Talk:Living with the enemy in the German-occupied Channel Islands

Change of name

I'm not very happy with the change of name. This article was designed to explain the difficult relationship between the local people and the occupiers. The new name does not reflect this.

There was another article planned which was to explain what it was like to be a civilian in the occupation. Sub headings being - family problems from split families, (with another sub article on evacuation of children to the UK), work, several areas on food (including black market, scavenging, cooking and red cross parcels), fuel problems, medical issues, requisitioned houses, clothing issues, transport, communications including red cross messages.

It would confuse this article to add all the above subjects into it and what would you call the new article?

I propose returning to the original name. Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 10:00, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Oppose. Besides myself, two other editors noted in the Afd discussion that they didn't think the original title was very good. The current title reflects the contents of the article as it currently stands. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:28, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Sorry but I don't see a debate about a change of name in the Afd discussion or any suggestion that it should be this name. As the Afd was not a discussion about the name, you could assume that those that wanted to keep the article, which was everyone, who did not comment on the name, which was most, were happy with it or could not think of anything better. By the way I like the cleanup you did, thanks for that. Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 12:37, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Do you want to get the opinions of User:Skylark777 and User:Jahaza, the two I referred to, or ask for more input from Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history? Also, the original title is not in the usual format: "Working ...". Clarityfiend (talk) 03:03, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

I suggested a name change on the Afd. The previous was really awkward sounding. The new name sounds much better, but it does not seem to really reflect the specific topic of the article. If something comes to mind, so far nothing, I will suggest it. Skylark777 (talk) 14:52, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm not saying that the original name was perfect. I had struggled for two weeks with names before posting the article. The problem I have is that I have an article planned for the title "Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands" or “Civilian life in the German-occupied Channel Islands” as explained above.

Some suggestions for alternative names.

Civilian cooperation under the German occupation of the Channel Islands

Civilian cooperation with the German occupiers of the Channel Islands

Civilian relationships with the German occupiers of the Channel Islands

The problem with the word "civilian" is that I don't think it does really covers the government relationships or that of companies, with the enemy.

Cooperation under the German occupation of the Channel Islands

Cooperation with the German occupiers of the Channel Islands

Cooperation in the German-occupied Channel Islands

Cooperation indicates the bulk of what happened.

Survival in the German-occupied Channel Islands

Surviving in the German-occupied Channel Islands

Survival may be suitable but I don't much like it.

Living under the German occupation of the Channel Islands

Living under the German occupiers of the Channel Islands

Living with the German occupiers of the Channel Islands

Living with the enemy in the German-occupied Channel Islands

Living seems a suitable description.

Any opinions ? Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 19:41, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

• Personally I don't get why "collaboration" doesn't work - there are many kinds of collaboration (political, economic, passive etc.). I think the real problem is that the German occupation of the Channel Islands main article is, in itself, a social history article and this page is, as such, basically a WP:CFORK...—Brigade Piron (talk) 16:21, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but collaboration is an illegal activity, people can be prosecuted for it and no one in the islands were. It is also a very inflammatory title. If you really want an article just on collaboration I will write one, but it will be much shorter than this one which was designed to explore all types of relationships with the occupying forces, not just potential collaboration issues. Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 16:12, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

Proposed change of name so a different article can use this name

The attached draft - Talk:Civilian life under the German occupation is the article I was planning on writing about civilian life during the occupation. You will see that it covers very different subjects to the article current called Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands. I therefore propose, as I have mentioned before, to rename the current article so that the new article can occupy this space.

Once this problem is sorted I will have a go at sorting the main article German occupation of the Channel Islands which is messy. Does anyone strongly disagree with this suggestion? Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 14:26, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

This article has been renamed and new article Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands now posted - sorting the main article German occupation of the Channel Islands - is the next target Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 09:38, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

Shouldn't that have been "Civilian life during the German occupation of the Channel Islands"? GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:05, 4 February 2016 (UTC)

POV title

The title of this article violates the neutral point of view to which Wikipedia aspires. "Living with the enemy" is hardly neutral. Would an article titled "Model occupation by Germany of the Channel Islands" pass muster? (It has been called a "model occupation." -- and not just by Germans.) There are also a number of words and phrases in this article which are not neutral.

