Greater Netherlands

[The Lawspeaker]

It would correspond much more with my idea of a multicultural society than we have now. Various cultures with a common history, with a heritage tributary to the Roman and Germanic realm, wielded together!

The thing is.. when it comes to the Greater Netherlands (and also Luxembourg in that respect.. stretching all the way down to Switzerland) is that the area is culturally so endowed with culture and I think that those that those that want to take over (the French and the Germans) do that out of pure jealousy because they only have one culture. It has to be this or that.. not so here with all our different shades, different landscapes, different dialects and that is actually what makes us strong as a culture. Yes.. it that's kind of multiculturalism, not the state-enforced one that has been here with us now for 40 years but the fact that we have all these different strains of Catholicism and Protestantism, the choice to live in an area where they speak French, Dutch, Flemish Dutch, Limburgic Dutch, Low Saxon, Frisian, on whether you want to live in the hills, in the flat lands or along the coast. Maybe more then other countries do we have the possibility here to make your life the way you want it and to pick your own influence and that's something I only begin to realise now.

It's the richness of our shared culture and heritage (even more enriched by our colonial histories with influences coming in from the East and West Indies, from North America and South Africa - but also from other European countries) that makes this country the place where you can build your life the way you want it.

It's the kind of modernity that isn't wrong but that can be combined with tradition. And what our foreign "friends" try to ignore is the fact that Walloons didn't run for France during the Eighty Years War: they ran to the United Netherlands. A lot of them were Huguenots and we still have our Walloon churches.

[Treffie]

[FONT="Georgia"]

Wales = Wallonia

[Osweo]

You and your schemes, Civis... You forget yourself.

I personally am very against any paternalism (as I too have seen) towards the Southern Netherlands

Ahem. I'd like to see the 'proof' that Walloons were once 'Dutch' who became Frenchified. I thought they were Gallo-Romans who'd been speaking Gallo-Roman since the 1st Century or so. I appreciate that the language border has moved, but surely Frankisch wasn't the language of the peasantry in ALL Wallonia!?

[The Lawspeaker]

You and your schemes, Civis... You forget yourself.





Ahem. I'd like to see the 'proof' that Walloons were once 'Dutch' who became Frenchified. I thought they were Gallo-Romans who'd been speaking Gallo-Roman since the 1st Century or so. I appreciate that the language border has moved, but surely Frankisch wasn't the language of the peasantry in ALL Wallonia!?

First of all: it's not a scheme. It's irredentism. The idea that we are one nation and we have been one nation before (and actually for a long time.. longer still that we have been separated ---under the HRE and the Burgundian Circle and in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands which fell apart through William I's insane policies and French machinations).

There is more then language alone. There is culture, Os, something that you being a foreigner would never understand as I (even if I would be living in England for 20 years) would never understand the full workings of it all as those workings are guess what: not a matter of language and/or that is brains only. It's a feeling. When I am in Flanders or Wallonia I am not abroad. And striving to improve their conditions of living as they have set back for a generation is not paternalism - it is called "helping out your fellows." A patriotic duty if any.

So Heel-Neerlandisme is not something new - it's something deeply ingrained in political and cultural life in both the Netherlands and Belgium with adherents from both the left and the right.

Religion: British

Besides... Britishness doesn't exist since there are English, Scots, Welsh and Irish. If the idea of a Dietsland, of a Whole Netherlands, a Low Countries idea cannot exist.. why can Britain ?

[MagnaLaurentia]

Our language skills have to be improved drastically: French and German should be seriously studied (English is omnipresent already)at school, instead of the moronic street language children are picking up now.

Exactly. I actually believe that French should overtake English for political reasons if we are to become a federation and yes: more emphasis should be put on learning languages - starting off in primary school. It should be made fun to learn a language and one way to do is to hook up children from let's say Holland or Overijssel with children from Hoei (Huy) or Andenne in de province of Namen so they can have a holiday camp together and mix.. they will learn the language that was even better then while being in school and later on they can learn how to write it.

Of course they should later on also read Belgian French literature or even French literature.. listen to the music of Jacques Zegers or Jacques Brel in the same way as children from Hoei or Andenne would then read Flemish or Northern literature and listen to Flemish or Northern music and watch films and it should be always be made clear that despite it being in another language it is part of the same Netherlandic school of thought.

