becomes too long. --Will74205 (talk) 19:02, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Look, this is not funny. I've argued with many others about this matter to death and finally it stopped. I don't want to go through the horrors of talking about the same stuff again for the, let's see uh, say 5th or 6th time. Besides, if the article is too long, then many other articles are too long too. There are other nation articles that are of comparable or larger size then the RoC article. Liu Tao (talk) 20:29, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

location

the article containing the Republic of China from 1949-present will be put on an article called Republic of China (Taiwan).

MrJanitor1 12:20, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

This is unnecessary as Republic of China (Taiwan) redirects to Republic of China. There is also a disambiguation page and a well-formed disclaimer in the case that the user would misunderstand the meaning of the page. Utopianfiat (talk) 18:16, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Chinese Taipei

There has been some edit warring on the the question of how extensively the misleading name "Chinese Taipei" is used. The Chinese Taipei article lists a number of international context in which it is used, but I don't think it establishes that the term is used in "most international organizations" as one version of this article says. Under the policy of removing information that doesn't have references, and without convincing evidence, I think we need to leave out the statement about "Chinese Taipei" being used in more international organization until some supporting references can be found. Readin (talk) 22:18, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Medical university vandal/edit warrior

I noticed under the history tab that there is someone who keeps edit warring on this page, and I was wondering why the IP has never been blocked for the activity. Why hasn't somebody taken this to the 3RR notice board? Why do people prefer to protect this article rather than block the troublemakers? Wikipedia policy discourages page protection when blocking would be just as effective. GO-PCHS-NJROTC ^(Messages) 04:52, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Adding a cross-strait relations section to this article?

I was thinking it might be a good idea to have a section within this article of cross-strait relations between China and Taiwan. I think it would add a great deal of information to the article, and there are tons of current events that could be stated in that section. Any comments? Hihappy21 (talk) 01:35, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

What was that?

Some bizzare Zodiac Killer vandalism was on this page, and theres no sign of it in the history. Did anyone else see it? 205.250.123.43 (talk) 01:27, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Current President

{{editsemiprotected}} Under the Present section it still says "current President Chen Shui-Bian" but he is no longer the President

 Done--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 06:13, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

capital

Is the capital of the RoC not officially Nanking? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jftsang (talk • contribs) 15:00, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes. However, since de facto it is not that due to it losing control of the mainland for 58+ years, generally its temporary capital Taipei is considered its capital. The Nanking fact can be included somehow as an aside, but anything beyond that suffers from undue weight. Ngchen (talk) 21:33, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Invasion, Civil War or Attack?

Currently, the language of the article claims that an attack from PRC is an "invasion". This is not the view from the PRC perspective which calls it a "civil war". There are arguments that support both sides. The West, namely US, would call it invasion. But everyone also agreed that the KMT(ROC) and CPC(PRC) did fight a civil war and the results are inconclusive as neither side agreed to "settle the issue".

Is it better and more neutral to just call it an "attack"? Shaoquan (talk) 03:26, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

An invasion is an invasion, civil war or not. As the ROC claims the mainland, an attack by either side would be an invasion. Remember that the ROC doesn't want or pretend to be independent. Both sides of the channel are parts of China. Both sides claim to be the legitimate government. It's wrong and misleading to simply state that Communist China claims Taiwan is part of China- for it is equally (or more so) true to say that the Republic of China claims the mainland is part of China.JohnC (talk) 06:19, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Even if it were a civil war, it would still be an invasion. For example, when speaking of the U.S. Civil War it is quite common to say the North invaded the South at a certain time and the South invaded the North at another time.

"Attack" doesn't carry the full meaning. "Attack" could mean just firing missiles at the country. Even the "missile tests" the Chinese conducted could be called an "attack" because they affected shipping and damaged Taiwan's economy. But "invasion" implies that people actually make the journey from China to Taiwan and land there with hostile intent. In the contexts where I see it used on the page, "invasion" is the right word. Readin (talk) 04:36, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

if missile test are attack then the US has attack every country with their forward missile deployment around the world. that is just clear BS. but yes, it can be considered either an invasion or liberation depending on the conditions of war since we don't know what type of conflict will erupt. there is an scenario(which was discussed on an article in Jane) where taiwan face yet another civil war between the seccesionist south and the nationalist north, if under such terms (a 3 way claim), an intervention would no longer in an invasion if it was done under the request of ROC. 218.186.12.200 (talk) 06:17, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Actually no, the missile scenario you gave us depends on who the missiles were target at and who were harmed in the process. An attack is just an attack, it's not an invasion or liberation, those are separate things. As for the civil war scenario you gave us, yes, that's true, it wouldn't be an invasion if the intervention was requested, but if not, it's an invasion. Liu Tao (talk) 16:54, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

The deployment of missiles isn't an attack! What about the regular shelling of Taiwanese strait islands by Communist artillery. Isn't that an attack?JohnC (talk) 06:21, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Reread what I wrote and answer your own question. BTW, shelling stopped in 1979 when the United States switched recognition from the ROC to PRC. Liu Tao (talk) 23:04, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

add

please add link to main article "healthcare in taiwan" in the public health section of this article —Preceding unsigned comment added by Okisdwed (talk • contribs) 13:20, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Questionable Image

Image:ROC_Administrative_and_Claims.jpg appears to be misinformation, no? Is it referring to the People's Republic of China (MAINLAND) or Republic of China (TAIWAN)? Prowikipedians (talk) 09:14, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

There's nothing wrong with the image. It's correct. It refers to the RoC. Read the map carefully and you'll see what it's talking about. Liu Tao (talk) 01:12, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Another Map

What do you folks think of another ROC map, this one including territorial claims in context with the rest of the world?

• 

Pryaltonian (talk) 20:10, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I think it'll be nice, but then it'll be the only one of its kind. Liu Tao (talk) 05:04, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

45 %"Taiwanese", 45% "Taiwanese" and "Chinese", 4% "Chinese"?

The statistics was shown in the Demonym column of the side table of the article.

I find this quite curious. A survey of a TV station is now fully qualified to tell readers what the people in Taiwan refer to themselves as. The reliable statistics should be official statistics, not those from a television station. The results are not backed up by another survey conducted by the "Global Views" magazine when 59.7% of the people agree that the two sides of the Taiwan Strait are Chinese while 27.9% of the people do not agree. The numbers are in this link http://www.zonaeuropa.com/200806b.brief.htm#001.

However, I don't have a problem with quoting the surveys in the footnotes, as they have some interesting results. But the fact it is written like the title is indirectly drawing an identity division when it is simply about Demonyn. I don't think that was what the surveys intended to do.

Also, a statement like "some...... others....." is not a statement of speculation. It is a statement saying a certain percentage of people think one way but the rest of the people think the other way, without stating what the percentage is (so no speculation). On the other hand, terms like "likely" are certainly terms of speculation.

I will revert the edit back to "Chinese" or "Taiwanese" while keeping the footnote.--pyl (talk) 03:48, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I find this quite curious. A survey of a TV station is now fully qualified to tell readers what the people in Taiwan refer to themselves as.

If you have a more reliable source please provide it.

59.7% of the people agree that the two sides of the Taiwan Strait are Chinese while 27.9% of the people do not agree.

The question is what the people call themselves, not what they think the two sides of the straight are. Readin (talk) 13:49, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I did. Global View magazine in your cite source. Read before being personal please. If people agree that they are Chinese, then that's how they think themselves are. Plus, this is part of the reasons why the figures shouldn't be cited on the table. You have missed the rest of the reasons.--pyl (talk) 13:56, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

You haven't provide any reliable source for what the people call themselves. You provided a source for what they call the two sides of the strait. Readin (talk) 13:58, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Do we need to seek arbitration on this one? You seem to be quite unreasonable. You ignored all my arguments and just keep repeating without advancing new arguments. You need to calm down.--pyl (talk) 14:01, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

You misquoted your source. Had you quoted it correctly this would have been less difficult. I'll discuss later. Readin (talk) 14:03, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

You didn't respond to the rest of my reasons why we shouldn't quote the statistics on the table. One of them is that these are figures from a TV station, not official figured. It is not reliable source at first place. I said it should be kept in the footnotes because the figures are interesting to readers, but I didn't say they are reliable enough to be on pair with figures such as "population" "area" "GDP" "HDI" etc. They are official figures.

Also, by calling both sides of the strait as Chinese, it means the people in Taiwan also call themselves Chinese. The people who disagree with that statement would not call themselves Chinese. I don't think there is anything misquoting about the results.--pyl (talk) 14:10, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

You undid everything. More than just this issue. You need to understand what you are doing. There are issues other than just demonym. We need to discuss issue by issue. For example Taipei is the de facto capital. There is nothing wrong with it as there is no law that says ROC's capital is in Taipei.

The language bit is also undisputed. The only official language is Mandarin. There is a footnote for it.

"Relocated to Taiwan" is not the correct term to described the ROC situation. But "jurisdiction limited to Taiwan" is undisputed.

As I said you need to calm down and see what you have reverted. This edit war is not necessary.--pyl (talk) 14:07, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Substance of Challenge

I propose to remove this:-

"Taiwan occupied[dubious – discuss] following World War II 1945"

As Readin's well aware, this POV is disputed, per legal status of Taiwan and political status of Taiwan.

I propose to remove the footnote in its entirety (including the TVBS survey) as well as the claim of "Taiwanese, and less commonly Chinese"

Using one telephone survey from a commercial television station is not sufficient to say more "Taiwanese" and less "Chinese". It is inappropriate to put an interpretive claim of the TVBS figures on the same level as "population" "area" "GDP" "HDI" etc, as these are official figures. I challenge the source of the footnote as well as the claim made on the ground of reliability, verifiability as well as the reasons I cited above (including conflicting figures with the Global Views magazine figures).

The policy relating to reliable sources says:-

"Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand."

"Primary sources are sources very close to the origin of a particular topic or event...[including]...tabulated results of surveys or questionnaires"

"Primary sources that have been published by a reliable source may be used in Wikipedia, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them. For that reason, anyone—without specialist knowledge—who reads the primary source should be able to verify that the Wikipedia passage agrees with the primary source. Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. To the extent that part of an article relies on a primary source, it should:

• only make descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge, and
• make no analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about the information found in the primary source."

The policy relating to verifiability says:-

"Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy.[4] Reliable sources are necessary both to substantiate material within articles and to give credit to authors and publishers in order to avoid plagiarism and copyright violations. Sources should directly support the information as it is presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made: exceptional claims require high-quality sources."

I, therefore, challenge that:-

1. TVBS is not "regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand";

2. The TVBS survey is primary source and therefore no interpretive claims should be made;

3. the TVBS source does not have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy in this matter;

4. the TVBS source is not appropriate for the claims to be made; and

5. the claim made is an exceptional claim, and the TVBS source is not of "high-quality"

The policy further states that "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material". I will therefore await a reply on this subject to satisfy the burden of evidence. I propose to remove the assertion, and I will seek administrative attention, if necessary. I will proceed to remove the challenged materials if a valid response is not given addressing the challenges by 8 October 2008 (UTC).

When I remove the challenged materials, I will leave the Demonym as "Chinese or Taiwanese" with a note saying "Due to the controversial political status of Taiwan, some people may refer to themselves as "Chinese" in addition to or in place of "Taiwanese", while others may refer to themselves as "Taiwanese" only". There is no speculation association with this statement. It just explains there are two groups of people in Taiwan identifying themselves differently without giving speculative figures or claims.

TVBS's survey cited that the survey was conducted in the "Taiwan Area". I don't understand why Readin removed it as no reasons were given. I propose to put the wording back, if the survey is retained at all (and I don't think it should).--pyl (talk) 06:30, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

"Occupied" Revisited

Relocated to Taiwan" is not the correct term to described the ROC situation. But "jurisdiction limited to Taiwan" is undisputed. The words the ROC government uses to describe what happened is that the "Relocated the capital to Taipei". Taipei is in Taiwan and the government is in the capital so there should be no problem saying they relocated the government to Taiwan. Saying they relocated "government organizations" works too.

The PRC for one disputes the ROC's jurisdiction over Taiwan. What the PRC does not dispute is that the ROC is currently governing Taiwan and that the ROC currently controls Taiwan.

"Occupied" accurately and concisely describes what happened. If you know a better word feel free to use it. "Sent soldiers to control the population, killed or imprisoned anyone who publicly complained, and kept government power out of the hands of the Taiwanese and in the hands of mainland Chinese" is accurate but too wordy. Readin (talk) 06:25, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

The PRC for one disputes the ROC's jurisdiction over Taiwan. What the PRC does not dispute is that the ROC is currently governing Taiwan and that the ROC currently controls Taiwan. I think if you read my increasingly repetitive statements properly in Talk: mainland China, you will note that the PRC doesn't dispute the ROC having the jurisdiction. They dispute the sovereignty. They also dispute "govern". They consider the ROC as the "Taiwan authority", not the "Taiwan government" (as government can mean having both 'sovereignty' and 'jurisdiction'). I think the US also commonly refer to the ROC as the "Taiwan authority" too. That's not a mistake. It is about sovereignty.

"Occupied" accurately and concisely describes what happened. If you know a better word feel free to use it. "Sent soldiers to control the population, killed or imprisoned anyone who publicly complained, and kept government power out of the hands of the Taiwanese and in the hands of mainland Chinese" is accurate but too wordy. I propose to remove both the statement as well as the date (so that entry no longer exists). The onus of proof is on you to justify that it is worth keeping (please see above) and saying "[occupation] accurately and concisely describes what happened" doesn't do. In order to address the issue, your "occupied" claim will have to be substantially undisputed. That's not the case in the legal status of Taiwan and political status of Taiwan articles. Please provide a valid argument by by 8 October 2008 (UTC).--pyl (talk) 08:22, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, contrary to your obvious intention, my sympathy for your claim decreases dramatically when you constantly use dramatic language to describe these events around the 1950's. I never saw you speak for the Taiwanese indigenous peoples in a similar manner when you are well aware that they were likewise mistreated by the Hoklos and Hakkas. They were even deprived of their land. Your so-called "native Taiwanese" (Hoklos and Hakkas) aren't the only victims here. Please be fair and neutral. If you want to talk about Taiwan being "occupied", please try the time when the real native Taiwanese, the indigenous peoples, were dispossessed of the land. Thank you.--pyl (talk) 13:09, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Hey Ply, you're getting off track with that last criticism towards Reading. You have to remember that Reading is a supporter of the DPP. His views sometimes are going to be different from the conservative views of the KMT and in some terms, the Taiwan Natives too. We're talking about occupation when Taiwan was transfered back to the RoC in 1945, not talking about Chinese from the mainland immigrating to Taiwan during the Early Ming dynasty and later Qing dynasty. What I don't like is the usage of "Chinese" and "Taiwanese". In my mind, all Taiwanese are Chinese. Taiwan is a province of the Republic of China, therefore Taiwanese is the demonym for the Taiwan Province, and Chinese is used for the demonym of the Republic of China. Because Taiwan is part of the RoC, technically all Taiwanese are Chinese. Liu Tao (talk) 17:15, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

A quick correction: Taiwan was transfered back to the RoC in 1945 Prior to 1945 Taiwan was never part of the RoC. From 1895 to 1945 it was part of the Empire of Japan. When the ROC "reunited China" in the 1920s it did not include Taiwan. Readin (talk) 21:30, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok then, it wasn't transferred to the RoC, it was stripped from Japan and given back to China, which at the time was the RoC, which is the successor state of the Qing Empire, from where Taiwan was ceded from. Either way, Taiwan was "given" to the RoC when Japan surrendered, agreed to the Potsdam declaration, which calls for the carry out of the Cairo Declaration, which states that "all the territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese, such as Manchuria, Formosa, and the Pescadores, shall be restored to the Republic of China." If you want to argue about whether or not Taiwan was part of the RoC in 1945, open up another topic, for this is getting too crowded and takes like 15 minutes to search where to respond. Liu Tao (talk) 22:39, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

If you want to argue about whether or not Taiwan was part of the RoC in 1945.... If you want to have strawman arguments go elsewhere. I didn't say anything about Taiwan not being occupied by the ROC in 1945. I said "Prior to 1945 Taiwan was never part of the RoC. From 1895 to 1945 it was part of the Empire of Japan. When the ROC "reunited China" in the 1920s it did not include Taiwan." Readin (talk) 22:46, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

No, I don't want to have strawmen arguments. I just stated all that crap in case if you want to HAVE strawmen arguments. But anyways, yes, you are right. I was just fearing that this would turn into that "other" argument that I dread having. Liu Tao (talk) 23:25, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Jesus Christ. The amount of pedanticism in this argument. Taiwan was 'occupied' in the sense that RoC did carry out a military occupation of the island of Taiwan after the surrender of Japan in 1945. So yes, Taiwan was technically 'occupied' by the RoC. Yes, Taiwan was never part of the RoC as the RoC came into being in 1912, when Taiwan by then was already under Japanese control since 1895 after Shimonoseki. But at the same time, RoC is the successor to the Qing Dynasty, so it is technically correct to say that, despite having never been a part of the RoC before 1945, Taiwan was a territorial part of China - 'China' in this sense is the cultural entity that was known then as the Qing Dynasty/Empire (whatever you want to call it) before the existence of the Republic of China or RoC. There isn't anything particularly hard to understand about that unless you want to drag in political/ideological mumbo jumbo. Vlag (talk) 13:41, 15 May 2009 (UTC)Vlag

I propose removing that entire phrase. Whether Taiwan was "occupied" or not is highly controversial. I will remind everyone that "occupied" carries a strongly negative connotation, of a "foreign" regime illegitimately taking over a place. One cannot "occupy" territory one is sovereign over, and the ROC considers itself sovereign over Taiwan. Also, FWIW, the PRC considers itself sovereign over Taiwan. Only (the more radical) supporters of Taiwan independence consider Taiwan to be "occupied." So, in order to avoid wading into that POV mess in the label, I suggest removing the phrase completely. Ngchen (talk) 22:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand this double standard. In the American Civil War article, we read, "From early years of the war, hundreds of thousands of African Americans escaped to Union lines, especially in occupied areas like Norfolk and the Hampton Roads region in 1862". In the World Ware II article we read that "In Asia, the United States occupied Japan". Are you saying that the United States occupation of Japan was illegitimate? Are you saying that Norfolk and Hampton Roads were not the United States sovereign territory and that the American soldiers in Virginia were foreigners?

If "occupation" really implies illegitimate and foreign, there is a lot of work to be done cleaning up that word's usage throughout Wikipedia! Readin (talk) 22:34, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with you, but as always, there's always going to be someone who's going to complain about this. If you remove "occupied", then what would happen is that people are going to say that the article is too biased in the KMT's favour and that Taiwan was really "occupied". The Pan-Green and Pan-Blue are still arguing whether or not Taiwan was ever part of the RoC. The Pan-Green says that Taiwan was never formally ceded to the RoC, and the KMT just occupied it from the Japanese, and other stuff like that. The Pan-Blue are stating otherwise saying that Taiwan was surrendered and given to the RoC by Japan etc. etc. This fight is going to be never ending, with apparently no middle ground for anyone, which is why I don't like to express my views, because I get criticised even though I provide all of these explanations, sources, and logic. Liu Tao (talk) 02:04, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback guys. I know Readin is a DPP supporter, s/he said that already. I wasn't critising Readin. I was just pointing out that one must pay attention to all aspects of issues, rather than just from a personal political perspective. The fact that dramatic languages are used doesn't make it more compelling, as it just appears to me that Readin was just making a personal point while ignoring others (such as the aborigines) with a similar issue.

