Talk:Chicken Kiev speech

Contested deletion

This article should not be speedy deleted as being recently created, having no relevant page history and duplicating an existing English Wikipedia topic, because... extremely relevant historical speech, used in numerous articles and books. Washington Times is only one of many sources. User misidentified and used wrong deletion tag, there is no mention of the chicken kiev speech in the article Chicken Kiev, except for "see also" which i added a few minutes before creating the article. --Spoildead (talk) 15:22, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

This article should not be speedy deleted as being recently created, having no relevant page history and duplicating an existing English Wikipedia topic, because... It got ample coverage, and years later Bush even explained things to clarify his position. Editing article now. -- Dream Focus 15:34, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

Highbeam shows 93 results for this . Dream Focus 15:39, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

As an admin who reviews speedy deletion noms I would suggest there was very little chance the article was ever in real danger of being deleted for the reason specified in that nom. Being mentioned in a section in another article that is only tangentially related is not what that criterion is intended for and I would like to think most admins would not fall for that. Nice improvements in the meantime, I've done some re-organizing and cleanup as well. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:07, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

chicken George

Was Chicken George related to this at all? He was too chicken to face Clinton in a debate, so they mocked him that way. But did this have anything to do with the Chicken Kiev speech? Dream Focus 22:18, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I can't say I have seen a source that definitively ties the two together, but the whole "Bush is a chicken/wimp" thing, as I recall, first came up in the 88 election. Before anyone knew what the word "meme" meant we had one for Bush. He got away from it for a while with the first gulf war, but it came back in the 92 campaign. It seems at lest tangentially related, perhaps more suited for a "see also" now that I think of it. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:18, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Significance of "Chicken Kiev"

It is not yet noted in the article that Safire's deeply wounding barb evokes the commonplace that the familiar Chicken Kiev of US fundraising luncheons would likely be the only cultural reference to Kiev (or perhaps to anything Ukrainian) for an American of superficial education, with a parochial worldview and little comprehension of the contemporary political subtleties. The reference itself passed right over Bush's head... --Wetman (talk) 17:27, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

That's an interesting, if condescending, opinion on the matter. I doubt most people would think that the former head of the CIA and Vice President under Reagan or his speechwriter, a professor of political science specializing in the Soviet Union, would meet that description. They were certainly both very wrong about what would happen if Ukraine left the Soviet Union and about the Ukrainians resolve to do so, but I don't think ignorance was the cause. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:06, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

• Is the speech related to that dish? One is a type of chicken meal, and the other is a speech where chicken means cowardice. They just happen to both have started in Kiev. Dream Focus 20:09, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

This article doesn't really explain why "chicken Kiev" was used at all. Did "chicken" imply cowardice? 2A00:23C5:FE1C:3701:B9E2:37CF:57AE:AA62 (talk) 11:04, 11 May 2025 (UTC)

Requested move 18 April 2025

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. Just as in the related discussion at Talk:Chicken_Kiev#Requested_move_18_April_2025, clear opposition to this move with WP:KIEV and WP:COMMONNAME cited as reasoning for opposition. (closed by non-admin page mover) cyberdog958^Talk 14:11, 25 April 2025 (UTC)

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Chicken Kiev speech → Chicken Kyiv speechChicken Kyiv speech – Kyiv is the correct spelling of the city Stidmatt (talk) 11:50, 18 April 2025 (UTC)

• Oppose, no evidence of WP:COMMONNAME, and likely WP:HISTORICALNAME per WP:KIEV, as it was spelled "Kiev" at the time. This is not a sub-topic of the city so doesn't need to follow the city's spelling automatically, its name is determined independently, just like Chicken Kiev (which has a discussion of its own) Nor do we follow "correct spellings", we only follow most-common. Per my comment at the Chicken Kiev discussion, "Chicken Kiev" is still overwhelmingly more common, doubt a recent rename occurring after the speech took place would lead to the renaming of an historic event. DankJae 15:03, 18 April 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. Chicken Kiev remains the common spelling for the dish and for the speech. Per WP:KYIV, the spelling Kyiv is likely to be appropriate, but proceed with caution for topics dated/occurring on or after August 24, 1991. This speech occurred weeks before this date. This article concerns a historical speech that was referred to at the time, and continues to be referred to, using the spelling Kiev. To even consider a change we would need to see an overwhelming majority of independent, reliable sources make this change first. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 15:33, 18 April 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose - it may be the more common name for the city but not the speech and food dish. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:00, 18 April 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose - This is futile. Such a name change will require a broader discussion. ArvindPalaskar (talk) 11:27, 19 April 2025 (UTC)
• Oppose. Is this serious? Nobody calls the dish a chicken Kyiv and the speech was made when the city was still known in the west as Kiev in any case! -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:01, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The city is spelled Kyiv

This article about Ukraine’s road to independence, and covering events up to 2011, should use the normal spelling Kyiv when referring to the city. Current sources do not switch to the dated and non-neutral spelling “KIEV” because they mention something that happened 1 Aug instead of 15 Aug 1991. Kyiv is the default spelling per WP conventions, and it is the majority usage in this subject context in current reliable sources.

I searched Scholar for sources since 2022, and 47 use Kyiv while talking about the speech, while only 19 do not (manually count the English-language results).

Writing “KIEV” like it’s still the Cold War is non-neutral, “is now associated with the Russification of Ukraine”, and needlessly sends unacceptable negative signals. Using it makes this article look out of date, or written by uninformed or biased authors.

~2026-23357-73 (talk) 18:53, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

Did you read the move discussion above? We have WP:COMMONNAME. According to Google Scholar, there are 78 results for "chicken Kiev speech" and only 19 results for "chicken Kyiv speech" since 2022, but we shouldn't even have to limit results to arbitrary years because that is pure recentism. "Chicken Kiev" is also the overwhelming common name when referring to the dish. Mellk (talk) 19:37, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

The request was explicit, but you misunderstood. This article should use the normal spelling Kyiv when referring to the city.

For example:

The Chicken Kiev speech is the nickname for a speech given by the United States president George H. W. Bush in Kiev Kyiv, Ukraine, on August 1, 1991, three weeks [...]

~2026-23357-73 (talk) 20:09, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

And that that other article suffers from the same problem: Talk:Chicken Kiev#Refer to the city with the modern spelling. ~2026-23357-73 (talk) 20:27, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

@Mellk why did you not comment on the proposed change for over a week, and then revert the edit? ~2026-28038-02 (talk) 02:46, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

You were reverted because the community consensus is to not change Kiev to Kyiv. This is something that has been mentioned before on the talk page. Your Google Scholar results are also incomplete. Mellk (talk) 03:01, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

Why did you not engage in discussion about this? I made a substantive proposal and there was no objection. That’s literally an indication that community consensus isn’t what you say. ~2026-28038-02 (talk) 14:18, 9 May 2026 (UTC)