Follows a question and an answer I found on Tumblr regarding the Esperanto language and it's movement. I don't know what your thoughts on it might be. I certainly wouldn't know what to say to this person.

«Anonymous asked:
Why do you find the Esperanto movement to be racist and pro-genocide?

The Esperanto movement is racist and pro-genocide because it considers the fact that people speak different languages to be a problem (la lingva problemo - the language problem), and that the solution to this problem is to have everyone learn Esperanto as a second language (the realization of this aim is called by Esperantists la fina venko - the final victory). Esperanto is unquestionably Eurocentric, both lexically and grammatically. For instance, it employs subject-verb-object word order, uses suffixes to denote femininity in words (meaning the default is masculine) and the bulk of its vocabulary is unquestionably Indo-European in origin.

Esperantists constantly promote their language as being “easier” to learn than natural languages. This is only true if the learner’s native language is Indo-European, non-tonal and written with the Latin script.

If adopted internationally Esperanto would inevitably come to be an important vehicle of globalization (as the English language has been), it would supplant local languages, particularly those languages which have no literary traditions and it would lead to an erosion of local culture.

In short, Esperantists consider language diversity to be a problem and they consider that the solution to that problem is to have everyone learn their European styled language as a second language. In other words, Esperantists argue for a homogenization of world culture, for a world which is obligingly accessible for white people and white culture, and for a world which caters to white need for convenience.

If that doesn’t sound racist and pro-genocide to you, I don’t know what does.»

I suppose you didn't intend to be racist but actually there's no reason to see it
as racist other than to be racist against those that created the language the best
way they knew trying to make it as politically correct and easy to learn as possible.

Why try to paint it bad that way.

There may be individuals trying to promote any language that might have some abusive
thoughts, but there's really no reason to jump to such conclusions especially.

The proof is in the pudding. Who is cooperating to create a very versatile language?
The critics or the creators and users. Obviously the critics aren't doing anything
successful to create something even better. It seems the author wants to see the Europeaons
as guilty of somehting very bad and that's the way he'll probably be bound and
determined to do, but I hope he'll instead make friends and see that obviously
Esperanto isn't even a political movement at all. It was simply created to help people.

A

edcxjo:Follows a question and an answer I found on Tumblr regarding the Esperanto language and it's movement. I don't know what your thoughts on it might be. I certainly wouldn't know what to say to this person.

«Anonymous asked:
Why do you find the Esperanto movement to be racist and pro-genocide?

The Esperanto movement is racist and pro-genocide because it considers the fact that people speak different languages to be a problem (la lingva problemo - the language problem), and that the solution to this problem is to have everyone learn Esperanto as a second language (the realization of this aim is called by Esperantists la fina venko - the final victory). Esperanto is unquestionably Eurocentric, both lexically and grammatically. For instance, it employs subject-verb-object word order, uses suffixes to denote femininity in words (meaning the default is masculine) and the bulk of its vocabulary is unquestionably Indo-European in origin.

Esperantists constantly promote their language as being “easier” to learn than natural languages. This is only true if the learner’s native language is Indo-European, non-tonal and written with the Latin script.

If adopted internationally Esperanto would inevitably come to be an important vehicle of globalization (as the English language has been), it would supplant local languages, particularly those languages which have no literary traditions and it would lead to an erosion of local culture.

In short, Esperantists consider language diversity to be a problem and they consider that the solution to that problem is to have everyone learn their European styled language as a second language. In other words, Esperantists argue for a homogenization of world culture, for a world which is obligingly accessible for white people and white culture, and for a world which caters to white need for convenience.

If that doesn’t sound racist and pro-genocide to you, I don’t know what does.»

La imperio atakas denove.

Thi empair atak agen

The "answer" (if you want to call it that) is riddled with errors and misconceptions about Esperanto. Therefore my response to that person would be simply "You don't know what you're talking about." If they decided to try and argue their "points", I'd simply ignore them.

If someone can't be bothered to learn the facts about something, then their opinions about that something are worthless.

Leaving aside the non-sequiturs and obvious nonsense concerning racism and genocide, the post does make a point I find hard to refute:

If adopted internationally Esperanto would inevitably come to be an important vehicle of globalization (as the English language has been), it would supplant local languages, particularly those languages which have no literary traditions and it would lead to an erosion of local culture.

No doubt many Esperantists would respond to the above by pointing out that Esperanto only aims to be an auxiliary language, and that it isn't supposed to replace any local languages/culture, but merely to provide a neutral means of bridging the language divide. Well that's all very well if you believe that what Esperanto "aims" or is "supposed" to be would have the primary bearing (or indeed any bearing at all) on what Esperanto actually turned out to be, should the fina venko ever happen. Personally I find that idea impossible to believe, and frankly naive.

English didn't become a supplanter of languages and killer of cultures due to some oppressive ideology at its core. It became a supplanter of languages and killer of cultures because that is a natural result of being the international language. IMO Esperanto's interna ideo would do next to nothing to temper this, and its ease of learning and communicative power relative to English and other languages would probably just augment the detrimental effect on local cultures.

But of course even if all that speculation is true, it doesn't really support the idea the Esperanto movement is racist or genocidal. To me those things relate more to intent and ideological outlook, and in that respect it's clear to me that Esperantists have their heart in the right place.

tommjames:Leaving aside the non-sequiturs and obvious nonsense

There is so much of it, that one point that is hard to refute is not that important

Anyway, what I thought when I read that message is:
"As opposed to what?"
(1) Is Esperanto worse than isolated people who can't communicate with others? (2) Is Esperanto worse than using an ethnic language for communication?

Answers:
(1) No.
(2) No.

Esperanto is unquestionably Eurocentric, both lexically and grammatically.

Does it not bother the poster that the same charge could be levelled against English, the de facto international language?

The question should be which imposes a greater burden on the non-native speaker of English - having to learn English or acquiring fluency in Esperanto.

It sounds like a diatribe from a member of one of those nut-job organizations that see a conspiracy behind just about everything and evil lurking in the shadows everywhere. It's nonsensical and not worth wasting much time or thought about.

One big difference between Esperanto and English is that no army of Esperanto speakers ever conquered another country or tribe and forced the conquered to use Esperanto. Esperanto is learned on a voluntary basis. Translators of E works try to translate very little known works from small languages which are generally not read in classes to learn English. In fact, when learning English the students are practically only exposed to English and American cultures or the English-speaking culture of the land in which they are, e.g. Canada, Australia, SA, etc.
Furthermore, there are no native speakers of Esperanto who control Wall Street or the City and even if Esperanto were widely spread, I doubt that the native English speakers of the 1% would use it as they do English.
Word construction in Esperanto is much more similar to that of Turkish and Chinese (as well as Hawaiian) than is word construction in any other European language. Look at German! I am in Germany now and I see Germans borrowing words from English instead of using an Esperanto-like construction of new words. They talk on "handys" (sic) [cell phones], buy books in "bookstores" and purchase cheap goods at "sales". In the evening they go for "happy hour", etc. etc. Esperanto does not allow that to such and extent. Everyone around the world who learns basic Esperanto understands immediately "poŝtelefono".

robbkvasnak:Esperanto does not allow that to such and extent. Everyone around the world who learns basic Esperanto understands immediately "poŝtelefono".

OT: Actually German does have Mobiltelefon (mobile telephone), but that’s too long for many, which is why the pseudo-anglicism Handy is used more frequently in an informal context.

(A joke theory about the etymology of Handy states that it comes from a Swabian dialect speaker asking Hän di koi Schnur? = "don’t they have a cable?" upon seeing a mobile phone. The sentence would be Haben die keine Schnur? in Standard German.)