Talk:Leopold II of Belgium/Archive 1
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| Archive 1 |
5-21 million
[1] --Viriditas 12:37, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
- Well I am going to dispute this, if this is allowed. The lowest number cited in this reference is 2.1 millions. -> fixing the article accordingly. --FvdP 23:40, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
Article title
Leopold II "of Belgium"? Surely "of the Belgians" is correct? Flapdragon 22:58, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
I have one questions: Which company did the extraction of rubber?
You can't deny that there has to be a company present in Congo. I can't believe that a company like Dunlop would let all the rubber in the hands of ONE individuel.
You never read anything (or much) about the role some companies play in the worlds greatest failures. Think about Krupp or Gazpron. You can think of others too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.244.196.67 (talk) 19:40, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Massacre
Outside Belgium, he is chiefly remembered as the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free State, a private project undertaken by the King to extract rubber and ivory in the Congo region of central Africa, which relied on forced labour and resulted in the deaths of between 5 to 22 million Congolese.[1]
Cited or not, this must be bullshit. 22 is simply impossible since there were only 15 million Congolese in the 1950's. Who is this Matthew White anyway? This source is absolutely not credible and the man even writes on his page that his work may not be used on Wikipedia. I'm a realist, not a monarchist, so let's just stick to reliable facts. -Dionysos1 13:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
- 22 million is plausible since that is the total number killed between 1885 and the 1920s. There were 15 million Congolese in the 1950s, but he is saying that there would have been 37 million had the Belgian Congo never existed as a colonial entity.Chiwara 17:08, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
- That still doesn't state the credibility of the source. I have never heard of such a number, and half my family is born in the Congo. That doesn't make me a "colonialist", but it just cannot be. If it were like that, it would be known much more. I'll have to delete it if it's not stated by more - credible - sources. --Dionysos1 07:38, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
- Frederick Wertham's 1968 book "A Sign For Cain: An Exploration of Human Violence" estimates that the population of the Congo dropped from 30 million to 8.5 million in that period.
- Dr. Frederick Wertham was a German-American psychiatrist and crusading author who protested the purportedly harmful effects of mass media — comic books in particular — on the development of children.
- In 1900 Africa had between 90 million (African Studies Review 49.1 (2006) 179-181) and 133 million people (World Population Prospects: The 2006 Revision). -- Belligero 21:40, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
- what religion was he?:
- Cited or not, this must be bullshit. 22 is simply impossible since there were only 15 million Congolese in the 1950's
As Leopold II's rule over the Congo Free State predated 1950 by a good deal, I don't see how this is a relevant line of argument. If one shows up in a region of 30 to 40 million indigineous people (seems to be the range of contemporary estimates) and leaves it with only about 10 to 15 million indigineous people in the very early XXth... well, I'm certain we're all capable of performing simple subtraction.
The logical fallacy goes thusly: "The idea that Jack ate thirty beans between breakfast and lunch is bullshit because he only had ten beans by dinnertime." The subtraction occurs before the time used as a comparison, so the total offered as disproof has no bearing on the magnitude of the subtraction; it is merely what's left after the subtraction. --The Centipede 14:21, 2 August 2007 (UTC)User:The Centipede|The Centipede]] 14:14, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
From what I can see here, one thing is for sure: Leopold's crimes in Congo simply DWARF those attributed to Pol Pot in Cambodia almost a century later- and note that I am NOT a supporter of Pol Pot's un-Marxist brand of Socialism. ComradeFlorian RaduFlorian (talk) 13:08, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
And yet this mass-murderer still has a statue in Ghent. Unbelievable! ComradeFlorian RaduFlorian (talk) 13:34, 7 June 2008 (UTC)
- Hardly "unbelievable" -- lots of mass murderers (Stalin, e.g.) still have statues. Elphion (talk) 17:29, 18 May 2009 (UTC)
Fetishes
I just removed two paragraphs (one unsourced, one insufficiently sourced) purporting to relate to Leopold's various fetishes. If these have historical validity, they should be presented (if at all) as serious claims in a separate section, not just plopped as random items into the Biography section. Elphion (talk) 18:08, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
OK. I have a properly sourced reference that Leopold II was a pedophile:
"Leopold's reputation, particularly in his buying of the sexual favors of little girls, was well known. In 1885 when the London Pall Mall Gazette ran its exposures of child prostitution, Mrs. Jeffries had named him as a client when she was charged with procuring pre-pubescent virgins."
- Nelson, Michael; Queen Victoria and the Discovery of the Riviera; London, Tauris Parke Paperbacks, 2007, p. 100
Dick Kimball (talk) 15:25, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
- I was hoping for a bit more here. Does Nelson believe that Mrs. Jeffries is a reliable witness? On what basis? Is there more corroborative information about Leopold's involvement in this sort of thing? In particular, does Nelson give any source for his claim that Leopold's reputation was "well known"? I'm not trying to sweep this under the rug, but Leopold is such a grotesque excuse for a human being that you have to be careful that all the hearsay is real. Elphion (talk) 19:23, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
"Secret society of murderers"
(The issue is a minor edit war over including the given phrase that appears in a BBC article by correspondent Mark Dummett.) Reluctantly, I agree with Fynire that at it stands the phrase is not properly sourced. Yes, there is a reference at the end of the sentence to Dummett's article, but I agree it's not clear that that's the source of the quote. And in fact, it is not -- for the quote is not sourced in Dummett's article either. Moreover, the entire passage is lifted verbatim from Dummett's article. I despair over this article. Can't we do better than cutting and pasting from disparate sources on the web? Elphion (talk) 01:36, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Cleanup tag, September 2009
This article is not in good shape. The prose style alone needs serious work. An amazing amount of the current content was copied directly from one of the external links: The Congo Free State Genocide (at Religious Tolerance dot Org), which lists some reasonable references but whose discussion is largely unsourced. A fair amount of other stuff (much of it unsourced) has been added here in a rather scatter-shot fashion, with the result that the article is not well organized, and the force of the argument against Leopold's regime in the Congo is seriously weakened. As just one example, the death toll is attributed to several causes, and it is not at all clear what proportion was due to the colonial activities.
It would appear that a prerequisite for fixing the article is reading at least Hochschild's book (which I have not yet done; so this will be a long-term project for me). Goals of the cleanup should include: improving the prose; removing (rewriting) material from Religious Tolerance dot Org; presenting a more coherent and more clearly sourced description of the Congo Free State, and in particular Leopold's role in its operation; drawing a better comparison with other (non-Belgian) colonial operations; generally doing a better job of presenting the evidence from modern sources.
Also, there is remarkably little here about Leopold the man (besides fussy dynastic stuff and rumors of scandal), or about his influence on Belgium itself. Granted, the Congo is his main historical legacy, but Leopold himself has sort of disappeared. Is there a decent biography in English?
Elphion (talk) 05:28, 18 September 2009 (UTC)
Suggestions for reading -- interesting books in English that are well-sourced and treat Leopold respectfully but fairly:
- Adam Hochschild. King Leopold's Ghost. Second edition, 2005, Mariner, 0-618-00190-5. Probably the best modern treatment in English, one of the first to bring into the discussion modern reviews of the long-term effects of the Free State regime on the inhabitants. This book has something of a reputation in Belgium as being anti-Belgian, but it is nothing of the sort. The treatment is sensitive and scrupulously fair.
- Neal Ascherson. The King Incorporated. Paperback edition, 1999, Granta, 1-86207-290-6. Essentially a reprinting of Ascherson's 1963 book, but with a new introduction. Somewhat more of a biography of Leopold, but also an unblinking indictment of Leopold's regime in the Congo, concluding that the seeds for today's failed state were unquestionably sown then.
- Barbara Emerson. Leopold II of the Belgians. 1979, Widenfeld and Nicolson, 0-297-77569-3. A biography of Leopold, with extensive discussion of the Congo. Somewhat more detail on Leopold's private life. A bit hard to find today.
Elphion (talk) 04:54, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
Leopoldian achievements in the Congo Free State
Casement's report of 1904 was not all negative especially on transport development, while deaths through illnesses like sleeping sickness cannot be attributed to one man let alone a regime as this happened throughout the African and American colonial period: "A fleet of steamers . . navigate the main river and its principal affluents at fixed intervals. Regular means of communication are thus afforded to some of the most inaccessible parts of Central Africa. A railway, excellently constructed in view of the difficulties to be encountered, now connects the ocean ports with Stanley Pool, over a tract of difficult country, which formerly offered to the weary traveller on foot many obstacles to be overcome and many days of great bodily fatigue."--Fynire (talk) 11:02, 13 September 2009 (UTC)
- Yes, but Leopold did not build the steamers and the railway for humanitarian reasons: they were necessary to export the goods collected in the hinterland. Hochschild spends some time addressing the mortality from disease. The question is why did the Africans succumb to these indigenous diseases in such numbers during this period? The only answer that makes any sense is that their civilization was so profoundly disrupted by the colonial regimes (in the Congo and elsewhere) that the widespread dislocation, violence, exhaustion, and malnutrition (all well documented) made them particularly vulnerable. Elphion (talk) 02:47, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
- Railways were of course part of the development of the Congo and largely laid for trading purposes. That does not stop them being an Leopoldian achievement. Africans wanted to trade too and did using the new transports. [Most secondary material has Leopold as a unique colonial monster which hides the truth to no useful purpose, while population estimates on the Congo are utterly unreliable.] Anyway, Elphion, one cannot assess all human activity from a 'humanitarian' perspective else nothing would get made.
- The coastal areas of the Congo had been visited and influenced by Europeans some 300 years before Leopold so there was plenty of viral and bacterial interaction over centuries up the river. I do not know why sleeping sickness became such a killer however if it is indigenous can Leopold be blamed?
- "if it is indigenous can Leopold be blamed?" Yes. Sleeping sickness has been present in Africa for hundreds if not thousands of years. Yet the population succumbed to such an increased degree only during the Free State period. That's practically a smoking gun, and the practices that left the people vulnerable to the disease are well documented. The loss of life during this time far exceeds anything experienced from slaving expeditions of earlier Europeans, the natives, or "the Arabs". (Leopold loved to talk about suppressing the Arab slave trade, despite (a) its not having been prevalent in the Congo region, (b) his not actually making much of a dent in it, (c) his own enslaving of the inhabitants of the Congo on a much grander scale.) And cannibalism is largely a western myth, perpetuated as a pretext to justify western intervention in the area. There is no hard evidence for it, and if it happened at all it cannot have been common.
- Yes, the population figures are estimates, especially since Leopold deliberately destroyed most of the company records before turning the area over to Belgium. But the various lines of inquiry, from the early 20th century to the present day, all lead to the same conclusion: roughly half the population perished.
- The railway was built with enforced labor, at enormous loss of life. As the volume of goods extracted (not traded) from the Congo increased, it had to be rebuilt, again with forced labor and at even greater loss of life. Leopold was not promoting trade, he was putting in place the infrastructure required to get his riches out. Calling this "an accomplishment" with the implication that it was for the benefit of the Congo shades the history almost beyond recognition.
- No, Leopold's rapacity was not unique. Much of the European "scramble for Africa" was practically as bad. Europeans were (like most of us) a bit blind about injustices committed in the name of their own financial interests. Cadbury, an important supporter of Morel, seemed unconcerned about the cacao workers exploited in the Portuguese colonies. Forced labor and poll taxes on the natives continued in the Congo (often at the hands of Leopold's erstwhile officials) for years after it was wrested from the king's grasp. Leopold certainly became a convenient scapegoat, and Morel's task became much more difficult once this bugbear was removed. As I indicated in my assessment of the article below, the article should spend more time placing the Free State in context. The Congo has borne the brunt of Western interests practically to the present day. Belgium at least has apologised for its complicity in Lumumba's assassination, which the US has not done; and US support for decades of Mobutu's own rapacity is just staggering. However -- merely pointing the finger and saying "you're bad too" does not exonerate Leopold. We need to come to terms with this incredibly destructive exploitation if we are to have any hopes of moving on.
- Elphion (talk) 19:04, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
- But it is not about moving on, rather about writing an article that informs rather than prejudices and one that is not based on Euro-guilt or anti-Belgianism.
- Was the Panama Canal an achievement given the huge numbers of deaths associated with its construction? It certainly was not a humanitarian project unless you regard trade as an essential for human progress and improvement.
- There is no reliable sourced figure or even estimate for Congo's population to start with, nor of depopulation other than witness reports for certain areas, as Casement provided. Read Louis and Stengers who deal with the nonsense talked about counting Congo's population numbers. They also call into question Morel's reliability.
- By the way how many Europeans were actually in the Congo in Leopold's time to do all the damage suggested?
- If Casement is a reliable witnss read him on Congo cannibalism. Admittedly he latterly thought the locals should prefer Arab to Belgian enslavement.
- This article is not particularly anti-Belgian. It is not really motivated by "Euro-guilt". But anyone who can, with a straight face, say that European colonialism was, even on balance, a positive experience for the natives of most of the colonies engages in wishful thinking that is belied by the evidence.
- And the evidence is overwhelming, even where it is not always precise. Stengers is not exactly an unbiased source. Hochschild calls him at one point an apologist for Leopold, and the more I read of him the more I tend to agree. In the 60s, 70s, and 80s when Stengers was writing -- and when the Belgian government was still denying access to the surviving records -- it was just possible to make a case for a more or less favorable slant on the evidence. This is no longer true. Works published since Stengers (Hochschild cites many studies, by Jan Vansina and Jules Marchal, among others) lead independently to the conclusion that the original Belgian Government assessment was essentially correct: roughly half the native population perished during the Free State period. We are still dealing in very round numbers here, but the magnitude is no longer seriously in question.
- The number of Europeans was not the relevant factor; their modern weaponry and technology gave them an overwhelming advantage, here as elsewhere. And of course, they were able to intimidate a much larger number of natives into complicity. There is no argument here that all natives were blameless; but without something like Leopold's guiding hand, nothing like the historical destruction would have taken place.
- You are really stretching to cite Panama as a counter-example. Yes, it was undertaken for commercial reasons; yes, much life was lost. The key distinction is that it was not built with forced labour -- and the revenues did not end up in Teddy Roosevelt's pocket. (Of course, he had left office by the time it was completed, but you know what I mean.)