The fact that this is still disputed means it cannot be neutrally asserted on the table: Wikipedia is not saying the "occupation" didn't happen just because the assertion doesn't appear on the table, but if the assertion appears there, it means Wikipedia says the "occupation" definitely did happen. I know Readin is aware of this rule. So I will be removing the entire entry unless this assertion is no longer disputed by 8 October 2008 (UTC).--pyl (talk) 03:42, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

After reading through the history of the article, I note that Readin already tried to insert the "occupation" claim on 1 December 2007.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_China&diff=174841094&oldid=174780195

It caused an edit war around 14 February 2008:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_China&action=history&year=2008&month=2

Readin changed the term from "occupied" to "entered", conceding that there were claims that "occupied" was biased.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_China&diff=191320716&oldid=191313367

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_China&diff=191329155&oldid=191320716

Here is the relating discussions on this subject:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Republic_of_China/Archive_11

Given that Readin is well aware of people objecting to the "occupied" claim, I don't think we need to revisit the same issue that has been settled previously. I will now remove the disputed claim from the table.--pyl (talk) 12:41, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

"Occupied?" No 2

I propose removing that entire phrase. Whether Taiwan was "occupied" or not is highly controversial. I will remind everyone that "occupied" carries a strongly negative connotation, of a "foreign" regime illegitimately taking over a place. One cannot "occupy" territory one is sovereign over, and the ROC considers itself sovereign over Taiwan. Also, FWIW, the PRC considers itself sovereign over Taiwan. Only (the more radical) supporters of Taiwan independence consider Taiwan to be "occupied." So, in order to avoid wading into that POV mess in the label, I suggest removing the phrase completely. Ngchen (talk) 22:46, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand this double standard. In the American Civil War article, we read, "From early years of the war, hundreds of thousands of African Americans escaped to Union lines, especially in occupied areas like Norfolk and the Hampton Roads region in 1862". In the World Ware II article we read that "In Asia, the United States occupied Japan". Are you saying that the United States occupation of Japan was illegitimate? Are you saying that Norfolk and Hampton Roads were not the United States sovereign territory and that the American soldiers in Virginia were foreigners?

If "occupation" really implies illegitimate and foreign, there is a lot of work to be done cleaning up that word's usage throughout Wikipedia! Readin (talk) 22:34, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Occupation implies "foreign" and usually illegitimate. Sometimes, as in the aftermath of WWII, the territory of the losers was occupied. This fact probably isn't anything that was desired, but was due to necessity; the occupiers had every intent to hand control back to a "legitimate" local government. In the case of the American civil war, Norfolk was occupied by union forces, eventually, a local regime (loyal to the union) was set up and control handed to them. Yes, the union army was in some sense "foreign" to Norfolk. Now, no doubt union supporters would argue that their troops taking over Norfolk was a liberation by domestic forces; however, even they'd agree that the factual takeover by military means created a temporary occupation. I'm sure you're aware how the Japanese era (1895-1945) was considered an occupation from a Chinese POV. By calling it such, the rule is implicitly delegitimized. We don't call it such here b/c if we did so it would create neutrality issues. Ngchen (talk) 19:28, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

"Double standard" is exactly what I was talking about. Thank you for pointing it out.

The land of the Taiwanese indigenous peoples was also "occupied" according to your justification for putting the 1945 entry. I don't see you asking for that entry to be put in as well.

The occupied territory article says in its first paragraph:-

"Occupied territories is a term of art in international law. In accordance with Article 42 of the Laws and Customs of War on Land (Fourth Hague Convention); October 18, 1907[1], Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army. The occupation extends only to the territory where such authority has been established and can be exercised."

We got this issue sorted once and for all? More research and less arguments would be appreciated.--pyl (talk) 02:51, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

The 228 incident wasn't hostile?

You like to bring out law dictionaries. Be careful with that. Remember that Wikipedia is a general purpose encyclopedia, not a legal encyclopedia. Standard definitions should be favored over technical definitions limited to a particular field unless that particular field is being discussed.

I did do research on the topic when it came up a while back. I found definitions like "to take or hold possession or control of" and "to move in and take control of (a country or other place)". I also found instances where the term was used to describe U.S. occupation of places where the U.S. where I believe the U.S. was not considered hostile, such as France and the Marshall Islands. Readin (talk) 03:41, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your reminder, but it was a Wikipedia article, not a law dictionary. If you have issues with that article, I suggest you go addressing the issues there. Since there are conflicts between the definition in that article and your alleged definition, the assertion cannot be made due to neutrality issues.

Your beliefs on what the US was considered don't belong in this article. Please go to the relevant articles.

The land of the Taiwanese indigenous peoples was also "occupied" according to your justification for putting the 1945 entry. I don't see you asking for that entry to be put in as well. I don't object to it. I just don't know where you want to add it. Saying Taiwan was occupied by the ROC military certainly includes the Taiwanese Aborigines, as they were living in Taiwan at the time. Readin (talk) 03:45, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

The "occupation" I was referring to was about the time when the land was dispossessed by Han Chinese, your so-called "native Taiwanese". I made this clear in the section above.

I find taking people's statements out of context then use it against them offensive. I pointed it that out in the "One China Policy" article. It doesn't add to the persuasion of your arguments (which you need to form consensus), it just makes you appear to be a nasty person. So please refrain from doing it in the future.

You won't get consesus over this issue, so please drop it and save everyone's time. If you don't believe me, run a poll.--pyl (talk) 03:56, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

I find false accusations that I took something out of context pretty nasty and offensives also. The context was a discussion about what happened in 1945. With no reference to any other time period, you said "The land of the Taiwanese indigenous peoples was also "occupied" according to your justification for putting the 1945 entry. I don't see you asking for that entry to be put in as well." You even mention the 1945 context right in your statement. I'm frankly pretty sick and tired of your false accusations of a very personal nature. Learn to use a mirror.

I'm sorry I don't have time to look it up right now, but I do remember reading at one point that we're not supposed to simply quote other Wikipedia articles as reliable sources. I can't guarantee that that is still the case because the policy on aggressively removing non-cited text has changed; perhaps the restriction on quoting other Wikipedia articles as reliable sources has changed. Even if it has, it is just bad practice for the reason that the restriction was originally put in place - it tends to compound errors that are made. The Wikipedia article you cite, if it is something we should use here, should have reliable sources. So don't cite the article, cite the sources. Readin (talk) 07:32, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Pyl said:-

"If you want to talk about Taiwan being "occupied", please try the time when the real native Taiwanese, the indigenous peoples, were dispossessed of the land."

Pyl said:-

"I was just pointing out that one must pay attention to all aspects of issues, rather than just from a personal political perspective. The fact that dramatic languages are used doesn't make it more compelling, as it just appears to me that Readin was just making a personal point while ignoring others (such as the aborigines) with a similar issue."

Readin said:-

"Saying Taiwan was occupied by the ROC military certainly includes the Taiwanese Aborigines, as they were living in Taiwan at the time."

I don't think what I said above would be considered by a reasonable person as "false accusation". I am surprised that there was such an emotional outburst from you when I simply asked you not to take what I say out of context then use it against me. When I talked about the indigenous people I was always talking about the time when their land was dispossessed by the Han Chinese. If you find what I said personal attack, please refer this matter to the administrators.

I cited the occupied territory to show you that there is different definition from your definition of "occupied". My interpretation of "occupied" is the same as the definition that I quoted from that article. I find the word biased and it cannot used neutrally. I think other people have also expressed a view similar to mine already.

As I cited above, there is already a history of you proceeding with this line of argument. You didn't pursuade the people then, I don't think you have persuaded people now.

In Wikipedia:Disruptive editing, it says:-

A disruptive editor is an editor who:

• Is tendentious: continues editing an article or group of articles in pursuit of a certain point for an extended time despite opposition from one or more other editors. Tendentious editing does not consist only of adding material; some tendentious editors engage in disruptive deletions as well.

I think you are well aware that there is opposition, and I am finding these arguments very tendentious and they have gone much longer than they should.--pyl (talk) 09:44, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

So let me get this straight. In order to prove that I quoted you out of context, you quote yourself out of context???? I was responding to comments you made during a in a talk about 1945, not to comments you made 3 days ago in another section of the discussion page.

You call me "nasty", and then accuse me of an "emotional outburst".

You accuse me of being "emotional" when from very early on you've accused my edits of being "hostile and personal". This when I hardly knew of you and knew almost nothing about you.

You accuse me of hostile and nasty, and you are the person calling me a "disruptive editor" and in at least one discussion threatening to try to have me prohibited from editing a topic.

I'm sorry to have to attack you so personally, but you are the one who has made it very personal by first attacking me in a very personal and hostile manner. Readin (talk) 11:36, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

As this is more personally related (not directly related to this article), I will reply in User talk:Readin--pyl (talk) 12:18, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

GDP

this can't be right. It says the GDP in the fact file is 300,000 (ish) BILLION. BILLION? you mean three hundred billion. change that now. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.157.54.106 (talk) 19:52, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

It's probably in terms of Taiwanese dollar, but you're probably right. Somebody ought to look into it and clarify it before any changes are made. Liu Tao (talk) 16:55, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

regional languages

I accept that there is no official legally recognised regional languages in Taiwan. But I am not sure if that spot on the table is for official ones or just for any major regional languages. The table didn't say "official". Do we have any consensus on that please?--pyl (talk) 11:31, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

You could make 2 listings for the language section. You could state

Official Language: Standard Mandarin

Recognised regional languages: Taiwanese, Hakka, Aborginal languages, etc.

It's what is done for the United Kingdom.Liu Tao (talk) 16:54, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

That's what was done originally. But Jiang removed it. Please check history.--pyl (talk) 17:00, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

These languages are not "recognized" as they are in the United Kingdom. They carry no legal status.--Jiang (talk) 17:41, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Each country is different. Taiwan is obviously structured differently from the UK. That Taiwanese and Hakka are not "recognized" does not make them less important. This should work:

• Official Language: Standard Mandarin
• Regional languages: Taiwanese, Hakka, Aboriginal languages, etc.

Readin (talk) 05:33, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

It does not seem to be the convention on Wikipedia to list languages that are neither official nor recognized, except in cases where an official language does not exist. So I dont see the justification here for listing these other languages.--Jiang (talk) 12:36, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Wrong. Mandarin is the Official and National language of the RoC. Read Languages of Taiwan. On the other hand, even if regional languages are not officially recognised, you can list them down as "de facto". The US does that, same with the UK and Australia. They don't have an official federal language, which is mentioned, and English is their "de facto" National language, not "de jure". It's all listed on their pages, go check. Meaning we can indeed list your "not recognised" languages. I checked the language page I mentioned earlier and the pages of the Taiwanese, Hakka, and Formosan languages, they are definitely "de facto" at most. Formosan languages are dying out, with only 2% of the population speaking it. Plus, of the 26 Formosan languages, atleast 10 are extinct, 4-5 are moribund, and several others are considered endangered, based on the facts provided by the Formosan language page, which means the "de facto" stance for the Formosan languages is indeed debatable. But unless you want to get into a large debate about whether or not Formosan languages can be deemed "de facto", we'll have to include it into "Regional Languages" if we are to list them. We don't have to list all 26 languages, just "Formosan languages" along with a link. I think Readin would agree with me on this too. So, what you say? Will we go along with Readin's method or not?

Also, just in case if you say that no other nations have "Regional languages" stated on their pages, you're wrong, since there are many that do. Liu Tao (talk) 03:09, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

The entry is called "recognised regional languages". "Recognised" is the keyword. "Recognition by the government" is how I would interpret it. Does anyone have a different interpretation?--pyl (talk) 03:03, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

I would not have made that point if I were you, ply, because you're gonna get it bad for it. If you say that only languages that are "de jure" should be listed, then that means it should be the same with every single other nations who has a de facto language listed on their page should be removed. So, now you've 2 choices, you want go to every single national page and remove every de facto languages listed as well as getting yelled at by Taiwanese Nationalist supporters like Readin, or drop this "recognised" keyword matter. I'd pick the latter if I were you, it'll save a lot of trouble. Liu Tao (talk) 03:18, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong, I started this topic because the languages were removed by Jiang. I just wanted to know why it was done. I am not paying undue weight to the views of either pro-unificationists or Taiwan independence supporters, as I want this issue resolved neutrally.

I don't feel that there are only two choices. There is an issue here because, I suspect, there is a word "recognised" here. I don't think the word "recognised" is everywhere in all articles.

There can be de facto official languages. It makes sense. But, can there be de facto "recognised" regional languages? I find it kind of contradicting. The word "recognised" is there as part of the table template so if we want to make changes, it will change every other article too.--pyl (talk) 04:11, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, they don't contradict. "De facto" means in practice and as a fact. A recognised language does not necessarily have to by recognised by the law. It just has to be recognised by the government as a regional language. Sorry about the criticism, I had a long day and didn't want to argue, so I went on the aggressive to try and shorten it. Anyways, sorry, didn't notice the "recognised" part. I think Taiwanese, Hakka, and Formosan languages are recognised, but I'm not 100% sure. I know that they are not Official languages, that is a fact, so they are not "de jure" but "de facto". Liu Tao (talk) 04:53, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

No worries. I didn't take offence of what you said earlier.

I think we both agree that "recognised" is likely to mean "Recognised by the government as regional languages". I don't think the government has done anything to recognise those languages as regional languages yet. But if you have other information, please let us know.--pyl (talk) 05:02, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Interesting, Taiwanese is also known as "Holo"... Anyways, I've got onto the government site, it say anything about "recognising" these languages, but they talk about these languages being taught in schools and promoted by these different organisations of the different languages as well as the governments themselves. I still have doubts (I always do), but I can say that I'm 90-95% sure that these languages are recognised by the government as regional languages. Let's just put it on, it it is incorrect, someone would come tell us or correct it themselves. If we don't put anything on there, then noone's probably going to notice that there's no "regional" languages on there. Liu Tao (talk) 06:30, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Demonym

In order to be clear on the subject, I first looked up the word "Demonym". It wasn't in the usual sources, but I found this at Reference.com"

A demonym or gentilic is a word that denotes the members of a people or the inhabitants of a place. In English, a demonym is often the same as the name of the people's native language: e.g., the "French" (people from France). The word comes from the Greek word for 'populace' (δῆμος demos) plus the suffix -onym and was popularized in 1997 by Merriam-Webster editor Paul Dickson in his book Labels for Locals. The term is not widely employed or known outside geographical circles and does not appear in mainstream dictionaries.

First, notice that the word is not a political term. It is used for a term that denotes "members of a people or the inhabitants of a place", not "the citizens of a state". Second, the best guidance given for how the term is selected in English is based on the "native language". The native language of most people in the ROC is the language normally referred to as "Taiwanese" (Chinese is learned at school and is not the first language for most people). Working straight from the definition, "Taiwanese" is the better term for the majority of the people. Working from the survey, which is the best reliable source we have, "Taiwanese" is the more commonly preferred term. "Taiwanese" or less commonly "Chinese" is how the text should read after the "Demonym" label. Readin (talk) 05:30, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

The native language of most people in the ROC is the language normally referred to as "Taiwanese" (Chinese is learned at school and is not the first language for most people).

Actually, the native language of most people in the ROC is Mandarin. The whole "Taiwanese is the first language and Mandarin is the academic language" myth is incorrect. If you insist on proceeding with this line of argument, please provide reliable sources.

Please don't play politics over the "Taiwanese" language. It is a type of Chinese too. "Taiwanese" is called by the DPP government as "Taiwanese Min Nan". "Fujian Min Nam" is a type of Chinese, so is "Taiwanese Nin Nam". Even the "Taiwanese" article says Taiwanese is a type of Chinese. Similarly, US, British, Australian etc English are different types of English.

With your argument, we shouldn't have "Taiwanese" at all as demonym, and we should have "Spanish" for all Spanish speaking countries and "English" for all English speaking ones. A country with multiples languages would not be able to have any demonyms. The argument is illogical.

I deny that the TVBS survey is "the best reliable source we have". It is not a reliable source at all, as you have not responded to any of my challenges with valid arguments yet.

As I said above, if no valid arguments are provided by 8 October 2008 (UTC), I will proceed to do what I proposed to do. If you wish to restore the claim or the footnote, you can provide reliable sources afterwards, per the Wikipeida policy I cited above.--pyl (talk) 08:44, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

While I rather dislike the Taiwanization politics, I have to say that "Taiwanese" really is more appropriate here. This has nothing to do with the dubious arguments Readin cited, however. Demonym isn't a language issue; it's simply the name that's used to refered to the population. Taiwanese people both at home and abroad rarely refer to themselves as Chinese, regardless of their stance on the political and cultural situation. Similarly, news and other publications always refer to Taiwanese persons, companies, etc. as "Taiwanese". And of course, in all the dicussions here everyone use "Taiwanese" to refer to the people in Taiwan. o (talk) 13:54, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, what you write is true for supporters of the pan-green coalition. But if you look at their arch-rivals, the pan-blue coalition and their supporters, you'll find many more people who consider themselves either Chinese only, or Taiwanese and Chinese. The cite that was pulled up a few days ago indicated that the ratio (based on self-identity) of Taiwanese only/Taiwanese+Chinese/Chinese only was something like 45%-45%-10%. The latter two are significant viewpoints, and should not be omitted. Ngchen (talk) 14:24, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, if an editor writes Chinese in a statement to describe the people in Taiwan, this statement is likely to be removed or modified. Using "Taiwanese" to describe the people in Taiwan is unambiguous in a general statement. But when it comes to demonym, we can't decide through personal experience: we have to leave it to the people. The fact is, there are three choices: Taiwanese, Chinese or both, but we don't know what the real percentage is. And I am saying having a footnote for a telephone survey by a television company is insufficient and improper to tell us the real percentage because Wikipedia's policy says so.

We can only tell the readers the 3 choices and we are not in the position to tell them what the percentage is.--pyl (talk) 14:39, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

A U.S. State Department regulation for its personnel states, "We refer to Taiwan simply as Taiwan and to its governing officials as 'the Taiwan authorities.' Not all current residents of Taiwan are known as 'Taiwanese'; it is best to use the term 'people on Taiwan.' The proper noun and adjective to refer to the island, the entity, and its authorities are 'Taiwan.'" The regulations further state that "Taiwanese" as an adjective may only be used to refer to "descendants of pre-1949 inhabitants of Taiwan." If you read the literature coming out of the U.S. government, you should see that this is fairly consistent.

Indeed, the use of "Taiwanese" to refer to Mainlanders (waishengren) has only been mainstream in the past 8 years or so, with the very concept being introduced only in 1994 when Lee Teng-hui invented the term "new Taiwanese" (which, with the incorporation of mainlanders into the label Taiwanese in the past 8 years has fallen into disuse) to refer to mainlanders like James Soong and Ma Ying-jeou who had embraced the localization movement.

So it is not as simple as you put it, and Taiwanese people, depending on political persuasion, do commonly refer to themselves as Chinese, though Taiwanese is even more common these days.--Jiang (talk) 16:06, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Far be it for me to decide what the demonym is on my own, I nevertheless believe "Taiwanese" is more appropriate. The US State Dept. is certainly no more authoritative than a TV survey; their policy only matters to themselves. Now, I think there might be two issues that people tend to mix here: the ethno-cultural identity of people in Taiwan and the specific term people use to identify themselves. The earlier is a clearly a complicated issue, and no one is disputing that. The latter, however, is much simpler. As I stated before, Taiwanese people use the term "Taiwanese" to refer to themselves, and that is a fact. They may identify with Chinese ethnicity and culture, but I challenge you to find any reference in the media that calls a Taiwanese person/company/organization "Chinese". Again, regardless of their background and political affiliation. Taiwanese people, at home and abroad, take it for granted that the term "Chinese" means mainland China outside of linguistic, historical and cultural context. In business, scitech, academia, pop culture, and most media where political sensitivity does not reign, Taiwanese are always called "Taiwanese", never Chinese. The only context "Chinese" (or "ROC") would be used is in political and historical-cultural topics, where the different terms become loaded. I am not trying to simplify an issue to suit my political view, indeed I have rarely agreed with Readin in the past. But "Demonym" is simply the name a people call themselves, and the reality should be reflected over people's bias on these terms; political sensitivity shouldn't be allowed to dominate over every aspect of the article. o (talk) 01:26, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

As I've stated before, from what I think is reasonable, is that the demonym is "Chinese", not Taiwanese. Taiwan_Province is a Province of the Republic of China, and it still is widely accepted by many. Actually, there still is a Provincial government with a Council and Chairman, that is a fact. So technically speaking, Taiwanese is the demonym of the Taiwan Province. On the other hand, the demonym of the RoC is "Chinese". "Chinese" is the demonym for both the RoC and PRC. It's the same thing with North-South Korea, both of their demonyms are "Koreans". That is their official demonym. They don't call themselves "North Korean" or "South Korean", just "Korean". Actually, "Chinese" is the official demonym of the RoC, go read the article at the "Cultural problems" section.

