Talk:Winston Churchill

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Capitalized

I was thinking "first world war... wait, should that be capitalized? check... second is..." and then I went off to Unreasonable Faith and didn't check that I'd gotten the right word in there. Wazza (Not Wazzock, Wazza)^{Approach the Presence} 01:23, 19 November 2008 (EST)

Wit and quotes

These need merging. I'd do it but I don't want edit conflicts. Additionally the "haggling over the price" quote is normally attributed to GBS. Jack Hughes (talk) 16:17, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

I was under the impression that all the ones in the quotes section are false. See Wikiquote - they're all listed as "anecdotal". –SuspectedReplicant retire me 16:27, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

A quick Google finds plenty of properly attributed quotes of a far higher quality. I'll work on this when I have a moment. Jack Hughes (talk) 16:49, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Add to the effect 'not to be confused with his grandson of the same name - or the irritating dog in the adverts' 82.44.143.26 (talk) 15:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Angle

Hmm, I see the beginnings of an edit war here. I think we should sit down and figure out exactly what it is we want to say about the man. Baljit (talk) 19:56, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

I have a problem with psychoanalytical findings that say someone was "likely" this "probably" because of that when the person's psych records aren't at hand. And, like I said, anyone who believes in "superior" races isn't a "borderline" racist, he's a racist full stop. As for the rest, I don't give a shit. BbMaj7 Doin' to you in your ear hole. 20:02, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Grovel, grovel

The man almost singlehandedly saved the world from German authoritarianism. He deserves your knee's scraping the floor in utter snivelling devotion. This article is a hatchet job of one of the great figures of human history. ProudTory (talk) 10:47, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

"saved the world from German authoritarianism" - so did Stalin, why don't you praise him? Sophie^Wilder 11:09, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

It is a bit one-sided, but then we aren't an encyclopedia. We tend to put quirky, less well known and controversial things into articles, rather than filling them full of praise. I for one am not enamoured by some of Churchill's attitudes to colonies, and he was seriously pig headed at Gallipoli to our detriment. If you wanted to add a section mentioning his role in leading Britain during the second world war I doubt anyone would mind. --Damo^Hi 11:18, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Summer, 1940. France, Denmark, Norway and Poland had all fallen to the Nazi juggernaut. Pressure was on Britain to sign a ceasefire with Hitler. One man refused. One man, a man of destiny, saw that the future of mankind was incompatible with the vision of Adolf Hitler. That man was Winston Churchill, and he saved the world. Be grateful for him, you snotty ungrateful left wingers. ProudTory (talk) 15:47, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Christ, you wrote that like you were writing a second-rate movie trailer or something. Theory of Practice "...and we do love you madly." 16:00, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Without Churchill we'd all be speaking German and there wouldn't be any Jews or Roma anymore. The man should be worshipped every day by ever living, breathing person on the planet. ProudTory (talk) 16:03, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

See, when you make that comment, I presume you're forgetting several key reasons why the Nazis were defeated. Blue (is useful) 16:17, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

The majority of historians I've read seem to be under the impression that the Soviets, who had three times as many troops as the Germans, were the major contributor to the defeat of the Germans, usually with comments about how the rest were just distracting German forces and supplies. Not to downplay anyone's contributions, but the British were not that important in stopping the Germans. They were far more important in stopping the Japanese then they are usually given credit for, though.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 16:19, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Again, the same applies to Stalin - do you think everyone should be worshiping him, too?

A more likely possibility for what would happen without Churchill: the British would speak Russian. :D

Also, who is this "we" you are talking about? Not everyone here is English, American or even Western European. Some of us did end up "speaking Russian" even with Churchill.

And if you don't want people to consider you a cartoonish caricature of a right-winger, stop behaving like one.--ZooGuard (talk) 16:37, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, there was that asshole that wanted the British to side with the nazis. So, if not for Churchill, the British may very well be speaking German.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 16:58, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Fun fact, it was Churchill who released that asshole from prison, and later said he was a totally alright guy because how could an aristocrat EVER be bad? Racist AND classist. Churchill was a real gem.67.142.235.68 (talk) 00:57, 30 March 2014 (UTC)

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Had Britain given up in 1940 the German reich would have been free to steamroller over the Soviet Union, thus preventing Stalin the opportunity to relocate his military industrial complex east of the Urals. Had Britain given up then, Russia would have collapsed, and a German-Japenese alliance would have defeated the Americans in any ensuing war (Though it would have been unlikely for Hitler to declare war against the US if he had already crushed the Soviets.) Please keep the insults and childish name calling to a minimum. ProudTory (talk) 17:05, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

If you are talking to me, let me remind you of your own words: "This kind of hysterical cartoonish right winger simply doesn't exist." If you want to avoid "insults and childish name calling" like the last sentence of my previous post, avoid hyperbole like "The man should be worshipped every day by ever living, breathing person on the planet." Even if you really believe it, which puts you together with the allegedly atheistic morons who put their Dear Leader's mummy in a mausoleum.--ZooGuard (talk) 17:30, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

There's nuance to bear in mind. Whatever he may have done for WWII, he was still a racist who let countless people starve to death.--"Shut up, Brx." 17:33, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Not neutral but...