- Casement's evidence for cannibalism was only hearsay. Much of his testimony from the Congo was not hearsay; and much of the remainder is backed up by hard evidence. The observations on cannibalism are not. Yes, Casement's evidence has to be evaluated, like anyone's; in general he comes off well, but he was not infallible. And I am not arguing that cannibalism never happened; but it was not prevalent, and it certainly didn't justify the wholesale slaughter of natives that ensued as a result of Leopold's intervention. It was nothing more than a pretext.
- Supporting "stable" kleptocrats is hardly ever a good idea; it just keeps the lid on until the explosion becomes violent and inevitable. Would those countries have disintegrated so bloodily if the US had not supported the thieves at the top? American policy effectively kept both states in suspended animation for decades, giving Mobutu and Saddam no incentive to address the real problems. Of course the US had to consider its national interest in access to the natural resources in both countries; but history provides few examples of kleptocrats who work out well in the end.
Elphion (talk) 22:49, 25 November 2009 (UTC)
- Keepimg the lid on things is not necessarily a bad thing especially if you haven't a clue how ghastly the result will be of removing it or if you don't even care to consider the likely results.
As to best writing, I notice you don't recommend Roger Louis despite him being an exceptionally well-recognised historian. --Fynire (talk) 21:39, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
Other Attempts at Colonization
"After a number of unsuccessful schemes for colonies in Africa or Asia," What are those schemes? I'm quite interesting in knowing that... --Andrelvis 21:55, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
- It would be great to have a list here. Evidently he must also have had some involvement in Australia - why else would Alexander Forrest name King Leopold Ranges after him? --Rwestera (talk) 20:27, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
One attempt concerned Mexico, a member of the Belgium Royal family was even 'empress of Mexico'. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.191.241.1 (talk) 12:47, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
- The Mexican regime of Austrian Archduke Maximillian (supported initially by Napoleon III) was not primarily a Belgian affair. His wife was Leopold's sister, but that was more a dynastic coincidence. -- Elphion (talk) 13:49, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
"This number is disputed"
(Comment accidentally deleted by Edcollins:)
- (Oups, sorry for this... -- Edcolins 18:07, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC))
I removed the sentence "(This number is disputed.)" from the 5-15 million number. Who disputes it? For what reason? There appears to have been no related discussion. If it's disputed in the same way the Turkish government disputes the Armenian genocide, then it should be noted as such.--Eloquence* 13:49, Apr 20, 2004 (UTC)
- I suppose the numbers of Leopold II's victims is disputed because there was no population census before nor immediately after his rule in Congo, nor an account of the murdered. Therefore, only wide-ranging estimates are possible. I do not think the comment was meant to somehow lessen the crimes of this greedy bastard.
- You are funny, this number is disputed, because there is virtually no hard evidence for it. It's not those questioning the number that have to proof, but those that postulate those numbers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.19.132.47 (talk) 16:05, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
Assassination attempt
Kaldari Nov 9, 2004: I have found a single reference to an attempt to assasinate Leopold II, but could not verify its accuracy: "The other day, in Brussels, King Leopold was fired upon three times by a man named Genarro Rubini, an Italian..." The above appeared in Winn's Firebrand Vol II, No. 1 (an obscure political journal published in January, 1903). It is not clear if the assasination attempt occured in 1903 or 1902, as it only says "the other day". Can anyone verify this incident?
- Rubino, not Rubini I think...[3] or Rubin [4][5]. It seems the event happened on November 15, 1902 and the attempt was made by a 43 year-old Italian anarchist Gennaro Rubino (or Rubin).
- I suspect that Rubin is an anglification of Rubino, similar to Leopold's wife's name morphing from Marie Henriette to Maria Henrietta in the American press at the time. Kaldari 23:14, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Also it looks like his first name is 'Gennaro' rather than 'Genarro'. Here's another reference. Kaldari 23:26, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- There should be a generally accepted biographical source for this. --41.17.27.250 (talk) 16:21, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
POV discussion
Removed this paragraph:
- The American mystic poet Vachel Lindsay wrote that he was able to "listen to the yell of Leopold's ghost...hear ... the demons chuckle and yell, Cutting his hands off down in Hell." King Leopold had appropriated the rubber-rich "Belgian Congo" for his personal fortune, and his colonial regime of slave labor, rape and mutilation was immortalized in Joseph Conrad's version of Hell on earth, Heart of Darkness. It took an international outcry to force Leopold to relinquish control of what had become his private fiefdom. Despite his phobia about germs--he wore a bag over his beard--His Masjesty had countless mistresses, until he fell in love with a cigar-smoking, sixteen-year-old prostitute named Caroline Lacroix. He married her a few days before his death, and immediately after Leopold expired, she quietly left Belgium with his fortune in a suitcase.
There is valuable information in it but it should be rewritten in a more NPOV way.
- I admit, Leopold's Congo was not the paradise. But the expression "regime of slave labor, rape and mutilation" is most probably excessive and unilateral, in other words, non-NPOV.
- I beg to differ. If anything, describing Leopold's rule in Congo in such mild terms is tantamount to holocaust denial. The man caused millions to die.
- Could you please provide evidence about Lacroix leaving Belgium with Leopold's fortune ? I've never heard of that. That would have been a big scandale at the time if it were true.
FvdP 10:42 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
Vachel Lindsay a bit colourful for your tastes, eh? Yet it's what he wrote, so it's an attributed point of view. And Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness belongs in the article, not the talk page. I will gladly get quotes for those who recognized the human misery caused by Leopold II's rule: once attributed, they can go back in. If you can find any who characterized his rule of the Congo as benign, they'd belong, but I suspect such quotes are rare. After all, as Leopold II said, "In dealing with a race composed of cannibals for thousands of years it is necessary to use methods which will best shake their idleness and make them realize the sanctity of work." The Congolese government conscripted adults and children as porters, fed them little, overworked them, and did not always pay them. Edmond Picard, a Belgian senator described it thusly: "These porters...black, miserable, with only a horribly filthy loin-cloth for clothing, frizzy and bare head supporting the load...most of them sickly, drooping under a burden increased by tiredness and insufficient food -- a handful of rice and some stinking dried fish; pitiful walking caryatids, beasts of burden with thin monkey legs, with drawn features, eyes fixed and round from preoccupation with keeping their balance and from the daze of exhaustion. They come and go like this by the thousands...requisitioned by the State armed with its powerful militia, handed over by chiefs whose slaves they are and who make off with their salaries, trotting with bent knees, belly forward, an arm raised to steady the load, the other leaning on a long walking-stick, dusty and sweaty, insects spreading out across the mountains and valleys and their task of Sisyphus, dying along the road, or, the jouney over, heading off to die from overwork in their villages."
Of the 300 porters conscripted in 1891 by District Commissioner Paul Lemarinel for a forced march of more than 600 miles to set up a new post, not one returned alive.
In any case, let's try and get some numbers:
- Murder: When a village failed to meet its rubber quota, Force Publique solders or rubber company sentries often killed everyone they could find. In 1896, the German newspaper Kölnische Zeitung wrote that 1308 severed hands had been turned over to the notorious District Commissioner Léon Fiévez in a single day. Fiévez admitted he encouraged the practice of cutting hands off corpses, but pointed out that he never ordered cutting hands off the living. In 1899 a missionary, Ellsworth Faris, recorded his conversation with Simon Roi, a state officer, in his diary in 1899: "Each time the corporal goes out to get rubber, cartridges are given to him. He must bring back all not used; and for every one used he must bring back a right hand!...As to the extent that this is carried on Roi informed me that in six monts they, the State, on the Momboyo River had used 6000 cartridges, which means that 6000 peopel are killed or mutilated. It means more than 60000, for the people have told me repeatedly that the soldiers kill children with the butt of thier rifles." Other massacres are similarly well recorded.
- Starvation, exhaustion, and exposure: A Swedish lieutenant (P. Möller, Tre Ar i Kongo) wrote of how when villagers saw Leopold's soldiers appracing they would try to escape with some of their belongings to the woods, and goes on, "Before I left the place I had the village plundered of the large number of goats, hens and ducks that were there. Then we abandoned the village and retired to a better place for our noon rest." Some 30,000 refugees had cross into French territory by 1900. A Presbyterian missionary wrote "Tonight, in the midst of the rainy season, within a radius of 75 miles of Luebo, I am sure it would be a low estimate to say that 40,000 people, men, women, children, with the sick, are sleeping in the forest without shelter.
- Disease: Europeans and Afro-Arab slave-traders brought many new diseases to the Congo. Smallpox and sleeping sickness killed the most Congolese. 500,000 were estimated to have died of sleeping sickness in 1901 alone. This vast toll was greatly increased by governmental maltreatment of the population. Charles Gréban de Saint-Germain, a magistrate at Stanley Falls, wrote "Disease powerfully ravages an exhausted population, and it's to this cause...that we must attribute the unceasing growth of sleeping sickness in this region; along with porterage and the absecne of food supplies, it will quickly decimate this country. I've seen nowhere in the Congo as sad a spectable as that along the road from Kasongo to Kabambare. The villages for the most part have few people in them, many huts are in ruins; men, like women and children, are thin, weak, without life, very sick, stretched out inert, and above all there's no food."
An official Belgian government commission estimated (in 1919) that under Leopold's rule the population of the Congo decreased by 50%. Others (Major Charles C. Liebrechts, an executive of the Congo state administration, and Jan Vansina, historian and anthropologist) agree with that estimate. This would be a loss of about ten million people.
This all seems attributed, so by rights it ought to go right into the article, though I preferred pointing out that the regime ran on slave labor and maltreatment rather than getting into specifics. If you can find any quotes that suggest the description as a "regime of slave labor, rape and mutilation" is erroneous, I'd love to be able to incorporate them. I'll let you decide how much to put back in.
As for Lacroix, I'll try to find the source. I'm sure she didn't get the WHOLE fortune, but what she got was a fortune to her! --- Someone else 11:35 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
- Lacroix: not the best source, but a source nonetheless: Secrets of the Gotha, by Ghislain de Diesbach, p. 84-85. "After the king's death [Lacroix] hastily left Brussels in oder to avoid hostile demonstrations. She took refuge in France, where Leopold II had [bought] for her the quasi-royal domain of Ballincourt, in the Oise. ....[S]he did not known how to keep the immense fortune which Leopold II had built up for her in a few years - the sum of thirty millions in gold was mentioned. Her marriage to Emmanuel Durrieux, from whose arms the king had removed her, completed her downfall." She goes on to tell how Princess Louise, left very little from Leopold's fortune, had Lacroix's property sequestrate and sued both Lacroix and the Belgian state, which suits she lost. So yes, I suspect it made a bit of a fuss at the time.-- Someone else 11:51 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
Vachel Lindsay a bit colourful for your tastes, eh? : I've never said that, please make no baseless inferences about me ! Remember: you don't know me !
Yet it's what he wrote, so it's an attributed point of view: Wikipedia is not a collection of attributed point of views. Mere collection of POV's does not make a NPOV encyclopedia. I like Lir's solution of putting Lindsay in a "writings about Leopold" section. In the main section, it is better to state fact, they have a better objective strength than litterary citations.
I admit there were probably exploitation and slavery and such under Leopold's rule, and do not claim it was benign, but still maintain that describing this regime as "a regime of rape and murder" is way off NPOV. Write that the regime encouraged exploitation, covered murders and rapes, if that is true: OK. But do not qualify the regime as such, because it was surely also something else, too. I *may* accept the term "exploitation regime" *if* you provide evidence that the regime never did anything else, nor had any other purpose, than exploitation.
As for Lacroix: you first wrote she was gone with Leopold's fortune, which reads as she was gone with the whole of it. Now you're writing something much less strong !
FvdP 11:54 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
stop discussing it and discuss the current version...Lir 11:54 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
I like the current version much better, Lir. Thanks. But, still, we should:
- incorporate the fact that Lacroix received a big fortune from L2, but by no way the whole of L2's fortune;
- not sure about the authenticity and interest of L2's "fear of germs" anecdote;
- is it really Conrad who described Congo's regime as a regime of rape and murder etc ?
Surely it is not for me to provide evidence that the regime never had any other purpose than exploitation: It is evident that its primary purpose was exploitation. If you can find any evidence of another purpose, I welcome its addition, but again, I don't think you'll find much. No history of that time finds Leopold's administration of the Congo to have been beneficial. Someone else 12:10 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
it was exploitative like all governments are. Lir 12:12 Nov 18, 2002 (UTC)
- It was exploitive to a degree that few governments have ever been. Infrogmation
It was not a government. The Congo Free State was a privately owned for profit fiefdom. The kind of arrangement advocated by our friends at mises.org. In fact the severed hands 'scandal' is a perfect example of how a monetary system will naturally arise in a situation of economic liberty. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.128.243.138 (talk) 20:52, 12 April 2012 (UTC)
One thing is sure 172 know the use of Ctrl+V !
I hate to take an unpopular stand here, but I don't understand why 172's contributions were removed. The page as it stands now is somewhat convoluted, with information appearing twice. 172 was simply giving some in-depth information on Leopold's economic abuse of the Congo, which was his private realm and the brutality of which is, AFAIK, uncontested. It seems like part of a larger edit war, which I haven't been following, but here at least 172's contribution doesn't seem quite so controversial, to me at least. Danny
- I agree the text I removed may be interesting, but it's already present almost verbatim in the article over the history of (ex-Belgian) Congo (sorry, I don't remember the exact title off-hand). 172 is copying the same text everywhere: see e.g. Genocide. This is pure non-sense, however senseful 172's text is. The article here already tells a bit about Congo's abuses, but the main information about Congo abuses should go to a specific article, I think; "History of Congo" is specific enough. The reader may learn about the abuses here, and if he's interested enough, he should know where to look at. Perhaps that latter point is a bit lacking for now. (Note that I left 172's text intact in the "history of Congo" article.) FvdP 01:35 Jan 3, 2003 (UTC)
- Okay, I can understand that, and I don't particularly like the idea of just copying text from one article to another, so I see your point. It would, however, be useful to concentrate on Leopold's personal role in the exploitation of the Congo in this article. For instance, the book King Leopold's Ghost makes a fairly good argument that most of the exploitation was the result of his personal megalomanic desire for empire in the colonial era. I read it a while ago, so the precise details are kinda murky. Danny
- I agree with you, it may be interesting to have Leopold's specific role being explored more in depth in this article. Actually, I know next to nothing about these affairs, as a Belgian I did not learn these things at school, or perhaps I don't remember (that was 15-25 years ago...). This may explain a not-so-anti-Leopoldist bias, yet I'm ready to hear bad news about Leopold's or Belgium's behaviour and motives. I'm just a bit afraid of excesses, as you may see from the discussion above. If you (or anyone else) think you can do that in a NPOV way (which implies placing facts above rhethorics), you're most welcome. FvdP 02:09 Jan 3, 2003 (UTC)
Much as 172 is unpopular here, this should not blind us to the times when his facts are unquestionably correct. No honest historian who has even a vague familiarity with the history of the Congo Free State would argue with the description of it as "a regime of rape and murder". In the case of the Belgian Congo, any lesser description would be a whitewash. It really was that bad, and there is ample evidence. Tannin
The expression regime of rape and murder is precisely what I target as "rhetoric". The expression does not yield facts, it's just a verbal blame. That is not NPOV. Tell me where and when the regime encouraged rape and murder. These would be facts. FvdP
- Right through Leopold's rule from start to finish, FvdP, and in many, probably all, areas of the colony. I'm at work and don't have my references handy, nor have I read any African history to speak of in ten years or so, so my recollection of details is rusty, but I'll see if I can find time to refresh my memory tonight and post appropriately. The problem with the phrase "regime of rape and murder" is not that it's innaccurate - it is no more than the plain and abundantly verifiable truth - it is that it sounds like one of those wild charges that people often throw around without much justification. Nevertheless, I would prefer to see the entry avoid the phrase, simply because this sort of language gets so over-used in areas where it is not strictly accurate that in this instance (where it is abundantly justified), it can sound like mere mouthing off. If you trouble to read a little of the history of that unhappy area, you will soon discover that the exploitation of the Congo Free State by Leopold and his servants was an excercise in rapacious brutality of the worst kind. Europeans (and Arabs also) committed many such exploitations in Africa's history, but the Congo stands alone as the worst example of all.