Another thing I have to bring up is about those who live in Kinmen and Matsu. The problem with these areas is that they are not part of Taiwan, they are part of Fujian. This is also a fact, and is agreed upon by both sides. You are saying that people from the Fujian Province should use the demonym of the Taiwan Province. That makes no apparent sense, the demonym for Fujian is Fujianese. Yes, Taiwanese is a demonym, but only limiting to the Taiwan Province. You cannot force it upon areas outside the Province. It does not matter what is the majority or not, it matters what is officially the case, and here, the official case is that the demonym of the Republic of China is "Chinese", not Taiwanese. Taiwan is not a nation, it is a province with its own provincial government. Even the constitution is titled "Constitution of the Republic of China", along with the government, military, and other organisasions. Liu Tao (talk) 02:33, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Mention of State Department guidelines is not meant to imply that the Department of State is an authority on this matter, but that, contrary to your assertions, it found the issue controversial enough to regulate usage of the term. The issue is not as clear-cut as you put it. Taiwanese certainly refer to themselves as Chinese, but whether they refer to themselves as "huaren" 華人 or "zhongguoren" 中國人 (try entering both terms into a search engine and restricting your search to Taiwanese websites) is a matter of political persuasion. This past Sunday, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-pin, standing about 2 meters away from me, gave a speech at the Taipei Confucius Temple at the conclusion of the annual Confucius ceremony where he used the phrase "We Chinese..." 我們中國人... The media didn't find this speech worthy of reporting (neither did I) so you won't find this on youtube, but the self-referencing with the term zhongguoren is a common phenomenon by blue supporters. In Taiwan, you can often make out a person's political persuasion by the terms he or she uses, eg, whether the PRC is referred to as "China" 中國 or "the mainland" 大陸. And to repeat myself, the term Taiwanese has only taken precedence over Chinese in the past eight years, with a sizeable minority never referred to as Taiwanese until about ten years ago. Failure to recognize these political sensitivites is taking a political stance.--Jiang (talk) 18:57, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok, first of all, 華人 and 中國人 both mean "Chinese". I do agree with you on the political issue at hand, but I'm trying to put away the particanship and approach this matter logically and technically. This is why I don't like discussing this kind of stuff anymore, you say something and someone's gonna criticise you for being "pro-Blue" or "pro-Green". This argument is getting nowhere, I say that we just put it down as "Chinese or Taiwanese" and make a footnote explaining the challenges of both political sides. Liu Tao (talk) 00:47, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

(out dent for easier reading) O not said:-

"But "Demonym" is simply the name a people call themselves, and the reality should be reflected over people's bias on these terms;"

So I don't think we need to go into how the media call the people in Taiwan, as you said, that is not what demonym is about.

Given that there are no reliable sources at the moment, we will just leave the demonym as "Chinese or Taiwanese". Please let me clarify, I am not proposing to delete either Chinese or Taiwanese so we don't need to argue if Chinese or Taiwanese is better. They will both stay.

The main point is really the lack of reliable sources. The fact there are arguments over which one is better reflects the reality that there is neither consensus nor reliable source to say whether Chinese or Taiwanese is more appropriate.--pyl (talk) 02:57, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I was a bit mistaken there. "Demonym" is simply "the name of the people"; not necessarily what they call themselves (that's "endonym"). Still, doesn't the media simply reflect the reality of how this people is named? If both the local and international media overwhelmingly call Taiwanese "Taiwanese", who are we to say that the demonym really should be "Chinese"?

But anyway I can live with the status quo, if only to compromise. However I cannot agree with the notion that there's "neither consensus nor reliable source". There is no consensus in this discussion, but the consensus in the reality is quite clear. There is no "reliable source" because the people and the media at large already take the term "Taiwanese" for granted and no one bothers to investigate how Taiwanese people call themselves (again do not confuse appellation with identity). The editors who disagree only argue based on political and ethno-cultural grounds. The fact is there are people in the UK who would object to being called British, and people in Sweden who don't consider themselves Swedish, but the demonym is simply the common appellation and shouldn't be dominated by minority and context-specific concerns.

Since we are talking about a Wikipedia article, the consensus within this discussion is the one that matters. Regarding to your view that there is consensus outside this discussion, I disagree with it.

I also disagree with your construction for the reasons behind the lack of reliable sources. The fact that matters to Wikipedia is, there are no reliable sources that an editor can rely on to say the demonym should be "Taiwanese" only.

But I thank you for being able to accept the status quo of having "Chinese or Taiwanese" as denonym. I don't think this is an argument that can deliver anyone with a satisfactory outcome. So I think we should just leave it at that.--pyl (talk) 11:45, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Responding to Liu Tao's comments above:

Your example of N/S Korean doesn't apply there since both North Korea and South Korea are exonyms; they call themselves Chosonin and Hangukin. And of course in both N and S Korea, unlike in Taiwan, there is zero controversy their cultural identity as Koreans.

And, No, there is no such thing as the "official demonym". The official name of ROC is 中華民國, the citizen of ROC are 中華民國國民, there is nothing "official" beyond this. You won't even catch Ma calling himself 中國人 now that he's the president, nor will he call Taiwanese people 中國國民. For all practical purposes, that is simply confusing. Yes, Penghu and Kinmen are technically outside of Taiwan province, but outside of the specific political context, few associate the term "Taiwan" with "Taiwan province". You ignore the reality that the term "Taiwan" is universally used to refer to everything that is ROC outside of politically sensitive topics. Penghu and Kinmen natives are just as likely to call themselves Taiwanese when abroad; outside of local context. I am simply describing the reality, it's not helpful to politicize everything. o (talk) 09:01, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Did you read the demonym article that I pointed out? The RoC and PRC officially uses "Chinese" to describe their nationalities. "Both the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China officially adhere to the One-China policy, use "Chinese" to describe their nationals, and refuse to have diplomatic relations with states that recognize the other. "As for Penghu and Kinmen, based on what you said, you don't know anyone from there, but I know as a fact that the majority of Penghu and Kinmen residents DO NOT like to refer to themselves as Taiwanese. Then tend to refer to themselves as Chinese when abroad as well as at home. Also, that is nationality, not demonymation, these are 2 different things. Demonym denotes where a person is from. In this case, we are saying that the person is from the Republic of China, not Taiwan. The demonym of the RoC would be Chinese, while the demonym of Taiwan is Taiwanese, as RoC is considered as China too along with the PRC. It's the same with Korean IN ENGLISH, both North and South Korea are considered Korea, meaning their demonyms are both Koreans. Yes, technically speaking, you could say South/North Korean, to denote if they are from the south or north. Saying you're Taiwanese would mean that you're from Taiwan. Stating that you are Chinese would mean that you're from China, whether it may be the RoC or PRC. You say you speak "reality", I say I speak "logic" and "technicality". This is not the media, this is an encyclopedia. Things should be in uniform and correct in the sense of technicality. Liu Tao (talk) 17:06, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Demonym No 2

Give that Readin has not responded to any of my challenges, I have removed the disputed footnote as well as the claim. For easy reference, I am reproducing the challenges as well as the proposal, as follows:-

I, therefore, challenge that:-

1. TVBS is not "regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand";

2. The TVBS survey is primary source and therefore no interpretive claims should be made;

3. the TVBS source does not have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy in this matter;

4. the TVBS source is not appropriate for the claims to be made; and

5. the claim made is an exceptional claim, and the TVBS source is not of "high-quality"

The policy further states that "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material". I will therefore await a reply on this subject to satisfy the burden of evidence. I propose to remove the assertion, and I will seek administrative attention, if necessary. I will proceed to remove the challenged materials if a valid response is not given addressing the challenges by 8 October 2008 (UTC).

When I remove the challenged materials, I will leave the Demonym as "Chinese or Taiwanese" with a note saying "Due to the controversial political status of Taiwan, some people may refer to themselves as "Chinese" in addition to or in place of "Taiwanese", while others may refer to themselves as "Taiwanese" only". There is no speculation association with this statement. It just explains there are two groups of people in Taiwan identifying themselves differently without giving speculative figures or claims.

As cited above, if any editor wishes to restore the removed material, please discuss here before proceeding with it so that we comply with Wikipedia's editorial policy and process. Thank you.--pyl (talk) 13:08, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree with the latest version by Pyl. Ngchen (talk) 14:32, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

The TVBS source is better than no source at all. If we're not going to use a source, then we shouldn't put in speculative statements. In particular, given that "Taiwanese" is the more commonly used term, it makes no sense to list "Chinese" first. It should be noted that "Taiwanese" is the common term and "Chinese" is less common. Since we can't agree, we shouldn't have anything until we have a source of high enough standards to satisfy all of us. A high standard has been set in rejecting TVBS in favor of nothing. A high standard - one that includes avoiding biased sources such as offical KMT run agencies or other government agencies with reasons to please the KMT or PRC, will need to be met for us to put something back in. Readin (talk) 21:19, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

So would you be satisfied with "Taiwanese or Chinese?" The TVBS source is interesting, I find it reliable. I simply question the approrpiateness of using the numbers in the infobox, since the numbers are always changing, AND by putting it there we're presuming that self-identity is the "truth." While I personally agree that people should be categorized w/ self-identity, the notion is by no means universally accepted. I have no problem with including the survey results somewhere in the text. Ngchen (talk) 00:13, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Comment: I readily agree with Liu Tao's assertion on "technicality", but I don't agree that it's "logic". It's simply "logic" based solely on minority and political concerns. The fact is the term "Taiwanese" has many meanings. There is "Taiwanese" as oppose to "Chinese", and then there's the simple, unloaded adjective "Taiwanese" that's used universally in the media. I continue to emphasize media usage over "official" usage: official policies, by definition, are politicized. As I stated, the media usage simply reflect popular usage.

And to Pyl who say that there is no consensus here in Wikipedia, have you noticed that in all the discussions above, we always use "Taiwanese" the same general, descriptive way that the media does? When precision is necessary, we say ROC, but nobody say simply "Chinese" when meaning Taiwan/ROC. Even in official usage, I cannot remember any instance where Taiwanese politicians is refered to ROC as 中國 and not 中華民國 (aside from the "一個中國" discussion). If you really want to talk about the official policy, the demonym really should be "ROC" rather than "Chinese". As for Penghu and Kingmen: people from Åland don't like to be called Swedish, and I personally know Catalans, Bretons and Basques who don't like to be called Spanish and French. But for general purposes outside of politically or ethnically sensitive context, we call them Swedish, Spanish and French for the sake of simplicity and clarity.

Yes, since I haven't cited any sources you can say that's all subjective POV of one editor, but nobody has challenged my description of the "reality" so far. If as Liu Tao, you prefer politicized "technicality" over reality, I respectfully disagree. If technicality is to be obeyed, then "American" shouldn't be USA's demonym because they are more appropriately US of A. I won't push it further, though; I'm just personally dissappointed that everything about Taiwan/ROC has to be so politicized.

It shouldn't, but on the other hand, I do see sense in the demonym of "American". You could look at it in a way that "American" in this case is short for "Americans of the United States", same with the "Chinese of the Republic of China" and "Chinese of the People's Republic of China" and etc. Anyways, I see your point and disgust over this matter. I feel the same. I'm thinking we should just have a truce and just put both of them down, like "Chinese and Taiwanese" or something, and put a footnote next to it explaining about the challenges of the demonyms. I think that's the best and really only way to solve this problem as of now. Liu Tao (talk) 02:41, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

In any case, though, I never agreed with Readin's initial reason for the change, so I guess I agree with pyl's last edit. But I begin to wonder why it shouldn't be "Taiwanese or ROC", even though "ROC" is admitedly an awkward demonym. o (talk) 00:50, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, ROC is the state. The demonym is supposed to be what word(s) is used to describe the people there. And no, no one calls themselves an ROCan. Ngchen (talk) 04:34, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

O not said:-

'And to Pyl who say that there is no consensus here in Wikipedia, have you noticed that in all the discussions above, we always use "Taiwanese"'

I say Taiwanese because I wanted to avoid disputes with Readin. S/he has been known to remove all references to "Chinese" when the context means "people from Taiwan", citing NPOV reasons. The fact we are debating means there is no consensus in this discussion. I am not sure if you have seen a ROC passport. The nationality of the passport holder is "Republic of China".--pyl (talk) 02:53, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes I have seen a ROC passport, and it also says "Taiwan" on the cover. Now I know that in itself was controversial so let's not get into that. But do note that the nationality is "ROC", not "Chinese". As for the "consensus", I was referring to all the discussions in the talk pages and not just this debate, nor just the debates Readin participate in. Without consciously following any policy, all of us naturally use "Taiwanese" or "ROC", and never simply "Chinese" without qualification; just imagine the confusion that would have caused. Again, that's the simple reality that we are all actively part of. If we can't have concensus on what we already agree implicitly, then something is quite wrong here. o (talk) 04:01, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I understand the "Taiwan" remark on the ROC cover can be confusing to most people. That's why I added some statements under the image in this article to explain so it doesn't get interpreted the wrong way.:-

"A Republic of China passport. "Taiwan" was marked in English (but not in Chinese) in 2003. The then DPP government stated this was to facilitate travel, not to change the name of the nation"

But yes, the act was controversial. You seem to be able to read Chinese, there is the explanation of the remark:-

http://www.nownews.com.tw/2001/12/18/742-1238313.htm

As you can tell, the name of the country wasn't administratively changed by this action. The name can only get changed by a referendum, which didn't happen.

Here is a link where the media call the people in Taiwan "Chinese":-

http://www.chinareviewnews.com/doc/1007/6/5/2/100765225.html?coluid=1&kindid=0&docid=100765225&mdate=1009102552

I am just showing you that the media still call the people in Taiwan "Chinese". It is particularly the case in mainland China. But even if that's the case, that's just another POV, just like Jiang's US government example.

I agree that all these governments do that for their benefits, but I would also say that about the media too. Saying "Chinese" is offensive to some people, but saying "Taiwanese" is less likely to offend, as people who agree with both demonyms will accept "Taiwanese" as well. The media are inherently commercial entities. They are there to make money and offend as less people as possible.

I think we are here to balance all these POVs. I just put down what we already agree implicitly in the article (which include both) but I object the "more" or "less" claim because saying that would be against Wikipedia's policy.--pyl (talk) 04:54, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I beg to differ about the being insulted about being called "Taiwanese". It is insulting to some people, mostly as I've said to those who live in Kinmen, Matsu, and sometimes Penghu. There are some folks on Taiwan who'd get insulted too, just not as much. There are people who do think the same as I do about Taiwan and the RoC demonyms. To be called "Taiwanese" and not "Chinese" would be like lowering their demonym a level from the national level to the provincial level. This is primarily because of pride. It doesn't matter how probable it is, if it's insulting, it's insulting. I myself have to swallow half my pride just to read some of the word usages in Wikipedia, and there are people like me too. It's not just a few people I'm talking about, it's a bunch of them.

Yes it is possible that Taiwanese may be interpreted tha way. That's why I cite both so Wikipedia can neutrally let readers know that they are the possible choices without telling the readers which one is better. The "which one is better" question is disputed.

I also know that there is a large number of "silent" people. That's why the KMT got into power this time. I don't think the DPP can always make people follow their ideology by being loud or dramatic. At the same time, the KMT didn't get everyone to accept their ideology by forcing people to learn that they are "Chinese" in schools. I think everyone is smart enough to independently make their own decisions.--pyl (talk) 05:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

By the way, if you still have the old passports from before the DPP presidential terms, it says "Republic of China". As I've said, this matter is political too. Liu Tao (talk) 05:10, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, but I don't think that act was being political. "Republic of China" is the name of the country after all. There is nothing wrong for a government to use its name on the cover of the passport.--pyl (talk) 05:24, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Sure, refering to oneself as "Chinese" causes some confusion. But to my knowledge, at least the hard-core blues do it, to make a point. Ngchen (talk) 04:34, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Readin, please be civil and reasonable. I have put my proposal there since 3 October 2008 and plenty of time was afforded to you in good faith so you could respond. Regrettably, you chose not to directly respond to my proposal and proceeded with a line of argument based on native languages.

It is unreasonable when you chose not to respond directly to my proposal then decide to have problems with it now.

Readin said:-

If we're not going to use a source, then we shouldn't put in speculative statements.

I explained at length twice why there are no speculative claims or figures in the statements I put up. You didn't respond to my reason. I have put the statement back since there were no objections against it until you just now, and the fact you chose not to respond to my reasons implied that you didn't object to it either. I think any reasonable person acting in good faith would have assumed that.

Please tell us the reasons why the statements are speculative.

Readin said:-

In particular, given that "Taiwanese" is the more commonly used term, it makes no sense to list "Chinese" first. It should be noted that "Taiwanese" is the common term and "Chinese" is less common.

I stated "Chinese or Taiwanese" in my proposal. You again didn't respond to it and choose to have issues with it now. In the interest of avoiding edit war, I would accept "Taiwanese or Chinese" if you accept the explaning statements (provided other editors also agree). Please let us have an answer by 3am 10 October 2008 (UTC).

Readin said:-

Since we can't agree, we shouldn't have anything until we have a source of high enough standards to satisfy all of us. A high standard has been set in rejecting TVBS in favor of nothing. A high standard - one that includes avoiding biased sources such as offical KMT run agencies or other government agencies with reasons to please the KMT or PRC, will need to be met for us to put something back in.

I disagree. The fact that the people in Taiwan identify themselves as "Taiwanese", "Chinese" or both is common knowledge and no one objects to it (including yourself). Would you need a footnote to tell you that the citizens of the USA are called Americans? If you don't, neither do the citizens of the Republic of China.

You just wanted to assert speculative figures when it is clearly prohibited by the policy I cited above. In other words, the policy doesn't allow you to say which one is more and which one is less. Again, since there is consensus with having both "Chinese and Taiwanese", I have put them back.

Also, the following changes in the statement are not agreeable:-

from "Government organisations to Taipei; jurisdiction limited to Taiwan" to "Government organisations to Taipei; recently aquired jurisdiction limited to Taiwan"

You previously have agreed to the original wording (and implied consensus). I don't think it is reasonable that you change it unilaterally without discussing here first.

In the interest of not having an edit war, I repeat my invitation that for you to discuss your reasons here before making changes. If you do not agree with my invitation, I propose that we seek administrative intervention. In that event, I will let the administrator know of your strong DPP support and Taiwan independence support and I will seek a decision for you to be discharged from editing the section in question, due to Conflict of Interest.--pyl (talk) 03:41, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

FWIW, administrative action is designed to go after disruptive behavior, not content disputes. Let's all assume good faith (at least until proven otherwise), shall we? Ngchen (talk) 04:34, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I assume good faith. I think you can see that from what I do the whole way. I gave Readin plenty of time to respond and to consider my proposal, but it was ignored. I constantly said we should discuss here before making edits so we don't have an edit war, but that was also ignored.

If you read the section relating to Conflict of Interest, you will see the reasons why I cited it. I was being civil and reasonable by telling Readin that it may be a factor to consider so s/he can think about the potential violations of Wikipedia's rules properly before taking any action.

I am happy to discuss any proposals that Readin has, but I don't think it is appropriate to unilaterially edit the disputed sections without discussing here. If Readin decides to have edit wars and not to discuss here, then I think the only choice we can take is to ask for administrative intervention--pyl (talk) 05:05, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Pyl, I do not have enough free time to meet your timetables and arbitrary deadlines.

That I did not dispute a particular wording in one context does not imply that the wording remains ok in a changed context. The fact that the ROC almost completely changed its governed territory in moving from China to Taiwan is just as relevant to its founding as the movement of the capital from Taipei.

