I was being slightly facetious regarding my "honorary" comment, but I wished to point out that what seems obvious to one person, may have a completely different significance to someone else.

One might point out that many natural languages have an inherent sexist bias; but does that invalidate them? In Russian, for instance, when referring to an abstract person, masculine is invariably indicated in pronouns and verb/adjective inflections. Even if I were talking to a female-only group, I would ask "Kto s'jel moj banan?" ("Who ate my banana?" ) with "s'jel", the verb, superficially in the masculine gender. Yet I've never heard people objecting to this (and indeed, it is practically impossible to be "gender-neutral" in Russian without going to extremes like putting every gender-indicating word in neuter or plural, which sounds completely absurd).

Again, if people feel strongly about using -iĉ, I say go ahead and do what you think is best. If enough people feel the same way as you do, for a long enough time, then via a natural evolutionary process, it will become assimilated into the language at least as an accepted variant. I don't think iĉismo violates any core principles of the Fundamento per se.

Thank you for the reply, I was worried that some of my comments(however carefully-worded I tried to be) would be met with some anger. I'm glad to see that you don't find my arguments too unreasonable.

I would never say that inherent sexual bias in a language makes it invalid, but with all the decades of evolution that Esperanto has gone through it is still simply impossible for me to compare it with a natural language. This is due to the purpose of Esperanto versus the purpose of other languages. Does that make sense? Even if natural languages have some asymmetrical features doesn't mean Esperanto should "get away" with the same. I hold different standards for it than English or Russian or any other language, because it's meant to be neutral and international.

I do agree that in the long run it's probably not something that we can or should just change overnight, but I definitely think that those who agree with it's purpose should not be afraid to use it. Some arguments include sounding strange or silly while using -iĉ, but honestly the language itself is met with so much criticism and is regarded as silly by so many people that I really don't have a problem with people seeing me that way.

verdafeino:If -o is meant to be neutral, as it's often used nowadays, why should it also be masculine?

It's not also masculine. What makes "patro" masculine is not the "-o", it's the root "patr-" It means "father" not "parent" as written in the Fundamento.

verdafeino: Which takes me to the issue of ge-. I find this so illogical. The way things are now, nouns are specified as male or female(especially in the case of familial terms) and you add ge- to specify neutrality. I find it much more useful to start out with neutrality and have the option to specify gender with the use of -iĉ and -in. In this way "parents" would be "patroj", instead of the strangely-formed "gepatroj"(neutral-dads?).

1. So you see the word "cowboy" as a small minotaur? A boy's body with a cow head? or a cow's body with the torso of a boy attached, as in a centaur? Because if you are going to be pedantically literal about "gepatroj" then you really need to be the same with "cowboy" "butterfly" and other such compound words in English.
2. Ge- is not added to specify neutrality (forums such as "gepatro" notwithstanding); it is used to denote both genders taken together as a pair/group. Would you prefer Esperanto do like Spanish and have the simple form "patroj" used for "parents"? Somehow I think not.
3. "-iĉ" is not a problem, in and of itself. The problem arises when you go further on the logical process and then try to make "patro" mean something contrary to the Fundamento. As I said above, "patro" means "father", not "parent"; the Fundamento says so, so that's the way it is. Forgive me for my harsh words, but if you don't accept the Fundamento as THE "constitution" of Esperanto, you have no reason to even BE an Esperantist and so should really drop the language and go find something else to amuse yourself with.

@RiotNrrd

Thanks alot for your comment, I wanted to write something similar, but I don't feel well writing longer comments in English, so I'm glad someone did it for me.

Yes, less than 20 nouns are male by default, a few are female (damo...), and all the rest is neutral.
While I see the point that deriving female nouns from male roots is sexistic, it is also clear that from a linguistic point of view there is absolutely no correlation between social and linguistic sexism, as Erinja pointed out.

Anyhow, I disagree regarding the kontraŭfundamenteco: Neither adding a suffixoid -iĉ nor replacing compounds like patrino with new roots like *matro is forbidden (cf. -end or kanono for pafilego), the problem is that in my opinion one can't add another personal pronoun, as the Fundamento grammar states "the personal pronouns (not "some personal pronouns" ) are:".
The only viable solution would be going back to the (partly) Zamenhofian use of ĝi for unspecified gender.

Also it would be feasible to obtain a sex-symmetric system in Esperanto (just some 20 new words + broadening the use of another one), it's probably not going to happen for sociolinguistic reasons.