- Thanks for the precisions on your views. Their rational tone appease my fears a good deal. There remains to see the facts of course. Perhaps I'll take the time to dwelve myself into this... FvdP
- Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost is a good start. Danny
I did not use the prase "regime of rape and murder". 172
- I never thought you did. The phrase was here well before you arrived. FvdP
"much of his bloody fortune" NPOV according to 172 Ericd
Are you defending Leopold II now? You've moved on from making pages that mock this tragic chapter of history?
I know that you were trying to irate me, but it really reflects poorly upon you that you’d find light in the murder of millions, Ericd
See Ericd's article: Linda Lovelace and the free Congo state
Yeah I'm a fanatic Belgian nationalist. I have posters of Leopold II in my living. And a nude canvas of Leopold II in my bedroom. I eat only Belgian fries (no French fries) and I drink only Gueuze Lambic. It widely know that Gueuze Lambic cause brain damage :)
More seriously your comments in Genocide shows ohow you care for death of millions when it disturb your POV.
Ericd:
No, I've asked that every charge remain, whether I agree with it or not. You weren’t the Belgian nationalist to whom I was referring either. I was referring to FvdP, who removed descriptions of Belgian mass-murder in the Congo. Coincidentally, I suppose, he just happens to be from Belgium.
- You're upsetting me, 172, with your gratuitous suspicion against me. This is not the way Wikipedia is supposed to work. Continue to dismiss my point of view this way, and I'll refer you to Higher Powers. FvdP 18:03 Jan 3, 2003 (UTC)
Well, I sort of promised to document the history of the Congo Free State a little earlier today. I haven't actually got that far yet, but in History of the Democratic Republic of the Congo I've made a substantial start. Tannin 11:57 Jan 3, 2003 (UTC)
I removed some of the information irrelevant to the biography pertaining to changes in Congolese production patterns and society. But just as any Hitler article briefly mentions the Holocaust, this article must briefly describe Leopold’s rule.
- In this case, I find must agree with 172: a short description of the atrocities is needed here, together with a link to a fuller article.
- That information is already in the article. It may need rework, but it's already there. Please edit what's already here. 172 is just adding text, not editing other people's prose. (Perhaps not even reading it, who knows). FvdP
FvdP:
FvdP, I addressed the redundancy. It doesn’t seem coincidental (being that you’re Belgian) that you’re obsessed with shortening the section on Belgian atrocities either.
- No it's not coincidential. I'm Belgian so I'm interested in Belgium history. That does not mean I feel the need to cover any Belgian crimes. And you should not think I'm editing you just because of that. The fact that I'm Belgian seems to completely blind you about the other motives I may have to edit your prose. It's just too easy to dismiss my opposition by saying that I must be biased, since I am Belgian. Maybe I'm biased, but then you too. Let's judge articles on the basis of what they are, not on the basis of the alledged intentions of the authors. FvdP
- The information you add has barely any direct link to Leopold 2, it's an explanation of the Congo regime that is too detailed for an article on L2. And besides, it's already in the Congo history article, as you perfectly know. And by its choice of words it does not feel NPOV. FvdP
FvdP:
As I've said earlier:
A better work of history will not only chronicle Leopold’s motives, but illuminate briefly why he had such motives, and why he had such an impact on Congolese history.
Mass-production of rubber in a dense, tropical forest in one of the world’s most isolated regions was after all quite a massive endeavor. Other parts of Africa were not cultivating rubber (quite a harsh crop to cultivate); other parts of Africa had milder climates and topographies. So the whole rapid shift to mass-production of rubber might be considered more important than Leopold’s megalomania and insensitivity.
Old paragraph read as follows: “Exploitation of the Dutch East Indies, French Indochina (Vietnam), German Southwest Africa, Rhodesia, and South Africa paled in comparison to that of the Belgian Congo. Like all colonial powers at the time, the fortunes of Belgium and its king, Leopold II, and those of the multinational concessionary companies under his auspices, were mainly made on the proceeds of Congolese rubber, which had historically never been mass-produced in surplus quantities. While King Leopold II was the defacto sovereign of the Belgian controlled Congo Free State, between 1880 and 1920 the population of Congo nearly halved. Although the actual figure is disputed because of a lack of documented statistics at the time, nontheless, several million natives were the victims of murder, starvation, exhaustion induced by over-work, and disease.”
The error (I’m hoping just a typo) renders the article misleading. All colonies were not major rubber-producers.
Sorry to interupt your discussion here, but I was puzzled by the following sentence: "Though Lacroix is said to have been created Baroness de Vaughan, Lucien the Duke of Tervuren, and Philippe the Count of Ravenstein, no such royal decrees were ever issued." Is this supposed to read "have been created BY"? I would make the change myself, but I do not feel that I am qualified to do so, my knowledge of this topic is rather narrow
- Another way to say it would be "Though Lacroix is said to have been granted the title of "Baroness de Vaughan", her son Lucien given the title of "Duke of Tervuren", and her son Philippe given the title of "Count of Ravenstein", no such royal decrees were ever issued." Though I think the first may be clear enough. But "by" would not be right. -- Nunh-huh 21:37, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)
"regime of slave labor, rape and mutilation" is the correct way of describing it. lets face it any regime which reduces the population of a whole nation by 50% in less then 40 years through massive execution program, eg in the equtorial province, just for the purpose of showing the locals that the regime can and will kill them all if they dont bring them rubber, calls on all of its soldiers to bring hands of all people who have been killed to prove that no ammo has been wasted and permits rape and torture is commiting genocide. thus "regime of slave labor, rape and mutilation" is VERY much an understatement. next you will be saying that nazi germany should not be labeled totalitarian because that is just an opinion. it is clear that you,FvdP, are some kind of a pro imperialist nazi who thinks that colonasation was a process of bringing education and enlightenment to the savage african people--GregLoutsenko 00:43, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
- "it is clear that you [...] are some kind of a pro imperialist nazi" : I think we can safely ignore "arguments" from a guy who's able to utter such assholic statements... --FvdP 18:04, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
- I think its safe to ignore "arguments" from a man who would defend the rape, murder, and enslavement of a nation.202.235.215.33 (talk) 16:43, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
- This is painful to read. I'd hate to downplay Belgium's crimes against humanity, but this is an article on Leopold II. It should be made clear that his regime was based on the exploitation of the Congo, but it should also mention other things he did during his reign (including the buildings he built). I'd say that it should link to another article that goes into these crimes against humanity in greater detail. And for the record, I'm not Belgian, I'm Canadian. (207.47.246.113 (talk) 23:54, 24 June 2009 (UTC))
"what" tag on Powers
I realize that this is a passing reference but please clarify. I've read some of the related articles so I understand it, but I would have been confused had I not. Elinruby (talk) 09:33, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
- Fixed by IP 108.7.232.142 with this edit [6] (19 Oct 2012) -- Elphion (talk) 19:46, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
To all the people who accuse me...
By the way. To all the people who accuse me of being some sort of a negationist because of my previous edits here and there, and who I assume I take this stance because I am Belgian: I'm here because I'd like to know the facts, not the extrapolations of some multiplied by their indignation. If strong arguments support the claim that Leopold's regime killed 23M Congolese, let it be stated. But if instead we figure out the regime's death toll amounts to "only" 1M or so, let that be stated. I have not investigated the fact deep enough to bring forward strong arguments either way. But my feeling is that the indignation of some people (specially anti-colonialist people) just blinds them the same way they believe my Belgianness may blind me. Now if you want a sort of "proof" that I am not here with a blind pro-Belgian agenda: let me state here that I *do* believe that XX-th century Belgium politics most probably played a strong role in motivating the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. (Mind this: this is 12 years ago, not 120. This is about Belgium State responsibility, not a distant King's. I perhaps even voted for people who helped shape the Rwanda genocide.) (Of course, perhaps I'm acting out of a pro-monarchism agenda instead, who knows ?) --FvdP 00:03, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
that's the same as this line The Encyclopaedia Britannica gives a total population decline of 8 million to 30 million under Leopold's control. im sorry but that's just not possible. come on 30 million damm —Preceding unsigned comment added by NH-obi (talk • contribs) 00:59, 10 May 2009 (UTC)
- I am pro-Flemish and no friend of Leopold, yet I doubt many of the claims made by those insinuating Leopold's responsibility for atrocities the way they do. There are simply to many that have an axe to grind. --41.17.27.250 (talk) 16:23, 26 January 2012 (UTC)
FvdP, I realise that you were just trying to defend yourself against allegations of pro-Belgian bias, but bringing up the alleged responsibility of Belgian politicians for the 1994 Rwanda genocide, although a rather popular sport in some quarters, really does seem rather unfair on Belgium, roughly the equivalent of trying to blame the Holocaust not on Hitler but on Woodrow Wilson and David Lloyd George because of the alleged cruelty of the Versailles Treaty over 20 years earlier. Of course blaming it all on Belgians, mostly long dead Belgiam politicians, is a very useful way of deflecting the blame from powerful people who actually were responsible, few if any of whom seem to have been Belgians (as distinct from, in whatever order and proportions you care to choose, Rwandan Hutus, Burundian and Ugandan Tutsis, Ugandans, French people, Americans, and miscellaneous other nationalities serving the UN). Tlhslobus (talk) 03:32, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
The cut hands
I read : Children's hands were hacked off if they did not deliver the amount of rubber demanded by King Leopold II.The hands were then smoked and transported to Belgian contractors, who counted the number of severed limbs.
No!!! Every people's hands were cut in the villages where everybody was killed by the Leopold II' soldiers. Not only the children, evrybody. In order to control the bullets were right used i.e. in order to kill human beings and not animals. These massacres were used in order to terrorize every people and this horrible way to force these people to bring more and more rubber. José Fontaine (talk) 16:57, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
It is the reason why I put [the POV tag on -- edit by Elphion to mention but not use the tag here.]
- Is this the only issue you're identifying as "POV"? If so we can easily edit that and remove the tag. Otherwise, please identify the other problems. -- Elphion (talk) 00:28, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
Nonsense. Hands were cut of CORPSES, not living congolese. The reason was simple : the cut off hands were a receipt for the spent ammunition. The shooting was done by CONGOLESE helpers of the Belgian tax collectors. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.191.241.1 (talk) 12:52, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
- Not exactly nonsense. The official policy may have been to slaughter the people and mutilate the corpses, but the pressure to produce the evidence of destruction was so strong that the living were mutilated as well. Have you not seen the pictures or read the eye-witness accounts? -- Elphion (talk) 13:55, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Editors who keep on waffling about the practically inestimable atrocities under Leopold should remember that pushing fringe positions is a fast way to lose editing privileges. (Admittedly that might not mean as much for anon IP editors, but it's still worth saying.) --Middle 8 (talk) 09:00, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
- I agree. On the other hand, if you have one left, the atrocities are sourced. Sorry I woke you up. But then, you are not sleeping well, are you? -DePiep (talk) 23:19, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
Belgian "ignorance"
"This rather naive perception by many Belgians can be traced back in Belgian education programs (or at least in the majority of them) which still mention almost nothing about the reality of Leopold's colonialism."
Can anybody confirm this? I generally take such statements (about countries ignoring certain facts in their educational programs on purposes) with a pinch of salt.David.Monniaux 12:33, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)
I totally confirm this. I am a 37 years old Belgian, and quite representatively educated. I have never been taught the slightest fact related to those atrocities at any level in school or university. Today, a french friend brings it up to me. I think the Arte TV programme helped it. I deeply regret that the Belgian school programme did not cover this. On the other hand my parents are quite aware of the facts, to a certain extent.