With regard to the problems between Taiwan and China, it is difficult to find reliable sources. Those sources normally considered most reliable (government) tend to be the most biased in this situation. Even non-government commercial sources tend to be biased in favor of where they can make money. In that past that meant they agreed with the KMT. More recently there is more of a bias in favor of the CPC. To deal with this, we have previously used the best non-biased reliable sources we can find, as well as at times simple common knowledge, to fill in information that is otherwise difficult to document. The TVBS surveys fit into "best non-biased reliable sources we can find". They are certainly a better source than simply stating what we think we know. Getting rid of the sourced information sets a precedent for requiring a higher standard in our reliable sources than we have previously had. You didn't claim the source was wrong, just that it wasn't reliable enough. The information was not only sourced, but it fit with general knowledge. If we are to set our standard so high, then we have to expect that information that doesn't have a similar high standard will need to be removed. We had been bending Wikipedia policies about sourcing before, but we if are to set a high standard then we need to use that high standard rather than selectively applying it to replace sourced information with our own speculation. Readin (talk) 14:50, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Am I missing something here? You can dispute the percentages, and indeed polls in Taiwan are often whack, but ask any Taiwanese on the street and they won't dispute that both labels are used, albeit not universally. The point is not about the percentages, but that both labels are used. This is common knowledge and common sense. I don't get why this is being disputed.--Jiang (talk) 15:32, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

As I noted previously, I do not have a problem with using TVBS as a source. However, there is an OR issue with taking the results of the survey, and claiming that it is "the truth" w/r/t the demonym, since it's not universally accepted that self-identity=correct demonym. You bring up common knowledge; well, it's common knowledge that the people on the island are split into the blue and green camps, and that green people tend to consider themselves "Taiwanese" (almost exclusively, at least in a nationalistic sense.) The blue people tend to consider themselves "Taiwanese and/or Chinese," again in a nationalistic sense. I agree with Jiang and Pyl that that previous version is reasonable. Ngchen (talk) 15:38, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I will relent on this mainly because I consider Ngchen an unbiased arbiter. According to both survey and apparantly more importantly common knowledge, Taiwanese is the more common term so I will list it first. I assume there will be no objection to "Taiwanese or Chinese" instead of "Chinese or Taiwanese". Readin (talk) 15:47, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I can stand whatever order you put for the "Taiwanese or Chinese" or "Chinese or Taiwanese", as long as you put in a footnote explaining the challenges of the 2 sides. Also, I don't think just useing TVBS is fair, you can't just rely on one source, you've to rely on multiple sources; so if you want to insert these statistics in, you've to stick in multiple sources. Different sources say different things, and none of them are 100% accurate. It's not like they asked all the 23 million people what they call themselves. They only do it out of like 100, 1000, or 10000. It rarely gets higher than 50000, since it gets too complicated, meaning you're only at most asking 50000 people out of the 23 million, which is not very accurate if you think about the ratio. To make a long story short, you cannot take statistics like these for a fact, you can only merely state the statistics, but not enforce or interpret them. Interpreting's the one thing I hate the most, I make my theories and assumptions by hard fact, rarely do I use statistics like these, but if I am to use statistics like these, I tend to make my theories vague and general, to keep it as accurate as possible without having errors. It's like significant figures in Science, you can only take your calculations and measurements to so many digits or decimal places. You don't have enough, it's not as accurate as it can be. If you have too much, than it's not accurate at all and will be considered a big error and sometimes disregarded. Liu Tao (talk) 19:27, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Someone speculated that the two names results from the complex political situation. But do we know? Maybe its mostly simple ancestry. Some people have living ancestors from China, some don't. Perhaps some consider their ancestors birthplace important to what they are, while others don't. For those who believe they have ancestors from China some hundreds of years ago, some may consider that important to their identity while others don't. When people outside of Taiwan talk about the Taiwanese, people may similarly have different views about the importance of ancestry.

There is the complex political situation that is probably a factor, but is it the only factor? How much speculation should we engage in to write why people from Taiwan are usually called "Taiwanese" but sometimes are called "Chinese"? Readin (talk) 21:21, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

I think if you re-read the "political status of Taiwan" article, all your questions above would have been answered, incl ancestry etc.--pyl (talk) 02:57, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Great! If that article has the information you should have no problem finding the same sources they used (if the information is reliable they must have sourced it) and copying them here. Having reliable sources will solve the problem of speculation. Readin (talk) 03:27, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, Readin does have a point. It's actually both ways when you think about it. Some people call themselves "Chinese" for political reasons, and some for heritage reasons. I call myself "Chinese" because of my heritage, pride, and because it's what that makes sense to me (I've stated my reasons multiple times above). Also,there are some pro-blues who don't refer to themselves as "Chinese" at all, primarily speaking the younger generation. I personally have some friends who are like that and I stopped socialising with. There are some "Taiwanese" people who refers to themselves as "Chinese". My mother and most of her side of the family are like that. My grandmother is the same, and she's a Taiwanese native (She's from the Taiya natives). So it's really both ways, it's not entirely political, nor is it entirely ancestral. As for explanations, they'll just have to search it themselves, as ply indicated that the political reasons are on Taiwan politics page. I still think that we should open up another topic on the RoC page to explain about the demonym conflicts and challenges. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Liu Tao (talk • contribs) 03:36, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Cultural and heritage issues are in that political status of Taiwan article too.--pyl (talk) 04:30, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

(out dent for easier reading) I find the suggestion ill-considered. Having a reference to the article does the job for informing readers, and there is no need copying contents. Having a Wikipedia article also solves the problem of speculation.

I see you putting back "Taiwanese or Chinese" citing common knowledge. The statements are common knowledge too, as agreed by everyone here other than yourself. It is curious that you agree with part of Ngchen's comments but not others.--pyl (talk) 03:45, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Hey, Readin was asking about the "Taiwanese or Chinese" stuff, I'm just answering him and giving examples. It's a force of habit, wrote too many small essays... Anyways, which part of Ngchen's comments? He has like 10 comments on this talk page. Besides, from what Readin said, Ngchen is a generally unbiased person, and if that is true, then there would be nothing wrong with agreeing Ngchen's comment (whatever that is). Liu Tao (talk) 03:53, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

If you object to having the explanatory comments, I must have misinterpreted what you said. I apologise. For your easier reading the explanatory comments say:-

"Due to the controversial political status of Taiwan, some people may refer to themselves as "Chinese" in addition to or in place of "Taiwanese", while others may refer to themselves as "Taiwanese" only. "

Ngchen said:-

As I noted previously, I do not have a problem with using TVBS as a source. However, there is an OR issue with taking the results of the survey, and claiming that it is "the truth" w/r/t the demonym, since it's not universally accepted that self-identity=correct demonym. You bring up common knowledge; well, it's common knowledge that the people on the island are split into the blue and green camps, and that green people tend to consider themselves "Taiwanese" (almost exclusively, at least in a nationalistic sense.) The blue people tend to consider themselves "Taiwanese and/or Chinese," again in a nationalistic sense. I agree with Jiang and Pyl that that previous version is reasonable.

Readin then said by way of responding:-

I will relent on this mainly because I consider Ngchen an unbiased arbiter. According to both survey and apparantly more importantly common knowledge, Taiwanese is the more common term so I will list it first. I assume there will be no objection to "Taiwanese or Chinese" instead of "Chinese or Taiwanese". Readin (talk) 15:47, 9 October 2008 (UTC)"

You see that Readin agrees with one part but not the other? Ngchen said the explanatory comments are ok too.--pyl (talk) 04:26, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

FWIW, the explanatory note, on a second thought, is probably true; however, THAT does seem ORish w/o a source to back it up. Ngchen (talk) 04:30, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

That's fine. I think we can leave the version as is. I don't think there is any need to explain the common knowledge that the people in the ROC are "Taiwanese or Chinese". I just object to the figures being used to say which one is more and which one is less, as it is clearly not allowed by Wikipedia.--pyl (talk) 04:37, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Demonym No 3

Thanks for the discussion, Readin. I think it would be much more productive for everyone if we can stick with this talk page until some resolution is found so we can avoid the unproductive and uncivl edit wars.

The time to respond wasn't unreasonable. It was 5 days. If you needed more time to respond, I would have been happy if you could say that earlier. I don't think it was reasonable to avoid responding to my proposal altogether then complaining about it afterwards.

Regarding Taiwan as a "recently acquired" ROC territory, I think the point you wanted to make is already made in the first paragraph of the article. I don't see an urgent reason why this point must be made on the side table when there isn't much space to elaborate. That extra information would just confuse common readers.

The footnote was unreliable. I was happy to leave the footnote for the "interesting to know" factor as long as no claims were made about which one is more or which one is less on the table. You simply just ignored my plea and proceeded with adding "Taiwanese, or less commonly Chinese". As I pointed out in my challenges, it is clearly not allowed in Wikipedia to make interpretive claims based on a survey.

The demonym of "Chinese or Taiwanese" is common knowledge. As I said there is no speculative claim in the current explanatory statements. The "political status of Taiwan" article certainly explains why the demonym is "Chinese or Taiwanese". Therefore, there is no need for a footnote for it. If you do not agree with me, I am happy to get it sorted in the "no original research board".--pyl (talk) 15:17, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the discussion, Readin. I think it would be much more productive for everyone if we can stick with this talk page until some resolution is found so we can avoid the unproductive and uncivl edit wars. Until we reach consensus I'll remove both disputed entries (the earlier one that you removed and the more recent one that I've removed). Readin (talk) 15:37, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

establishing events

Why is the movement of the capital from mainland China to Taiwan significant? I believe it is significant because it played a role in establishing the RoC in/on Taiwan. If that is the consensus, then it is even more significant that Taiwan came under RoC control (however you want to say it: "occupied", "taken over", "acquired", "lovingly embraced").

If we are only to have one, it should be the acquisition of Taiwan. To leave out that acquisition while including the movement of the capital is misleading as it implies something by omission.

The RoC was formally established in 1912. If we are to say more we should not selectively leave out significant events. Readin (talk) 03:51, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't object to you removing the two Taiwan comments altogether. I don't consider them as important as the remaining two. These two are the true establishing events.--pyl (talk) 04:02, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Pinyin

I notice the article says Jhonghua. This is terrible! It should be Zhonghua! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.242.85.107 (talk) 19:37, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

How Taiwan came under ROC control is not nearly as significant. From ROC's point of view, as well as the POV agreed by everybody except for one pro-Taiwan-independence interpretation, Taiwan was returned to China as Japan was defeated in WWII. The end of the WWII is certainly significant, but the return of Taiwan was one detail on the list of war-end events -- no one yet could have forseen the importance Taiwan was to play in the near future. The move of capital from China to Taiwan on the other hand is obviously a significant event in ROC's history because fundamentally transformed ROC's position. The same cannot be said for the return of Taiwan. Gaining control over Taiwan simply was not an event that changed ROC in any profound way. Indeed it didn't even change Taiwan all that much. Real change, and real historical significance would come with the move. o (talk) 04:15, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

redirecting "China" to the "PRC"

There is a discussion going on here.--pyl (talk) 05:20, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Add Forms of Government template

Hi, I think the Forms of Government template is quite appropriate on the article. Arilang ^talk 20:35, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Someone removed the Forms of Government template, I shall put it back, because People's Republic of China has the same template, why not Republic of China? Arilang ^talk 15:22, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Date format

{{Editsemiprotected}}

The infobox states:
> Date formats yyyy-mm-dd
> or yyyy年m月d日
> (CE; CE+2697)

Please add CE-1911 to that list. It is commonly used (with the date format 民國y年m月d日). (212.247.11.156 (talk) 20:47, 17 December 2008 (UTC))

 Doing... Very true. I know the Chinese name for the system, but what is the English name? Leujohn ^(talk) 13:09, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

年号 redirects to Regnal year, but there's no emperor (or king) for this era. But since there's an article about the Minguo calendar, maybe it's better to just refer to that article. (212.247.11.156 (talk) 20:55, 19 December 2008 (UTC))

 Done Leujohn ^(talk) 06:34, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Call to reform "Note 2: Please do not add Hanyu Pinyin to the infobox"

Hanyu Pinyin is now the legal standard in the ROC (Taiwan)... Check the Hanyu Pinyin article... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gumuhua (talk • contribs) 23:22, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Id like to propose the following: We should differentiate between:

A) Country level institutions and country level agencies: Hanyu Pinyin (Zhonhua Minguo)

B) County level institutions and agencies: case by case: so far, only the municipalities of Taibei City, Xinzhu City and Jinmen County use Hanyu Pinyin. The rest will make the switch in an undetermined future.

If u need/want some sourcing for this, please ask me to copy the URL here... Cheers —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gumuhua (talk • contribs) 23:29, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

The infobox looks like it only has room for one romanization. Because this article is about the ROC, the romanization should be the one used by the ROC. For other places, such as the introductory sentence in the first paragraph, all romanizations in signficant use should be given. Right now the article seems fine. Readin (talk) 00:30, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

• The infobox should show the official romanization system used.. since 01-01-2009 it is Hanyu Pinyin.. My proposition is to drop tongyong, write just Hanyu. Gumuhua (talk) 18:55, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

The official romanisation used by the ROC is tongyong. We use whatever's official, so tongyong should be the one used. Hanyu is NOT used by the ROC in official romanisations, I don't see at all how it should be used to replace the Tongyong or even the Wales-giles romanisations already used to romanise names of places and other proper nouns of the ROC. Liu Tao (talk) 23:00, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

The official romanisation used by the ROC is tongyong. FALSE... READ THE HANYU PINYIN ARTICLE... THERE R SOURCES IN THERE...Gumuhua (talk) 20:18, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I believe Gumuhua is correct. If I recall correctly, as part of Ma Ying-jeou's attempts to make Taiwan part of China, one of his first acts as president was to schedule for China's Pinyin system to become Taiwan's Pinyin system early this year. This was in contrast to the previous president's attempts to emphasize Taiwan's continuing independence by continuing to use a romanization systems that differ from those used in China.Readin (talk) 20:37, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

one of his first acts as president: NOPE, he was elected in march, 中文譯音使用原則 was submitted to the executive yuan during september...

Partial POV, but as long as u acknowledge that it is official.. ok... Id like to remind u that Ma Yingjiu is President because he was elected, the same way Chen Shuibian has been president, because he was elected...

It seems that only U and I r interested in the ROC (Taiwan)... where r the other contributors?

Gumuhua (talk) 21:36, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Getting off topic but minor point. Chen was elected by promising to maintain Taiwan's independence and seek recognition for it. He did so even if not always successfully on the latter point. Ma was elected by saying Taiwan enjoys sovereignty but once elected began describing Taiwan as a "region" with non-state-to-state relations with China. So at least on this topic, the election was not quite the same. Readin (talk) 21:55, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Its up to the citizens of the Republic of China (Free Area) to elect their president and legislators... We can like em or not, but our POV's aint gonna change the reality... Gumuhua (talk) 22:29, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, it's only POV because China has adopted a flat-earth and lunar landing was faked approach to recognition of neighboring countries. Readin (talk) 23:23, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Opening sentence

I love how the opening sentence captures the tragic irony of the ROC's status. 58.178.53.125 (talk) 00:58, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Linguistics infobox, country infobox:

Hello there:

Is any policy or guideline regarding the possition of the lingustics infobox below the country infobox? Gumuhua (talk) 12:12, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I think it's supposed to be below, not at the top. It looks wierd. Change it back like the way the other articles are. Liu Tao (talk) 01:24, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

education

The article states that Taiwan has a 22 year education system, but then only lists 16 years (elementary school, middle school, high school and college). Is the original wrong, or is there another 8 years for something else? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.67.160.112 (talk) 13:35, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Dubious

I marked this sentence about the education system "dubious": "The system includes six years of elementary school, three years of middle school, three years of high school, and four years of college." I did so for two reasons. First, I know someone who was educated in Taiwan and did not follow that system. She attended a sort of junior college that began while, according to the sentence above, she would have still been in high school. The second reason I marked it dubious is that I wonder if colleges are considered part of the national education system. There is no reference given to say one way or the other. Please provide some evidence and/or explanations. Readin (talk) 18:40, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

excuse me, that was the system my parents went through in republic of china. so shut your mouth if you havent even set foot on taiwan. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.107.72.153 (talk) 20:36, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

referencing PRC and ROC

I am not up to date on the Wikipedia style for referring to these related countries. Could an expert please take a look at this diff[1] and fix the reference, or not if it is correct as is, to conform with the correct Wikipedia style? Thanks. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:43, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

The issue is fixed--pyl (talk) 17:56, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Capital city in the infobox

I replaced a secondary source newspaper with information from the ROC GIO. Newspapers are not more reliable than the government themselves. I chose a 2003 Yearbook because the quote was the most explicit. Ma's incoming GIO wrote a new yearbook for 2008 which also says Taipei (http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/island/). The GIO never mentions Nanjing, and neither do any other ROC government sources. Unless the long-standing claim that Nanjing is still the "official" capital can be sourced to recent government statements or existing relevant legislation it should not be in the infobox, but the claim, not as fact, could be discussed as prose in the text. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

I oppose classifying Taiwan as a country

The status of the region has not been clear yet. It seems the mainstream opinion in current international politics is to consider the region a special part of the country of People's Republic of China (PRC), in part due to the strong stance of the Communist Party of PRC. Therefore, I object classifying the region as an independent country before its status becomes finally established.

We're not classifying Taiwan as a Country. We're classifying the ROC (Republic of China) as a Country. Taiwan in Wikipedia is classified as 3 things, the island, the province of the ROC, and the province of the PRC. Liu Tao (talk) 01:48, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

We should be classifying Taiwan as a country (and as an island and an administrative province of the ROC). We should be classifying ROC as a "state". Readin (talk) 02:00, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The definition of a Country is that it's the territory of a State. Political Scientists don't use the term 'country' at all, they use 'state'. But if you do want to use the term, it should denote the territory of a state. Taiwan is not the equivilant to the territory of the ROC, as the ROC does not contain just Taiwan, therefore Taiwan cannot be deemed as a 'country'. Liu Tao (talk) 03:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

The definition of a Country is that it's the territory of a State. That is only one definition. In any case, the fact that a state has more territory doesn't prevent its usage. The French Republic has more territory than just France. The Empire of Japan controls more territory than just Japan. None of these facts prevent Japan or France from being described as a "country" or even from commonly using "Japan" and "France" as the common names for the states, just as "Taiwan" is commonly used for the "Republic of China". Due to political sensitivies of people who wish to annex Taiwan to China, we generally use "Republic of China" for the state in places where for other states we would use the common name. But it is one thing to change how we refer to something. It is quite another to pretend that definitions don't exist or don't apply. Readin (talk) 22:14, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Country denotes territory, that's how it is. Even if you want to use Country synonymously as state, you still can't call Taiwan as a country, since Taiwan is not sovereign. Taiwan is part of the Republic of China. It's true that "Taiwan" is commonly used for "Republic of China", but that would be technically incorrect. Taiwan is not the same as the "Republic of China". Taiwan is a province OF the ROC. Either that or it's an island of the ROC, depending on how you look at it. It doesn't matter how people refer to things, people talk in slang all the time, it's a habit of theirs, but do they write their papers and essays in slang? No they do not. I do things based on what is and what's not. Something either is or is not, I don't care about people's habits. This is an encyclopedia, what's "official" is official, what's is is is, what's not is not. Liu Tao (talk) 23:47, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

POV hat note

{{dablink|The Republic of China was commonly known as "China" or "Nationalist China" until the 1970s when it has since been commonly known as "Taiwan".<ref>[http://www.gio.gov.tw/ Government Information Office, Republic of China (Taiwan)]</ref> For a topic outline on this subject, see [[Topic outline of Taiwan]].}}

When I first saw the hat note, I believe it grossly violates NPOV, so removed it. Both ROC and PRC claim the opponent's territory, so if I can find a similar hat note on to of the PRC article, this is quite contradictory to each other. In fact, regardless of what Taiwanese think, people outside ROC thinks that China in present (even before 1970) refers to the PRC with the huge territory or ancient China before the revolution. Besides, the source is from ROC government not from English-speaking world or Western or even neighboring countries. However, unfortunately, Liu Tao (talk · contribs) reverted my edit[2] Any thought?--Caspian blue 22:04, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Actually, that is partially false. Before 1971, the Republic of China was internationally recognized as "China". The term "Nationalist China" was still widely used outside of the Greater China region until the 1990s. nat.utoronto 23:31, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the input (a citation is needed though), perhaps what I know about the matter is not correct but should the content be addressed at the far to of the article? It gives a biased view and wonder. Besides, the source is still a problem.--Caspian blue 00:09, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

A source? Why do you need a source? These things are the obvious and common sense. There's no "source" for this. Go ahead and ask people in the previous 2 generations and see what they tell you. As for before 1971 stuff, that has hard evidence for it. The ROC was one of the UN security members as China until 1971 when we were replaced by the PRC, therefore the UN "recognised" the ROC as "China" before 1971. Also, as a rule, I take sources that are written OF the language of the culture/civilisation as more exact then those written of other languages. History books about China written by foreigners who speaks no Chinese have an ultimate flaw, which is the lack of first hand sources and knowlege. Everything they've learned are translated or based on assumptions. Some of them have never been to China, let alone know of the cultures and stuff. As far as I know, the ROC government site is a government site, it is as official and "true" as it's gonna get. The stuff is officially endorsed by the government, to say that it is biased would be controversial, which is something Wikipedia does not support. Also, how do you know if something is biased? You read it and see if it is an opinion or a fact. If it's an opinion, then it's biased, if not, then it's not.