I know that RW ha no need to present a balanced point of view, but isn't this a little bit too heavy on the negatives?--Coffee (talk) 08:58, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, it feels like I'm reading a Metapedia "article". --Evil Reptilian Overlord (talk) 19:38, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

There are plenty of hagiographies of Churchill out there for you to read. What do we gain by reproducing them? Either we have an article that presents the less-known reading of his life or we don't have one at all -- which might be best, as I'm not sure he's really missional/worth our time. PowderSmokeAndLeather: Say something once, why say it again?. 19:44, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure what it has to do with the mission either, but such an unbalanced portrait seems a bit odd. The RW article on Nelson Mandela, for example, is quite kind and the world is not short of positive reports on his life. Using the logic applied above the Nelson Mandela should be a hatchet job.--Coffee (talk) 20:12, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Not really. We insinuate right from the beginning that Mandela was engaging in militant actions. Osaka Sun (talk) 02:36, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

The trouble with our articles on mainstream politicians is that they end up as nothing more than places for various passers-by to post their grievances. We really need to go through them all and ask "do we really have anything to say about this person that will fill an article?" Balaam (talk) 21:18, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Coverage of Churchill's attitude towards the colonies is fair enough, but I've stripped the gratuitous content about his depression, eating & drinking. Plus a load of very dubious "anecdotal quotes". Wēāŝēīōīď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 01:02, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

I put it back. Most of it is a serious commentary on his life. ħuman 09:19, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

David Irving

Why can't we use him as a reference? Edwardian (talk) 17:26, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Why is this bronze?

There's almost no content on this page, and most of the sections are useless. GeeJayK (talk) 03:20, 24 May 2021 (UTC)

It was bronzed in 2016 by JorisEnter, without an edit summary. At the time, it had an entire extra section (unsourced) about his views on Islam, recently removed by AMassiveGay. I'm inclined to agree that this shouldn't be bronze; the largest section is the inspirational quotes, which account for nearly half the references. The second largest section, the not-so-praiseworthy stuff, has all of 2 references. I took a look at the sources for the mental health section, and I'm not convinced they justify the claim that these mental problems have "been widely suggested". 𝒮𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓃𝑒 ^talk 21:10, 24 May 2021 (UTC)

its trash. another bit i removed was were it blamed him for the vietnam war. AMassiveGay (talk) 02:20, 25 May 2021 (UTC)

Shall we just remove the brainstar and be done with it? Spud (talk) 04:06, 25 May 2021 (UTC)

Yup, promote. IIRC bronze stuff don't really need vote but maybe that should change. --It's-a me, LeftyGreenMario! 05:15, 25 May 2021 (UTC)

Well, that being the case, I've removed the brainstar. This article is now unrated. I did hope that "Articles for demotion" would also be a place where we could also discuss genuine demotion (not in the RationalWiki sense) of articles, especially changing the rating from bronze to nothing. Spud (talk) 05:41, 25 May 2021 (UTC)

Also, the article cites WordPress and CounterPunch, which are listed on Wikipedia's "perennial sources" page as "generally unreliable" and "deprecated", respectively: [1]. Should those be removed? 70.124.147.243 (talk) 01:23, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

Also, some links are dead, while many quotes don't actually have a source. I'll probably have time to do something on Sunday, I'll see if I can fix part of the article. GeeJayK (talk) 02:08, 18 December 2021 (UTC)

New biography by Tariq Ali

After reading 1,100 pages of Churchill by Andrew Roberts I kinda feel like I need to read this one too in order to have a more balanced view on Churchill. I hope I'll be able to read it next year. GeeJayK (talk) 02:17, 15 September 2022 (UTC)

Something missing?

In the first section: “(and when the Allies finally pulled out of that fiasco“. Then what? He stood on his head and ate ice cream? He won the Derby? We, the curious of the parish, wish to know. Mr Larrington (talk) 23:33, 25 October 2022 (UTC)