Talk:Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe

Revert of accurate name change

Explain your actions Matthead (talk · contribs), I mean if we translate Iron Cross then why not this one?Rex 10:27, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Explain your actions first, Rex, as you moved the article away from a German name, as you try do with many other articles while being on "revert parole for cleansing this wiki of german nationalists". So you certainly insist also on Cross of war and For the Merit, or are you only opposed to German? -- Matthead ^discuß!     O       22:31, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

As noted below, I can't and don't speak for "Rex", but the reason why "Croix de Guerre" is generally left untranslated is not anti-German bias. For that to be the case would mean there was also pro-French bias, and you'd have to be blind to believe that Americans and British, at the very least, are particulary pro-French (I don't think English-speaking Canadians are, either; don't know about other English speaking populations). "Croix de Guerre" is what it is because (a) it is an established and familiar term and (b) tens of thousands of Americans, Brits and Canadians have received either the cross itself or the fourragère (sorry, another French word) of it as a unit citation in two World Wars. Americans in the 82nd Airborne and other units to this day continue to wear the CdG fourragère awarded to those units in pervious wars.

Jumping to another language, the Polish Virtuti Militari and Polonia Restituta are more commonly known by their Latin names in English than they are by their English names, and are almost never seen in their Polish names. In Poland, however, the former is more commonly known by its Latin name and the latter by its Polish name. The Order of the White Eagle, by contrast, is known in English by its English name (by the way, this Wikipedia page needs to be fixed, as there were three Orders of the White Eagle - one in Poland, one in Imperial Russia and one in the Kingdom of Serbia). There is no consistent rule other than a preference for English except when there are certain customary names of long-standing.Airbornelawyer 02:12, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Libel and false accusations will get you now where Matthead. I have one of wikipedias longest breaths and I will have justice. You will learn to discuss your edits and use arguments instead of ad hominem attacks. You refuse to discus your edits. Do you know why? Because you edit by bias and nor reason. Rex 23:03, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

You have one of Wikipedia's longest breaths? Hold it. --- Matthead ^discuß!     O       02:39, 27 December 2006 (UTC) This quote had been removed by User:Rex Germanus as Wikipedia:Remove personal attacks

Provide arguments for your reverts, if you refuse and/or cannot give arguments to support your actions refrain from editting and revert yourself.Rex 10:52, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

opposed to such a move, "Honor Goblet" is not a current term in English. This is an article on a German award, directly comparable to Pour le Mérite, which we don't move to For the Merit either. Rex, your self-imposed mission to cleanse en-wiki from perceived German nationalism is off track, you've been put on parole because you have shown that you are not able to use good judgement yourself, and you should just step down, or at least cut the belligerence. dab (𒁳) 16:51, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I was put on parole because I removed the bias and nationalism of a user from this wikipedia and I will not step down. I will continue until the behaviour of persons like Ulritz stop. If people discuss their actions there is no problem whatsoever. Problem is these people don't. Instead they insult and accuse me. Where were you then Dbachman?Rex 17:02, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

As for the discussion. Take a look at Category:Military awards and decorations of Germany. The vast majority of these awards have an English title.Rex 17:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I do have problems because this is the English wikipedia.Rex 22:56, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

A slight edit: I am deleting references to the category "Awards and decorations of the military of Germany" per the discussion on that page. The categories Category:Orders, decorations, and medals of Imperial Germany and Category:Orders, decorations, and medals of Nazi Germany may be referenced instead.Airbornelawyer 20:57, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Proposal change of name to English variant

Most German awards are translated into English here on the English wikipedia. Some examples:

• Eiserne Kreuz → Iron Cross
• Abzeichen für Blockadebrecher → Blockade Runner Badge
• Ehrenkreuz → Cross of Honor
• Schnelbootkriegsabzeichen → Fast Attack Craft War Badge
• Infanterie Sturmabzeichen → Infantry Assault Badge
• Ärmelschild Kuban → Kuban Shield
• Erwundetenabzeichen → Wound Badge
• Scharfschützenabzeichen → Sniper's Badge

In fact, all German awards in the category Awards and decorations of the military of Germany are translated into English. All except for the Pour le Mérite order, probably because it's a German award already in another language. The Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe is perfectly translateable. Why not? Rex 19:07, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Support, as per above.

Oppose as by the original creator of the article (Mfields1 (talk · contribs)) who had chosen "Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe", and by the reasons given by me and Dbachmann (talk · contribs) above. Not all name of German awards are translated into English, and certainly not all of other nations either. -- Matthead ^discuß!     O       18:46, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Support - I am a German-American, so I am far from concerned about German language terms in English or expressions of German nationalism or any other argumentum ad hominem diversion. "Not all name of German awards [or other terms] are translated into English", but most are, and the ones that are not aren't only because they are more familiar in their German form. We routinely say Luftwaffe, but almost never Heer, for example. This is not the case for Ehrenpokal, an obscure award to begin with, and one I suspect most readers here have never even seen except in pictures. I have held in my hands the Ehrenbecher für den Sieger im Luftkampfe of a Pour le Mérite-Träger who flew with Freiherr von Richthofen and once slugged Göring. Back on more objective grounds: Matthead, the article you created cites Wehrmacht-awards.com as its source. I am a moderator of that website's discussion forum. A search of "Honor Goblet" returns more hits than a search of "Ehrenpokal" in the discussion forum, so the argument that the German term is more prevalent than the English term does not hold water, at least among the community of people for whom the history of these awards really matters.