Aubright:So sorry to have re-opened what I'm sure is considered a kind of Pandora's Box of sorts. My computer showed no listing of another thing on this topic (although my common sense dictated otherwise). In response to a few things I have read this far, if no one minds: sexism is not a perceived problem in Esperanto. It is not a shadow people are leaping at in some paranoid hunt. It is a problem that has been brought up quite a bit by hoards of people. Now I understand not wanting to change Esperanto because you want it to be as easy as possible, but to flat out DENY there is any problem whatsoever seems like a stretch. And in response to efilzeo; As a feminist i am as equally against the glorification of the male as I am towards the female. I seek an answer as to how one could bring a more gender-neutral platform to Esperanto, not to further engender the language. In short I am not here to advocate some drastic reform nor am I here to try and bring shame on Esperanto or it's users. I am only trying to get answers to a question that has been making it hard for me to feel comfortable with a language I otherwise greatly enjoy and respect.

I think you hit the nail on the head right there. Reading some of the response after mine is that people can't see the sexism. Why? Because they are either men who haven't had to live in a sexist society and are used to everything just being default male (seriously look at movies, games, books... how many of the heroes/protagonists are men. Look at how in wikis he/him/his is used when referring to a viewer/player/participant), or are women that have internalized the sexism and can't see it because "That's the way it's always been, that's nature right." Sinfest did a real nice take on it on their series of Sisterhood strips. Basically sexism is 'The Matrix' and one you study feminism.. you can SEE the matrix and it's something you can't UNsee. Thus with Esperanto and it's default male structure it is INDEED sexist. Also don't tell me OTHERING women is some how honorary. I get that enough in life about how it's so horrible to be a woman, gotta separate the men from the 'girls'.

Also men... you can't define what is and isn't sexist. Only women can define it as only women are affected by it. So listen to us.

I also love the people that dismissed what I said and went on about the "125 years of writings!!!!1" when I already stated that in other ways people are ignoring those 125 years and are using words/suffixes in other ways. *sigh* Esperanto it seems needs another 125 to wake up to itself and realize it isn't an equal language.

Maverynthia:Also men... you can't define what is and isn't sexist. Only women can define it as only women are affected by it. So listen to us.

I can't agree with this. Of course no one can't tell another person whether (s)he has to feel discrimiated or not, but you can't deny everyone's right to reflect on the problem.

BTW: In the linguistic matter I agree with you that Esperanto has sexist traits which could be repaired rather easily, but I also disagree in the statement, that only a symmetric system is not-discriminating.

Men (white, grown-up, non-handicaped men) are the defaults in thought, not in the language (there they're only less visible than women*). And you won't change thinking by changing the language, no way, you have to go the other way around by changing the reality (hm, I've just found out I'm a materialist ") ).

*The roots lie deep in Proto-Indo-European, where there were originally a common and a neutral gender. In late PIE a special feminine gender emerged, which made the former common gender a masculine, which however retained the old function of a neutral means for expressing people. I can't see sexism here, frankly.

orthohawk:
1. So you see the word "cowboy" as a small minotaur? A boy's body with a cow head? or a cow's body with the torso of a boy attached, as in a centaur? Because if you are going to be pedantically literal about "gepatroj" then you really need to be the same with "cowboy" "butterfly" and other such compound words in English.
2. Ge- is not added to specify neutrality (forums such as "gepatro" notwithstanding); it is used to denote both genders taken together as a pair/group. Would you prefer Esperanto do like Spanish and have the simple form "patroj" used for "parents"? Somehow I think not.
3. "-iĉ" is not a problem, in and of itself. The problem arises when you go further on the logical process and then try to make "patro" mean something contrary to the Fundamento. As I said above, "patro" means "father", not "parent"; the Fundamento says so, so that's the way it is. Forgive me for my harsh words, but if you don't accept the Fundamento as THE "constitution" of Esperanto, you have no reason to even BE an Esperantist and so should really drop the language and go find something else to amuse yourself with.

1. As far as I'm concerned Esperanto must be treated more pedantically and taken more literally for the simple reason that we don't all understand the context of words like "cowboy", being from different language backgrounds. I would never say "bovknabo" to mean "cowboy" because it could have so many meanings to different people and it's simply not good Esperanto. English is allowed to have words like this because it's a natural language that was never intended to be neutral and simple for foreigners to learn and use... that's the ENTIRE point of Esperanto. People need to stop basing their arguments on comparisons to natural languages because it's getting them nowhere.

2. If you re-read that part of my comment you'll find that this is actually exactly what I was suggesting. I know, "crazy" right?