I don't care what people in the present "think". I don't even care what people in the past "think". Something either is, or is not, it's that simple. As for what the people do think in the present, that's not true. The ROC is still recognised by 23 nations, and most of them recognise it as the 1 and only China. Also, only ignorant people think that China is either the PRC or Ancient/Imperial China. Ask someone who learned their history correctly and they'll tell you that it was the ROC that overthrew the Qing in 1911. People are not all as ignorant as you think they are. Liu Tao (talk) 01:55, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmm.. what you know may not be equal to what other people think and know. Making personal attacks is not to make you plausible. As you insist, "the conception about China" is so obvious to everyone, why the hat note has to be referenced? As you said, sourcing for hat note is not usual, so you or someone who inserted the hat note might think that the description is easily objectifiable by editors? This is an encyclopedia written for anyone who can read English, so what other people besides Taiwanese think matters a lot to describe the relationship and history of "China". I've raised the POV issue and sourcing to make the article to be neutral.--Caspian blue 02:18, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

P.S I figure out who altered the hat note[3] from this neutral description; The "Republic of China" has been commonly known as "Taiwan" since the 1970s..--Caspian blue 02:38, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, got a bit carried away. Anyways, stuff like that is hard to cite. It is common knowledge, as I've said, if you don't believe me ask people who live pre-1971. Unless your grandparents are dead and you don't have any seniors anywhere near where you live, you shouldn't really have a problem with it. If you really want citations, watch documentaries, news clips, and other stuff that talks about China from pre-1971. There's plenty on Youtube. There might be some from between 1971 and 1979, but they tend to call the ROC "China" rarer then those from before 1971. There are also Newspaper articles, textbooks, and other stuff from before 1971 you can check out. Newspaper articles are real easy to find in the Libraries. Look, there's no straight up "citations". These kinds of things you can only determine for yourself by accumulating evidence. Read old books, newspapers, watch old news recordings, documentaries, look at old maps, and ask people who were alive back then. I'm not talking from the point of view of a Chinese person, I'm talking from the point of view of foreigners, particularly speaking Americans. Encyclopedias aren't written so they are "in par" with what the people think. Encyclopedias are books/servers that contains facts. What is is is, what's not is not. Go to your local library and pull out an encyclopedia, sit down, and read it. Don't tell me you don't have the time, cause if you have the time to debate with me, then you better have the time, because you're gonna read it. I read encyclopedias and resource books all the time, as well as analyse articles to see what's biased or not. If the statement is opinionated, it's biased, if it's not, it's not. That's how you determine if something is biased or not. You don't tell by seeing if the fact supports a certain point of view or not, that's not how it works. Points of views are formed because of these facts, not the other way around. Liu Tao (talk) 02:43, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Obviously you're more knowledgeable of this matter, so you finding sources seems to be much easier than me. I think we can bring this issue to WikiProject China or Taiwan.--03:02, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not saying I'm more knowledgeable. This isn't a debate about who knows more, it's a debate about who's way of thinking and doing things are right. I think my way is correct and your way is wrong and vice versa for you. Sorry if I was being so aggressive and stuff. Didn't mean for it to happen. I think we should bring this issue to Wikiproject Taiwan, but not Wikiproject China. This issue is specifically talking about the ROC, it does not bring the PRC directly into this issue. We're talking about what the ROC was called before 1971, not what the PRC was called. Liu Tao (talk) 03:30, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Wherever you want to take it to, I just need broader opinions from more editors.--Caspian blue 03:42, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest that you both leave the article be until consensus is reached. Edit Warring is an unacceptable behaviour. Discussion, not reverting. Regards, nat.utoronto 02:48, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

When editing sensitive issues, building a consensus is always ideal. However, both I and Liu Tao reverted only one time, and immediately started discussing on the matter with each other. So well, your suggestion is a bit stale and does not fit in this situation.--Caspian blue 02:57, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Old airport?

What was the name of the old airport at Taipei? I landed there once in 1978, on my way to Manila. It was surrounded by buildings and had a very short runway, much like the old Kai Tak airport in Hong Kong. Both were extremely nasty places to land a big jetliner. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bizzybody (talk • contribs) 07:20, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Taipei Songshan Airport ? — ASDFGH =] ^talk? 21:06, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

"De facto" capital?

Wikipedia seems to be the only place where Taipei is not just the capital of Taiwan but the "de facto" capital of Taiwan. Although it's true that no documents from the ROC government seem to mention what is the capital, there are plenty of reliable sources, including the CIA Factbook and Times articles, which say that Tapei is the capital of Taiwan. So, could someone please provide a source for this "de facto"? If there are none, I suggest to simply remove it. Regards. Laurent (talk) 09:59, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Taipei is the Capital of the ROC, not Taiwan. Jhongshing is the capital of Taiwan. Anyways, as for de fact or not, it's contested between people, some claim it's de facto, whilst others claim it's proclaimed the new permanent capital of the ROC. If you want to know how Taipei became the capital, it became the capital post-1949 when mainland was lost and Taipei was proclaimed the provisional capital of the ROC until mainland is taken back. But we can't find any sources pertaining to if Taipei is still a provisional capital or has it been declared as the new permanent capital. The old source originally used has since been deleted, so we cannot use it anymore. However, I have been notified by a fellow editor who claims he recieved some kind of mail message from the ROC government that the capital is Nanjing, not Taipei. I have not brought this up because he can't procure an actual copy of the mail for everyone to see (He copied and pasted the message and sent it to me). Liu Tao (talk) 22:54, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

A mail message from Taiwan governement wouldn't be acceptable if it's not published by a newspaper or directly by Taiwan. However, I can find you tenth of reliable sources, which say that Tapei is the capital of Taiwan, and at no time would they append a "de facto" to the name. The capital is Tapei and there's no reason to confuse readers with this "de facto". Again, if nobody can provide any source for it, I'm going to remove it. Laurent (talk) 08:29, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Here is a page from the GIO website where Tapei is refered twice as the capital of Taiwan: http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/yearbook/ch19.html Laurent (talk) 14:24, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

It USED to be the capital, but nevertheless, it was still a capital. As for the capital of the ROC, it doesn't say if it's permanent or not. It just says "capital", nothing to indicate it is the official capital or anything. Liu Tao (talk) 14:27, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

The China Post also calls Taipei "Taiwan's capital", and refers to Nanjing as a "Chinese [city]". I'm sorry but that's the fourth reliable source - from three different countries - that I provide. What else do you need? Laurent (talk) 19:19, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

de facto means what is in fact occurring regardless of what should be occurring, what is legally defined as occurring, or what anyone says is occuring.

de jure means what is in name, or what is legally defined.

We should be ableo to at least agree that Taipei is acting as the capital of the ROC regardless of what the ROC Constitution legally defines as the capital. All five Yuans meet in Taipei. Foreign dignitaries are received in Taipei. Newspaper reports in talking about ROC relations with other countries often use "Taipei" as shorthand for the ROC. The placement of "Taipei (de facto)" in the infobox should not be a problem.

The issue that remains is whether to also include Nanjing and if so, how to include it, and whether or not the "de facto" next to "Taipei" needs to stay. Those are legitimate questions. My inclination at first was that Nanjing is in fact the de jure capital, but I haven't yet seen documents to prove it (and no, the letter doesn't count).

This isn't an NPOV issue. It is simply a matter of finding verifiable reliable sources. Until we have reliable sources that say one way or the other what the current de jure capital is, we should keep "Taipei (de facto).

If we find reliable sources that say Taipei is also the de jure capital we can drop the "de facto". If we find reliable sources that say Nanjing is the de jure capital, we can say "Nanjing (de jure), Taipei (de factor)" We can say whatever makes sense once we have reliable sources. But until we have such sources, we should avoid saying what the current de jure capital is. We can either leave it as it is currently ("Taipei (de facto) Nanjing (1934-1949)") or we can simply say "Taipei (de facto)". Saying anything that differs from reliable sources or saying anything that is not supported by reliable sources is not acceptable.

Stop edit warring and go do some research. Readin (talk) 15:20, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Ummm, we got a letter in response of the issue from the ROC government, are you saying that the ROC government is so unreliable that they don't even know what their own capital is? Or are you saying that they are deliberately lying to throw us off track? I think the ROC government knows pretty well what the capital of the ROC is, they've already stated clearly, the official capital is Nanjing, but the location of government is Taipei. The centre of government can change all they want, but the capital never changes. Liu Tao (talk) 15:41, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

The problem is verifiability. There is a saying: "on the internet no one knows you're a dog" (from an old cartoon where a dog is using a computer). I have never met you. I don't know if you're a school teacher, a priest, a PRC agent, a doctor, a used car salesman, or an alien from Mars. I don't know if that letter was typed up by you or perhaps a friend of yours. I'm certainly not saying you're dishonest. I'm saying that as two anonymous users we have have no way of knowing whether each other are honest. Laurent has pointed you to WP:V. Have you read it? It really is critical to having a fruitful discussion.

"Wikipedia:Verifiability is one of Wikipedia's core content policies. The others are Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Jointly, these policies determine the type and quality of material that is acceptable in Wikipedia articles. They should not be interpreted in isolation from one another, and editors should familiarize themselves with all three. To discuss the reliability of particular sources, see the reliable sources noticeboard."

Readin (talk) 16:15, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Huang has agreed to forward the e-mail to anyone who does not believe him. I've receive the e-mail as well. And if you don't beleive him yourself, you could send an e-mail to the person yourself, the link for contacting the government was included. Here:

http://service.moi.gov.tw/ecss/bin/ite003q1.asp?IstrMid=010-98010307&IstrUnit=10009000&IstrType=2&mail=hyocean1989@aolchina.com

Hope you're happy now. Liu Tao (talk) 16:25, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm still leery of relying on an email. I've posted a query at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#A_repeatable_email. Readin (talk) 21:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Let me give you some tips for you to contact with the premier of ROC. The link Liu Tao mentioned is just a link to confirm my email has been handled by the goverment. Here is the link: http://www.ey.gov.tw/sp.asp?xdURL=mail/mail.asp&ctNode=99&mp=1

You can get approach to Premier's E_mail Correspondence Group Executive Yuan.( Pay attention to the "Yuan" here which means "院" not a person's family name .( And Executive Yuan means "行政院"，Ministry of Execution. "院" pronounces "yuan" in Chinese.)

And if you send the mail in a right way, you will get the answer in one week.( I sent it in 7th April and got the answer in 13th April.) Huang Sir (talk) 03:07, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Just passing by, thought I would add my thoughts. I would be surprised if an email was acceptable, if only because the information needs to be verifiable by an independent reader, not just agreed between the editors here. It's clear that can't be a satisfactory way forward. All of the sources quoted (CIA, Times, China Post) are independent and reliable, so the statement that Taipei is the capital is WP:V verifiable, which is all that counts. If people tell you it's a duck, it waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, then that is enough for wikipedia to think of it as a duck! If Nanjing was the capital I would expect more mentions, both in the press, and from the government's websites. Cheers, Bigger digger (talk) 11:32, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Denomyn no.4

Apparently the issue with the Demonym has been brought up again. Okay then, let's start from page 1, what is a Demonym? It's the term used to describe/represent the people of a certain area, whether it be something as small as a village or as large as a planet. So, what shall we do about this issue then? Lemme ask you a question, how come people of the Republic of China are not called "Chinese"? What, is it because that the only territory that they have left is virtually just Taiwan? Is it because of that they suddenly are no longer called "Chinese" but "Taiwanese"? Is it that? Then what about the small pieces of land that are NOT part of Taiwan, like Kinmen and Matsu? They're part of Fujian, what, you're saying they should be called "Taiwanese" as well? Wow... This is really some really nice logic, apparently it's so logical that I've failed to deduce it. Liu Tao (talk) 00:30, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

The logic and deducing would be Original Research. They are called "Taiwanese" because the ROC Government Information Office calls them "Taiwanese" and no one has claimed that the ROC GIO is not a reliable source for that information. Wikipedia is all about reliable sources and neutral point of view. If you haven't read the guides on those then you really should. Readin (talk) 02:13, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3GEe1Gt_Ls Listen to the announcers in the background, especially to what was said in English. "Here are the Cadets of the Chinese Army, They are the Rising Stars of the Chinese Army". I think I worded it wrong or something, but anyways, it's something like that, you happy? Liu Tao (talk) 02:22, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I believe Youtube is not a reliable source because there is no way to prove where the video came from and that it wasn't manipulated. Feel free to browse the wikipolicies and prove me wrong. As for what I think of the video, unfortunately I can't access it. The text sounds like something out of the 1950s or 1960s when the west tried to push the idea that the ROC was the real "China" for political reasons. Such propaganda would not be considered a reliable source for the current debate. Do you know when the video was made?

Obviously "Chinese" was the denomyn prior to 1949. Perhaps we should say "Taiwanese (current), Chinese (historical)" Readin (talk) 02:33, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh my god, yeah, now I bring up a source and you claim it's manipulated. I can say the same thing about your claim. When the video was made? I dunno, maybe it's 1999 like it says? Denomyn doesn't change for heaven's sake! There is also the Passports you may like to take a look and read. There's also the constitution, I mean c'mon?! Who do you think you are to discredit one's source? I've shown you a recording and you say it's been doctored. Either you accept my source or I'm finding a 3rd party to help out. Liu Tao (talk) 02:45, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

A website maintained by the ROC GIO is difficult for you or I some malicious person to manipulate. But anyone can post to Youtube. If you want you can ask at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard if youtube can be considered a reliable source. Have you read Wikipedia:Reliable_sources? Readin (talk) 03:46, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I checked, it's fine. It's a recording from a Television. Hey, if you want, you could try and find people who were at the parade. It's only 1999, it's not that long ago. And what, like 200000 people attended that parade? Anyways, this is getting nowhere, you want me to source everything while the things you want me to source are basically common sense. I'm finding a 3rd party to deal with this. Liu Tao (talk) 04:15, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Youtube has information about the reliability of youtube. Most of the comments are against considering youtube to be a reliable source. Readin (talk) 05:10, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

It depends on what kind of video it is, if the video cites where its information is coming from and stuff, it's somewhat "safe". It's primarily talking about the videos people make and post online. I'm talking about a recording of the Military Parade on October 10, 1991 by a news camera crew. The same thing aired on TV for heaven's sake. This is a recording, solid proof of what was used to refer to people of the ROC, and you're denying it's credibility? What do you want me to do, break into their TV station, steal the original recording, and send it to you? Yeah, you'd probably say I doctored the recording as well. I see through you now, any evidence I show you, you're just gonna deny it as credible or in this case, "old and outdated".

But hey, you want another source, I'll give you another source. The constitution itself, read it and see how many times you see the term "Chinese" being used. How many times you see the term "Taiwanese" being used? Only time it uses the term "Taiwanese" or actually, to be more accurately, "Taiwan", is when they talk about the Province, "The modifications of the functions, operations, and organization of the Taiwan Provincial Government may be specified by law." Hey, I didn't want to have to bring this latter part up, but you've forced me, I wanted to do a compromise and make it back to the way we decided it to be months ago bu no, you had to put this stuff back on the table to deal with, this time even going as far as claiming my sources are not "credible". Now I'm drawing out the Constitution and see how credible it is and how much you can claim that it can be "altered". Guess what, only the Legislature can change the Constitution, and they haven't done any changes to it since 2005. Sorry, if I point out the "Chinese" part, I've to point out the "Taiwanese" part as well. You forced me from taking a middle-ground stance to picking a side. Liu Tao (talk) 06:31, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

The bottom line here is that the governement of Taiwan (and plenty of other sources) calls Taiwanese people, well, "Taiwanese" and not "Chinese". You haven't been able to provide any reliable source for it, yet you keep reverting my changes and removing my two sources from the GIO website. YouTube is a self-published source like a blog and is therefore unacceptable. Also we are talking about the demonym here, i.e. "how are Taiwanese people called", not "how is the army called". Laurent (talk) 08:34, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

And there are also sources that calls Taiwanese people "Chinese" and not "Taiwanese". I have provided sources, there's the news recording of the double 10 military parade of 1991 and there's also the constitution. The "Chinese Army", what does that mean? "Chinese" here is the denomyn, not "Taiwanese". Also, there's the constitution that you have still yet to rebuff. Youtube is like a blog, but it is also like a database of videos and recordings. It's reliable if the source of the video is cited. If I'm correct, Part 4 of the video, at the end contains what's called "Credits". Also, if you were in Taiwan and happen to be watching a news channel on October 10, 1991, I think you would remember watching that exact same vid as well. Liu Tao (talk) 09:02, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't know about 1991 but right now the Taiwanese army is officially called Republic of China Army and not "Chinese Army". But actually it doesn't even matter how the army is called, since we are talking about the demonym, i.e. "how are Taiwanese people called", not "how are certain random things called". In Taiwan, there are plenty of french or italian restaurants, so if we follow your logic, should the demonym of Taiwan also be "Taiwanese, Chinese, French or Italian"? Sorry but this is absurd. Laurent (talk) 09:37, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I think we can agree that the ROC Constitution is a reliable source of the what the ROC Constitution calls the people of the ROC. I think we can also agree that the ROC Constitution represent, or at least represented, a notable POV. So if the ROC Constitution says the people of the ROC are called "Chinese", add a reference to the ROC Constitution when you include "Chinese" as a denomyn. Please provide a link in your reference (it surely exists online somewhere in English). Readin (talk) 09:42, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Excuse me, gentlemen. I think there exists another way to solve the problem. You can refer to the page http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%B8%AD%E8%8F%AF%E6%B0%91%E5%9C%8B . In this page, We have solve the collision by discussion. Besides, we have offered some reliable sources as the evidence. As far as I am concerned, you can read the page above, then make a decision.On the other hand, you can translate the page. Also, I can offer you an E-mail from the government of R.O.C. which I have sent to Liu Tao. And what written in the letter can be treated as the fact as well as the answer to all the question.Huang Sir (talk) 13:45, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Then could you please provide these reliable sources so that we can independently verify them? Thanks Laurent (talk) 14:05, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Laurent's edit to the article made me dig into the ROC Constitution to see what it says. He has a point that all usages of "Chinese" are to "Chinese citizens living abroad". However an argument could be made that this implies that citizens of the ROC are "Chinese" but that the term is only used explicitly in the context of "abroad" because all citizens at home are assumed to be "Chinese". In the strictest sense, such an argument would be WP:OR, but I'm not sure we need to be that strict for this.