English and German are easier to learn then French and will of course be given too - also starting off in primary school.

Je vous encourage mes amis! D'ailleurs, les Néerlandais/Flamands sont les germains que je préfère le plus.

[The Lawspeaker]

Je vous encourage mes amis! D'ailleurs, les Néerlandais/Flamands sont les germains que je préfère le plus.

And they are more then welcome. One nation. One Netherlands instead of the two we have now..

[Osweo]

First of all: it's not a scheme. It's irredentism.

I meant to put my post here in the other thread that's running now, where you outlined all your fantasies for remodelling Walloon infrastructure - i.e. rampant Dutch paternalism!

Reminded me a little of how crazy old Onkel Dolfi used to spend hours planning what he'd do to remodel Linz and Berlin while the Russkies were breathing down his neck...

The idea that we are one nation and we have been one nation before (and actually for a long time.. longer still that we have been separated ---under the HRE and the Burgundian Circle and in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands which fell apart through William I's insane policies and French machinations).

Nation...
A bunch of people who never spoke your German tongue, and whose ancestors were there before the Germanics swarmed over the Rhine.
Walloons are Gallo-Romans, with a dash of Frankish elite absorbed into them. Flemings are Franks and Batavi etc. with a bit of absorbed and assimilated Gallo-Roman.

It's a little bit like Welsh and English, Estonians and Latvians....

And weren't the HRE and United Netherlands as multinational as the present Belgium? Why swap one for the other?

There is more then language alone. There is culture, Os, something that you being a foreigner would never understand as I (even if I would be living in England for 20 years) would never understand the full workings of it all as those workings are guess what: not a matter of language and/or that is brains only. It's a feeling. When I am in Flanders or Wallonia I am not abroad.

It's not 'foreign' to you, sure, but neither are... oh, let me think... Muenster? Cleves? Maybe Koeln isn't SO foreign? Or Picards, or perhaps even Normands and Champagnoises?

There are continuums in matters ethnocultural, especially in your wider regions, but lines must still be drawn somewhere.

I'd say that Walloon independence would indicate the nature of the continuum better than simply having a big fat France, Netherlands and Germany.

So Heel-Neerlandisme is not something new - it's something deeply ingrained in political and cultural life in both the Netherlands and Belgium with adherents from both the left and the right.

Please, find me some WALLOONS that want it!

Besides... Britishness doesn't exist since there are English, Scots, Welsh and Irish. If the idea of a Dietsland, of a Whole Netherlands, a Low Countries idea cannot exist.. why can Britain ?

Britain is an island. All those peoples are British in a very simple, apolitical, sense.

My religion is not tied in with a political project, but simply my ancestry and sentiments.

[The Lawspeaker]

I meant to put my post here in the other thread that's running now, where you outlined all your fantasies for remodelling Walloon infrastructure - i.e. rampant Dutch paternalism!

Reminded me a little of how crazy old Onkel Dolfi used to spend hours planning what he'd do to remodel Linz and Berlin while the Russkies were breathing down his neck...

It's better then what Flemish "nationalists" do who just tear everything down while selling off their own country to the Israeli's.
But maybe that's a more nationalistic thing: caring about your own kin and that's why I personally have no respect whatsoever for many Flemish nationalists. I can understand it very well if they despise the French or the froggified elite but the normal regular Walloon, that has to live off a meagre tchômaedje (chomage) because his factory closed down and so did all the others, is innocent when it comes to past mistreatment of the Flemish in their own country.

Nation...
A bunch of people who never spoke your German tongue, and whose ancestors were there before the Germanics swarmed over the Rhine.
Walloons are Gallo-Romans, with a dash of Frankish elite absorbed into them. Flemings are Franks and Batavi etc. with a bit of absorbed and assimilated Gallo-Roman.

I recommend you to look up stuff about Belgian French and the Walloon dialect.. it has seen a lot of Germanic influence and Flemish has seen a lot of Gallo-Roman influence. Hell even the Brabantic my mother spoke. Ask Heimmacht what a nondeju means. Not Germanic no ? It isn't. It's Brabantic and means goddammit.

