Belgium is about to split
 

It seems the french-speaker and the dutch-speaker can't stand each other anymore.
Or at least, they don't wan't to live in the same country.

What do you mean exactly? Is the country going to split? Please provide links.

No link, that's an impression I got when I watch the news.

There was a serious crisis a few years ago, but now it seems to get worse.
An example: in administrations, people who speak both french and dutch are not welcome, because they should be paid more (even though It can be useful).

You're Belgian? What do you speak?


Are there identifiable areas that mainly speak one of the two languages?

oh, dear gawd, please think of the waffles! :(

Maybe they are thinking of the waffles.

No I'm french.
And I speak french.

You know Belgium is important. It's like, the core of Europe.
And Europe does matter (eh? eh?).
Yes, they have their own compound/ghettos.

people don't think enough about the waffles.

What? I don't think Belgium isn't important. And yeah of course it's important for the European Union.

Er... you're taking the piss. But if there aren't areas where one language is predominantly spoken, then it's going to be difficult for Belgium to split.

Why do you get this impression ? I'm asking because I think it's basically impossible for the country to split, for financial matters alone. And, besides that, what would Brussels become ? It wouldn't last as an independant state... Moreover, the tensions between flemish and walloons aren't THAT bad, it's not like if there was a civil war or something... They would never let the country split, we just have to try standing each other because it won't change.

here's a small summary:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/europe/10227430.stm


There is actually also a German-speaking community/region in the east of the country, but it's really small and part of the Walloon (French-speaking) region, from what I understand...

the three main regions look like this:

Thanks

I've heard the wallons don't want to pay social welfare for the flemish (and/or vice versa)
If the country split, it's gonna be a mess. Don't know how it will affect the EU..

Are you very attached to your country as it is now?

I wouldn't say I am VERY attached to my country but yeah, I certainly don't want it to split ! All I'm trying to say is that people shouldn't worry about that because it's practically impossible that it happens and even if it does, it wouldn't happen overnight. They said the same thing about 3 or 4 years ago and they even did a fake breaking news report called "Bye Bye Belgium" (it's on youtube I think) saying that the country had split but I don't really feel that the situation's worse right now... But we sure are in a political mess these days, it was voting day today so I guess we'll see.

Well, you have Michel Daerden.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6icNu70hx9o

A popular politician, it is said.

My brother has been living for several years in Brussels now (he's not Belgian) and is quite pessimistic about the future of the country, and keep telling us examples/anecdotes about tensions between the two communities, but the whole situation remains difficult to comprehend for someone who does not live in Belgium...

However, in the end, I get the impression that it is the politicians that have exacerbated this situation, and if minorities are calling for the country to split, the majority does not want it to happen... Plus, one thing I gather, is that the status of Brussels is indeed one question that complicates the actual splitting of the country.

I don't much about this situation, so I may be talking total bullshit - if that is the case, you are of course welcome to correct me...

who would have figured a country with french people in it would have separation anxiety(!) i assume the belgian french are just like the quebecois, a bunch of unemployed,fashion magazine obsessed francophones who like to sit around all day having little frenchy chats and murdering the mothers of good hardworking,anglais speaking people

am i right?

No, we are not like that... In Brussels at least.

just a mean joke, stereotypically the french like to make them but can't stand it from the other side(i like french canadians more than english to be honest but canada is boring and i can't play hockey so if i don't tease the french there's nothing to do :( )

Didn't the French in Quebec laughably want to split from Canada?

it depends, some of them just whined alot but there was cool french canadians called the flq who kidnapped politicians and blew up mail boxes and were just generally gangsta

i'm belgian and i live in flanders, and there is quite a lot of tension right now but...

it has always been there.

at the moment there is a very popular flemish politician who wants to separate the country, but he's very vague on how exactly he'd do that. i don't trust him at all, but he gets tons of votes since he entered a very popular tv show and profiled himself there as a smart and funny man, while he has quite extreme ideas. people now vote for him because they think he's smart and nice, but they barely know what he stands for. sickening.

most of the country is going towards the right, and the more extreme politicians and it scares me. there have always been screams about splitting the country and ditching the king, but now more and more people start to listen to it, while i don't think it's such a good idea.

and don't worry space, while the funding for culture and certain types of education will certainly drop, this new popular politician looks like this:



i think the waffles, fries and chocolate will be safe.

