Talk:Victoria State Government

Requested move 26 March 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus to move. There is concern among opposers that "Victorian" is easily confused with governments during Victorian era. The alternate suggestion, Government of Victoria, looks like it would have more support but it hasn't gained a clear consensus in this discussion. (non-admin closure) (t · c) buidhe 17:15, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

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Victoria State Government → Victorian Government – Per WP:NCGAL and WP:COMMONNAME. With due respect to those who contributed, it appears as though the consensus reached in the last move discussion is based on a literal reading of the article subject's logo. While the logo in question does indeed read Victoria State Government, the article title in its present form is not a natural-language word or expression per COMMONNAME - the closest such form would be Victorian State Government, however this is not the name most typically used in reliable sources.

If users remain concerned about ambiguity with any governments associated with Queen Victoria (aside from such ambiguity existing solely in theory) can be resolved through use of Template:Distinguish, or by instead moving the article to Victorian Government (Australia) in line with NCGAL. I note that Victorian Government already redirects to this article, which suggests this isn't a concern amongst the broader community. Heyitsstevo (talk) 10:10, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

• Oppose. Terrible idea. "Victorian Government" would be read by most as government in the reign of Queen Victoria (even if a disambiguator was added, given Australia was governed in Victoria's reign!). The current title is by far the clearest. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:47, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
  • Australia was governed in Victoria's reign... for all of 22 days while she was gravely ill. Heyitsstevo (talk) 21:59, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
    • On a federal level, yes, but "Australia" is also very commonly used collectively to refer to the colonies before they came together to form the Commonwealth, so this is really just splitting hairs. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:28, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
      • And the colonial history of (the state of) Victoria is precisely why 'Victoria State Government' is an inappropriate article title. Heyitsstevo (talk) 22:12, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
• @ItsPugle, Old Naval Rooftops, SMcCandlish, Pizza1016, StormcrowMithrandir, ProcrastinatingReader, 3 kids in a trenchcoat, Fecotank, Thomasmax911, and HiLo48: Pinging participants in previous discussion. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:51, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose for all the reasons given in the recent RM just above this one. There's nothing unnatural about "Victoria State Government" (any more than for "New Zealand Government"; the existence of a more clearly adjectival form, like "Victorian" or "New Zealander", doesn't necessarily make it a perfect choice in every circumstance). The proposed name (already rejected in the last RM) is farcically ambiguous, and would be interpreted by nearly everyone but some Australians as referring to the British government under Queen Victoria, which is the same problem the original title, Government of Victoria had, except even more so. Also, there is no way to "read" the wording of a subject's logo except "literally" (if you "read" it to say something it doesn't say then you're not reading it, you're pretending to read it). But the logo isn't the reason (per WP:OFFICIALNAME) the page is where it is; this is the best name we could come up with given various ambiguities and awkwardness in other attempts. I.e., this page title is the result of consensus, not of thumping a particular source.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:27, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

  PS: Victorian government, Victorian Government, and Government of Victoria should all resolve to a disambiguation page that has at least the following three entries: 1) this page; 2) British governments during Queen Victoria's 1837–1901 reign; and 3) Queen Victoria's governance as monarch of the British realms during her reign, including Great Britain, Ireland, India, Australia, Canada, and others.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  11:52, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

  • The desire by American users to prescribe ambiguity where it does not currently exist on Wikipedia is what is really farcical. The head of state is not the head of government: the page titled Elizabethan government refers not to the current British head of state but to the reign of Elizabeth I over England from November 1558 to March 1603, at a time when the English Parliament was not the supreme law-making body. During Victoria's reign, some ten prime ministers led the United Kingdom's parliament, and by extension the Government of the United Kingdom (eg. Second Melbourne ministry, Third Derby–Disraeli ministry). Any such ambiguity exists only within this talk page. Heyitsstevo (talk) 21:58, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
    • Well, I'm British and I would entirely agree with SMcCandlish! The most common use of the term "Victorian" in the real world is to refer to things that happened in the reign of Queen Victoria, despite her not being the head of government. -- Necrothesp (talk) 15:32, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
      • Except that there was no one (Queen) Victoria(n) Government. The concept of governance under Queen Victoria (as Victorian governance, perhaps) might have notability to warrant an article, but at present we're discussing a hypothetical. The Victorian Government does exist, and any confusion is avoided through use of a Distinguish template. Heyitsstevo (talk) 22:17, 1 April 2021 (UTC)
• Weak opppose While "Victorian Government" appears to be the best WP:COMMONNAME, there are some concerns with confusion as "Victorian" is strongly associated with Queen Victoria, not the State of Victoria. Current title is a compromise, and I think it will have to do. 162.208.168.92 (talk) 19:39, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
• As an aside, the title in its current form fails to reflect the subject's first fifty years as a responsible colonial government. Heyitsstevo (talk) 22:01, 26 March 2021 (UTC)
• Agree It should be Victorian Government or Government of Victoria Muzi (talk) 11:57, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
• Agree with Victorian government. As I said before official it's the Victorian Government just the logo says Victoria state government --Thomasmax911 (talk) 12:11, 27 March 2021 (UTC)
• Support I personally prefer Victorian Government (note the capital G to denote a proper noun) over the status quo, but I also recognise the possible ambiguity with Victorian (era) government. I think, per WP:DIFFCAPS, I think we have enough difference to rename safely, but it'll just need a hatnote (should have one either way). ItsPugle (please ping on reply) 03:17, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose It should be 'Government of Victoria' for all the reasons stated above. I've read through the discussion to date and cannot see anything convincing. I note that the official terminology used by the government to refer to itself is "State Government of Victoria" (e.g. in the footer of departmental websites: https://www.vic.gov.au/). This is consistent with other public sector arms and bodies, such as Parliament of Victoria, High Court of Australia and many others. Claiming that this is now dissimilar to other article titles on this topic is irrelevant, especially considering that many seem to have been recently changed along similar lines.Takerlamar (talk) 08:36, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