It's a little bit like Welsh and English, Estonians and Latvians....

Nope. So if it would be like Welsh and English then they shouldn't be in the United Kingdom.

And weren't the HRE and United Netherlands as multinational as the present Belgium? Why swap one for the other?

It's not 'foreign' to you, sure, but neither are... oh, let me think... Muenster? Cleves? Maybe Koeln isn't SO foreign? Or Picards, or perhaps even Normands and Champagnoises? There are continuums in matters ethnocultural, especially in your wider regions, but lines must still be drawn somewhere.

Munsterland (the area to the west of it) spoke and still speaks to an agree (unless they stopped doing it after 1983) a Dutch-related dialect. Cleves was Dutch-speaking until the last century.

And the borders are drawn at the Munsterland, Oost-Friesland, below Bonen, Kamerijk and along the Luxembourg border. The old borders of the Netherlands in the HRE minus Luxembourg.

I'd say that Walloon independence would indicate the nature of the continuum better than simply having a big fat France, Netherlands and Germany.

It is a continuum.. you can't have one thing without the other. The Netherlands AND Belgium that exist today are both amputated nations.

Please, find me some WALLOONS that want it!

There are no Walloons here but more and more of them seem to be learning Dutch while Flemish and Dutch now move into Wallonia. There is an article about it but you would have to look for it yourself.

Britain is an island. All those peoples are British in a very simple, apolitical, sense.

My religion is not tied in with a political project, but simply my ancestry and sentiments.

Britain is four nations that all had an avid dislike of each other until they were united under one King and and even then it took 200 years and now you still have the Scots that want the English out.. so it isn't working, no ?

Let me tell you one thing about the Low Countries. It isn't an island (I wish it was though but it isn't. It lays on the very fault lines of the Gallo-Roman and Germanic cultures. Just go to Maastricht or Antwerp.. or yes Brussels and you will understand what I mean that is if you keep your eyes open.

Another such country would be Switzerland and they wouldn't appreciate it over there if you didn't call them a nation but suggested that Geneva became part of France.

[Osweo]

I recommend you to look up stuff about Belgian French and the Walloon dialect.. it has seen a lot of Germanic influence and Flemish has seen a lot of Gallo-Roman influence. Hell even the Brabantic my mother spoke. Ask Heimmacht what a nondeju means. Not Germanic no ? It isn't. It's Brabantic and means goddammit.

Neighbours influence each other. Borrowings remain borrowings, however.

Nope. So if it would be like Welsh and English then they shouldn't be in the United Kingdom.

Maybe they shouldn't. It's certainly worth examining other political arrangements.

Munsterland (the area to the west of it) spoke and still speaks to an agree (unless they stopped doing it after 1983) a Dutch-related dialect. Cleves was Dutch-speaking until the last century.

What next then? Nederlanden van die Seine zu den Ems!??

There are no Walloons here but more and more of them seem to be learning Dutch while Flemish and Dutch now move into Wallonia. There is an article about it but you would have to look for it yourself.

The present few threads might hopefully attract a few who are doing websearches.

But seeing as how it's your project, YOU should go and find some on their own forums, and report back to us what they think of your ideas...

Britain is four nations that all had an avid dislike of each other until they were united under one King and and even then it took 200 years and now you still have the Scots that want the English out.. so it isn't working, no ?

That is grossly simplistic. Strangely enough, we do a hell of a lot of interbreeding, despite these 'avid dislikes'...

[The Lawspeaker]

Neighbours influence each other. Borrowings remain borrowings, however.

And thus over time communities are created and thus nations. Well done, Os, you just found the key to nationhood. Next step: understanding that multi-lingual nations do exist. Let's see if you can get there too. Switzerland and Luxembourg are now on the menu for debate.

What next then? Nederlanden van die Seine zu den Ems!??

Nee hoor. Van de Eems tot aan de Zoom (Somme).

But seeing as how it's your project, YOU should go and find some on their own forums, and report back to us what they think of your ideas...

It is not an unknown topic on Dutch AND Belgian forums.

That is grossly simplistic. Strangely enough, we do a hell of a lot of interbreeding, despite these 'avid dislikes'...

And so do Flemish and Walloons. And to an extent Flemish and Northern Dutch. Your point being ?