2008/12/1 Fajro faigos@gmail.com:
WTF???
Some people really need read more about cultural diversity
Bible belt America does not share a culture with say Perth or indeed much of New York.
and linguistic rights
No such thing.
Language can be a tool for control. With English this is hard. There is simply too much of it out there an English speakers move around too much. It isn't really practical to keep them out. But if your general population doesn't speak English that doesn't matter. By actively promoting minority languages you increase the longevity and frequency of such situations. A population that does not speak English is one that it is fairly easy for those in power (be it dictators of tribal elders or religious leaders) to control the information flow to. And wikipedia can do nothing about that. A single data source is too easy to block.
So we tolerate smaller languages or languages with lower levels of existing information but should not go as far as actively promoting them. For the time being we accept that yes they are what we are going to have to use if we want to work with such groups (and heh even North Korea has a hard time dealing with Korean speakers among it tourists). But that does not mean we should make any attempt to promote them.