- Well, I am the one who wrote this (then you might want to have another point of view and I will clearly understand). But I just want to explain a bit more (feel free obviously to change what I wrote accordingly). What I meant is not that Belgium was ignoring certain facts in their educational programs on purpose. But there is a clear general ignorance of these facts in Belgium, and I admit that I don't know the ultimate cause. A direct and tangible cause at least is that most Belgians do not learn that in high school. I have talked to many Belgians and I was just amazed that they were just knowing nothing at all about this. I did ask the following question to many Belgians: "What comes to your mind first if I tell you Leopold II?". Their answer: "The King-builder, the king-builder, the king-builder...". This is so peculiar, it seems the only thing they learn about Leopold II at school (an example from the web, in you can read French: this is a school report made by pupils from a typical traditional school in Brussels). Well, what is the ultimate cause of this ignorance at the end of the day? Are Belgians too proud of their monarchy? Are they simply considering that Belgium was not involved and has nothing to do with the King Leopold's bad old ways? Leopold's actual achievements in Congo is not to be found in their collective memory anyway. -- Edcolins 21:28, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)
- The section rings POV to me right now. I think that if we can get some non original research confirmation of it, parts of it could be rewritten and stay however. I wouldn't be at all surprised if many Belgians didn't know about this part of their history, or only vaguely. In part because people are generally rather underinformed about their history. I'm Dutch, not that far from Belgium, and while I'd heard a few things about this before, I just learned a ``lot`` more by reading wikipedia. Martijn faassen 00:07, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)
- I am not aware of any study, academic research or survey specifically addressing Belgian ignorance on Leopold's whereabouts, so I reworded the whole thing. This "silence of history" is however explained in Adam Hochschild's King Leopold's Ghost.-- Edcolins 20:43, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)
Personally i believe that this Belgian 'ignorance' is somewhat overestimated here. It's true that schools don't spend much attention to the attrocities in Congo, but the media are more or less making up for this. In 1985 Daniel Vangroenwheghe published his book "red rubber". Excerpts of this book have been published in the popular weekly magazine "humo", which has about a million readers, which makes up 10% of the Belgian population. Recently the media have also been delving in the personal lives of the Belgian royals, and this included estimates of their wealth and how it was earned. A popular book called " the shadow of the crown" has been published by royalty-watcher and journalist Jan Van den berghe, which -although slightly biased-tells the full story of the Belgian royal family, past and present. Several documentaries and talk show items have also been devoted to the subject. If the Belgian media have been overly respectful in the past, at present the pendulum seems to swing a bit to the other side, exposing the wrongdoings of Leopold II in detail. User:Karelke 03:43, 29 May 2006 (UTC)User:Karelke 03:43, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
- I must say I agree with Edcolins' remarks (almost three years old now): the flemish education system (there is no such thing as a belgian education system), be it on purpose or not, almost entirely ignores past atrocities of the Belgian kings. Even events in more recent history are never addressed: in my educational carreer, I have not once heard a single word about the Rwanda genocide, in which Belgium has an important and controversial role. The circumstances of the death of Patrice Lumumba were also never discussed. I find it hard to believe that this is the result of active censorship of the government; I rather think it's an inherent form of bias and racism in the education system and the media as a whole. Wouter Lievens 08:59, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
- I also confirm that Belgian education system (french part in my case) completely ignore the genocide and atrocities. The best example is the following: i'm connected here today because i just saw yesterday the film "Blood Diamonds". There were some references to L2 atrocities in the film that caught my attention and i'm just discovering now how terrible this period has been!!! Basically, all we learned is that L2 went in Congo on his own initiative, that he succeeded to get his share of Africa mainly by diplomatic means, and that it pay off a lot. We also learned that L2 freely donated Congo to Belgium, and that L2 built lots of edifices.. and that's all !!! So of course, we know that European countries exploited African population and that brutalities were common facts. But nothing told us that L2 distinguished himself by such cruelty and that so many people died (2-15 millions, what a shock)... I personally doubt that such an omission was not done on purpose, as Spanish people are less informed about the atrocities committed by their own country. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.245.132.165 (talk) 10:25, 3 March 2007 (UTC).
- I'd say the atrocities of Leopold II are well known, it's just that they don't form part of the school curriculum. I remember my grandfather telling me "people spat on Leopold II's coffin when it was driven around Brussels". No more was said; if you - as a young boy - understood what was implicated, getting hold of the facts was easy - a trip to the municipal library was all that was needed. Other events - eg. the controversial death of Albert I - were told to me in the same way. Adults spoke, and it was up to you to grasp what was left unsaid.
A good example of Belgian ignorance: Official fairytale - a whitewash of history.--88.195.100.60 (talk) 15:11, 14 June 2009 (UTC)
I was thaught about the brutal rule of Leopold II, both in university as in the secundary education system. I think much of the lack of knowledge (or acknowledgement) in Belgium comes from a certain degree of non-involvement, belgians were and are not that involved themselves, they had other troubles themselves. In 1885 belgian parliament and the belgians themselves didn't want the congo (the upcomming socialists argued that when belgium couldn't civilise, educate and feed properly its own population, it should't aspire to do so in the congo neither) and belgium only very reluctantly took over the congo to avoid further embarresment to the dynasty (not only international embarresment over the atrocities committed, but also financial embarresment: the congo freestate was bankrupt and could only be maintained by huge stateloans to Leopold II...); essentially to restore a more sane economic and social policy (to make the congo into a socalled model-colony) Leopold II is the most controversial king of the belgians, because he first exploited brutally the congo, ran it poorly after his monopoly on rubber was gone, lost huge sums of money, and threw away fortunes in megalomaniac buildingprojects and beatifications of some belgian cities (mostly brussels and ostend, the socalled "royal cities") and alledgedly to his mistresses (who were usually estimated to be far to young for the old king)... (=Belgian POV) amongst academics there is not so much discusion weather brutalities were committed or not (because everybody pretty much recognises that it was brutal) but on the critics (themselves at the time holders of huge colonial empires) and on the figures... much of the figures are contested on the basis that the're estimates... the belgian state is the first to have factual numbers on the population, all figures before that are basicly estimates; by explorers (that will have embellished the richness of the land) and by people that only skimmed the land alongside its rivers, never taking the overview over the huge country covered by rainforests and other less inhabitable land. for all we know, congolose population might actually have grown during leopold II's reign (in stead of having been decimated), despite the brutalities... and some numbers do seem unrealistic exaggerations; however, I don't think the numbers are all that important; the important thing is to rememeber that the congolese people recieved a very shabby treatment, were exploited brutally, and that many people were maimed or killed during the reign of Leopold II. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Monoclemask (talk • contribs) 09:37, 24 August 2009 (UTC)
I'm Irish, but my primary education was mainly in a French-speaking school in Brussels from 1960 to 1965. Maybe things have changed since then, but back then, far from being taught anything about quasi-genocidal atrocities, we were taught that Leopold was Belgium's greatest King (and in effect the greatest Belgian in all history) because he acquired the Congo for Belgium. But I don't think Belgians are in any way untypical of most of the rest of humankind in this regard (defeat in World War II has made the Germans an exception, at least for now). Romanians under Ceaucescu were taught (and maybe still are taught today) that Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) was a great national hero. Last time I heard, New York schoolkids were being taught about genocide, focussed on 3 specific actual or alleged genocides - the Nazi Holocaust, the Irish Famine, and the horrors of Slavery in the ante-bellum South; one genocide or quasi-genocide not mentioned was that of the Amerindians, seemingly precisely because that quasi-genocide has been so successful that New York State has no large block of Amerindian voters, unlike its large blocks of Jewish-American, African-American, and Irish-American voters. And in Ireland we are taught about Roger Casement's role in exposing the horrors in the Congo, but we learn nothing about the part played by Irish people in the actual or alleged crimes of the British Empire - nor do we ever ask why white Irish UN troops were in Katanga (while I was in my Belgian primary school) killing fairly large numbers of black Katangese troops who were serving what was (at least to the best of my knowledge) the democratically elected government of Katanga (whose secession from the Congo was backed by Belgium, France, and Britain), seemingly all on the basis of some wonderful theory about it being our solemn international anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist and anti-partitionist and anti-British duty to hand Katanga back to the Congo and its US-supported kleptocratic government. Nor is this blindness some purely white phenomenon - as far as I know, Genghis Khan remains a great national hero in Mongolia; and I expect there's no shortage of other non-white examples. So if this article is to have any criticism of Belgian ignorance today, it will hardly be properly balanced and NPOV unless it adequately mentions other countries' equally unsatisfactory records of self-criticism. Tlhslobus (talk) 02:54, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
- I'd like to make a nuance: if you talk about Belgium, you have to know that Belgium is divided in two parts. So if a person of Wallonia says: "Yes, it's true, in Belgium they never mentioned it on school!", you have to ask yourself where does he come from. Because in Flanders, schools are not the same as in Wallonia. They have a (slightly) different school system and Wallonians love the king far more than Flemings do (generally spoken). Because of this it can be possible that in Wallonia it's less mentioned than in Flanders. So I, as a Fleming, can say you, that at school we've learned a lot about it, and we all know very well about the Congo colony. --Best regards Bellepheron (talk) 16:41, 12 June 2013 (UTC)
Maybe it's worth noting that Belgium, unlike most countries, does not have centralized school-leaving exams, each school (or teacher) sets its own, which means the teachers have some freedom in deciding what to teach, especially in history. Ssscienccce (talk) 21:46, 22 October 2013 (UTC)
Roman Catholicism
His father, King Leopold I, was Protestant monarch, right? So when did Leopold II convert to Roman Catholicism and why? Surtsicna (talk) 13:31, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
- I believe Leopold I remained a protestant but agreed to raise his children as catholics. Känsterle (talk) 11:32, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
- So why does the article still list him as Roman Catholic if he was Protestant? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.53.223.53 (talk) 20:06, 21 August 2013 (UTC)
Very curious that the circumstances of the son of a Protestant being "raised as a Catholic" (if that the phrase) is glossed over.... AchisDeGeth (talk) 10:59, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
- Belgium split from Holland to defuse the tension between the Protestants (concentrated in the area of the modern Netherlands) and the Catholics (who mostly lived in the south of the larger Netherlands). It was founded, therefore, explicitly as a Catholic country, and the goal all along was that the monarch should also be Catholic. The principal candidate, who became Leopold I, was inconveniently Protestant, but as part of the agreement to become king he pledged to raise his heirs as Catholics. You correctly point out that we don't seem to discuss this in any of the obvious spots (Belgium, Leopold I of Belgium, or the present article). -- Elphion (talk) 15:01, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
- A very common phenomenon in 'new monarchies' during the nineteenth century was for newly-elected monarchs, if not of the majority religion of their adopted country, to raise their children in the dominant or state religion of their adopted country. For example, Ferdinand I of Bulgaria, a Roman Catholic, had his heir, the future Boris III, brought up Eastern Orthodox, Both Carol I and Ferdinand I of Romania were Roman Catholic, but the children of Ferdinand I were raised Eastern Orthodox. William IV of Luxembourg, a Lutheran, had his children raised Roman Catholic (their mother's religion), George I of Greece was a Lutheran, but had his children raised Eastern Orthodox, and so on.JWULTRABLIZZARD (talk) 11:48, 29 October 2013 (UTC)
- There must be some citable source for this information, and it is important enough to merit being included in the main narratives. AchisDeGeth (talk) 11:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
Belgium seceded from a forced union with the Netherlands for historical, religious and political reasons - Historical, in the sense that it survived for centuries as the staunchly Catholic rump of the Low Countries, in opposition to the secession of the Protestant Netherlands, passing from Spain to the Austro-centered Holy Roman Empire of Germany before the French & Napoleonic occupations. However, the drive for a free Belgium was a collaborative effort between believing Catholics and anticlerical Liberals, with the later looking more to emulate anticlerical, anti-Catholic France than to Catholicism. It is my understanding that it is this latter faction, which tended to politically predominate and which progressively forwarded an antiCatholic political agenda for Belgium, which deliberately foisted a Protestant king on Belgium. AchisDeGeth (talk) 11:28, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
Tervuren Museum and Hochschild
The text on the museum is not up to date anymore. The museum's last exhibition is clearly image enhancing after what Hochschild said (visit their homepage). I haven't been there since 5 years or so, but does it look better? I mean, during my "research" (ahem) I almost felt pity for the poor museum. Phlebas 00:22, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- I agree that the Museum faces a daunting task, a real public relations nightmare; but they have a long way to go. On the website [7], the only acknowledgment I could find that the full story has not been addressed is the following quote: "As it’s displayed now, the permanent exhibition still reflects the way Europe regarded Africa in the nineteen-sixties, despite a radically altered social context not only in Africa but here as well. One of the Museum’s priorities now is the renovation and refurbishment of the Museum building." But all the links to "renovation" talk only about refurbishing the building. Elphion (talk) 20:25, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
- For what it's worth, I read an article (which is no longer available online) saying that the museum has closed for renovations, and will reopen in a few years as a respectable museum about Africa, past and present rather than a "museum of a museum", and it will have a proper treatment of the Congo atrocities. Oreo Priest talk 02:17, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
This article focuses too much on the Congo Free State and not enough on Leopold's role (or on his reign as King of the Belgians)
It's good to see there are others working on this article. It, however, has substantial problems. First is that it mentions nearly nothing on the domestic rule of Belgium's longest-reigning king (or even that fact itself). I'll make an effort to partially fill that gap in coverage.
A second major problem is that what content there is on the Congo Free State is mostly unrelated to Leopold. Obviously some should be included as context for what he was implicated in, but once it's been established that he obtained the Congo Free State, his actual involvement is completely neglected. Perhaps someone more knowledgeable about these aspects could reform the section so it is actually about Leopold, the subject of this article. Perhaps the campaign he waged to defend his rule, his specific policies, or the amount of money he made could be included. I look forward to hearing others' thoughts. Oreo Priest talk 03:35, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
- Agree text about his local rule could be expanded (but not relatively by shrinking Congo rule). If he made any rules on horses shitting in the streets in Antwerps, that could be given some due weight too. Maybe he improved the working conditions in the Borinage too (though, he would have made a greater PR from that I'm sure so we'd have heard).
- In general, improvements as you have in mind are welcome. It would be nice to see a detail that is not related to his Congo rule. It's just that they should not be added in a way to clean his record. -DePiep (talk) 07:48, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
- I certainly have no intention of cleaning his record. I would just like to see the article more complete, in the same way that the article Adolf Hitler goes over much more than just the Holocaust and World War II. In fact, that article is a good example of how the Congo Free State section could be improved, in that rather than simply discussing WW2 or the Holocaust, it actually explains Hitler's role. Oreo Priest talk 14:31, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
In general I agree with your observation that there is not enough about his influence on Belgium -- I noted that up above in the section on the clean-up tag. You are doing a good job of adding material along those lines. I don't agree that "what content there is on the Congo Free State is mostly unrelated to Leopold". Everything about the Free State is related to Leopold -- he micromanaged it from beginning to end. The careful planning, the manipulation of European diplomacy, the arming, the occupation, the pillage -- it all reflects the incredible ability of this long under-estimated man. One can only wish it had been directed along more humanitarian lines. The Congo remains to this day his primary and enduring legacy. Any meaningful account of his life must cover it extensively. -- Elphion (talk) 22:43, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
- If he extensively micromanaged the Congo Free State, then this article should say that. I understand that as his undertaking he had some hand in what went on, but his actual influence should be made very clear. Take a look at the current state of the article. Between the Exploitation and atrocities and Criticism of his rule sections, Leopold's involvement is only mentioned once. Right now it just sounds like a bunch of (bad) things happened in a territory he happened to own. So please, tell us about "The careful planning, the manipulation of European diplomacy, the arming, the occupation, the pillage ... the incredible ability of this long under-estimated man". Oreo Priest talk 02:09, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
- To clarify, I'm not doubting that he was responsible or saying that explaining what was going on is not important. I'm saying that because this article is about Leopold II, not the Congo Free State, it's important to tie everything back to him rather simply describing the Congo Free State at length and assuming that because he was owner that the connection to him is obvious (it isn't). Again, the article Adolf Hitler does a good job of this. Oreo Priest talk 03:56, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
Blankenberge Statue - Citation Needed
Having done some research (Googling), I believe that this is the statue being mentioned in the text, for which a citation has been requested:
http://salonvansisyphus.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/bruyne_lippens_n.jpg
I think that it is called the "Lippens and De Bruyne". I do not speak Flemish and so cannot verify exactly what the subject is, but it does look as though the woman and child are referred to as being black in the sources I saw, and it does look as though they are clinging to the flag as though being lifted to some kind of salvation.