Something to note, is article 3: "Article 3. Persons possessing the nationality of the Republic of China shall be citizens of the Republic of China. ". This suggests that maybe the ROC Constitution's POV is that the correct term is "citizens of the Republic of China".Readin (talk) 16:43, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

We are talking about denomyns, not citizenship. Anyways, here's another article. Read the first definition. And look, it's what that makes logical sense, you got a nation that's called "Republic of China", so what are their people called? The obvious is Chinese, I mean what more do you want? Liu Tao (talk) 16:58, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Seriously, if we want this discussion to go anywhere can you please read WP:V and in particular WP:SPS? Those are Wikipedia's policies with which the majority of editors agree. You keep quoting Wikis and other self-published sources like YouTube, which are not acceptable. Laurent (talk) 17:42, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

What more do you want from me? I verified my claims, I threw in a wiki article, the constitution, and even a recording, which all of you either discredited, twisted, or dismissed. That particular video DOES NOT belong to youtube, it's a recording of the Parade made by a TV News Station that they had broadcasted on TV. It's even got credits, someone just happened to upload it onto Youtube. Apparently you seem to have issues with understanding what a Demonym is as well. Here's the definition provided by the Wiki-article: "A demonym, also referred to as a gentilic, is a name for a resident of a locality which is derived from the name of the particular locality." What's the locality we're talking about? The Republic of China. How in the world do you derive "Taiwanese" from the name "Republic of China"? "Taiwanese" is the demonym for Taiwan, they demonym of the Republic of China is "Chinese". The demonym is derived FROM THE NAME OF THE LOCALITY. Also, read the Demonym article as well, I'm going to quote it directly, "Both the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China officially adhere to the One-China policy, use "Chinese" to describe their nationals, and refuse to have diplomatic relations with states that recognize the other." Liu Tao (talk) 19:26, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

3O

Youtube or your own interpretations of identity based on personal experience are not reliable, independent sources to verify this claim. This is a topic of extensive scholarly activity: [4] [5] [6] [7] Please use these assertions by these and similar sources to guide the discussion. Madcoverboy (talk) 16:17, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

And the scholar works aren't identified as well? You're saying that a scholar's intepretations weighs more then my interpretations? Also, those of which you speak of are "Self identifications", I'm not talking about Self Identifications, I'm talking about Demonyms, which is a name used to describe the people of a locality that is DERIVED FROM THE NAME OF THE LOCALITY. The Locality we're speaking of IS THE REPUBLIC OF CHINA, NOT TAIWAN, there's a difference, get over it. Ask a 2 year old and they can tell you what the denomyn of a nation called "China" is. Liu Tao (talk) 19:31, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

The threshold for inclusion on Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. It doesn't matter what you or I think, only what reliable sources state. Madcoverboy (talk) 20:31, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh my god, it's not what I think, it's what is. Okay, then you tell me, what is the Demonym for the Republic of China then? I'm not talking about what the people identify themselves as, I'm talking about what is the term that is derived from the name of the Republic of China to describe the people of the Republic of China. Obviously it's not Taiwanese as Taiwanese is not derived from the name of Republic of China. The ROC may refer to some of their citizens as of, but that doesn't mean it's the denomyn. I can call Americans Yankees, but does that mean that "Yankee" is the demonym of the United States? No, it's not. Liu Tao (talk) 21:59, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

You provided a link to Demonym and I followed it. The very first sentence reads (with my emphasis added "A demonym, also referred to as a gentilic, is a name for a resident of a locality which is derived from the name of the particular locality." Given that the "Republic of China" is a state, not a locality, I guess that eliminates terms coming from the name "Republic of China". (If the ROC were a locality, then the pre-1945 ROC and post-1949 ROC articles would need to be separated because they obviously cover different localities. But we don't separate them because we recognize the continuity of the state even as it moved from place to place.) Both "Chinese" and "Taiwanese" would appear to be eligible terms since both refer to a locality. One could argue that "Chinese" is ineligible because the ROC is no longer in China. Of course others would disagree saying that the ROC in China. We won't reach a consensus on that, but then that isn't our job. Our job is to look at reliable sources. If we can find a verifiable reliable source saying that a demonym for the ROC is "Chinese" then we should use it. I'm surprised that Eeeeeeeeew and Liu Tao haven't found a good one already. The ROC Constitution was a good idea, and I was frankly surprised that it didn't provide more explicit support. But I still think a little Google research will find something. Certainly the demonym for the ROC pre-1945 was "Chinese". We could probably put "Chinese (historical)" even if no one finds a source for modern usage. Readin (talk) 00:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Why is this section called "30"??? Readin (talk) 00:39, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm against putting "Chinese (historical)" because the infobox expect the current demonym and not the (possibly multiple) previous demonyms. I'm sure most countries have plenty of historical demonyms but they don't appear in the infobox, so they shouldn't appear here either. You bring a very good point that the demonym is "derived from the name of the particular locality", so in that case it should be "Taiwanese" and that's it. In the United Kingdom, people are not called the "kingdomese" but the British or Britons because they live in Great Britain. Laurent (talk) 08:26, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

We can't simply dismiss "Chinese" by reasoning that the ROC is not in China. Wikipedia respects all views, no matter how ludicrous, if those views are notable. There there are plenty of people (1 billion of them in the PRC) who would argue that Taiwan is part of China, and that therefor that any locality within Taiwan would also be in China. We can't simply ignore that POV. Readin (talk) 12:47, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

The issue is that they didn't provide any source for this claim. In France, people who live in Brittany often call themselves Breton and not French. However, it doesn't mean that we should change the demonym of France to "French" and "Breton". I'm entirely open to all POV but in the end it's not about POV it's about sources. However, it looks like Madcoverboy found a good source so this issue might be sorted out. Laurent (talk) 14:12, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh my god, a state IS a Locality. So is a province, a city, a county, a continent, and EVEN A PLANET. And we haven't found good ones? Are you kidding? I've thrown in MULTIPLE sources, each of which you dismissed. We are talking about the denomyn of the REPUBLIC OF CHINA, NOT TAIWAN, THE DENOMYN "TAIWANESE" IS DERIVED FROM THE NAME "TAIWAN", IT IS THE DENOMYN OF TAIWAN, NOT THE REPUBLIC OF CHINA. THE DENOMYN OF THE REPUBLIC OF CHINA IS "CHINESE" AS THAT IS WHAT THE DENOMYN OF ANY NATION CALLED "CHINA". DENOMYN IS DERIVED FROM THE NAME OF THE LOCALITY, THE LOCALITY IN QUESTION IS THE REPUBLIC OF CHINA, NOT TAIWAN, A STATE IS A LOCALITY, SO IS A PROVINCE, SO IS A COUNTY, SO IS A CITY, SO IS A TOWN, SO IS A VILLAGE, SO IS A DISTRICT, SO IS AN ISLAND, SO IS A CONTINENT, SO IS A PLANET, AND SO IS MANY MORE OTHER STUFF. IF THE ROC IS NOT A LOCALITY, THEN THAT MEANS THE ROC HAS NO DENOMYN, AND NEITHER DOES THE UNITED STATES, GREAT BRITAIN, HUNGARY, FRANCE, RUSSIA, MEXICO, CANADA, AUSTRALIA, INDIA, ISRAEL, IRAQ, IRAN, AND EVERY SINGLE OTHER STATE IN THE WORLD. THAT MEANS THE DENOMYN OF THE UNITED STATES IS NOT AMERICAN, BUT MARYLANDER, TEXAN, NEW YORKER, SOUTH/NORTH DAKOTAN, RHODE ISLANDER, HAWAIIAN, PUERTO RICAN, ALASKAN, AND EVERY OTHER TERRITORY/STATE/COMMONWEALTH OF THE UNITED STATES. Liu Tao (talk) 21:28, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually, "locality" is defined by Merriam-Webster as:

1  : the fact or condition of having a location in space or time 2  : a particular place, situation, or location

So in fact a state is not a locality. Taiwan is a location in the geographic sense. The Republic of China is a government. If it were a location, it would no longer be the same Republic of China that it was prior to 1945. So perhaps we shouldn't even list a demonym for the ROC. The ROC isn't like other states such as the French Republic and the Kingdom of Spain that have kept dominion always in the same location, and thus can with a little imprecision be treated as synonymous with their location. Readin (talk) 22:17, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh my god, a state is also a location as well as a state. A STATE POSSES TERRITORY, POPULATION, AND A SOVEREIGN GOVERNMENT. THOSE ARE THE REQUIREMENTS IN DETERMINING WHAT A STATE IS; A STATE CANNOT BE A STATE IF IT DOES NOT POSSESS TERRITORY. THE UNITED STATES WASN'T ALWAYS IN THE SAME POSITION, IT STARTED OUT AS JUST THE 13 COLONIES AND NOW IT CONTROLS 50 STATES PLUS OTHER TERRITORIES HERE AND THERE. BRITAIN WASN'T ALWAYS IN THE "SAME LOCATION" AS WELL, THE BRITISH ONCE CONTROLLED 1/4 OF THE WORLD'S POPULATION, HOW MUCH OF IT IS LEFT NOW? A government is a government, a location is a location, a population is a population, get those 3 items figuired out in your head. A state encompasses all of those, if it does not have just even one of them, it's not a state. The territory of the ROC is Taiwan, Kinmen, Matsu, and the other nearby islands. The Population is the 23 million people. The Government is the Government of the Republic of China. And last but not least, most important property of a state, is it sovereign? Is it sovereign as in is its government able to make and enforce their own laws without the intervention of a higher power? Yes. The ROC government passes and enforces their own laws without any other political ntities' permission, nor do other political entity have power over the ROC's government. Liu Tao (talk) 22:59, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

In fact, we could easily have one single article for both Republic of China and Taiwan, like the Encyclopaedia Britannica did, and organize the article like, for example, the Spain article - History, Geography, Government, etc. The fact that there are currently two different articles has more to do with politics (and likely pressures from various groups) than factual accuracy. Laurent (talk) 23:04, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Liu Tao is exactly right when he says A STATE POSSES TERRITORY.... I possess a car. Do I have a model name? No, but my car does. People don't have model names. The car or cars they possess do. A state possesses territory, but it is not territory.

The reason we have two articles instead of one is because of what I've been talking about. If you had a Kingdom of Spain article it would cover the same territory as the Spain article because it has always been in Spain. It may have grown or shrunk, but the core has always remained constant. The Republic of China spent the first 1/3 of its life in China, an the last 2/3 in Taiwan. The only part that has remained constant is the tiny islands of Kinmen and Matsu, which have never been considered the core territory of the state. Readin (talk) 23:17, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Can you refrain from saying "in China" and "in Taiwan"? By saying so, you are adhering to POV, and the only way to challenge that statement is by saying "Taiwan is a part of China". Anyways, as for your example, I can still attack it. Take a look at Britain, their core territory is England, but is their demonym English? No, English is the demonym for England. The demonym of Britain is still British or Briton. And core territory? What in the world is Core territory? Territory where the government is located? Okay, if that is so, then who says the core territory of the ROC is Taiwan? How come it's not the capital Taipei? What, does that mean suddenly the demonym of the ROC is now Taipeinese or something? My god, territory is territory, there is no such thing as "core territory". As for it being territory or not, well guess what, the territory of the ROC isn't Taiwan either, Taiwan is only PART of the ROC's territory. What you gonna say? Most of the territory is Taiwan? Okay, then take a look at the British Empire, they once controlled 1/4 of the world's population, and during that time, they were all 'British', but the British Isles is only a set of Islands off the coast of Continental Europe, then how come all of those people were called British then? You want to know what's the territory of the Republic of China? It's formal name is real simple, it's "Territory of the Republic of China", not Taiwan, not Kinmen, not Matsu, not Mainland, but the "Territory of the Republic of China". The ROC is as much as a state as it is a location. It HAS a location, and is a location in of itself. Liu Tao (talk) 23:39, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Can you refrain from saying "in China" and "in Taiwan"? By saying so, you are adhering to POV, and the only way to challenge that statement is by saying "Taiwan is a part of China". I don't know of any nuetral terms. The articles use "mainland China" to refer to China, but I don't believe that is neutral. However I've agreed with other editors that we use the term as a compromise. But "mainland China" in the context of Taiwan is confusing because it could imply that China is somehow Taiwan's mainland. So I just say China, like many so objective newspapers do when talking about Taiwan and China. Readin (talk) 14:03, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

"Mainland China" is a geographical area, it has no kind of political conotation to it. If you say Mainland and Taiwan, that's fine, since you are not saying China and Taiwan are both separate countries, nor are you saying that Taiwan is a part of China. By saying "China and Taiwan", you are saying that they are both of the same level meaning that they are both nations and that Taiwan is not a part of China. by saying "mainland and Taiwan", you are referring to 2 regions that do not contain each other. As for getting confused, there's nothing to be confused about. If someone is confused, then explain it to them. If you don't want to explain it to them, then link them an article to read. And as for the Newspapers, guess what, I don't care about the newspapers, many of them have strong POV in them, and half the things they say about Taiwan and China aren't even accurate. I care about what is, not what people think. And if you don't like it, well guess what, welcome to the world of technicalities and legalities. Liu Tao (talk) 15:01, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I see what you mean - things are never simple and straightforwards since most states don't have one single territory. However, here it's an encyclopedia, and sometime we need to use common sense and not pure logic. For example, France has territories all over the world, however nobody is going to split the France article into "France" and "French Republic" because everybody knows that the main territory of the French Republic is France. Everybody associate France to the French Republic. Likewise, the main territory of the ROC is Taiwan, therefore there should only be one article, which could start like that: "Taiwan, officially the Republic of China, is a self-governed island located in Asia" (if we can't call Taiwan a country, then we can definitely call it a self-governed island). This is the POV adopted by most people over the world. For example read the Times, Le Monde, El Mundo, the China Post, or any other major newspapers.

If the ROC started its existence in China then fine, we need to document it in the article. However its past shouldn't be a criterium to categorize the article (i.e. to give it a name). Laurent (talk) 00:10, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

You still don't understand what a demonym is. A demonym is DERIVED from the NAME of the locality. Taiwan is not self governed, the only political entity at the present with the name "Taiwan" is the province(s). And what do you mean "one single territory", how many times must I say that territories cannot be represented with nummerical numbers?! Territory is territory, it's either part of something or it's not, it's that simple. Who says Taiwan is a territory? Taiwan is a PIECE of territory. There's a large difference. The territory of the Republic of China doesn't include only Taiwan, it also include Kinmen and Matsu. The people on Kinmen and Matsu are NOT Taiwanese, as Kinmen and Matsu are NOT part of Taiwan. And as for common sense, yeah, I remember trying to use that earlier on and you guys dismissed it, saying that wikipedia doesn't support what's "should be", but what "is". Now I'm going what's "is" and you're trying to switch the stuff around. And the stuff about France? Apparently you've still failed to tell the difference between the Island and the Province. Reason why there is a Province article and an Island article is because they are TWO DIFFERENT ENTITIES. The Island article is about the Island named Taiwan. The only thing that's named France is the state that's name France. The territory of the ROC is NOT Taiwan, the territory of the ROC ENCOMPASSES Taiwan. The ROC also includes Kinmen and Matsu, how many times must I say that before you finally understand? And as for POV, guess what, too bad for them. Sure, everyone speaks slang, but does that mean it should be deemed as standard/proper english? I don't think so. Liu Tao (talk) 00:28, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

If you're going to be dealing with "technicalities and legalities" as you say above, then you cannot say there is such a thing as "the state that's name France". There is a state named "French Republic" (or "République française" to be precise). The state is usually called "France" because the most significant country (or "region" if you prefer) it controls is France. For the same reason, that state named "Republic of China" is usually called "Taiwan" because the most significant country (or "region" if you prefer) it controls is Taiwan. I realize that you disagree with much of what I'm saying. I disagree with some of what you say. We both have POV. And if we weren't convinced the other person were wrong, then we wouldn't have our own POV. And so we have to compromise. We don't compromise because we believe the other person might be right. We compromise because it is the only way to have peace and make a stable article. One method of compromise is what Wikipedia calls WP:NPOV. But sometimes there is no such thing and we have to compromise using the old-fashioned method of meeting each other half-way. On this specific issue of demonyms, we are compromising two ways. First, we are both editing Wikipedia so we are both willing to put aside our own knowledge and instead follow the rule of reliable sources. The second way is that you are willing to tolerate the inclusion of "Taiwanese" (backed by reliable sources) even though you think the demonym has to be based on the name "Republic of China", while at the same time I'm willing to tolerate the inclusion of "Chinese" (backed by reliable sources) even though the demonym is said to be based on location and the ROC is no longer in China (and yes I know you and some other people disagree). Is that acceptable? Readin (talk) 01:25, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

France is not a geographical entity, it's a political entity. Anyways, I've already said, the British Empire once controlled 1/4 of the world's population. During that time, all of those people were deemed "British". Why are they called British when the British Isles is only a set of Islands off the coast of mainland Europe? Would you care to explain why? And toleration? How can I tolerate something that is not "is"? Any bloke can see plain as day that "Taiwanese" is not derived from the name "Republic of China", therefore it cannot be the denomyn of the Republic of China. Also, the sources you've pulled out, all it did was call the people "Taiwanese", but does it say directly that the denomyn is Taiwanese? No. What does the term "Yankee" mean? It means Americans, but does it mean that it's the denomyn of the United States? No. Why? Because it is not derived from the name of the locality in question, the United States of America. "Taiwanese" is only the denomyn of people who are from localities named "Taiwan", and currently the only locality who's name is "Taiwan" is the Island and the Province. The state's name is "Republic of China", therefore the denomyn is the "Taiwanese", but "Chinese" because the name of the locality in question is "China", not "Taiwan". Now, unless you want to tell me that the name of the locality is "Taiwan", knock yourself out, cause it's not happening. I don't care if most of the current territory of the ROC is Taiwan, but there's still a difference, and make note of that difference cause that difference is a big one. The demonym of Taiwan is Taiwanese, and the demonym of China is Chinese, unless that's not correct, then stop arguing. Liu Tao (talk) 02:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Ok so now per your criteria France is no longer a "geographical entity" but a "political entity". So where is this entity located then? Somewhere floating in the air? I'm sorry but your posts are getting more and more abstract and confusing, and I don't even know where to start with when I read them. In my opinion, the problem with the demonym is that there shouldn't be a Republic of China article to begin with. It should be merged in the Taiwan article, per the (nearly) internationl consensus, and Taiwan should be identified as (for example) a "self governing island (de facto)". We can easily provide hundred of reliable sources where Taiwan and the ROC are used interchangeably, including the Times, China Post, etc. Obviously you don't agree with that, and I doubt we can reach a clear consensus, which is why I've started the mediation process. Hopefully, we'll manage to get somewhere that way. Regards, Laurent (talk) 10:06, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

The first paper I linked to above claims in the conclusion:

"The historical origins and current ramifications for Taiwanese Chinese were examined using a theory of double identity. Structurally, it was found that (1) 90% of those surveyed thought of themselves as both Chinese and Taiwanese."

Seems like a pretty airtight case for including both Chinese and Taiwanese. More cites on double identity: [8] [9] [10] Madcoverboy (talk) 13:58, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing these sources to the discussion. The conclusion you mentioned above is interesting and should probably go in the article as a comment on Taiwanese identity.

However, I'm not convinced the demonym becomes "Taiwanese or Chinese" just because people think of themselves as belonging to one group or the other. For example, many people in Romania think of themselves as Hungarian however there's no way the demonym could be "Romanian and Hungarian". Some may belong to the Hungarian ethnic group, may feel Hungarian, speak Hungarian and even be born in Hungary, but still - they are Romanian. That's my point - we get the demonym of the country we are in, not the one we choose.

So my suggestion would be to leave the demonym as "Taiwanese" AND add to the article some comments about Taiwanese identity. In particular, that some citizens of the ROC think of themselves as Chinese, and explain why based on the sources you've provided. Just a suggestion... Laurent (talk) 22:15, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

• Opinion Um, guys, as is pretty clear, you're stepping into a major political landmine here. Identity is at the heart of the Taiwan Strait dispute. I suggest leaving the demonym out, or noting that it's the subject of controversy, linking to the appropriate controversy, and leave well enough alone. Ray^Talk 15:53, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Email from the government of ROC (automatic translation)

Here is an E-mail from the government of ROC. If anyone think it's suspect, I can forward it to him or her.Huang Sir (talk) 04:54, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

• • Please do not directly reply to the letter if the letter of reply, please fill out the web site to the Minister of mail, resulting in inconvenience to you for your patience **

To deal with the situation:

Hello Dear
Your 98 years in the April 7 on the advice of the e-mail, I reply as follows: In the capital of the Republic of China in accordance with the Declaration of 16 years the Nationalist government in Nanjing, capital. Subsequent relocation of the central government office on several occasions, but did not change the capital. At present, the central government in Taipei as the seat of China.
Liaison officers in this case:林景福
Contact Tel :02-23565281

敬祝

Good health. Best

Minister of the Interior Dear E-mail

Welcome to link to the Ministry of the Interior Web site satisfaction surveys filled out the questionnaire http://service.moi.gov.tw/ecss/bin/ite003q1.asp?IstrMid=010-98010307&IstrUnit=10009000&IstrType=2&mail=hyocean1989 @ aolchina.com

================================================== ==== 

A letter from the summary: [010-98010307] A letter from the elements: Dear Sirs:

Premier E-mail a letter received by the public, some things are in your possession, please review the discretion of track and closed the floor to the Deputy Chihpen group to string Quakers. Please be sure to follow the "Executive Yuan and their organs to deal with cases of people petition points" for the people to petition the case, and Chen lover kept strictly confidential and the identity information.