  @Takerlamar: I absolutely oppose Government of Victoria. This has already been discussed before and there has been a clearly developed consensus in the May 2020 RM that "Government of Victoria" was not the most appropriate title with respect to naming policy. If you look at the website, it refers to the Government as the "Victorian Government" everywhere else - dare I say, trying to say that the website supports "Government of Victoria" because it's mentioned once in the footer is cherrypicking. The difference with the Parliament of Victoria and the High Court of Australia is that that is how they call themselves and how they're known; unlike the Victorian Government website and publications, the Parliament of Victoria and High Court of Australia refer to themselves as how their article is named. ItsPugle (please ping on reply) 08:43, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

  @ItsPugle: I understand that you absolutely oppose that title. I look at the previous discussion and don't see consensus. Instead, I see a handful of votes and brief discussion by, it appears, (mostly) non-Victorians/Australians. I do not agree that "Government of Victoria" in the website footer is cherry picking. This is how it is consistently referred to in the highest law in the land (Victoria's Constitution Act 1975) and in official legal statements (such as copyright notices) - i.e. as "Government of the State [i.e. Victoria]" or "Government of Victoria" or similar: https://www.legislation.vic.gov.au/in-force/acts/constitution-act-1975/221 . Yes, there are instances where "Victorian Government" is used in public communication and marketing, but even this is not consistent by any stretch of the imagination. If you are using the yardstick as you have above regarding how institutions refer to themselves, this argument is void because no institution is consistent. Just to pick one example from above, there are many instances where the Parliament of Victoria refer to themselves as the "Victorian Parliament" even though this is not their official name(e.g. https://twitter.com/VicParliament and https://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/visit/schooltours/2-legislative-assembly/articles and https://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/sarc/). We should instead be asking how we determine what the 'official' name of the institution is and apply that consistently. I, for example, would argue that a state's legal constitution trumps a marketing logo, but I think this is the discussion that needs to be had rather than picking random pieces of text off websites and arguing over which one is the most "prominent" or common. Takerlamar (talk) 09:12, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

  I, for one, am Australian, so... anyways, diversity in people's geographic location etc is a strength to that discussion. Wikipedia articles aren't read by only the people in the same country or region as the article subject, but by readers worldwide. In reference to that act, it was written 50 years ago and is legalese, not designed or meant for the public. And "there are instances" is misleading - for the past several years, every public communication has referred to it as the "Victorian Government", and yes it is consistent. Can you show any significant public communication where it uses "Government of Victoria"? And again, you're picking one-off instances rather than looking at patterns - on Twitter, the Parliament calls itself the "Victorian Parliament" once as their display name, but they call themselves the Parliament of Victoria on: their website (apart from that one work in progress page you found), Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn etc (again, cherrypicking?). I think the principle issue that we're debating here is, as you said, what 'official' means - while you appear to be travelling down the line of legalese and word-of-the-law, I'm proposing what the actual body calls itself towards the public within the view that Wikipedia is written for people to understand, not for lawyers to use as material in court cases. Part of Wikipedia being accessible to everyone is that we use the most common name that anyone would recognise it by based on the exposure of that name, not what some crusty document from the 70s written by a bunch of white, wealthy men says. ItsPugle (please ping on reply) 09:59, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

"Agriculture Victoria" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Agriculture Victoria. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 July 29#Agriculture Victoria until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 19:00, 29 July 2021 (UTC)