If someone can use this information to find a citation for the claim in question, that'd be awesome! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.35.30.54 (talk) 15:11, 2 January 2014 (UTC)
- Thank you. I had tried to find it myself, but my Google-Fu failed me. I will look into this. Oreo Priest talk 20:34, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
- So I looked into it, and found some good documentation of the statue. Here [8] is the best I found, and there's also a commons cat: [9]. I can translate the Dutch or French if anyone needs. The Dutch Wikipedia article on De Bruyne is at nl:Henri De Bruyne. I found a more complete account of what happened here: [10]. Lippens and De Bruyne were soldiers acting on behalf of the Congo Free State, and had been sent to some lands with an Arab presence to claim it for the Congo Free State. On the outbreak of the Congo Arab war, they were massacred by a mob.
- In the statue, Lippens and De Bruyne are being held up as heroes for protecting Africans from [actually] brutal Arab slavers, and dying for the sake of civilization. The article currently says the "...monument shows a colonialist bringing "civilization" to the black child at his feet", which is probably an inaccurate interpretation in terms of the specifics of their story and the monument's inscription. Nonetheless, the idea that they're "heroes" for "civilization" is also a tremendous whitewash of what was occurring, and is itself evidence of the "great forgetting". I think the mention should be kept, but changed to be less inaccurate. Thoughts? Oreo Priest talk 22:40, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
- I have rephrased it to "a monument shows a pair of colonialists as heroes protecting a desperate Congolese woman and child with "civilization".[ref](in Dutch) Monument to De Bruyne and Lippens[/ref] -Oreo Priest talk 22:56, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness'
This famous novel is mentioned here on the Talk page, but not in the article. Valetude (talk) 18:35, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
- and that's the only reason I came here, and stil hven't found the link.--Pawyilee (talk) 12:52, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Use of the word genocide
Definition of genocide, I bvelieve element 1 is absent. There never was a conscious intent to destroy the Congolese people:
Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.
Article II describes two elements of the crime of genocide:
1) the mental element, meaning the "intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such", and
2) the physical element which includes five acts described in sections a, b, c, d and e. A crime must include both elements to be called "genocide."
Article III described five punishable forms of the crime of genocide: genocide; conspiracy, incitement, attempt and complicity.
Excerpt from the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide (For full text click here) "Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Article III: The following acts shall be punishable:
(a) Genocide;
(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;
(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
(d) Attempt to commit genocide;
(e) Complicity in genocide. " — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:1811:898A:AB00:E8D6:ECDB:383C:233F (talk) 06:36, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
- It's a subtle point. Leopold himself was not, I think, complicit in genocide in the strict sense. It is clear, though, that he was indifferent to the welfare of the Congolese, and his policies led to conditions that encouraged his agents to target them almost indiscriminately. The line between this and genocide is vanishingly thin. Describing this as "and the subsequent genocide", even if Leopold himself did not commit or intend it, is not entirely inaccurate.
- This situation is similar to that in the American West. The official government position (usually) was not to exterminate the Indians, and many people deplored the injustices shown them; but many others felt that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian" and acted accordingly.
- The section cites King Leopold's Ghost, even though in that book, Hochschild actually says that the atrocities in the Congo do not constitute a genocide (on page 225).
- "although the killing in the Congo was of genocidal proportions, it was not, strictly speaking, a genocide. The Congo state was not deliberately trying to eliminate one particular ethnic group from the face of the Earth. Instead, like the slave dealers who raided Africa for centuries before them, Leopold's men were looking for labor. If, in the course of their finding and using that labor, millions of people died, that to them was incidental."
- In a later the article "In the Heart of Darkness" (New York Review of Books, October 6, 2005) he wrote: "no reputable historian of the Congo has made charges of genocide; a forced labor system, although it may be equally deadly, is different."
- Good points, and I see that "Congolese Genocide" now redirects to Atrocities in the Congo Free State. -- Elphion (talk) 00:54, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
Consensus growing
Re recent edits: it's not the estimate of the number of dead that's growing (that number has been all over the map), it's the consensus (i.e., the number of historians agreeing) that's growing. So "the consensus figure climbing by around ten million" is not correct. We need to say something like "There is growing consensus [or growing evidence] that the actual number is in the general neighborhood of 10 million." -- Elphion (talk) 20:37, 8 April 2016 (UTC)
George W. Bush
Under George W. Bush's regime, millions of US citizen people died; modern estimates range from 25 to 40 million, with the consensus figure climbing by around 30 million.
Well actually, those are not "modern estimates", but my very own rough estimate. In any case, the sentence in the lede is almost non-sensical. (No, this comment is not attached to the wrong article.)217.248.40.195 (talk) 11:16, 21 July 2016 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.248.46.124 (talk)
- This has nothing to do with Leopold. The estimates of mortality in the Congo Free State are made by close analysis of surviving historical records. They are necessarily imprecise, but the magnitude of the death toll is no longer seriously questioned by historians. Several different lines of inquiry lead to the same general ballpark. And it is significantly larger than a natural death rate would account for. -- Elphion (talk) 22:55, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
- I don't question the numbers, I question the sentence.217.248.46.124 (talk) 08:35, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
Honors
The detailed list of fairly routine honors strikes me as overkill. If we keep it, perhaps box it? -- Elphion (talk) 16:41, 25 October 2016 (UTC)
Dutch name
The Dutch version of his name is Leopold Lodewijk Filips Maria Victor.
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9047845/Leopold-II
genocide?
Why is there no mention of genocide or that he killed over 10 million people? See: http://www.walkingbutterfly.com/2010/12/22/when-you-kill-ten-million-africans-you-arent-called-hitler/
- From the lead: "His regime was responsible for the death of an estimated 2 to 15 million Congolese." This is already discussed at length in the article. -- Elphion (talk) 04:52, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
- The deaths were largely due to disease. It was in any event not a genocide.Royalcourtier (talk) 00:36, 19 April 2017 (UTC)
There are many diseases here in the Congo region. Malaria is very strong and kills thousands of people every day. Thyphoid fever is also very common here. Yellow fever and ebola are not so common but very deadly. African trypanosomiasis or sleeping sickness made thousands of dead. Leprosy and sexually transmitted diseases are also major causes of death. Many Congolese friends have lost their mother in childbirth... Leopold II ruled for 22 years. It is possible that 10 million people passed away during these 22 years, but not because of him, because of deadly diseases. Steeve P (talk) 22:14, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
- But the colonial regime bears responsibility for the disruption, hardships, flight, and starvation of the population (all well documented) that made people susceptible to these diseases to a degree not seen previously. -- Elphion (talk) 23:13, 29 May 2019 (UTC)
Language and objectivity
An anonymous edit made from a Government of Canada IP address on May 29, 2019 at 20:44, changed the language describing Leopold's legacy from that which is "marred" to that which is "characterised by murder, torture, and human rights atrocities, resulting from notorious systematic brutality."
I'm curious about the rationale for that edit, why an effort this morning to revert the change was itself reverted, and whether the person responsible for the 20:44 edit can explain if this is the official position of the Canadian government. Attempting to force some sense of objectivity seems highly contentious in this context, given that Leopold's legacy is marred by murder, torture, and human rights atrocities, resulting from notorious systematic brutality. Gramscisghost — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gramscisghost (talk • contribs) 10:52, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
- (page watcher). Personally, I found the original wording of "characterised", to be a little more encyclopedic and less emotive than "marred" (although I can live with both as "marred" is not so bad either). However, if a major RS on the subject has specific wording on this, then I would go with that too. This page gets a lot edits around POV-wording concerns, so anything other than very encyclopedic language, or language sourced directly from a major source on him, tends to get reverted. thanks. Britishfinance (talk) 11:01, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
English Language Citations
Nearly the entire opening is sourced to only two documents, at the end of the third paragraph (making it unclear if the first two are even cited to these sources) and further, the sources are in French, leaving readers unable to investigate the source material that makes up the entire beginning, assuming they're English speakers who sought the English page because that is their primary or best language. This makes it a little more difficult to trust the page than if it cited sources that were in the same language. Typing: — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.135.80.70 (talk • contribs) 03:29, 16 July 2019 (UTC)
Semi-protected edit request on 9 June 2020
 | This edit request to Leopold II of Belgium has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
to the list of statues:
add: Statue on the facade of the town hall in Leuven. In 2018 a student brought attention to the statue by attaching a note about Thomas Kanza, the first Congolese student to be admitted to the University. source: https://www.demorgen.be/nieuws/student-beklimt-leuvens-stadhuis-om-standbeeld-leopold-ii-onder-de-aandacht-te-brengen~b18d2bef/?referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F
To the statue in Lokeren. The statue has been removed on 9/6/2020 and is said to be moved to a local museum. https://www.hln.be/in-de-buurt/ekeren/omstreden-beeld-van-leopold-ii-weggehaald-uit-dorpskern-van-ekeren~ac4d1066/ 81.164.141.19 (talk) 13:11, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
Not done: The page's protection level has changed since this request was placed. You should now be able to edit the page yourself. If you still seem to be unable to, please reopen the request with further details. TheImaCow (talk) 13:01, 12 June 2020 (UTC)
Overestimation
According to this Wikipedia article https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Republic_of_the_Congo, there were 12.2 million inhabitants in 1950. It doesn't make sense that 50 years earlier (Leopold II died in 1908) there were 30 million inhabitants in the Congo. According to Adam Hochschild (the most controversial writer on the subject), Leopold II killed a maximum of half of the population: 15 million. 15 multiplied by 2 = 30. 30 million Congolese in 1908 ? This figure doesn't make any sense. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a work of fiction. If you want to write fiction, go ahead, but refrain from doing so here. Steeve P (talk) 12:56, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
- I have reverted your unsubstantiated edits. The material in this article is well sourced from Reliable Sources. Please discuss here further. Your argument (that the Congo's population of 12 million in 1950 precludes a larger population in the past) is not logically sound, and not supported by references. Scholarly consensus today puts the death toll at somewhere in the magnitude of 10 million. Hochschild is hardly "the most controversial writer on the subject", and you have misrepresented what he wrote. -- Elphion (talk) 04:31, 7 May 2019 (UTC)
The argument IS sound. Wikipedia is not a work of fiction like "Heart of Darkness". It's an encyclopedia. This article on Leopold II is overly exaggerated. I don't know whether Congolese people like Jean-Pierre Nzeza Kabu Zex-Kongo (the author of "Leopold II, the Greatest Head of State in the History of the Congo" ("Léopold II, le plus grand chef d'État de l'histoire du Congo")) are right when they say that Leopold II was the best "Head of State" of the country, but I know this is exaggerated. I also know Leopold II made the first schools and the first hospitals in the country. He actually made thousands of them! He ended the slave trade. He made the first cities: Kinshasa (was founded by Stanley in 1880 and called "Leopoldville" by him two years later), Lubumbashi, Kisangani, Mbandaka and the others. He made most of the roads that are used today, like the N1 from Matadi to Kinshasa and from Kinshasa to Kikwit. He made the railroad from Matadi to Kinshasa. He made several churches as well, like the Saint Leopold Cathedral in Ngaliema (a commune of Kinshasa). He had the idea to unite the 450 different tribes with one common language, one common religion and one common education system (Nzeza Kabu Zex-Kongo, p.83). Dear Elphion, how long have you lived in the Congo region? How long have you helped Congolese people? It seems that you don't know much about the subject. Who is the most controversial writer on Leopold II? Please understand that "Heart of Darkness" is a novel. Conrad hated his time in the Congo, everyone knows that. Let me know about the other "scholars". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Steeve P (talk • contribs) 22:14, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
- No, your argument is not sound: a population can be significantly reduced and then fail to recover for several decades. Nothing you have mentioned rules that out. That the population had declined by about 50% during the Free State period was in fact the conclusion reached by the Belgian government when it assumed management of the Congo in the early 20th century. As for Conrad, you will notice, I hope, that the article never uses him as a reference. There are several other, non-fiction writers, scholars, and investigators who have come to similar conclusions -- and they are already referenced in the article. The pious tale that Good King Leopold brought all the benefits of Western civilization to the benighted Congo is simply not historical, and it has been debunked several times over. That he was actually up to no good is strongly suggested by the fact that he had all the administrative records burnt before handing the colony over. -- Elphion (talk) 22:46, 27 May 2019 (UTC)
- I also could not support that argument. We have to stick to the best quality independent reliable sources. Your argument is getting into WP:OR terrority, and goes against the consensus of established research in this area. Until high-quality independent WP:RS say it, we can't I'm afraid. thanks. Britishfinance (talk) 09:53, 28 May 2019 (UTC)
I find it odd that nobody has compared the population fo the Congo with neighbouring areas. Assuming that 10 million Congolese died during the Free State period (a ridiculously high number by any account) and that this due in part to Leopold's harsh regime, there should be a significant demographic drop in Congo's estimated population numners comapred to neighbourign regions. As far as I'm aware there is no indication for such a significant comparative drop in population.
Secondly, the number if supposed victims should be offset by the estimated total population of Congo.
It is telling that no reference is being made to such estimates, even to they are crucial to the argument. Yes, there are references to 'estimated eaths'- but ithout further references this is nothing but an educated guess'.