敬祝 Well safely

Premier Dear E-mail Group

【Number】 [010-98010307] 【010】受文者the Ministry of the Interior

※ return, "President of the e-mail group" should pay attention to matters: <Recipient> Please fill in fields: hyocean1989@aolchina.com <A copy of the recipient> Please fill in fields: eypo@eyemail.gio.gov.tw <Keynote> Please fill in fields: [010-98010307] (Note): the case of the President Office of the President (Vice President) to switch to mail a letter, "the recipient" field, please fill in: 1.work2 @ mail.oop.gov.tw and 2. The public E-MAIL address (such as the contents of the letter attached) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Huang Sir (talk • contribs) 04:49, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

"...group to string Quakers."

Y gotta love automated translations! Readin (talk) 12:52, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, my English is poor. I don't have the capacity to translate some proper nouns. However, the letter just have Chinese edition. But if you are a Chinese or American-Chinese, I can forward it to you.Huang Sir (talk) 13:59, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

I thought it said above that the tranlation was "automated". Readin (talk) 15:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

I understand your words.You know some Chinese words are difficult to be translated into English.And I do it with a software.Huang Sir (talk) 08:08, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Here is the Chinese edition.Huang Sir (talk) 14:07, 24 April 2009 (UTC) Ministry of the Interior of R.O.C.:

** 請勿直接回覆本信,若需回覆本信,請至部長信箱網站填寫,造成您的不便敬請見諒 **
處理情形 : 
敬啟者  您好
您於98年4月7日的電子郵件所提意見，茲答復如下：
中華民國首都依民國16年國民政府宣言定都於南京。嗣後中央政府曾多次遷移辦公，惟首都並未更迭。目前臺北市為我國中央政府所在地。
本案聯絡人員：林景福
聯絡電話：02-23565281
敬祝
身體健康．萬事如意
內政部部長電子信箱　敬啟
歡迎連結內政部網站填寫滿意度調查問卷
http://service.moi.gov.tw/ecss/bin/ite003q1.asp?IstrMid=010-98010307&IstrUnit=10009000&IstrType=2&mail=hyocean1989@aolchina.com
======================================================
來信摘要 : [010-98010307]
來信內容 : 
敬啟者：
行政院院長電子信箱接獲民眾來函，事屬貴管部分，敬請酌處逕覆，並請副知本小 組結案，至紉公誼。
請確實遵照「行政院暨所屬各機關處理人民陳情案件要點」辦理人民陳情案件，並 對陳情人之身分資料嚴加保密。
敬祝
平安如意
行政院院長電子信箱小組　敬啟
【文號】 [010-98010307]  
【受文者】 010內政部
   ※回傳「院長電子信箱小組」應注意事項：
<收件者> 欄位請填入：hyocean1989@aolchina.com 
<副本收件人> 欄位請填入：eypo@eyemail.gio.gov.tw
<主　旨> 欄位請填入：[010-98010307]
(註)：如係總統府總統(副總統)信箱轉來信件，「收件者」欄位請填入：
1.work2@mail.oop.gov.tw及2.民眾E-MAIL位址(如信件內容所附)
  【民眾姓名】政治（** 先生） (To protect my personal information, I make some correction here.)
【民眾電子信箱位址】******@aolchina.com
  【民眾來信內容】
請問中華民?的首都問題,請給民?一個明確的答案

Well, I thought we had solved the capital question when Laurent came up with that source, but I guess with further research he found that the source got its info from Wikipedia. This makes the email a relevant question again. I've put in a query at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#A_repeatable_email about whether this email can be considered a verifiable source if an email can be sent to the Taiwan Ministry of Interior and a similar response received. Readin (talk) 19:22, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I've also sent a request to both the GIO and the Ministry of Interior to see if they can help, possibly by pointing us to an official document. In the meantime - if we were to use the above email - it would be useful to translate it to English, as the current translation is not very clear. Laurent (talk) 20:03, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I hope that works out Laurent. The people responding to Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#A_repeatable_email are leaning pretty heavily against accepting the letter as a reliable source. I've been under the impression for some time that Nanjing is still the de jure capital of the ROC. I'm surprised we're having so much trouble getting it confirmed. Readin (talk) 23:37, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps one of the reason is that the ROC doesn't want to admit that Nanjing is the capital of Taiwan, since doing so would be like admitting that Taiwan is part of China. They cannot say that the capital of Taiwan is Taipei ; on the other hand, they don't have to say that it is Nanjing (if it really is) and therefore don't publish any official documents about it. This is just a guess though, but it's indeed troubling that we can't find anything about Nanjing being the capital. Or maybe it's mentioned somewhere in an old document dating back from when the ROC was still in China? Laurent (talk) 11:46, 28 April 2009 (UTCey)

Hey,Laurent, Have you received the respondence? And I cannot agree with you for something in the article above. Firstly, the government haven't called themself a country named Taiwan. Taiwan is just a noun in the field of geography. Neither the PRC nor the ROC thinks Taiwan is a country, but a province. And the constitution of ROC says her territory consists of the mainland and the Mongolia region and other territory controlled by others currently, Diao Yu Islands included. In other words, the square of her territory is 11,440,000 sq.km., the second in the world . Secondly, If you understand Chinese very well. You will find the words in the email are expressed with a firm hand. Why they don't put the fact on their web? To the problem, as a Chinese, I learned more information than you. Politicaly, KMT and her chief think mainland is a part of their territory and Nanking is their capital which resulted from the fact, the tomb of Mr.Sun located in Nanking and Mr.Sun thinking Nanking being the capital of ROC for eternity. And you will find phone numbers of area in Taiwan begin with "02". And Taipei's is "02". "01" for whom? Nanking. The KMT and many people in Taiwan want to recover the mainland and go back to Nanking, permanently. On the other hand, the other one, DPP, want to found a country named Republic of Taiwan, isolating Taiwan from ROC. Historically, do you know "2.28", some natives in Taiwan were killed by KMT in the incident. So some of the natives don't believe in KMT or ROC, of which is taken advantage by DPP to fight against KMT. If the government says Nanking is the capital of ROC or the territory of ROC contains mainland, which means Taiwan is a part of China, the DPP will say the government is betraying the interest of people living in Taiwan. Afraiding to lose the support of such natives, the government has to avoid such issues appearing in public. However, after 2000, DPP was in power , conducting a campaign to get rid of Chinese elements in Taiwan. At present, KMT is in power ,getting rid of the correction made by DPP. And some web will be corrected sooner or later.Huang Sir (talk) 09:19, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Request for mediation

Note: I've added an informal request for mediation on this page: Wikipedia:Mediation_Cabal/Cases/2009-04/Republic_of_China Laurent (talk) 11:44, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

The E-mail comes from the government not published by myself. It's the attitude of the government. So it can be seen as a reliable source. Besides, if you need the E-mail, I can forward it to you. And I want you correct your words on the mediation page, make the description clear and keep your words justical.Huang Sir (talk) 12:48, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

I've changed the request, and mentioned the email. Laurent (talk) 14:14, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Excuse me, sir. I have to say you aren't familiar with the government of ROC, nor Chinese. It's not "somebody at the ROC government". "內政部部長電子信箱" means Minister’s Mailbox of Ministry of the Interior. Do you understand? It's not a individual but a government department, a department of Ministry of the Interior. Additionally, firstly, I sent the E-mail to Premier's E_mail Correspondence Group, then it was sent to Ministry of the Interior and handled by Minister’s Mailbox of Ministry of the Interior( a department like Premier's E_mail Correspondence Group)

" Dear Friend:

Thank you for your thoughtful e-mail, which we have read with much interest. Your questions and suggestions to the Premier have been sent to the responsible department for prompt reply. Best regards,

Premier's E_mail Correspondence Group
Executive Yuan "

And I beg you change your words again.Huang Sir (talk) 08:33, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I've added that "Executive Yuan" answered. Laurent (talk) 09:47, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh, Jesus! You should add "Minister’s Mailbox of Ministry of the Interior" at least.It's a department of Ministry of the Interior. The decision was made by the department not one person. It's literally a petition system. Huang Sir (talk) 12:08, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Though I make an adequate explation, you couldn't understand it. I regret to tell you I have to add it myself.Huang Sir (talk) 12:13, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

We can't accept an email to another editor as a reliable/verifiable source. Email can be forged. Dougweller (talk) 11:23, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

You need it? I can forward it to you.And here are the phone number 02-23565281 and the pagehttp://service.moi.gov.tw/ecss/bin/ite003q1.asp?IstrMid=010-98010307&IstrUnit=10009000&IstrType=2&mail=hyocean1989@aolchina.com You can confirm it or contact with the department of Ministry of the Interior of ROC to verify the fact.Huang Sir (talk) 13:47, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

So what happened to assuming good faith? Ngchen (talk) 13:49, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

And what happened to assuming the assumption of good faith? Laurent (talk) 13:56, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Demonyms

Until we have consensus on whether Demonyms apply to administrative structures, or only to localities, may I suggest that we not go around to articles that focus on government structures and add demonyms? Taiwan has a separate article for the geographic entity. Based on the Wikipedia description of a demonym, that it is tied to a locality, the geographic Taiwan certainly can have a demonym. Whether or not the separate Taiwan Province article should list a demonym is different question. I mention this here instead of on the Talk:Taiwan Province page because I recognize that the edit was done in response to ongoing discussions here. Readin (talk) 23:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

The demonym in Fujian Province article is acceptable since there is no separate article that covers the geographic region in a non-political way.Readin (talk) 23:33, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

A demonym doesn't just deal with geographical regions, it deals with political regions as well. A Locality just means a certain location, so it can be the location of a certain state, province, county, city, Island, continent, planet, whatever. Liu Tao (talk) 00:02, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Second email from the Ministry of Interior

I've got the answer from the Ministry of Interior. From what I understand, they are saying that Nanjing was in the draft of the constitution but got removed later on. Is that correct? They also point to article 31, which states that "The National Assembly shall meet at the seat of the Central Government" (See [11]), which means that Taipei is officially identified as the "seat of the Central Government". Can someone with a good understanding a chinese provide a short summary of the email? Here it is:

There is currently an ongoing dispute on Wikipedia about the "Republic of China" article. One of the element of this dispute is that we cannot agree on whether the capital of Taiwan is Taipei or Nanjing. Some claim it is Taipei because this is where the government of the ROC is located; whereas others claim it is Nanjing as it was between 1912 and 1949. Please could you let us know what is the position of the Republic of China regarding this issue? As you can see, on the Wikipedia article, we have currently put the capital as:

- Taipei (De facto)
- Nanjing (De jure)

Does it seem correct to you? We would greatly appreciate your advice on this issue. Thank you for your time.

謝謝您的來信，您於97年4月26日的電子郵件所提意見，茲答復如下：

一、世界各國指定首都，多有其特殊考量或重要性，有為政治中心，或為經濟重鎮，或為國防需要，而且首都往往隨著時代與環境需求而變遷，因此各國憲法對於首 都的指定，多持慎重的態度，有予以規定者，亦有不予規定者。我國憲法草擬之初，曾於草案中訂「中華民國國都定於南京」之條文，惟在制憲過程中，各界對於首 都均有不同主張，故最後未能納入憲法明文規定。 二、查民國38年政府遷臺辦公後，同年12月7日總統頒布命令，政府遷設臺北，有關首都之選定與頒布程序皆以行政命令為之。又憲法第31條規定：「國民大 會之開會地點在中央政府所在地。」、總統副總統宣誓條例第4條規定：「總統、副總統宣誓，於中央政府所在地，以公開方式分別行之。…」 非感謝您的來信，並祝您身體健康，事事順心 本案聯絡人員：游淑妃

聯絡電話

Could you tell me the question you asked, Laurent? Did you ask them the question where the capital is in an accurate way? What a pity! You must have made them thought that in your minds Nanking is the capital written down in constitution. Anyway, I think they just stands that Taipei is officially identified as the location of the Central Government by circumbendibus. And in their minds, the capital can be located in politics center, economy center and somewhere for defence or other special meanings. And they didn't mention the significant point, the seat of their capital.So what can we do? Cancel the capital? I also send the third email to ask the question Why the capital is different among medias, files and answers and require them give me an accurate answer.Huang Sir (talk) 11:56, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

I've added my email before the answer. Laurent (talk) 12:05, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

The capital... Taipei was never proclaimed as the official capital of the ROC, not to my knowlege and not to any sources that people has given. I've only seen sources of Taipei being proclaimed as the Provisional Capital, or sources that just say Taipei is the capital, but does not state if it's the official or provisional capital. Of all of the sources found and brought up along with my own researches, they all say 1 of either 2 things:

1. Taipei is the Capital of the ROC, but does not state specifically as to whether it is the official or provisional capital.

2. Taipei is Proclaimed as the provisional Capital of the ROC, but Nanking is the official captial of the ROC.

All of the sources I have found along with those brought up in Wiki supports or somehow fits the view of Nanking as the official capital and Taipei as the Provisional Capital. Liu Tao (talk) 12:07, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Please could you provide the sources saying that Nanjing is the official capital? I can't find any myself. Thanks, Laurent (talk) 12:16, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

RE:Laurent Oh, no, Jesus!!! You can't tell them you come from wikipedia. They are very careful. They are afraid of media.And they are afraid that the information they give to media may be used by their enemy on politics. So it's an email, a question, having been responded before sent. They will not tell you the reality directly.Huang Sir (talk) 13:15, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Here are some sources, there are bound to be more, but here's the few I could locate from the multiple sources I've read:

http://www.economicexpert.com/a/Republic:of:China.htm

http://www.bambooweb.com/articles/r/e/Republic_of_China.html

http://www.knowledgerush.com/kr/encyclopedia/Republic_of_China/

http://www.onpedia.com/encyclopedia/Republic-of-China

http://www.onpedia.com/encyclopedia/nanjing

Liu Tao (talk) 19:05, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Theses sources are not valid for Wikipedia because they all go their data from Wikipedia. If Wikipedia allows such sources to be used, mistakes would be self-perpetuating. See WP:V#Wikipedia and sources that mirror or source information from Wikipedia. Readin (talk) 06:33, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

In the government official websites of ROC, here are some official sources says that Taipei City is the capital of the ROC:

Tourism Bureau:

http://eng.taiwan.net.tw/m1.aspx?sNO=0000202

Ministry of Economic Affairs (economy overview) :

http://hirecruit.nat.gov.tw/english/html/taiwan_01.asp

(Taipei, the capital of Taiwan, was assessed in 2004 by the Intelligent Community Forum (ICF))

Government Information Office:

http://origin-www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/island/

114.42.198.99 (talk) 02:37, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

As I have said MULTIPLE times, none of these sources states whether Taipei is the official capital or not. Of all the sources presented, none of them states that the official capital is Taipei. The sources either states that Taipei is the provisional capital and Nanking is the official capital, or they just simply say Taipei is the capital but does not specify if it is provisional or official. Therefore, none of the sources contradicts each other, they all agree that Taipei is the capital, only that some of them specifies specifically that it is the Provisional Capital, and others just specifies it to be a capital in general. On the otherhand, all of the sources provided, when specifically talking about the official capital, if it talks of the official capital or not, all of them specifies it as Nanking while the provisional capital is Taipei, therefore, there is nothing wrong with stating Nanking as the official capital and Taipei as the Provisional Capital. Liu Tao (talk) 02:49, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Then I have to ask again - could you please provide these sources which specify that Nanking is the official capital? As Readin mentioned above, all the sources you've provided are circular references which we cannot use. We need reliable sources - i.e. reliable newspapers, third-party published books, official documents, etc. I personnally can't find a single source myself, and I'm starting to think that Nanking should not appear in the article as the capital of the ROC. Laurent (talk) 08:22, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

My sources are not circular references. They are all separate from the wikipedia articles, take a look yourself. These are all third-party sources as well. C'mon, these are the sources I mustered, don't discredit them as unreliable. They're all cited themselves, if you refuse to accept them, then that means you yourself are clouded by your POV. I have already stated very clearly, none of the sources provided says that Taipei is specifically the official capital. They either say Taipei is the Provisional capital or just capital in general. The sources that do mention Taipei as the Provisional capitals says Nanking is the official capital. The sources that just say Taipei is the capital does not mention Nanking at all. In conclusion, none of the sources say Taipei is the Official Capital, and none of them say Nanking is not, only the other way around. Liu Tao (talk) 20:00, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

They are circular because they get their information from Wikipedia. The two onpedia references even say so explicitly. The other references look suspiciously like Wikipedia and do not say where they get their information, and they are not original sources nor are they well known. If you think one or more of them are reliable, take it to the reliable sources notice board. If they approve of the sources then I will accept them and Laurent will probably accept them as well. Readin (talk) 20:53, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the five references - not just Onpedia - take their contents from Wikipedia (check the small characters at the bottom of the pages). Yes, I'll also accept them if the noticeboard accepts them. Laurent (talk) 21:14, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I have submitted the links to the reliable sources noticeboard: Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#A_repeatable_email. Laurent (talk) 08:37, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Okay, if you want sources, here's some more, I've checked to see if any was derived from wiki, and one of them's even a .edu!

http://web.mit.edu/shou/www/china/notes.html

http://www.123-cams.com/travel-200-Webcam-Taiwan,Taichung,University.html

http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Taiwan.aspx

Hope you're happy. Liu Tao (talk) 09:21, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Liu Tao - the encyclopedia.com I think is acceptable. It's not a secondary source, but still much better than the wikis (on the other hand, the MIT source is self published and 123-cams.com takes its contents from encyclopedia.com so it's not good either). Just a question though: when the ROC moved to Taiwan and declared Taipei as the provisional capital, did they write some official document about it? Or is it just something that Chiang Kai-shek said? Laurent (talk) 09:54, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I concur. The encyclopedia.com will be ok. Technically it is reprint of the Columbia Encyclopedia and the Columbia Encyclopedia needs to be listed in the reference somehow. Readin (talk) 18:01, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Why did someone make the change without including the source? Haven't we all read WP:V yet???? Without the source, anyone and everyone is perfectly justified to remove the information. Readin (talk) 02:46, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

The change's long been made before this was even brought up, but I'll get to it anyways. Liu Tao (talk) 03:03, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Self published sources doesn't mean they're bad. All government sites are self published, but you regard them as a legit source, do you not? And as for the MIT, take a look at it's reference page, nothing is from encyclopedia.com, though it cites many encyclopedias. And as for official document, I have no idea. It's probably something the government just declared as the Provisional Capital, it's probably recorded down on paper somewhere or something, I have no idea where to start looking though. These kinds of things don't happen very often, declaring provisional capitals, usually it's just something the government says and stuff, because they don't plan to be there permanently, that's why it's called a provisional capital. But if you are to do some searching, your best shot is to look for notices issued about the declaration, recordings of the declaration. These are primary sources, very hard to come by, the best kinds of sources for this kind of thing would be reference books, maps, and other stuff. Liu Tao (talk) 10:16, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I also conducted a brief search and was unable to find anything. As much as it goes against what I understood to be the truth, I agree that we need to remove Nanking and just leave Taipei up there until we can find a reliable source to say Nanking is still the official capital. Readin (talk) 08:25, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Readin,Laurent,I don't want to say anything. You can refer to the history textbook used in ROC. It claims that Nanking is the capital untill 1996. Under the pressure the Ministry of Education reedited their textbook in 2007 , claiming that Taipei is just the seat of the central government National Institute of Compilation and Translation. U.S. and UK haven't admitted ROC for a long time. And you can't find any current information about ROC in the Liberary of Congress. Many sources you used are about a country named Taiwan or some products of political fight. Neither people from PRC nor others from ROC don't think there sxists a country named Taiwan. PRC and ROC are just two political system. And PRC equals ROC. So you can say my sources are reliable or can't be used in Wikipedia. And I can say your sources are false and unconscious. You looks like two ridiculous small man learning nothing, shouting:" Look! Look! Reliable sources!" Disgusting! You two not from Mainland nor Taiwan, just edit by memory or emotion. You don't know everything on the both sides of the strait and don't try to accept others' advice any more. And I have to say something in Chinese:

‘几个所谓学者文人的阴险的论调，尤使我觉得悲哀。我已经出离愤怒了。我将深味这非人间的浓黑的悲凉；以我的最大哀痛显示于非人间，使它们快意于我的苦痛，就将这作为后死者的菲薄的祭品，奉献于逝者的灵前。’---鲁迅

尽管在中文维基中，在一些问题上有巨大分歧，但至少我们可以谈得来，可以坐在一起讨论；但是和你们交流，只有被否决，除了否决还是否决,几乎没有共识。几个生长在外国却又不曾受那古老文明熏陶的人，不了解实情的可悲者，却牢牢霸占着一个本应由中华民族来诠释的问题，为什么海峡两岸的人能坐在一起，而与你们却只有三顾家门而不入的愤怒？说的浅显一些，是不同语言的缘故吧；说的深刻一些，怕只有民族，国家这些词才能解释。这也从你们的行为上直接否决了什么所谓的Taiwanese与Chinese。谬论！胡言！Nonsense!你们以你们的行为戳穿了自己，以己之矛，攻己之盾。快哉！

‘ 真的猛士，敢于直面惨淡的人生，敢于正视淋漓的鲜血。这是怎样的哀痛者和幸福者？然而造化又常常为庸人设计，以时间的流驶，来洗涤旧迹，仅使留下淡红的血色和微漠的悲哀。在这淡红的血色和微漠的悲哀中，又给人暂得偷生，维持着这似人非人的世界。我不知道这样的世界何时是一个尽头！......苟活者在淡红的血色中，会依稀看见微茫的希望；真的猛士，将更奋然而前行。’—— 鲁迅

Huang Sir (talk) 13:10, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

You looks like two ridiculous small man learning nothing, shouting:" Look! Look! Reliable sources!" Disgusting! Please see wp:verifiability. "Wikipedia:Verifiability is one of Wikipedia's core content policies. The others are Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. Jointly, these policies determine the type and quality of material that is acceptable in Wikipedia articles." As editors of Wikipedia, insisting on reliable sources is what we're supposed to do.