I see another article titled Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands which seems to cover the same ground as this article. Shouldn't one of those articles be deleted or the two combined? Smallchief (talk 01:47, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Hiya Smallchief, thanks for the comments,

The title Living with the enemy in the German-occupied Channel Islands is about... the Germans living with Channel Islanders... or is it... Channel Islanders living with Germans ? Why is that not neutral ? If it was renamed Living with civilians in German occupied... it would be biased to the German point of view....

They were enemies of each other, through the whole of the occupation and neither side forgot that, so why not use the word enemies.

Why not model occupation ? Well partly because of a book of that title, which was very biased in its talking about too close friendships without explaining that the vast majority of people were not like that and caused a lot of controversy when it was published. Partly because the main reason why it was so peaceful, was because the the high proportion of Germans to civilians. The Islands are 1/1000 the size of the UK, so if the UK had been occupied they would need 20,000,000 German soldiers to pacify them the same way, the Wehrmacht only had 20.7m, if the Germans had the same number of solders per sq km as they did in France in 1941, there would be just 50 (fifty) soldiers in the Islands. Sorry but I don't think that it was a model occupation, Germany did not have enough soldiers to apply the model's rules elsewhere and therefore was not a test that could possibly work in other countries. Lastly, you would need to apply model to the header article German occupation of the Channel Islands, not one looking at only a small aspect of the experience.

This article is primarily about the direct relationship between the two nations, conducted at government level, with the impact on civilians and their reaction mention, whereas Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands is more about what most people experienced during the 5 years, yes there was German influence in lives and therefore some overlap, so each article has a small paragraph and a cross link to each other, but it is more about the interrelationship of civilians and their concerns over food and communications with loved ones, there being very few personal contacts between civilians and the Germans. I think each subject is too large to merge into one article and would cause confusion.

Each of these articles and a number of others like Resistance in the German-occupied Channel Islands, Sark during the German occupation of the Channel Islands and German fortification of Guernsey are designed to be sub articles of German occupation of the Channel Islands, an article that I am currently revising to turn it properly into a header article.Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 08:23, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Sorry, but the brief lead on this article is simply not, under any definition, neutral, containing a number of non-neutral phrases and words. I'm not aware of any other article about the German occupation which uses the word "enemy" in its title. Moreover, the word "enemy" to refer to Germans is also in the text of the lead paragraphs. "Individuals who got too close to the enemy." Who is judging whether they got "too close?" That's a matter of opinion.

Then there is the statement that most Islanders "had no choice" but to endure the German occupation. Well, of course they had choices. Not good ones -- but they could have died fighting, they could have attempted to escape, they could have cooperated whole-heartedly with the Germans, etc. That sentence needs repair.

Then there is the statement that the Islanders "experienced freedom" when liberated by the UK. "Freedom" is a loaded word that means different things to different people -- and who is "free" and who is not is a matter of opinion.

I'm putting a NPOV tag on this article.

We're all guilty at times of letting our opinions creep into articles -- and most of this article is interesting and informative, but the lead paragraphs seriously need revision.

Smallchief (talk 12:00, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

I have added additional wording from the German point of view. There are sadly not many books written by the defeated army and wording written after the event by Germans, recollections by them tend to be quite soft in their nature, skipping over many subjects. I will carry on hunting and find some more.

I am very busy for the next week, but i'll have a read through the article bearing your comments in mind next week.

I am not fixed with the word "enemy", I was not aware it was controversial, if you have two armies fighting each other, they are enemies. Would you be happier with "Living with the German occupiers of the Channel Islands" as I had suggested previously ? Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 19:03, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

Added section "Relief of civilians" to show the German compassion? or desire to preserve food stocks? as the end of the war came close and British attitude to let the civilians starve, then their compassion to allow red cross parcels in. Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 07:40, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Added Kommando-Unternehmen Granville to show the problems the Germans had in planning operations when surrounded by civilians. Ânes-pur-sàng - À la perchoine 10:44, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

Poor Title

The thought I had reading the new title was that the British and Germans were in bed together. Literally. Moreover, the new title doesn't tell the reader what the article is about. The old title was better; restore it. Smallchief (talk) 21:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Proposed merger

See Talk:Civilian life under the German occupation of the Channel Islands#Merger proposal MartinPoulter (talk) 12:11, 22 April 2020 (UTC)