The introduction mentions a 'consensus' on an estimated 10 million deaths, without reference. The retort that such references are made further in the article doesn't apply here, where there is no reference at all, nor any mention of the fact that all estimated deaths are just that: estimates. And whetehr there is 'consensus' on such estimates or not doesn't change the fact that they are estimates. As the introduction remarks, estimates range from 2 million to 15 million. That in itself is telling enough: hard data are simply not available to reach anything beyond a 'consensus' on 10 million. The result is still nothing more than aan estimate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.168.225.91 (talk) 11:36, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
- References generally are not required in the intro; the matter is discussed in more detail in the appropriate section of the article, which *is* referenced. The estimates are clearly labeled as estimates. These estimates are not "ridiculously high numbers by any account" since several accounts by professional historians do contain them. By nearly all accounts, there was significant loss of life in the Congo. The preponderance of the evidence, as referenced, points to a figure somewhere on the order of 10 million, though that is necessarily an imprecise figure, as advocates on both sides point out, and as we mention in the article. But the imprecision is not evidence that the deaths didn't happen. As for other areas of Africa: this article is about Leopold, not other colonizers. I hope you're not about to make the argument that high death numbers in other colonies somehow excuses the ravages of Leopold's regime. The European exploitation of Africa around the turn of the 20th century in general has few heroes, but as Hochschild points out, the evidence suggests that the death toll in the Congo seems abnormally high for this period. -- Elphion (talk) 12:22, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
- cf "an estimated 10–15 million Africans died" - the 2 references don't lead to e.g. calculations taking into account the historic numbers of birth-rates, population numbers, etc and then calculating backwards, comparing that to neighbouring regions. Anybody has references to that e.g. as in this spreadsheet
"Population RDC during Leopold II and ballmarks on the numbers of estimated assassinated Congolese/Africans under his reign"? Thy, SvenAERTS (talk) 11:38, 24 June 2020 (UTC)
- The article that elaborates on this issue - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atrocities_in_the_Congo_Free_State#Estimates - mentions "Other estimates of the size of the overall population decline (or mortality displacement) range between two and 13 million." and "Jan Vansina returned to the issue of quantifying the total population decline, and revised his earlier position, he concluded that the Kuba population (one of the many Congolese populations) was rising during the first two decades of Leopold II's rule, and declined by 25 percent from 1900 to 1919, mainly due to sickness. Others argued a decrease of 20 percent over the first forty years of colonial rule (up to the census of 1924)." - so shouldn't the "an estimated 10–15 million Africans died" become "an estimated 2–13 million Africans died"? Thy,SvenAERTS (talk) 12:08, 24 June 2020 (UTC)
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Leopold's gains from Congo Free State
There are several mentions of the fortune Leopold extracted from CFS, but no monetary value is mentioned — is this just an oversight, or is there a reason? I've come across a NYT review of the book 'King Leopold's Ghost', where the author apparently cites research by Jules Marchal, saying "Marchal, the Belgian scholar, estimates that Leopold drew some 220 million francs (or $1.1 billion in today's dollars) in profits from the Congo during his lifetime." Could this be regarded as RS? And if so, could/should it be included in the article? Or does anyone know of another figure and/or a better source? -- DoubleGrazing (talk) 07:45, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
Encyclopedia
I call upon the decent people working at Wikipedia, do not turn this website in to woke activism, because you will lose all credibility with the center people (Majority), and this project will be lost forever, please!!! Don't be stupid!
Be fair and balanced, thanks.
2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:ACA9:BE5C:A026:20F8 (talk) 15:31, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
- I would be interested to know what part of the article you consider unbalanced or unfair. Leopold's personal responsibility for policies instituted for his personal gain that led to extreme hardship and death in the Congo is by now incontrovertible. (I do think the detailed list of vandalized statues is rather overkill; it suffices to mention that some were vandalized in the past, and more in the wake of George Floyd's murder.) -- Elphion (talk) 18:56, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
There are also sources that claim that the population grew under Leopolds rule, that there where not even 10 million people present in the congo, at the time of arrival of Stanley, but i dont see anything of that here... No you choose to use the source of a political activist, and his book 'King Leopolds Ghost', with a few pictures of mutulated africans as proof, and also if you add up all the africans on those pictures together you will not even have 100 people, certainly not millions... and they might not even be of the Congo, they can be taken anywhere in Africa, i also saw on BBC documentary, that stanley was not aproached by Leopold as described here on wikipedia, but that rather Stanley first aproached Brittain who did not want to hear of it and then aproached Leopold, this is what a Congolese historian says on a BBC documentary, yet wikiepdia goes with the source again of a political activist... Wikipedia is becoming a Political far left website because it uses sources from political activists in Media and education... And yes Media and education is ran by Far left activists, specialy on this kind of subjects... 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:4507:9B47:3030:352C (talk) 00:24, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
- The author of 'King Leopold's Ghost' is a historian, not a political activist, so it is a reliable source. Media and education is ran by far left activists? Sounds like a conspiracy theory, there is no place on Wikipedia for that. --PJ Geest (talk) 09:03, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
- Indeed, the cognitive resistance among conservative Belgians, and their knee-jerk reaction to tarnish Hochschild and shoot the messenger because he bears unwelcome news is truly amazing to watch. But Hochschild is certainly not the only modern writer to point out the historical reality; and you have to wonder how the Belgians can overlook the testimony of the original witnesses back in the early 20th century. What must all those people have had against poor King Leopold! -- Elphion (talk) 18:34, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
A conspiracy theory lol.... ok, first Media and education is right wing yes, they are all supporters of Trump for example because they are so Right wing... we hear that every day, how in the news how they love him, how they love salvini, how they love Boris Johnson, how they love Orban and so on, to denie that media and education is left wing is a conspiracy theory, so yes indeed for you there should be no place on wikipedia, who are you kidding, you are clearly not living in reality!, and 4.000.000 people died during the napoleonic wars, you are telling me Leopold killed 15.000.000 people with a few hunderd mercanaries, right... they where superman, with magical murdering spells, and where is the proof? oh yes there is no proof...., just 1 single book, your entire genocide theory is based on 1 single book from a political activist. wow that is really very scientific... lol 80.200.232.97 (talk) 19:34, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for showing your true face, by denieing Media is left wing, something everyone knows, and only left wing people denie, and talking about ognitive resistance among conservative Belgians, and their knee-jerk reaction... you have shown what you really are and what you really represent, Wikipedia is a left wing pedia runned by left wing activists... 80.200.232.97 (talk) 19:37, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
According to the unproven Adam Hochschild conspiracy theory, where he talks about 15.000.000 people killed in 12 years... lol according to that calculation a few hunderd Belgian mercanaries then would have killed about 3.424 people per day for about 12 years straight and mutulated thousands more per day.. RIIIIIIIGHT! hey, you know what maybe they where lizard people with magical powers, that would explain everything... 80.200.232.97 (talk) 19:57, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
- You should take the time to read the article more carefully. What you have attributed to it is not what it says. -- Elphion (talk) 21:26, 5 September 2020 (UTC)
I've spent a lot of time editing the Atrocities in the Congo Free State article. To say Hochschild is a "political activist" and to deny the immense amount of death and population disruption that took place in the Congo is patently absurd. Have you read his book? He does a good job accounting for his conclusions. Now that said, there is significant debate over the exact number of casualties, what caused them, and whether it was a genocide. Some of that is mentioned here, though of course it could be expanded. While you're "lol"ing about this idea that "a few hundred Belgian mercenaries" killed multiple every day for years, maybe you should stop to consider how 1) They were in command of a 19,000-strong Force Publique and numerous militias which enforced much of the rubber policy and suppressed rebellions with harsh force 2) a de facto slave society might literally work thousands of people to death, and 3) that taking hostages and forcing people to harvest rubber to a quota for fear of being shot might seriously disrupt the time they would normally commit to agriculture, disrupting planting seasons and causing starvation. -Indy beetle (talk) 00:35, 6 September 2020 (UTC)
I have read a part of his book and also watched a few lectures, well he also explains that what the Belgian king did was not any different then what any other colonial regime did, that all of the European powers used the same slave labour, and that some people died yes, for various reasons, but it was not a genocide, and certainly not comparable to the holocaust like is being claimed by certain activist groups, he also explains that the other European powers used Leopold as a sort of boogie man, to hide there own crimes and atrocities, because at the time it was more eazy to shine the light on a small country like Belgium and its monarch and blame everything on him, then it was to shine the light on a massive super power as the British empire, Or france for example, so i think you should make a few articles about the british crown and the atrocities they commited, and put pictures of mutulated african slaves on Queen Victorias page.. 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:50AB:7F58:73CD:A174 (talk) 02:59, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
- While it is true that other colonial powers exploited the situation to deflect criticism of their own colonial projects, Leopold was nevertheless in a unique position compared to the other European monarchs. He pursued colonization of the Congo under the guise of a charity organization against the wishes of his own government and, as head of state of the Congo (arguable a violation of his own country's constitution), ruled it as his private fiefdom with the sole goal of making money. He had 100% power over the Congo, unlike the other monarchs, who had varying degrees of power over their respective colonies delegated to their prime ministers and parliaments, since they were national and not personal projects. He ad the concessions system instituted, which was copied by the other colonial powers (i.e. he created one of the most disastrous systems of economic exploitation). As the respected historian Van Reybrouck points out, most economic exploitation in the Congo was undertaken by Leopold himself and the concession holders. Between 1896 and 1905 he personally made 70 million Belgian francs' in profit in the Congo. Most of the important decisions taken in the Congo were well-within Leopold's purview, and he did little if nothing sincere to stop the unfolding disaster. While we will never really know how many people died in the Free State due to its policies, the fact that so many academics place their estimates in the millions and the fact that the post-Leopold Belgian colonial administration had to institute mass migrations to depopulated areas to provide labour for their business indicates that many people died. Or you know, you say, "some people died". While I share the belief of some that this was indeed no genocide, consider that Georges Nzongola-Ntalaja (who is a respected political scientist, not "some activist") said the Congo Free State incurred "a death toll of Holocaust proportions." Hochschild said the atrocities in the Congo were "one of the most appalling slaughters known to have been brought about by human agency." These are damning statements that point to a historical uniqueness in the level of economic exploitation undertaken wholly by this man. Your attempts to minimize this with whataboutism will get you no where. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:10, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
You say that nobody really knows how many people died, but yet Academics say it is millions.. right that makes sense.., and those concession holders, you mean like the British shipping company that was given a Monopoly by Leopold and that transported all the ivory and rubber from Boma to Antwerp, you are talking about them? You are the hypocrite... And you as a usefull idiot, are doing the good propaganda work for the other major colonial powers, and for left wing activists by spreading this propaganda on Left Wing Pedia, Well the good news, less and less people take wikipedia seriously, and less and less people take the so called respected academics seriously also.2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:50AB:7F58:73CD:A174 (talk) 13:26, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
I've spent months researching this event. By comparison, I suppose you've spent months pulling an opinion out of your ass. If I'm a useful idiot, I guess you're a useless one. A lack of agreement over how many people died doesn't mean a negligible number of people died. Go ahead, try making that argument on the Holocaust talk page. -Indy beetle (talk) 19:21, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
Good research boy, the Queen will have a present for you, for serving the empire so well, maybe even a medal. 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:9158:EF5:36D5:499D (talk) 22:03, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
The holocaust has actual proof, it is maybe the best proven case of genocide ever in history, there is no guessing work when it comes to the holocaust, because every killed person is proven, the deaths in Congo is not.. but i guess that argument is also part of your comperhensive research. 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:9158:EF5:36D5:499D (talk) 22:07, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
- The atrocities of the Congo Free State has "actual proof", photos and testimonies and such. As for the Holocaust, no, not every death is accounted for. Read [the death toll section] of the Holocaust article. I guess the disagreement over the exact number of deaths mean the whole thing is a fraud, right? -Indy beetle (talk) 21:43, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
The world knew nothing about it, yet they where providing shipping for all the goods looted in the Congo.. https://www.cmb.be/en/history 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:9158:EF5:36D5:499D (talk) 22:19, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
if you look at the Congo today, not much has changed, the presidents always have been and stll are proxies of the big super powers, and if a president dears to work for the interest of the congo itself he is killed, like Patrice Lumumba, The Congo free state was a proxy for the other colonial powers, the Belgian Congo was a proxy for the United States and the western interests, Mubutu Sese seko was also a proxy for the western interests, Kabila originaly was a proxy for the western interests, but switched to the Chinese and in response the western powers cut all ties with kabilla and send in the usefull idiot ngo's to make reports about human rights and so fort to push him out under international presure, And now president Félix Tshisekedi seems to bring in the western powers again, because ofcourse the exploiters stay loyal to the regime that brought them in, so as long the Chinese have all the contracts the money and power that comes with it will keep floating to the former regime, and sadly the Congo is so rich in resources that i doubt they will ever be free of this. 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:9158:EF5:36D5:499D (talk) 23:02, 7 September 2020 (UTC)
The entire Leopold myth is created so that the other powers can wash their hands in innocense and blame everything on King Leopold II evil practice, just like has been done with all the other leaders of the Congo, and you usefull idiots are doing the good work of not looking further then your nose, and spreading the propaganda, because as Hochschild pointed out in his book and his lectures, the other European powers did EXACTLY THE SAME in there colonies, what leopold II's people did in his. And at the same time the extreme left has another evidence of all white people are evil and white supremacy theory, they can exploit for there own political agenda 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:9158:EF5:36D5:499D (talk) 01:55, 8 September 2020 (UTC) |}
List of buildings
The Dutch wikipedia show a list of buildings commissioned by King Leopold II, maybe its a good idea to put one here also, because many of the most important and most iconic buildings and monuments, like the palace of justice in Brussels, or the Antwerp central station are commissioned by this King. LordLiberty (talk) 08:26, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 06:38, 22 September 2020 (UTC)
His Statues In Europe Are Drawing Vandalism--And Calls For Removal
In the wake of the killing of George Floyd, statues of Leopold II are being targeted by vandals amidst calls for removal:
How can we incorporate this development into the "Death and Legacy" section?TH1980 (talk) 02:58, 6 June 2020 (UTC)
only very few people (crazy extreme leftists) support this, dont make it as if the whole Europe wants this... 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:ACA9:BE5C:A026:20F8 (talk) 15:25, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
You are expression an opinion, and without any sources, so please avoid that. It should be known that it is not a new thing to tear down statues, or at least protest against them, and this is not something only "crazy left extremists" do. Here is an example of such a tear down: [1] Personally I think it could be incorporated in the George Floyd article, as example of other protests that were triggered by this incident. And there could be links to articles about such incidents. Does not have to say anything how common it was, and don't necessarily have to specify who was behind it unless that has been proven.Per Ö Westling (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 10:44, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
Flemish National Poster
Because of the reason stated here, I still think this file should be removed from the article. "poster is about Leopold II en Congo free state" isn't enough to prove the specific relevance. The ad hominems of the user involved don't help by the way. Encycloon (talk) 11:46, 5 January 2021 (UTC)
Splitting off statues sections proposal
I propose that both sections Statues in Congo and Statues in Belgium be split into a separate page called List of statues of Leopold II of Belgium especially the latter. This section is large enough to make their own page and much of its contents is WP:RECENT. StellarHalo (talk) 10:45, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
- Support : currently the list rather overwhelms the article, with far more detail than necessary for a biographical article. -- Elphion (talk) 16:32, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
- Support : I diddent find any king on wikipedia that has a list of statues on his page, this is nonsense under pressure of far left activists, why even a page? the pictures should just be on wikimedia commons, like with every other king... 2A02:A03F:8B18:9300:ACA9:BE5C:A026:20F8 (talk) 15:41, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
- Delete. This list certainly is not appropriate for this article but does not seem inherently notable. It seems inspired by an WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS and WP:RECENTISM. Some content can be merged into List of monuments and memorials removed during the George Floyd protests but most of the rest should probably be deleted. —Brigade Piron (talk) 18:17, 15 August 2020 (UTC)
- Support - The statues have generated a lot of talk in the media, but they do not belong in this article. A separate one is needed. -Indy beetle (talk) 17:24, 3 September 2020 (UTC)
- Support Defiantly should be split, no other monarchs have lists like this on their pages, and it just takes up a massive chunk of the page. NDV135 (talk) 20:02, 21 October 2020 (UTC)
- Support : Splitting out the statue part is a good idea. I am not sure how to proceed here so I am letting someone else do that. Per Ö Westling (talk) 10:48, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
Done per overwhelming consensus above, see List of statues of Leopold II of Belgium. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 11:51, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
POV Lead
72.142.101.86 (talk · contribs · 72.142.101.86 WHOIS) has added the following sentence to the lead: During his rule, King Leopold II killed and estimated 10 to 15 million congolese people. In the first place, this is redundant, since the death toll in the Congo is already summarized in the last paragraph of the lead. But secondly, the sentence is an inaccurate summary of the article, since (as reflected in the section Exploitation, atrocities, and death toll) there are referenced sources (primarily from Belgian historians) arguing that the death toll was much lower. While I think the preponderance of the evidence points to the higher numbers (as also discussed in that section), the Belgian sources should not be ignored; otherwise the lead leaves a wp:POV impression. -- Elphion (talk) 12:34, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
Perception of Leopold II
I made several edits, that taken together create a tonal shift in how Leopold II is portrayed. Based on my reading of the negative articles about him from that time period, the financial connections of these newspapers to various American and Belgian investors in the Abir Rubber Company, and the wide powers enjoyed by necessity by the administrators of the Congo Free State because of the lag time in communication between Africa and Belgium I believe Leopold II was being demonized by the press to protect investors reputations who had far greater control over the colony's day to day administration by bribing the proverbial shit out of the underpaid Belgian civil servants who ran the colony. I cited an interview of King Leopold which explains my viewpoint fairly well. Interview of King Leopold about his reputation. I will include relevant quotes here as a tl;dr because I understand this is a really large edit, and I am new here, but this topic is near and dear to my heart :). "In no shape or form have I bettered myself financially through my relationship with the Congo. On the contrary, I have spent large sums of my own in developing the country sums amounting in the aggregate to millions. I am poorer not richer because of the Congo. The betterment of the country and the improvement of the conditions of the natives are the only objects of my efforts.