As this seems to have been misunderstood: I did'n create the article, and have update my vote above to give proper credit. As argumentum ad hominem is concerned, (Personal attack removed) -- Matthead ^discuß!     O       01:31, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

My misunderstanding on that point. I have no knowledge of, nor do I care a whit about, any "Wikipedian's" mission. I don't know this Rex Germanus from Jack. There does seem to be a general policy on use of English on an English-language encyclopedia though. For what it's worth, I think this policy is taken to ridiculous extremes in certain cases. I have no idea why the article on the last German emperor is under "William II"; that seems more likely to confuse people than Wilhelm II would. Frederick the Great is fairly well known in English texts, so rendering Friedrich makes sense, but the other Hohenzollerns?

On my website, when I translate the names of decorations, I render the Militärischer Karl-Friedrich-Verdienstorden as Military Karl-Friedrich Merit Order. The name of the order is translated into the customary English terms, but the monarch's name remains in its proper form. I see the Wikipedia entry makes him Charles Frederick though. Wikipedia also renders Grand Duke Wilhelm Ernst of Saxe-Weimar as William Ernest, so I suppose when and if I make a page for the Wilhelm Ernst War Cross (Wilhelm-Ernst Kriegskreuz), a decoration he established in 1915, some busybody will mess with that as well. Airbornelawyer 01:51, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

My support is tepid, by the way. If the consensus is for Ehrenpokal, I don't care. I suspect a name change would only lead to an argument over whether to call it Honor Goblet or Honour Goblet anyway, and then the Germans can sit and watch while the Brits and the Yanks piss on each others' cornflakes. Airbornelawyer 23:25, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Oppose a name change to Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe. I chose Ehrenkopal for the original article because I have not seen any reference previously to the term "Honor Goblet". A google of Ehrenkopal will provide about 11,000 hits. A google of "Honor Goblet" (must use the quotes) returns only about 1,100 hits. Any article that links to Ehrenkopal der Luftwaffe will yiled a reader with an explanation and will further their knowledge. A link to 'Honor Goblet' would likely be ignored. Readers can easily learn the translated term in the article anyway. The era when the award was given and the scarcity make it better to keep in the German language. Besides, to mix English and German in the description by using a title like 'Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe' seems like nonsense. If English should be used the proposal should be 'Honor Goblet of the German Air Force'. More has been written on the talk page about this article than on improving the article itself. Mfields1 02:05, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Ehrenpokal, not Ehrenkopal. ;-) Citing Google for this, as for other such arguments on Wikipedia, is problematic. Google creates self-feedback circle jerks, since many of the entries turn out to be sites indexing the Wikipedia entry itself, or eBay dataminers and the like which ultimately lead back to the same places. That is why I cited Wehrmacht-awards.com's search results, since that is a discrete site where the item in question is routinely discussed by people who are familiar with the subject matter, many of whom are speakers of both German and English. Airbornelawyer 02:49, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Mfields1, this link, already in the article, is dedicated to the Honour Goblet. So here's your reference for the English name being used: (link)Rex 10:24, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Your counter argument on citing google is not relevant because I googled the word Ehrenpokal before the Wikipedia article existed. The article I read (not on the internet) used the term Ehrenpokal and to understand the term is when I googled. Yes I had already seen the cited article, which is commercial in nature and geared towards collectors of the items. Even in the article you cited, that term is only used in the banner. Elsewhere in the article Ehrenpokal is used. The actual object may be a fine thing for you collectors of such stuff but the award was more than the object itself. Mfields1 10:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

That you checked Google before creating the article may or may not be the case. Let us stipulate that you did. That is not what you cited above, however. You state "A google of Ehrenkopal will provide about 11,000 hits. A google of "Honor Goblet" (must use the quotes) returns only about 1,100 hits." That returns, as I noted above, the current results, including Wikipedia hits and eBay hits. Also, you neglected to restrict the search to English language pages, which would be relevant to this determination. Even then, a review of the search results shows the weakness of relying on Google, as among the hits that come up are www.philipp-militaria.de and www.pilotenbunker.de, both German sites. And the results are 277 for Ehrenpokal, of which 54 are discrete (most of the hits are to otherwise similar pages, i.e., separate pilot bios on www.luftwaffe.cz); 135 for "Honor Goblet", of which 50 are discrete; and 32 for "Honour Goblet", of which 18 are discrete.

