patrik: Yet, it feels strange, that while we welcome communists and anarchists, we are not that open towards fascists. Maybe because fascists almost drove us to extinction in the past...

You think fascists were the only ones?? Ask the Orthodox Church hierarchy that survived Albania's communist period about that.............oh, wait; you can't because there were only 3 very old priests left and they've died since the fall of the iron curtain. but maybe if you hurry you can still talk to Orthodox Russians and Romanians and Serbs that survived the communist yoke before they all die off too.

orthohawk:

patrik: Yet, it feels strange, that while we welcome communists and anarchists, we are not that open towards fascists. Maybe because fascists almost drove us to extinction in the past...

You think fascists were the only ones?? Ask the Orthodox Church hierarchy that survived Albania's communist period about that.............oh, wait; you can't because there were only 3 very old priests left and they've died since the fall of the iron curtain. but maybe if you hurry you can still talk to Orthodox Russians and Romanians and Serbs that survived the communist yoke before they all die off too.

I might be misunderstanding the tone by no need to bite the boy's head off . I believe that there is confusion here - the myriads of commies today are not necessarily the same as the authoritarian bunch who persist in North Korea, and decimated many countries due to ultra-nationalism, which is not a trait belonging to Communism but rather the entire authoritarian scale.

Ultimately, fascism is actually the extremist form of what most western governments are, while communism has a greater spectrum, ranging from authoritarianism with strong socialism, to weaker socialism with aspirations for a stronger central govt. Of course, due to fascism being much strongly represented by a small amount of highly dangerous governments, no one calls the conservative side of the authoritarian spectrum Fascist as a whole, rather it is divided up into what's regarded as good ol' Western government, and a continuum leading to Fascism.

Anarchists are special - they are also somewhat more less dangerous, wanting freedom and not so much authority - and can range from socialist liberalists (utopianists?) to conservative liberalists (tribalists?).

I recommend looking at the Political Compass which possesses a somewhat better 2 dimensional political scale instead of the old 1 dimensional commy-nazi scale, and has the authoritarian right and left and the libertarian right and left. The moderate west is towards the bottom left of the authoritarian right (conservatism?), and Gandhi and Mandela and co. are in the libertarian left (utopian socialism?).

So, in essence, it's more the extremists who are generally not felt nicely to; and every group has an extremist equivalent.

@orthohawk: Whoa, whoa, calm down! It's only that Ms. Clare mentioned a fascist Esperantist, so I said so. I have nothing to do with fascism at all, nor do I feel any sympathy towards them in regards to their ideology. Nor did I ever insisted that ONLY fascists did wrong towards Esperantists or any other minority in the past...OK, I have to be extra careful from now on whenever I'm saying things, because I want to prevent misunderstandings like this (or as we say in our language, "I don't want to get myself electrocuted."). I'm sorry for my recklessness.

@Jan: Well, okie, mi tute komprenas vian respondon. Almenaŭ, tio klarigas aferojn al mi. [I totally understand your response. At least, that cleared things up for me.]

@ceigered: Yeah, that question (on tolerance) is a philosophical one, and it involves intense emotions sometimes. But at least, we need to be objective...

patrik:@orthohawk: Whoa, whoa, calm down! It's only that Ms. Clare mentioned a fascist Esperantist, so I said so. I have nothing to do with fascism at all, nor do I feel any sympathy towards them in regards to their ideology. Nor did I ever insisted that ONLY fascists did wrong towards Esperantists or any other minority in the past

Sorry for the, er, reactionary reacion but it sounded for a minute like you were all "the communits and anarchists are all nice and wonderful but look at what those nasty fascists did!" What with the sometimes extreme "leftism" I've noted in the Esperanto community, I didn't feel right letting (even an implied/inferred) "letting off" of one of the worst ideologies to come along in history. And FWIW, "Communism" thanks to 70 years of totalitarianism is now seen by most (if not all) as Marxism-Leninism type totalitariansm, regardless of what the "original meaning" of the term was. Technically christian monasticism is the perfect communistic society, if you think about it

My view of political discussions on Lernu!: generally best left alone.

Most forums on the internet are "international" in the sense that you can visit them from anywhere*, and, if you speak English, can even participate in them. Truth be told, most forums I visit - and I have visited a lot of forums in my day - are solidly in English, and most of the people I meet on them are Americans, Canadians, Irish, English, Australians, etc.

Prior to coming to Lernu!, I had literally never met someone from Russia online. Or from anywhere in Eastern Europe. Or from Turkey. Or Taiwan. Or... They may have been reading the same forums I was visiting, but very close to none of them were participating.

Lernu! isn't diverse like the average internet forum; it goes waaaay beyond that. This is one of the only forums I have come across that I consider of a truly global nature. Certainly there are others as diverse, but I think overall they are relatively few in number.

So, with that diverse a crowd, political discussions can spiral out of hand in an instant. And they can get really out of hand. People tend to feel strongly about politics, which means it's easy to get nasty with people who don't agree with your own quite reasonable and correct views, and who instead are spouting that discredited (though still dangerous) nonsense that you know for a fact couldn't be more wrong. And it's tempting to want to correct them.

