Type 69 Rocket Launcher?

[predator20]

Originally Posted by BurtReynoldsMoustache

BTW, do you have a reason for your decision on this issue? I'd like to here it if you do. I'm not challenging your authority here, I'd just like to know why my argument didn't appeal to you.

To leave it dummy proof. So someone who's not that into weapons, may not know what the hell Type 69 means.

I tried to read the back and forth messages between you and Evil Tim. But it was too much to sort through. I don't care that much about the topic. So I would rather just leave it be.

[BurtReynoldsMoustache]

Originally Posted by predator20

To leave it dummy proof. So someone who's not that into weapons, may not know what the hell Type 69 means.

I tried to read the back and forth messages between you and Evil Tim. But it was too much to sort through. I don't care that much about the topic. So I would rather just leave it be.

I hope I'm not overstepping my bounds here, but I'd like to point out that there are photographs on this site. Anything listed as "Type 69" has a photograph accompanying it. On a more personal note, I feel that there is no point in appealing to the uninformed when this site exists specifically to inform and present accurate information.

The way I see it, what's good for the AK-47/Type 56 distinction, is just as good for the RPG-7/Type 69 distinction. I think it would be a good idea to use the former as a guide in whatever decision is finally reached.

[BurtReynoldsMoustache]

I've spent the entire day arguing back and forth with Evil Tim about this and it has been exhausting, so I'd like to raise some points about him and his debate style that should be taken into consideration in this issue.

1: His basic argument is a fallacy. Everything he says keeps coming back to a variation of "everyone does it so it must be ok." I keep refuting this with the fact that common usage does not make something technically correct. He counters with "yes it does."

2: His basic position is false. He claims that "RPG" is a catchall term for personal antitank weapons. It isn't. I have never heard or seen "RPG" used to describe the M72 LAW, the AT4, the Carl Gustaf, the SMAW, the B300, the Armbrust, the Panzerschrek, the Bazooka, or any other shoulder launched recoilless antitank weapon.

3: He seems more interested in arguing with me than in correcting information. I went through about 10-15 articles originally, deleting the phrase "RPG" from sections on the Type 69. He changed back exactly 2 of them, RPG-7 and Terminator 3. When I undid his revisions, he almost immediately changed them back again, every time. He made no effort to revert any of the other articles, nor did he make any effort to edit any articles I had not changed to suit his position. Going through every instance of the Type 69, even just once, would have been easier, less tedious, and less time consuming then arguing with me over this for the last 12 hours.

4: He has a history of being difficult. On his user page it says that he used to be known as Dongs, Vangelis, and Vangelis2. I remember reading in old threads about Dongs/Vangelis being a bit of a pill in the Perfect Dark and Goldeneye 007 articles. I'm sure the people who were actually here when it happened can vouch for this.

5: He seems completely incapable of understanding certain basic concepts. Throughout my debate with him I kept repeating certain things multiple times. Key to our debate; he does not understand the difference between accepted usage and and preferred usage in language. He believes them to be one and the same. Nor does he understand the difference between literal translation (transliteration) and equivalent translation (using analogous phrases). This deficiency presented itself in a very strange argument he used which I will detail below.

6: Some of his arguments are bizarre. For some reason, he felt that bringing up a supposed naming dispute over a WW2 German tank was appropriate to the issue. The tank in question is the Tiger II, informally known as the Königstiger. Königstiger was translated by allied soldiers as "king tiger" or "royal tiger". the literal translation is "king's tiger", with "king tiger" being the most widely know translation. Königstiger is the German language phrase used to refer to Panthera tigris tigris, which is known in English as the Bengal tiger. If you understand that "Königstiger" and "Bengal tiger" are analogous phrases and not direct translations of each other, then you will understand the frustration I'm about to relay to you.

Evil Tim presented an article as part of his argument. The article claimed that "king tiger" is an incorrect translation of Königstiger, and that the Tiger II's informal name should be translated to Bengal tiger. Evil Tim presented this article originally as an example of what he thought I was doing wrong. He compared my position on "Type 69 RPG" to that of the author of the article on the Königstiger translation. The link he claimed was that we were both arguing for a claimed technically correct term that is not in common professional usage (Type 69 for me, Bengal tiger for the author), and therefore incorrect by his standards. I then explained how the author was incorrect in his assertion and was arguing from a position of not understanding how linguistic translations work. Evil Tim then flipped his position on the article and claimed that the author was correct in claiming that Bengal tiger was correct inspite of not being widely used, the exact opposite of the argument he'd been making the whole time. I think he may have flipped to support a previous argument he tried to make where he asserted that because of my position, I would logically want all German machine guns to be labelled as "machine rifles" because the German language analog to machine gun translates to "machine rifle" (much like the German phrase for submachine gun transliterates to "machine pistol").

If this sounds confusing, it's because it is. I'm not even sure if I'm remembering this correctly because of how mentally draining debating with Evil Tim is. It's late, I'm tired and frazzled, and I've spent several hours typing this post and replying to him with a headache while trying to dull the pain with Law & Order: SVU. If anyone wants to sift through the whole thing to try to make sense of it, the whole debate is on his talk page.

Please take this into consideration when determining the validity of anything he says.

[MoviePropMaster2008]

"history of being difficult"

Hmmm. Burt Reynolds Mustache. That's a bit of the pot calling the kettle black. (edit) One must be careful of latching onto an idea and 'marrying the idea'. Many times on IMFDB you don't get what you want. I have yielded many times to decisions I was strongly against. As for the argument I don't have that strong of an opinion one way or another, BUT, there is merit to the argument that we are here to educate people who are NOT gun experts. Idiot proofing must be balanced with 'exact historical nomenclature'.

[funkychinaman]

I have no dog in this fight, but looking at the volumes each of you have written here and on the discussion pages, I have to say, the passion is quite admirable.

[BurtReynoldsMoustache]

I looked this up at the top English language source for information on the Chinese military, http://www.sinodefence.com/ . They don't have any information about small arms anymore for some reason so I used the wayback machine at http://www.archive.org/web/web.php to view their archives. The Type 69 page refers to it as "Type 69 rocket launcher". The phrase "rocket propelled grenade" is used to describe the ammunition, though they are not type classified as such, instead using names like "Type 69 HEAT", "Type 69-1 HEAT", etc. Additionally, the photographs of the ammunition have labels describing them as "rocket shells". These labels are part of the photographs and are not text captions, indicating that where ever they originated from used that phrase to describe them.

[Gunmaster45]

Since I doubt such a minor text change will be taken to the supreme court anytime soon, nor deserves such extreme effort to argue over, I found this fitting:

[MT2008]

Originally Posted by Gunmaster45

Since I doubt such a minor text change will be taken to the supreme court anytime soon, nor deserves such extreme effort to argue over, I found this fitting:

I admit that debating (as opposed to arguing) can be fun. But yes, it's becoming pretty obvious to me that Burt invests a little too much of his self-esteem into these sorts of exchanges.

Anyway, I was away a lot this weekend, but here's my take: I think both Burt and Tim need to shut up, and we, the mods and admins, should decide. They've been had more than enough time to make their case, and ultimately, it comes down to what we think. In situations like this, what else can we do?

All in favor of Burt's position, vote yeah. Opposed, nay. I vote nay.

[predator20]

I vote nay.

[Ben41]

I vote Nay.