3. I'm sorry, that's an absolutely absurd thing to suggest. This is in large part why Esperanto hasn't succeeded at the ultimate goal is strives towards. The community suffers from the same issues as all small causes - insecurity, exclusivity, and the inability to move with the times. I love this community and I love the language but I can see the way it eats it's own tail and goes through the same motions, never getting anywhere. To tell those choice few eager and earnest to learn that they should give up is not exactly wise when considering that it's a small enough group that you could actually kill the movement with suggestions like that. Just because I don't think of the fundamento as my bible or Zamenhof as a prophet doesn't mean I don't have a right to use the language for my "amusement".

verdafeino:If -o is meant to be neutral

It isn't meant to be neutral, it just means noun. Nouns come in 3 types: masculine, feminine, and neutral. Most nouns belong to the latter category but it's the meaning of the root that determines what category a noun falls into, nothing to do with the ending used or anything grammatical (assuming we don't explicitly show the gender with -in or ge- or vir-).

verdadeino:The way things are now, nouns are specified as male or female

You missed "or neutral".

verdadeino:and you add ge- to specify neutrality

No, you add ge- to show the presence of both sexes. This is why "gepatroj" does not mean "neutral dads", but rather "father and mother".

Or maybe "father and mother" is too sexist for you? Sorry.. "mother and father". There we go.

verdadenio:It seems that a lot of people have no real reason to dislike this idea other than the fact that "things have always been this way", or because it's complicating the language

In my own case it's nothing to do with those things. The reason I dislike -iĉ, and useless reform proposals more generally, is that they can never actually be realised. Thus they are a complete waste of time. So discussing them as if they were some sort of viable solution that deserves anyone's attention really does not appeal to me at all. Esperanto isn't open to reforms, so what exactly is the point of a reform proposal?

verdafenio:The great thing is that we COULD choose to change it.

Assuming by "choose to change it" you mean "choose it change it in sufficient numbers that some actual change could be realised", I'd have to disagree. Seems like pure fantasy really.

verdafeino: It is NOT honorary to be "othered", to be thought of as separate from the "natural state" of masculinity.

Ino, malino.

In this case it's the opposite of what you said. Now we could count the words which according to this obsessed way prefer the male or female form, but what for? Doesn't it look pointless to you? If a female saying "Mi estas instruisto" sounds natural to you as it does for me, where's the problem?

Language is not mathematics, it has not to do only with quantity and relations but with all aspects of life, therefor is impossible for it to be perfect (considering also that everyone has a different "perfect" ).

Why does patro -> patrino sounds offending to you and ino -> malino sounds fine to me?

This "problem" of derivation exists in many other senses. Why should an atheist be called sendiulo/a-teisto, giving that is the believer who adds something in his life? So what do you we do? Do we invent something new to describe them? Why should pacifists be "othered" from the "natural state" of warmongers? It has completely no sense to me. Simply language has a story and has to begin from somewhere; giving that believers had a stronger political position they got the first place in this theme and atheists followed. So? Where's the problem? Still every baby comes to the world atheist, then logically believers should be "separate from the natural state of...". This is the history of the language and I find it interesting, maybe many times bad but I don't demand to change it because of my feelings, history is not morality. What about the word "cretin" coming from "christian"? Should every christian feel upset about it, or simply see it as the history of that word and nothing more? Should Europeans feel upset because they are literally "people with wide faces"? Do we have to change all these things trying to do a perfect language? I think it is impossible, and if it was possible I wouldn't want that because we'd lose a lot. Eventually, and above all, unlike those precedent examples, patrino coming from patro has no bad/insulting meaning at all. I also don't understand what's the problem with gepatro if you just want to say "parent" as Orthohawk explained.

In my opinion this is just obsession, as the post here below proves:

Maverynthia:Also men... you can't define what is and isn't sexist. Only women can define it as only women are affected by it. So listen to us.

verdafeino:This is in large part why Esperanto hasn't succeeded at the ultimate goal is strives towards. The community suffers from the same issues as all small causes - insecurity, exclusivity, and the inability to move with the times. I love this community and I love the language but I can see the way it eats it's own tail and goes through the same motions, never getting anywhere. To tell those choice few eager and earnest to learn that they should give up is not exactly wise when considering that it's a small enough group that you could actually kill the movement with suggestions like that. Just because I don't think of the fundamento as my bible or Zamenhof as a prophet doesn't mean I don't have a right to use the language for my "amusement".

So why other planned languages which don't have a Fundamento and are open to reforms have succeeded a hundred time worse than Esperanto?
The Fundamento is not a disadvantage, but one of the biggest advantages of E-o and a warranty for its stability.
But again: As long as we want to add something, not change anything, we don't have problems with the Fundamento.

efilzeo:Eventually, and above all, unlike those precedent examples, patrino coming from patro has no bad/insulting meaning at all. I also don't understand what's the problem with gepatro if you just want to say "parent" as Orthohawk explained.

For me it is a problem that a "mother" is expressed just as a female who is like a "father". Anyhow, because of less than 20 such words I won't throw away a working language, otherwise I would have to be just silent, as no language is perfect.

But gepatro is an impossible form, as ge- means "both sexes", so a gepatro would be some kind of hermaphrodite. Zamenhof, BTW, used ge- only for natural pairs, even gesinjoroj for "ladies and gentlemen" is an innovation.
Why not use gepatrano for "parent", at least this is a kind of group?