Talk:Tourism in Vatican City

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Hi, everyone. This is a talk page. It's where people go so they can talk about an article, instead of just edit-warring endlessly or abusing admin rights by making empty threats on user's talk pages. This means you, User:Schrandit and User:Gentgeen.

Recently, these two Catholic partisans were offended by the casual mention, made in this article, of the issue of Vatican City's legitimacy as a state, so they banded together to censor Wikipedia. It's a simple fact that the VC's statehood is a very unique case and has been disputed. It's also a simple fact that the article I linked to, at the reputable Standing Group on International Relations web site, not only mentions the dispute but points out the VC's inability to use economic sanctions and the need for tourism to bolster the presence of a micro-nation.

Now we come to the reliable source dilemma. If I were to spell out the fact that, if not for tourism, VC would have an economy based entirely on charity, then I'd be accused of original research. If I let the facts speak for themselves, however, certain people would pretend not to be able to see the connection. Instead, I will present the dilemma and wait for third parties to join in the fray.

In the meantime, visit my talk page to see how User:Gentgeen abused his admin privileges to try to bully me into silence, and how he was unable to respond to my accusation and instead took sides in this conflict among editors instead of remaining neutral. People like him deserve not only to have their admin bit flipped back to zero, but their banned bit set to one. I would say that rogue admins like User:Gentgeen are a disgrace to Wikipedia, but the sad fact is that they're pretty much par for the course. Spotfixer (talk) 03:06, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Gentgeen's argument, taken from my user page.

Here's what User:Gentgeen wrote on my talk page:

Now, I have looked at your citation. It is crap. First of all, it doesn't support the statement it's attached to. I've read it's section on Vatican City State, and it never mentions tourism. It never calls into question the legitimacy of the Vatican's statehood. It's also full of errors. If the author can't even identify the familial relationship between two of the most important people in France in the first millennium, what other facts are in error? Any 6th grader should know that Charlemagne was not named Pippen (his father and two of his sons were), and was not the son of Charles Martel (he was Charlemagne's grandfather). It also spends almost all of its section of the VCS discussing the foreign relations of the Holy See. According to the Fundamental Law of Vatican City State[1], the VCS does not participate in foreign relations; they are handled for it by the Holy See's Secretariat of State, an entity closely tied to, but distinct from, VCS. What other factual errors has the author and editor of the work allowed into their work? Why would you use a source that doesn't even mention the "fact" it is supporting as a citation? Gentgeen (talk) 01:37, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Gentgeen is either lying or lazy. You decide.

All I know is that even a quick search for "Vatican" would have brought up the following sentence:

Of course, one might argue that the Vatican City State is neither a nation nor a state when assessed according to the historical record of the Peace of Westphalia, but it has been recognized as a statist entity in international law and actively mediates in diplomatic disputes utilizing moral norms without the backing of military and economic sanctions.

Contrast this with the claim that "It never calls into question the legitimacy of the Vatican's statehood." (sic)

As for tourism, another quick search brings up:

Similarly, tourism and its strategic marketing of a package of attractions enhance the presence of a small state through the generation of a claim to world culture.

Once again, it speaks for itself, at least if you stop counting on your rosary long enough to listen. The real question, though, is not the source of Gentgeen's errors but why he should be allowed to censor Wikipedia based on them. Spotfixer (talk) 03:19, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Don't be so dramatic

The sentence that I tagged was the unsourced statement "It (Tourism in Vatican City) is also of political value for the Vatican State, which relies on the high number of international visitors to back its claims on statehood." The source you put up didn't back that claim. Developing a roundabout proof implying that the Vatican needs revenue from Tourism (which would be OR) in order to maintain a sizable economy in order meet the standards of statehood generally observed in the 17th centuries is a stretch at best. You're not being persecuted by some evil Catholic cabal, your source just didn't back the claim, its not a big deal. - Schrandit (talk) 09:37, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

It doesn't have an economy and it's not a real country. Rather, it's an excuse for the Pope's goons to mess with any UN resolution that wants to save women's lives with condoms. But we both know that already. Spotfixer (talk) 14:50, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Economy =/= nationhood. Besides, how do, as you say, the "Pope's goons" mess with UN resolutions when they have a non-voting observer seat? You need to work on your conspiracy theories.

Its really nothing too elaborate, a source couldn't be found for the claim so it was removed. - Schrandit (talk) 00:36, 4 January 2009 (UTC)