"This is not purely an American corporation; half of the shares are held by Belgian financiers. The new company has two objects-first, to prospect for and work mines, and, second to plant rubber forests on modern principles. I have no pecuniary interest in the company, but the Congo has, for , as in the case of all concessions given in the Congo, shares meets the expense of the Congo Government and the dividends it now receives are sufficient to pay the whole interest on the Congo national debt. To see this development of the Congo is my reward."
"It is asserted you are financially interested in the Congo and make a huge fortune there yearly. Is this so?"
Leopold replied: "It is absolutely false. I am the ruler of the Congo, but the prosperity of the country no more affects me financially than the prosperity of America increases the means of President Roosevelt. I have not one cent invested in Congo industries and I have not received any salary as Congo Executive in the past twenty-two years.
"We have been fortunate in reducing smallpox in Central Africa by the introduction of vaccine. We have stopped the Congo slave trade and prohibited alcohol from entering the country, but steamers on the rivers have built and are building railways and introduced the telegraph. Now we are sending out motor cars.
"All this is only the beginning of our work. by the concessions we have given, especially concessions to Americans, we have reduced almost to nothing the territory of barbarism. Now we must fight the dreadful disease known as sleeping sickness, which has depopulated not only the Congo but also Uganda. We hope with the help of Almighty God to succeed in stamping out this scourge in Africa. In dealing with a race composed of cannibals for thousands of years, it is necessary to use methods which will best shake their idleness and make them realize the sanctity of work." He was a giant racist, but so were all his contemporaries, so I feel we can give him a pass on all the white man's burden bullshit.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Iosif Ilyich (talk • contribs) 09:28, 9 September 20211 (UTC)
- Leopold's protestations above are provably false. The vast majority of his wealth came from the Congo, and this is well-documented. He did spend a lot of it on his construction projects in Belgium, which would not have been possible without the infusion of cash from Africa, but there was still plenty left over. And many of the "public works" projects were not exactly public; much went into improvements of royal properties as well, so Leopold was not as public-spirited as he would like us to believe. What you see above is Leopold trying to sweeten his legacy after the fact. That anyone can still fall for this Kool-aid is yet another example of Leopold's incredible facility for self-promotion. The well-documented historical studies, from Ascherson to Hochschild and beyond, easily put the lie to this white-washing. Essentially the only modern professional allies of Leopold are Belgian apologists who can't quite bring themselves to accept the historical data. Fortunately, even Belgian historians are beginning to shake this nonsense. Particularly in regard to the Congo, Leopold is decidedly not a WP:Reliable Source: he lied constantly and pervasively about his intentions and performance there, from the inception of the project to the bitter end when it was finally wrested from his hand. He spent much of his final days burning incriminating evidence. -- Elphion (talk) 14:19, 9 September 2021 (UTC)
The lengthy introduction is excessive.
Elizabeth II has a one-sentence introduction. Henry VIII & Adolph Hitler have a one-paragraph introduction. I haven't looked at others, but the introduction for Leopold II seems very excessive. Readers simply do not need to read about HM Stanley, the Berlin Conference, etc. in the introduction.
I would recommend that the introduction be shortened to the following, with the changes/additions bolded:
.
Leopold II (Dutch: Leopold Lodewijk Filips Maria Victor; French: Léopold Louis Philippe Marie Victor; 9 April 1835 – 17 December 1909) was the longest-reigning Belgian monarch, reigning from 1865 to 1909.
In modern times, he is most well-known as being the namesake of Villa Leopolda, for his establishment of the Congo Free State, and for the many allegations of brutality during his reign of the Congo Free State. Although estimates vary, it is generally accepted that several million Congolese died during his reign -- primarily from disease, but also a significant number of deaths as a result of brutality, murder, and an impromptu monetary system that used severed hands instead of typical forms of currency, which led to militarized groups collecting hands from innocent victims for profit.
Although the term "genocide" has often used to describe the brutality of the Congo Free State, the events that took place fall short of meeting the criteria for such a description, most notably the intent to eradicate all or even most of the entire population.
.
If even this is viewed as being excessive, it could be ended after the first sentence of the second paragraph. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.37.102.223 (talk) 05:17, 10 June 2020 (UTC)
- I do not view the current intro as excessively long. Per WP policy, It should be a good summary of the article. And in this case there's a lot to cover. -- Elphion (talk) 13:07, 17 June 2020 (UTC)
I agree that the introduction should be shortened. I also think that the portion "through his own efforts, the owner and absolute ruler of the Congo Free State" is inaccurate and implies meritocracy. In fact, King Leopold II received great help from Sir Travers Twiss, as can be seen from page 277 in this book: Fitzmaurice, Andrew. Sovereignty, Property and Empire, 1500-2000. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Web. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2804:1B2:D080:B99B:FD38:EFE6:24BC:C1FD (talk) 21:27, 26 September 2020 (UTC)
"Excessive" is a euphemism for this ridiculous political pamphlet of a lead: 252 words about Leopold's atrocities in the Congo and 179 words about anything else during his 44-year reign.
But he did commit atrocities, that's true. I'm sure articles about other colonial powers are the same. Or are they?
Let's have a look at East India Company. This merciless money machine that squeezed India for a hundred years and caused famines that killed millions does not have A SINGLE WORD about its atrocities in the lead. In fact, the only problem seems to be that it "had recurring problems with its finances," the poor thing.
OK, maybe it's an unfortunate omission. Let's take the Indian Rebellion of 1857. This event that claimed the lives of up to a million Indians (versus six thousand British colonialists) is described in its lead as inflicting violence "on both sides, on British officers, and civilians, including women and children, by the rebels, and on the rebels".
Who is listed as the British leader during the rebellion? Queen Victoria. Surely, there must be something about the massacre of close to a million people on her page? There is! "The Queen had a relatively balanced view of the conflict, and condemned atrocities on both sides." How nice.
In conclusion, it seems that Leopold is the only 19th-century royal scoundrel deserving such a lead. But, of course, his atrocities were done in his own name, not in the name of the glorious British Empire. That's surely completely different. --Sobol Sequence (talk) 21:17, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
- The failure of other articles to address historical reality is not a valid reason to ignore historical reality here. Rather, it is a reason to start correcting the other articles. Everything Leopold accomplished in Belgium depended on the money he wrung from the Congo. The weight of the intro reflects historical reality, as it should. -- Elphion (talk) 23:55, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
- It's systemic. It's not about correcting articles, it's about correcting an Anglocentric world view. Good luck with that. --Sobol Sequence (talk) 10:05, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
A very interesting phrase from the intro: "...the colonial nations of Europe authorized his claim by committing the Congo Free State to improving the lives of the native inhabitants. Leopold ignored these conditions..." Of course, the other colonial nations (a league of humanitarians, basically!) did everything to improve the lives of their natives (why would they enslave them otherwise?), so they're perfectly justified in demanding the same from the naughty Belgian kid. What a load of hypocrisy. I'll edit that into something less neo-colonial. --Sobol Sequence (talk) 11:54, 20 January 2022 (UTC)
The lead
Obviously, his reign over the Congo Free State is an enormous part of his legacy, and is appropriately addressed in the lead. But after saying he was the king of Belgium, absolutely nothing in the last 3 paragraphs of the lead mentions any of his policies in Belgium; it's entirely dedicated to the Congo Free State. That seems a bit out of whack, seeing as he ruled over both places; the material about the Congo Free State in the lead can probably be stripped of some verbiage without losing any meaningful content, and maybe at least a few sentences about what he did while ruling over Belgium. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 03:47, 16 February 2022 (UTC)
- I noted much the same thing about the absence of material on Leopold (the man himself and his influence on Belgium) back in 2009. More should be added to the lead (and to the article itself) in this regard. Part of the problem is that the well-known sources also focus heavily on the Congo, which is indeed his main legacy -- the project that consumed most of his energy. I resist the notion of cutting the lead significantly though: the lead is supposed to be a meaningful summary of the article, and (as I said on a previous occasion) in this case there's lots to cover. -- Elphion (talk) 14:17, 16 February 2022 (UTC)
- Agreed on removing any kind of meaningful content, I think it can all be expressed but with fewer words. Last night I reworked one section and removed around 300 bytes of just filler material. I'd be willing to give it a shot in the next day or so, I think the 3 paragraphs could be consolidated into 2 while still conveying all the same information; that would make it easy to put in a paragraph about his reign in Belgium without making the lead overlong. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 17:58, 16 February 2022 (UTC)
War Crimes
Do we have any sources on his crimes against humanity? Jishiboka1 (talk) 01:56, 5 April 2022 (UTC)
Claim of "Consensus" for 10 Million Deaths Not Supported by Sources
Article currently says this: "Modern estimates range from 1 million to 15 million Congolese deaths, with a consensus growing around 10 million." These are the three citations for this claim of a "consensus":
"Belgium's genocidal colonial legacy haunts the country's future". The Independent. 17 October 2017. Retrieved 9 June 2020. The Independent article says only this: "Estimates of deaths in that period range from 10 million to 15 million Africans, and the debate whether it constituted a genocide continues." There is no mention of who made these estimates or who is debating. There is also no use of the term "consensus". This is not a good source.
"The hidden holocaust". The Guardian. 13 May 1999. Retrieved 9 June 2020. Again, the word "consensus" does not appear. This article actually says the opposite. "But what has stuck in the gut of Belgian historians is Hochschild's claim that 10 million people may have died in a forgotten holocaust. In outrage, the now ageing Belgian officials who worked in the Congo in later years have taken to the internet with a 10-page message claiming that maybe only half a dozen people had their hands chopped off, and that even that was done by native troops." So we have one American journalist, Hochschild, who says ten million, and actual Belgian historians who say it was closer to six (not six million, six).
Further, "Professor Jean Stengers, a leading historian of the period, says: 'Terrible things happened, but Hochschild is exaggerating. It is absurd to say so many millions died. I don't attach so much significance to his book. In two or three years' time, it will be forgotten.' Leopold's British biographer, Barbara Emerson, agrees..."
"Controverse over standbeelden van Leopold II: Waarom is de Belgische koning zo omstreden?". 5 June 2020. Machine-translating the article into English: "The figures differ on how many victims there have been in Congo under the 23-year reign of Leopold II. In 1998 the American journalist Adam Hochschild published "The ghost of King Leopold II and the sack of the Congo" about the abuses in the colony. The book, which becomes an international bestseller, talks about 10 million deaths. Other sources speak of 2, 3 or 5 million dead." Again, Hochschild is the only one named who claims millions of deaths. "Other sources" apparently speak of millions of dead, but they are unnamed.
The article currently heavily relies on the American journalist Hochschild, or else online newspaper articles which merely quote Hochschild and allude to other, unnamed sources. Hochschild is apparently a journalist, not a historian, and actual historians (who are actually named) of Belgium and Leopold find Hochschild's claims unbelievable. I presently see no reason why Hochschild should be weighed more reliable than the historians of Leopold and the Congo, yet he is currently the #1 source for this article.
