The reason geographical names are crucially important to some
people is that they are actively engaged in political advocacy.
For example, the "occupied Palestinian territories". This simple
term carries a lot of baggage.
The term means that Gaza and West Bank are _under occupation_,
which in turn implies that Israel is wrong to have its military
forces there. The term also means that the territories belong
to "Palestinians"; when we de-reference this latter term, we
find that Palestinians are a stateless people (nearly all Arabs)
living in (or desiring to live in) the region formerly known
as Palestine.
So, every time someone mentions Gaza and the West Bank, they
have a choice: simply call them "Gaza and the West Bank", which
doesn't imply much of anything; or call them the "occupied
Palestinian territories", which implies that Israel shouldn't
have those lands but the stateless Arabs should.
Wikipedia actually has to make this choice. It can choose to
get to the bottom of the controversy, take an objective stance,
and educate people as to the real truth. Or it can do its best
to stay out of the controversy and merely report on what the
various advocates say. I have tried to word the various Arab-
Israeli conflict article so that Wikipedia can stay above the
controversy (BTW, how'm I doin? ;-).
What does this have to do with Polish or German names? Well,
I don't know: nothing, I hope. But I worry that some advocates
may be playing a variation on the "occupied Palestinian terri-
tories" game. If the REAL name of a geographical feature is
Polish, that implies that its REAL OWNER is Poland. Or, real
name German implies real owner is Germany.
I think we should rise above this controversy as much as we can:
* Acknowledge the _existence_ of alternate names.
* Avoid any pronouncement that either alternative is the
"right" one.
* Where controversy is heated, describe it in the article,
e.g., "German historian Adolf Hamburger calls this village
Frankfort, while Polish geographer Jerzy Polska call it
Phrangforcky."
My 2 cents.
Uncle Ed, aka Ed Poor