We're fucked, his party (NVA) just won the elections in Flanders.

i know.

good thing: soon enough people will see he can't solve their issues either and they'll lose a ton of votes again. it was the same thing with vlaams belang, they got tons of votes, changed nothing and now they keep losing voters with every election.

i find this man (bart de wever) extremely scary and i don't trust him: mainly because all he ever says seems like he thought about it beforehand. i've never heard him say anything spontaneously and it makes him look like he never shows his true face to me.

i'm also scared for the future of education in general and 'smaller' kind of schools (like art schools) especially. over the past few years, fundings for higher art educations have gone so low some of the teachers are underpaid, and these parties don't seem to care a whole lot about art or culture in general. we're doomed.

uit het losse "polsje"
 

ploesj, stop scaring everyone, please ;)

Seriously though, it's quite baffling, reading your posts in this thread. So much so that I don't really know where to begin.

name one of his ideas you find extreme, please

You're being more vague than I've ever seen him, imo.

Again, you don't say why you think an independent Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia is a bad idea. I'm guessing you must like our king.

Sure, Bart De Wever is overweight and not as sporty as Jörg Haider, but maybe that's a good thing... I also don't see why a politician's looks are important. (unless we're talking about Filip De Winter, of course ;))

Not trying to defend Vlaams Belang here, but they were never in power, never part of the government, because of the cordon sanitaire.

You must be joking.

In his victory speech, De Wever reached out to both Wallonia and competing Flemish parties: "We have to realise ourselves that we have to build bridges, with Flemish and French-speaking Belgians alike."

Even though he is a proponent of an independent Flanders, I think De Wever means well with all people living in Belgium (including our king).

(I voted Groen! (Flemish green party) btw)

wanting to make flanders a separate country is a pretty extreme thought in my head.

i'm vague because i'm not a politician and i don't intend to be one. these men are supposed to be really clear in what they are up to and what they want.

i've never felt the need to split our country in half. i've never felt 'flemish' or thought of myself as 'from flanders': i'm belgian.

oh and that thing about what he looks like? that was for space; if you read what i posted underneath his photo, you can see i was referring to his fear of losing the waffles ;)

when i hear the people around me who voted for him, it's mainly because he seemed funny, smart and sympathetic in that tv-show, or because they think he'll do something about the immigrants and see him as something to vote for instead of vlaams belang (which they wouldn't do because they're not as mainstream and it's not as acceptable to vote for them...)

my youngest brother can't vote yet, but he's already screaming about 'how the streets are so unsafe because of all the immigrants'. we live in the center of the city, it's mainly tourists and restaurants and shops, and he never really goes anywhere else. it bothers him that he goes to school and there are a lot of foreign students there, but he forgets that they all speak dutch quite perfectly and are not that different from the rest of the students. i spend quite some time in the 'bad neighbourhoods' like borgerhout, and i rarely feel unsafe or threatened. to be honest, the only times i've really been bothered in the city was when drunk flemish students started to shout some nasty stuff.

i'm not going to say there are no problems with immigration in belgium, like we saw in brussels, but this has so many causes, and it's not just their fault.

oh, and i don't mind our king. he's part of the tradition of our country, and i think he might actually help to bring flanders and wallonia closer together. i might be naive, meh.

yesterday i was talking about all this to my boyfriend and older brother, and came to the conclusion that i don't trust bart de wever because everything he says sounds very well thought out. and i mean EVERYTHING. he never says anthing spontaneously in public, and thus never shows his true colors. call it intuition, but i don't trust him.

and i voted groen! too.

cf. Dissolution of Czechoslovakia
 

Even when it happens peacefully and democratically, like the dissolution of Czechoslovakia?

oh and remember this?

they're pro.

The only thing that sucks about that bridge is its name...

of course it doesn't matter to you, you don't live right next to where it's going to be.

i'd like to hear your opinion on a giant viaduct (because that's what it mainly is) this close to your home.

with this i mean the noise, pollution, view and the fact that it will go right through a neighbourhood that had just started to live up again, after lots of great initiatives. it was becoming a place for people to meet up and do things together instead of only being there to live because it's super cheap but dangerous. and now they want to plant that bridge through it.

You're mostly right, of course. I was just being provocative, sorry.

sorry if i sounded a bit rude, but this is a sensitive matter around here :)

now the people in Berchem are getting worried since there are ideas to build a bridge there, and lead traffic through a street with a lot of houses.

the original idea was to lead the traffic around the city, but that part has been filled with houses too.

I've just heard Belgium has no government for 200+ days.
And it doesn't explode, or implode.

Is that a belgium specificity, or are every gvt useless?

Pimpin, where you at, here in LA we mad concerned with the waffles you smell me on that?

Has Belgium split yet?

nope, but still no government. thank god the people are starting to protest, even though they are being very calm when doing so. it's about time those politicians start doing what they get paid for. we elected them to form a government and run the country, they should start doing so.