There is also no mention of death tolls in the millions in the Casement Report on Belgian mismanagement of the Congo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casement_Report
I propose that the line "Modern estimates range from 1 million to 15 million Congolese deaths, with a consensus growing around 10 million" be deleted, and unless better sources are provided, more emphasis that Hochschild is the only one claiming millions of Congolese deaths. 50.253.11.17 (talk) 15:41, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
I see that the line "Modern estimates range from one million to fifteen million, with a consensus growing around 10 million" is repeated later in the article, with two different sources. These are also weak. The Historytoday article (https://www.historytoday.com/archive/contrarian/belgiums-heart-darkness) says "estimates for the number of people killed range between two and 15 million, easily putting Leopold in the top ten of history’s mass murderers", but like the other online newspaper articles it does not mention the provenance of these alleged estimates. The second source, "Colonial Terrorism, Global Capitalism and African Underdevelopment: 500 Years of Crimes Against African Peoples" by Asafa Jalata, uses Hochschild as the sole source for the Congo portion, mentioning Hochschild by name 28 times in a 42 page paper.
I have tried to do further research to find support for Hochschild's claims that Leopold was responsible for millions of deaths. David Van Reybrouck in Congo: The Epic History of a People, says: "By the year 1908 some sixteen thousand children were attending missions schools, an estimated thirty thousand people had learned to read and write, sixty-six thousand had served in the army, and some two hundred thousand had been baptized. Directly or indirectly, hundreds of thousands of locals had been effected by the rubber policies. Millions had been struck down by sleeping sickness and other infectious diseases." https://archive.org/details/congoepichistory0000vanr/page/98/mode/2up?q=millions
Neal Ascherson in The King Incorporated says that Casement said that the population of the Congo had fallen by 3 million in 15 years, but does not provide a direct quote. He says to see Lord Monkswell's speech in the House of Lords on July 29, 1907 for the source. Ascherson implies that the sleeping sickness was probably responsible for most of this decrease. This is one source that actually does support a claim for population reduction in the millions, but only weakly. Ascherson is apparently quoting Monkswell who was, maybe, quoting Casement. I did not see the three million figure in the Casement report. https://archive.org/details/kingincorporated0000asch/page/250/mode/2up?q=million
A.S. Rappoport's 1914 biography of Leopold does not mention millions of deaths. https://archive.org/details/leopoldsecondki00rappuoft/page/n11/mode/2up?q=million
John de Courcy MacDonnell's 1905 book King Leopold II : his rule in Belgium and the Congo also does not support the millions of deaths figure. He says that a million a year were taken as slaves in Africa (the whole continent, not Congo), but this slave trade was not the fault of Leopold. Rather, Leopold was working to abolish it. https://archive.org/details/kingleopoldiihi00macdgoog/mode/2up?q=million
Edmund Morel was a harsh contemporary critic of Leopold, does not allege millions in his 1903 "The Congo Slave State: A Protest Against the New African Slavery". Morel quotes Edgar Canisius, who says that ten or twenty thousand might have been murdered in Mongalla, but that is not millions. https://archive.org/details/congoslavestate00moregoog/page/n58/mode/2up?q=thousand
Tod Olsen, Leopold II : butcher of the Congo, 2008, says this: "According to the government’s report, the Congo's population had been cut in half since 1880. Ten million people had either died or left the Congo in 40 years." Finally, one source who at least mentions the ten million figure. However, this is a children's book, published by children's book publisher Scholastic. There are no footnotes or endnotes, only a bibliography. Hochschild is mentioned in the bibliography. Hochschild is likely again the only source for the figure of ten million. https://archive.org/details/leopoldiibutcher0000olso/page/118/mode/2up?q=million
Another by Edmund Morel, Red Rubber. He echoes the population reduction of 3 million ascribed by Ascherson to Casement and gives his own calculation of a population decrease of 1.5 million, but without any elaboration on the basis of his estimate. "The decrease of the population is appalling. By a careful computation —but which, of course, can only be hypothetical—based upon accessible positive data relating to depopulation, an analysis of the whole evidence which has been accumulating since 1890, the ivory and rubber output, the quantities of staple food-supplies wrung from the people, the spread of disease, etc., I estimate that in the last fifteen years the population of the Congo has been decreasing at a minimum rate of 100,000 per annum, or say 1,500,000 in the past fifteen years. I am convinced that is the very lowest computation compatible with accuracy. Consul Casement considers it far too low. His opinion is that the last decade has witnessed a decline in the population by nearly three millions. Of the two opinions his is likely to be the soundest, because he has seen with his own eyes the effects of the Leopoldian system upon communities which he knew in former years to be populous and thriving, and because he is a servant of the Crown with twenty years’ African experience." https://archive.org/details/redrubberstoryof00more_0/page/n227/mode/2up?q=soundest
Morel's comments above in Red Rubber are the closest thing to supporting the "consensus of 10 million deaths" line, and even then only extremely weakly. Morel speaks of a population reduction of 1.5-3 million. First, that's not ten million. Second, a population reduction is not necessarily the same as deaths. Casement describes mass migrations out of Belgian territory. Third, the population reduction is not necessarily related to Leopold's administration. Casement makes clear in his report that he believes the populations reductions were largely due to the plague and that the effects of the Belgian administration were only a secondary cause. Fourth, the line says "modern estimates", and Morel and Casement's estimates are not modern. They pre-date the first census in 1924 by almost two decades.
The more I look into this the less justification I see for the line about a consensus of ten million deaths. It seems that the consensus among historians is that the millions of deaths figure is incredible, and the dissenter is the journalist Hochschild and other journalists quoting Hochschild. 50.253.11.17 (talk) 18:04, 20 July 2022 (UTC)
- You are making many of the discredited claims that have already been answered in the talk archives: that Hochschild is not a historian (he is), that he is the only one estimating millions of deaths (many other studies, including recent ones from Belgian authors, generally fall in the ballpark of several million -- an necessarily imprecise number), that there are no references to other studies (see the archives, and the section "Exploitation, atrocities, and death toll", and the article Atrocities in the Congo Free State) This is no longer controversial among reputable historians, despite the early waffling by Stengers et al. It is horrible to contemplate the massive death tolls in the Congo, or in the Holocaust, but we must face them. The constant efforts to erase their memory deny history. -- Elphion (talk) 08:43, 21 July 2022 (UTC)
- Your assertion that it is not controversial does not make it so, nor does it excuse the poor state of the sources in the article. If there are better sources available, then the article should be using them.
- You have also not shown me a source where the line "Modern estimates range from 1 million to 15 million Congolese deaths, with a consensus growing around 10 million." is justified.
- I looked over at the sources on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atrocities_in_the_Congo_Free_State, and unfortunately they aren't much better.
- The first line is "Historians generally agree that a dramatic reduction in the overall size of the Congolese population occurred during the two decades of Free State rule in the Congo." Source is Gibbs, 1991. I do not see where Gibbs talks of a consensus for ten million deaths. The consensus in 1991 is probably also not necessarily the consensus today.
- Forbath is listed as a source twice, separately. First, "Peter Forbath gave a figure of at least 5 million deaths," and then in the next paragraph, "Despite this, Forbath more recently claimed the loss was at least five million." The source for both is his 1977 book. Is 1977 still considered recent? But Forbath doesn't even personally claim 5 million deaths. He says: "A native might save his life by surrendering his right hand, but more often than not the harvesting of hands meant wholesale murder, and there are estimates that in the twenty years of Leopold's personal rule at least 5 million people were killed in the Congo." Similar to the newspaper articles, Forbath says that there are (unnamed) estimates of five million deaths. His book does not have footnotes or endnotes. So Forbath is not claiming ~5 million, he's making an innuendo that somebody else did, but leaving that person unnamed. No basis or calculation is given for the estimate either.
- Isidore Ndaywel è Nziem is referenced: "According to historian Isidore Ndaywel è Nziem 13 million died, although he later revised this number downwards to 10 million." There are two sources sited. One is a book in French with no link and no page number. The edition of the book that I see online for $166 is 988 pages long. Given the number of other sources for this topic that don't actually say what they're asserted to say, this isn't very promising.
- Ascherson is mentioned citing Casement, but I've already addressed Ascherson above. Casement is not a "modern" estimate.
- John Gunther "also supports a 5 million figure as a minimum death estimate and posits 8 million as the maximum." The source is a 1953 book with no page number cited and no link.
- Lemkin has two lines. He "posited that 75% of the population was killed," and Raphael Lemkin attributed the quick spread of disease in Congo to the indigenous soldiers employed by the state, who moved across the country and had sex with women in many different places, thus spreading localised outbreaks across a larger area." The source is not Lemkin, but a paper by Dominik Scaller about Lemkin. Lemkin's unpublished memoirs are used as Scaller's source for the 75% figure. Unpublished sources are explicitly disallowed on Wikipedia. These lines should certainly be deleted.
- Roger Anstey "wrote that "a strong strand of local, oral tradition holds the rubber policy to have been a greater cause of death and depopulation than either the scourge of sleeping sickness or the periodic ravages of smallpox."" This sounds like Anstey is not making that assertion himself, only repeating hearsay.
- There is a line, "Others argued a decrease of 20 percent over the first forty years of colonial rule (up to the census of 1924)." Again, source is not directly named. The linked source, which I can't get to open, is apparently a brochure!
- Another line: "Other investigators put the number of deaths significantly higher. Adam Hochschild and Jan Vansina use an approximate number of 10 million." Vasina is sourced many times in the paragraph, but this particular line is missing a source for Vansina's alleged claim of ten million. The other lines in the paragraph seem to show that Vansina has a much more nuanced understanding of Congolese population figures.
- Please look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability#Exceptional_claims_require_exceptional_sources. Not everyone is accused of killing ten million people. That is an exceptional claim. The wiki policy is to have exceptional sources. Right now, we don't even have sources that support the lines they're linked to.
- Now, I have already done a lot of work reviewing these sources and searching for sources that actually support the claimed numbers. If you know any good sources, please link them directly, rather than again asserting without evidence that "this is no longer controversial among reputable historians".
- I am going to copy this to the talk page over there.
- 50.253.11.17 (talk) 13:58, 21 July 2022 (UTC)
- Ideally, we would have a tertiary academic work which explicitly says "There is a consensus growing around 10 million deaths" or something to that effect. Claims of "consensus" that aren't explicitly backed by a source but are instead made a Wikipedia editor by cobbling together various sources is a WP:SYNTH violation. -Indy beetle (talk) 00:47, 22 July 2022 (UTC)
Requested move 7 January 2023
- The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The result of the move request was: not moved. Consensus between participants to not move anything, including myself, the nominator. I am retracting my proposal. (closed by non-admin page mover) PhotographyEdits (talk) 13:12, 11 January 2023 (UTC)
– This article is the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for the subject of Leopold II. The disambiguation page should be moved to Leopold II (disambiguation). PhotographyEdits (talk) 23:25, 7 January 2023 (UTC)
- Oppose - While this Leopold is probably the most prominent Leopold II, I do not think that he is a well-known enough figure in English-language societies to justify the simplification. It still behooves an English-speaking lay reader to see "Belgium" in the title, as it can't be assumed the typical user of Wikipedia already knows this.
- Besides that, when one considers how many other "Leopold II"s are listed in that disambiguation page, (7, for those who didn't look,) I just don't think this is a good change. At least one of them, Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor, is a pretty notable figure in early modern European history. He's the son and heir of Maria Theresa, arguably the best-known non-British queen to laypeople. He played a key role in the events leading up to the French Revolution, and is regarded very highly by many historians and Austrians. While perhaps not as well-known as his Belgian counterpart, I don't think that he is incomparable in notability.
- In short, while I don't think this would be a disastrous change, I think the status quo is best. Garnet Moss (talk) 03:07, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
- It would help if you actually made an argument for primary topic by not just invoking the lengthy guideline but by explaining your rationale for why you think some way. This sounds like we're supposed to be voting on preconceived notions here, which would be against the spirit and letter of the guidelines and policies.
- Offhand I'd agree that that the Habsburg emperor has at least similar long-term significance, but I haven't researched them recently to be able to formulate a truly informed comparison. I went to check https://wikinav.toolforge.org/?language=en&title=Leopold_II and it shows these two articles in the right-hand side of the graph, but, the left-hand side seems broken because search traffic data is obviously missing, so 125 incoming 178 outgoing makes no sense. It is quite amusing that the most popular item is the last in the list, yet people still apparently click it so much.
- I don't quite see the benefit to readers of short-circuiting navigation in cases where there's generally no big traffic and no apparent inability of readers to click the most popular item. Let's just sort the list differently, maybe so these two are at the top, and see later if this needs further adjustment. --Joy (talk) 09:46, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
- I agree that placing Leopold II of Belgium first, and then Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor second on the disambiguation page, (with the rest following in chronological order,) would be a good compromise. Garnet Moss (talk) 21:16, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
- @Garnet Moss @Joy That seems like a reasonable compromise. If both of you agree, can I close this rename discussion? PhotographyEdits (talk) 08:40, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- Sure, if you withdraw the previous proposal and nobody else comes forward, that should be fine. Maybe give it one more day so more people notice. --Joy (talk) 14:24, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- @Joy Okay, fine! PhotographyEdits (talk) 15:20, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- I think that'd be perfect. Garnet Moss (talk) 20:24, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- @Joy Okay, fine! PhotographyEdits (talk) 15:20, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- Sure, if you withdraw the previous proposal and nobody else comes forward, that should be fine. Maybe give it one more day so more people notice. --Joy (talk) 14:24, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- @Garnet Moss @Joy That seems like a reasonable compromise. If both of you agree, can I close this rename discussion? PhotographyEdits (talk) 08:40, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- I agree that placing Leopold II of Belgium first, and then Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor second on the disambiguation page, (with the rest following in chronological order,) would be a good compromise. Garnet Moss (talk) 21:16, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
Requested move 16 January 2023
- The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 | It was proposed in this section that Leopold II of Belgium be renamed and moved to Leopold II.
result: Move logs: source title · target title
This is template {{subst:Requested move/end}} |
Leopold II of Belgium → Leopold II – Leopold II of Belgium is clearly the WP:PRIMARYTOPIC for "Leopold II", as visible on this Pageviews Analysis page. CJ-Moki (talk) 10:17, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
- Please read the discussion above, we just talked about this. (BTW page views analysis can give you useful info about primary topics by usage, but it's not automagically clear, you have to present an argument, and clarify about primary topics by long-term significance.) --Joy (talk) 12:52, 16 January 2023 (UTC)