There are arguments about bad faith on the part of Rex here. Let me now note that your "you collectors of such stuff" statement reeks of snide bad faith argumentem ad hominem as well. I am a military historian and a historian of "such stuff". I am also a combat veteran who knows one hell of a lot about what the meaning behind these objects is. To the extent I do collect, it is an outgrowth of the horsetrading I and my fellow soldiers diod with soldiers from other countries we served with. And among my fellow moderators and members on that forum of "collectors of such stuff" are a number of other veterans. So take the snarky attempt at condescension elsewhere and stick to substantive argumentation. Airbornelawyer 19:25, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Airbornelawyer wrote "On my website, when I translate the names of decorations..." and I saw reference to www.wehrmacht-awards.com, I assumed they were one and the same. Perhaps it is not your website? No harm was intended against collectors of such stuff. "Stuff" is a word and it was the one that came to mind when I wrote this. You should not have taken offence because I meant none. I collect "stuff" too. Would you feel better I had written "collectors of military awards"? I did google "Ehrenpokal" before adding the Wikipedia entry. In my later post the numbers I cited were for this morning. If you want to google again, and deliberately leave out the sites you mention and search for "-ebay -Wikipedia" you get 9,390 hits for Ehrenkopal. Mfields1 01:22, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

You still haven't taken into account that if you are going to use Google in a debate over what is proper English language usage, you need to restrict results to English language pages.

Using "Honor Goblet" -wikipedia -ebay yields 105 hits. "Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe" -wikipedia -ebay yields 1 hit. "Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe" -wikipedia -ebay gives 3 hits. Ehrenpokal -wikipedia -ebay gives 247 hits. All of the above using engish web pages only. Mfields1 18:50, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

"My website" refers to my own website, which is primarily a reference site for Imperial German military awards. Wehrmacht-awards.com is not mine, but I serve as a moderator of some of the subforums of the discussion forums there. I am also a moderator of a military discussion forum for special operations personnel. Those forums really are much easier ways to talk over these things than these Wikipedia talk pages, I must say.

Another issue on the naming trend, aside from an English language preference on English language Wikipedia except where terms are in common usage in their foreign form (and this would capture Luftwaffe, it is only Ehrenpokal that is at issue), is disambiguation. "Ehrenpokal" in this context can only refer to the Luftwaffe award, but "Honor Goblet" translates both the Luftwaffe award and its World War I equivalent, whose German name is different ("Ehrenbecher"). To be honest, I don't know what, if anything, a page on that award by itself would be called. "Ehrenbecher" by itself, like "Ehrenpokal" by itself, can mean any honor cup or goblet and could be a bowling trophy. For the WW2 award, "Ehrenpokal der Luftwaffe" or "Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe" is relatively short and sweet, but the full name of the WW1 award is "Ehrenbecher für den Sieger im Luftkampfe" or "Honor Goblet for the Victor in Aerial Combat". A bit long-winded and doesn't nearly clue you into whose air combat you're talking about the way "Luftwaffe" does. Of course, we haven't yet mentioned (and I intend to add them to the main article so this talk page isn't the only thing modified today) the "Ehrenbecher für erfolgreiche Angriffe aus der Luft", an even rarer Imperial German air award, and the "Ehrenpreis für Vernichtung eines feindlichen Flugzeugs", the Imperial German Naval equivalent of the "Ehrenbecher für den Sieger im Luftkampfe".

I guess the point, half of one that it is, is that "Ehrenpokal" really only refers to the WW2 Luftwaffe award, while an "Honor Goblet" article can be written to encompass all of these awards. But, like I say, it's only half a point, since the point is mooted if the title is "Honor Goblet of the Luftwaffe" since we are back to limiting ourselves to the WW2 award, with the WW1 awards treated as mere back story. Airbornelawyer 01:52, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

We do agree on this point, that the award I was refering to when I originally createdd the article, was the one established on February 27, 1940 by Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring. I have found also that on Wikipedia one can often be brought up short when discussing certain topics. There is a tnedency to declare that a person is making a political statement to even mention such things as war awards or symbols. But, recognizing also that when a biography mentions a soldier's (or airman's or seaman's for that matter) receipt of an award then it is important to also educate and illuminate the purpose of the award. In addition it only makes sense to clarify the award to avoid confusion with other awards or even how the award was determined over time (e.g., the Medal of Honor changed a lot over it's history). IMHO there should be a separate page for the various awards according to how they are distinct. Mfields1 18:39, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

I disagree Mfields1, they are used interchangable to me, and since this is the English wikipedia, and English usually translates foreign orders this seems a pretty clearcut case...Rex 11:46, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

If they are interchangeable you should have no problem with Ehrenpokal :-) Mfields1 01:22, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Please take to WP:RM and follow proper procedure. -Patstuart^talk|edits 21:29, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Ehrenpokal and Ehrenbecher

I actually added some content to the main article, rather than just continuing the oh-so-fun discussion here. But now there is more content on the Imperial Ehrenbecher and related awards than there is on the Ehrenpokal. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Airbornelawyer (talk • contribs) 02:48, 30 December 2006 (UTC).