There are people of every conceivable stripe here. In the interest of keeping the peace, I really think political discussions should be kept essentially nonexistent. People are here to learn Esperanto, and that should be the primary focus. Anything that distracts appreciably from that focus (detailing the evils of communism, or the wholesome goodness of socialism, or why anarchism is really the best solution to every problem, or..., for example) probably ought to be reined in a bit.

I'd put religious discussions in the same category.

I'm not saying that any of the above is how anyone MUST act, or even SHOULD act (that would be a bit presumptuous on my part). But, you know... do we want harmony here, or do we want to be right? Being right is nice, sure, but harmony has quite a lot going for it, too.

My two low denomination coins; currency unspecified.

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* Some countries do manage what their population can (and cannot) access. So "anywhere" may not include those countries.

RiotNrrd:* Some countries do manage what their population can (and cannot) access. So "anywhere" may not include those countries.

That said, in the interest in helping people learn Esperanto, we should probably be a bit careful with our words for those where the govt prevents them from accessing material deemed disruptive (sometimes accidentally).

I think politics is fine as long as we keep neutral, as orthohawk said, monastic christianity is akin to proper communism in a way. The biggest problem is that, as the Australian TV show "Hey Hey it's Saturday" demonstrated, despite coming from the same base culture, as an international English community we're now very diverse and certain things have different effects on different communities (in the Hey Hey example, blackfaces is horrifying to Americans, and US media treated Australia like we hadn't heard of civil rights; conversely, Australians were annoyed by the US treatment of them as if they were a US state with the same historical references (adding fuel to the fire, it didn't seem known by the US media that the people doing the skit weren't actually whites, and it didn't probably still doesn't seem known by Australia why the US thought the tribute skit was racist)). As we can see there, it doesn't take much to misunderstand when we expect our own cultural standards on others.

So perhaps we should better explain our view points particularly to people from other countries, since I can sort of see a bit of US vs World thing going on, where the US people have certain cultural references, where as the rest don't quite understand despite speaking the language; or at least that's a bit how I feel.

Oh, well, I diverged from my original topic, so it's best not to talk politics here.

Well, I've never been in a Esperanto congress yet, so I have no idea what really happens during such occasions. I do see some videos in Youtube, but it's not sufficient for me in order to have an informed opinion of it. I've read a few articles about the congresses, and almost all of them are overwhelmingly positive, despite some problems (most especially about sex).

So, for those who had attended congresses or "renkontiĝoj" already, what is it like? I'm a bit clueless.

patrik:So, for those who had attended congresses or "renkontiĝoj" already, what is it like? I'm a bit clueless.

They provide an opportunity to experience an Esperanto-speaking environment. A Universala Kongreso has antaŭkongresoj and postkongresoj which are like package holidays conducted in Esperanto. It's a chance to meet Esperantists from all over the world and so experience an unique Esperanto environment. A national congress however is still well worth attending, and of course a lot cheaper.

Miland:

patrik:So, for those who had attended congresses or "renkontiĝoj" already, what is it like? I'm a bit clueless.

They provide an oppportunity to experience an Esperanto-speaking environment. A Universala Kongreso has antaŭkongresoj and postkongresoj which are like package holidays conducted in Esperanto. It's a chance to meet Esperantists from all over the world and so experience an unique Esperanto environment. A national congress however is still well worth attending, and of course a lot cheaper.

Feeling isolated is definitely an issue for me. I joined Lernu nine months ago, when I fell for the lies of the Esperanto propagandists; e.g. 16 easy language rules, oh wait, several hundred pages of PMEG too? What else are they lying about? Now that I'm addicted, I have yet to meet a real, live samideano in-the-flesh; a fleshperantist.

Lernu indicates that the closest active fleshperantists live about 120 kilometers from me, but all have virtually (e.g. via Email) expressed their disinterest in meeting face-to-face. Are cyberbots possibly generating all of these messages in my email and in the forums? I still have absolutely no firsthand evidence that fleshperantists really exist.

To find out for myself, I intend to visit the national congress in 2011 to both antaŭ- and post-kongresari (many thanks for this hidden gem of Esperantujo above) with some fleshperantists, where I intend to do some socially relevant and internationally important drinking. Hopefully, fleshperantists really exist so I won't be drinking by myself. If this trip leads to a second addiction, well … you'll have to listen to the Radio Verda podcast (RV161 2010.03.14) titled “Is Alcohol Better Than Esperanto”.

biguglydave:16 easy language rules, oh wait, several hundred pages of PMEG too?

I'm wondering where exactly lernu! says so?

Pri la Fundamento

That chapter contains the famous 16 rules. It is a common misconception that Esperanto has only 16 rules. In fact, the number of rules is far greater; indeed the "Fundamenta Gramatiko" itself contains 17 rules, as it begins with an unnumbered explanation of the alphabet. Further, more rules can be found in the Ekzercaro section, both as direct instructions and by means of examples. Some parts of the Fundamenta Gramatiko can only be properly understood if one compares them with the practical usage in the Ekzercaro.