I'm normally not overly-picky about reliable sources. That's one reason the Nanjing information is still there, and that there is a lot of other information on pages I watch for which I haven't insisted on reliable sources. But in this case a piece of information was challenged. We've all researched it and come up empty. As "official" information, it should be documented. It usually de facto information that is difficult to find. For example, on the Chiang kai-shek page we had a discussion about whether to call Chiang a "president", a "dictator", or both. He was obviously both and that is well known. But it was much easier to find verifiable sources for the official view that he was a "president" and so the page says "president" and doesn't say "dictator". In this case, the supposed official view is that Nanjing is the capital. If that is true, then as official information it should be easy to verify. If even the ROC, the source of the "officialness", no longer makes the claim that Nanjing is their official capital, then perhaps it no longer is the "official" capital. The lack of ROC documentation certainly argues that the "official" capital is not as important as the de facto capital. Readin (talk) 15:11, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

According to anything, 1. Taipei has not been stated as a capital but a governmental center; 2. Nanjing was a capital before 1949; 3. No one said officially that that Nanjing is a capital is wrong; 4. It could be accepted that Taiwan has a governmental center but no capital. So we can fill "None" in the capital entry (as it must show up in the template) plus a footnote concerning the issues of Taipei and Nanjing. Lightest (talk) 02:17, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

We do have a reference for Taipei as the capital. Taiwan Yearbook 2004. The government puts one out every year. It says "Taipei is the capital of the ROC." Readin (talk) 02:26, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't say if Taipei is the Official or Provisional Capital. It just says "Capital". Again, as I've said, none of the sources that Taipei is the de jure capital. All either puts Taipei as a capital in general, or as a provisional capital. As for Nanking, none of the sources comes in conflict with Nanking as the Capital, and those that does mention Nanking mentions it as the de jure capital. We have no conflict in information, everything fits together. Nanking is the de jure capital, whilst Taipei is the de facto capital. Liu Tao (talk) 02:39, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

1.Why Nanking is the de jure capital? Could you take out some source to prove it?

2.In the agreement that the ROC signed with the El Salvador, the end of the document mention that ”this agreement signed in the capital of ROC, Taipei."(中華民國七十一年二月二十五日即西曆一九八二年二月二十五日訂於中華民國首都臺北。) (http://law.moj.gov.tw/LawClass/LawAll.aspx?PCode=Y0060085 ) In the ROC, this agreement has the force of law. This agreement may be regard as the basis that Taipei is the official capital.114.42.198.99 (talk) 06:55, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I like your resource; that's better than the "Yearbook" because English is not the official language. Just cite it! 160.39.90.88 (talk) 18:40, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

1. I have already provided many sources above, please take a look.

2. The agreement still fails to specify if Taipei is the official capital or not, therefore to regard it as the official capital or not is purely based upon opinion. Liu Tao (talk) 07:57, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

There is no opinion. There is citation to Taipei being the capitol. There is no citation to Nanjing being 'de jure'. There is no need to continue a charade about Nanjing without a primary source. De jure means "by law", and since clearly there is no law to cite, it is not the 'de jure' capitol. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Look, primary sources cannot be found at this time, all I have is that there are sources that cites Nanking as the Official Capital, if you disagree, then find a source that says Nanking is NOT. As far as I know, you have NO sources that comes in conflict with Nanking as the Official Capital, nor do you have any sources citing that Taipei is the Official Capital. Here, lemme clear it up for you with the old fashioned timeline:

1. 1911 -- ROC Established

2. 1947 -- Nanking declared official capital of the ROC in Constitution

3. 1949 -- Mainland lost to Communists, KMT retreats to Taiwan, declares Taipei as the Provisional Capital

4. 2009 -- Us here bickering about if Nanking was the Official Capital or not.

As you can see, there's a big hole from 1949 to now, Taipei was NEVER declared as the Official Capital. The only time it has ever been declared as a capital was in 1949 as a Provisional Capital. Unless you can bring up sources that contradicts Nanking as the Official Capital, you have no leverage against this. And as for exactly what to look for, here, I'll tell you, you're looking for 1 of these 3 things:

1. Sources indicating Taipei is the Official Capital

2. Sources indicating that Taipei was declared as the Official Capital

3. Sources indicating Nanking was declared as no longer the Official Capital

Remember, you're looking for sources talking SPECIFICALLY about the Official Capital. If the source just says "Capital" in general, that doesn't cut it. As far as I know, there are different types of Capitals, and as shown repeatedly in this discussion, there's "Official Capital" and "Provisional Capital", and "Capital" can mean either of those 2. Liu Tao (talk) 17:13, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Split discussion

(unindent)

"find a source that says Nanking is NOT" Negative proof. You don't prove negatives.

"nor do you have any sources citing that Taipei is the Official Capital." Yes, we do. The yearbook references are official publications.

"1947 -- Nanking declared official capital of the ROC in Constitution" That statement isn't in the Constitution. It isn't there. If it was, this wouldn't be a debate worth having.

Insisting on the adjective "official" is pretty strange and I'll ignore it. The current sources say, simply, that "Taipei is the capitol" without any disclaimer or needing any more validity.

So, you are arguing from a point of logical fallacy, requiring a negative proof. You are demanding evidence that does not need to exist. You are using sources to prove your points (encyclopedia.com) that are weaker and far removed from the conflicting sources (the government's official publications) and you are making statements that are demonstrably not true (Nanjing being in the 1947 Constitution)

Your claim is that "Nanjing is the 'de jure' capitol of the Republic of China." and that should be easy to prove. Find the law, cite it. I've asked for that from every participant who wants to make this claim for more than four years now. Quoting Chiang Kai-Shek is not a cite. Quoting propaganda is not a cite. Stale third party competing encyclopedias is not a cite. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Is there law that states that Taipei is the Capital? Can you find it? So what if the Yearbook is an official publication? It doesn't specify if Taipei is the official capital or not. As I've said, none of your sources is evidence that Nanking is not the Official Capital, you have no evidence against or contradicting it. The sources you've found only states that Taipei is the Capital, but it doesn't specify what kind. The source I have found SPECIFICALLY specifies Taipei to be the Provisional Capital while Nanking is the Official Capital. My source does not come in conflict with yours, nor does yours come in conflict with mine. You have no law, neither do I. As for third party sources, bah, that's not a good excuse to de-credit it. Liu Tao (talk) 21:30, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Asked, answered. I'm not fond of repeating myself: you are asking for negative proof, you are not evaluating worthy sources to their claims, you are making claims that are demonstrably untrue, you are demanding evidence that does not need to exist. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

You have not answered my question. You say this stuff needs law, then where is the law? You have procured no law that states that Taipei is the Official Capital, nor does the source you've provided state SPECIFICALLY that Taipei is the Official Capital. And of course the evidence I want doesn't exist, simply because it doesn't. Taipei is NOT the official capital of the ROC and you just made my point, there is no evidence that states that Taipei is the official capital of the ROC. Liu Tao (talk) 19:05, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

The infobox doesn't ask for "Official Capitol". It asks for "Capitol". The source, an official publication provided by the Ministry of Information of the Republic of China, provides the answer for "Capitol". This adjective, "official" is your requirement, and it is inconsistent with Wikipedia standards.

When sources disagree we must weigh the quality and reliability of sources. In this case, the source provided, an official publication provided by the Ministry of Information of the Republic of China, versus a third party competing encyclopedia that does not publish its references is quite clear which source is more reliable. The information about Nanjing is not discarded, it is in the prose text of the article, but not the infobox.

Your actions here are bordering on the belligerent. You are not following Wikipedia policies on either content or behavior. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Additionally, using the terms "de facto" and "de jure" when the cited sources do not use those terms is Original Research. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

Well, it wants capital, those are the capitals, the official and provisional, there are 2, that's why they are labeled de facto and de jure. And it doesn't matter what the cited sources say, they mean the same thing in this context. If I'm correct, last time I made it "official" and "provisional" just as the sources say, but apparently you had to have something to say and remove it as well. And as I've said, there is NOTHING IN CONFLICT. The source you've given just says that the capital is Taipei, but it doesn't specify it as either provisional or official while my source does. The encyclopedia is an encyclopedia, what kind of encyclopedias publish their sources?! The website you gave doesn't publish their source as well! It doesn't matter what the rules say, the rules have no part of this issue. Your source says that Taipei is the Capital, my source takes it a bit further and more detailed and says that Taipei is the Provisional Capital while Nanking is the Official Capital. There is no need to compare what's more reliable or what's not, as the sources are both considered "reliable" and do not come in conflict with each other. If they do, then tell me, how do the sources conflict with each other? Unless you can find a source that comes in conflict with mine, you have no case. Liu Tao (talk) 22:06, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Nanjing or Nanking?

Just curious - should we say Nanjing or Nanking? The Wikipedia article uses Nanjing (and redirects Nanking to Nanjing) and so does this article. So which one is correct? Laurent (talk) 21:32, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Nanjing is the currently approved spelling in both China and Taiwan. Nanking is a spelling that was commonly used in the past. I have no idea which is currently the more commonly used in English, but if the editors of the Nanjing articles decided on Nanjing then that works for me in current contexts. If we find a source to say Nanjing is the current official capital of Taiwan, then we should use the current spelling. It's a little trickier if we just say that it was the capital of the ROC prior to 1949. The spelling at that time was "Nanking" so we should probably use "Nanking" in that case. Readin (talk) 21:42, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

As far as I know, Nanking is the official spelling of 南京 by the ROC. Liu Tao (talk) 00:39, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

You could be right. I'm pretty sure that used to official spelling. I assumed they had switched it to Nanjing when Ma made PRC pinyin the national standard. Readin (talk) 02:06, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

No, that's not necessarily true. The official English names of the cities in the ROC are still all in their old romanisations. Liu Tao (talk) 08:05, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

City names aren't changed. Taipei is still called Taipei, not "Taibei".--pyl (talk) 12:55, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I am not an expert or anything, but "Chiang Kai-shek evacuated the government from Nanking (then romanised as 'Nanking')" seems to not make sense. I propose either changing the first instance of Nanking to Nanjing (which it redirects to anyway), or else removing the parenthetical phrase.

By the way, I am fairly new to [editing] wikipedia. If I have used the talk page incorrectly (should I have made a new heading? this one seemed an appropriate title), please feel free to say so. TachyonJack (talk) 02:37, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Unnecessary templates on top of page

May I suggest to only put ONE template on top of the page to disambiguate between the ROC and PROC? The template which states how the ROC was sometime called in the 70s is ridiculous and just add to the confusion. Yes mention how the ROC was called in the article, but not as the first thing readers see. The Taiwan / Taiwan Province / ROC split is sufficiently confusing without adding to it with irrelevant templates. Laurent (talk) 10:38, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't ever hear anyone ever confuse the ROC and the PRC except in Chinese and only when they are speaking too fast! It is simply a political statement to have the current disambiguation of "not to be mixed up with the PRC". If there's any confusion, it's why Wikipedia tries to have separate articles for ROC and Taiwan, another POV political statement. 61.216.7.91 (talk) 11:22, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Mediation

A user has requested mediation on this issue. A mediator is here to help resolve your dispute. The case page for this mediation is located here.

Moved from article text. --Cybercobra (talk) 18:49, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Semi

This seems to need some peace; I've semi'd it for a bit. Complain here William M. Connolley (talk) 20:49, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Taiwan vs. ROC naming issues (RFC)

Involved editor I have no problem with listing the de jure capital as Nanjing, with the current capital of Taipei because well, it is technically true. I'm fairly certain that if editors dig hard enough a source can be found for listing Nanjing. Now, in terms of the Taiwan article, I think it should be about physical geography the way it was before people started adding all sorts of history to it. There is already a separate history of Taiwan article, and duplication leads to inevitable POV-forking. Finally, in terms of demonym, I will argue that "Taiwanese or Chinese" is a fair compromise because frankly, what the people consider themselves there is in large part determined by the politics. Call a pan-green coalition person "Chinese," and one insults him. But insinuating to a pan-blue person that he's somehow not "Chinese," and one insults him. Also, "Taiwanese" doesn't apply to people living in Kinmen or Matsu which are part of Fujian, no matter how one looks at it. We shouldn't simplify things to the point where (verifiable) truth gets obscured. Ngchen (talk) 02:37, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I've been involved in searching for a citation that Nanjing is the official or de jure or whatever capitol for more than four years. I don't believe it to be true, other than via the proclamation of Chiang Kai-shek and propaganda by the KMT bureaucracy during the years of martial law. There are obviously very vehement KMT supporters who still believe it. I've never had a problem with this being stated in the text, because this is obviously true. I do have a problem with it being described in the infobox, or insisting it is true in modern times, or adding it to other almanac style articles on Wikipedia. It was tradition, not truth, and it hasn't been "true" since the RoC has evolved into a democratic state ruled by law, rather than personality. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

I believe the main premises of your arguments are essentially correct. However, the proclamation of Chiang Kai-shek is what made it law. Chiang Kai-shek being the president of the ROC at the time had the power to do so. I don't think this proclamation has been repealed by a later authority.--pyl (talk) 02:59, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Did the ROC constitution at the time give the president the power to unilaterally make laws? Or does this re-open the question on the talk:Chiang Kai-shek page about Chiang was a dictator? Readin (talk) 13:51, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

The president is empowered by law to proclaim the location of the capital.--pyl (talk) 15:21, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

I live in Taiwan, and anyone you ask will tell you that the capital is Taipei. If you pursue the matter and ask about the "technical" capital, you get an answer of "well, maybe, yeah, guess the legal capital is still Nanjing...maybe..." The infobox should state that Taipei is the capital, as that is what is actually true; the government is located in Taipei, and that is the definition of a capital city. If there are some reliable sources which can show that the "legal capital" of the ROC is still Nanjing, then by all means include that info in the article. But Taipei is the de facto capital of the ROC, so the infobox and the lead paragraph should treat it as such. Cheers, --Aervanath (talk) 07:31, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

This discussion is now active here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_mediation/Republic_of_China_2--pyl (talk) 07:56, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Economy merge

I propose that the Economy section of Taiwan be merged into the Economy section of Republic of China. The Taiwan article is primarily geographical/cultural and the Economy section is not about just Taiwan-the-island; it confusingly uses "Taiwan" to refer to all of the ROC. So, the Economy section is really about the ROC, not Taiwan specifically, and it doesn't belong (at least with its current content) in a non-country article. Therefore it should be merged into the article about its true subject, the ROC. --Cybercobra (talk) 17:57, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I think the economy section should stay since it specifically deals with the economy in the island of Taiwan. Likewise Northern Ireland as an economy section, even though it's part of the UK. Laurent (talk) 18:35, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Economy is more tied to the location than the state. Were we we to have an "Economy of the Republic of China" section, what would it talk about? Taxes and state-owned enterprises? By putting the section in the Taiwan article, we can include all facets of the economy, not just those tied to the government. Economy is an economic activity, not a political activity (unless you're in a communist state, of course). Readin (talk) 18:42, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

We already have one: the "Economy" section of this article. And it does not overly focus on the governmental aspects of the economy, it's about the economy nationally. If you compare the two economy sections, they're pretty similar anyway, so why have repetitive material in 2 separate places? --Cybercobra (talk) 23:52, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

True, we don't really need to have an Economy of the ROC government section. But I'm not sure it hurts anything to have the brief summary of the Economy of Taiwan article in both places. The economy section of this article is unnecessarily long since most of the information is covered in the main article. It should be trimmed. Of course the economy section of the ROC article and the economy section of the Taiwan article need to be a bit different when discussing anything prior to 1945 because before that time the ROC was not in Taiwan. Readin (talk) 00:09, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

In looking over the economy section of the ROC article, you can see one of the problems with the proposed merge. Consider these two lines. "Japanese rule prior to and during World War II brought forth changes in the public and private sectors of the economy, most notably in the area of public works, which enabled rapid communications and facilitated transport throughout much of the island. The Japanese also improved public education and made the system compulsory for all ROC citizens during this time." Readin (talk) 00:11, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Actually, you won't find those lines there anymore. I removed them as they made no sense here. The first sentence had nothing to do with the ROC (which was in China at the time, not in Taiwan). The second sentence would be nonsense anywhere as Taiwanese weren't ROC citizens when Japan was forcing education on them, they were Japanese. Readin (talk) 00:22, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Color of the ROC national flag and the emblem

modified by user:Zscout370 on 26 December 2008

File:1928 Republic of China national flag.gif

upload by user Arilang1234 on 14/5/2009

Editors please check User talk:Zscout370#Image:Republic of China Army Flag.svg, I have lengthly discussion with user Zscout370(who is a wiki commons admin ) about the wrong color, and he knows the color is wrong, and quote:I have tried to use a similiar blue as the KMT emblem, but was told to change it. He did not say who told him to change it. Meanwhile, I think we need to use the jpeg image I have uploaded into commons, I know it is not perfect, but it has the right color. Thank you user cybercobra for your patience. Arilang ^talk 04:30, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

For the record, (a) your edit comment gave no explanation at all as to why you were changing the image and (b) you messed up badly on the syntax (check out the text rendered underneath the flag in your versions). --Cybercobra (talk) 04:44, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

But by all means, make sure the color is accurate. --Cybercobra (talk) 04:46, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks cybercobra again, as you can see the problem is at the commons end, and I am not a SVG expert, though I am eager to learn. Once the color at commons is wrong, everything gone wrong. I try very hard to fix it. Arilang ^talk 05:05, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

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