Well, I've been an Esperantist for more than 3 years. I enjoyed reading, chatting, singing and speaking in it, and I am very happy to have Esperantist-friends (looking forward to meet them soon). But I want to speak about the negative side of the whole experience, because these somewhat made me a bit sober of the whole idea of an international auxiliary language.

First, the negative propaganda. While it is true that Esperantists do exaggerate the facts or propagate myths, most of the negative propaganda are based from whole lies and sheer ignorance. Also, reading the kabeuloj are such a pain. Despite the much visible resentment, bitterness and frustration in their posts, I can see their point. Some Esperantists are not that friendly and tolerant. Even I admit that I have some moments of being dogmatic about E-o. And yes, let's stop talking more about E-o and let's do something more creative in E-o. [Well, we cannot really just stop talking, let's just then walk the talk. ]

Second, promoting the language itself. I tried to convince my friends, but I miserably failed. One of them called Esperanto a "cult". Grrr. Being alone is so unbearable, that when a Japanese Esperantist wanted to meet me, I went to our meeting place by just walking in order to meet another Esperantist for the first time (the place is quite far and I didn't had the money even for commuting). -_-

Well, out of those experiences, I had my conclusions:
[LISTO]
Esperanto is for people who hold unto a ideal, as expressed by its leaders and the history of the movement itself. In other words, it's for the idealist, like I am.
The "Fina Venko" is impossible from the grassroots level.
Esperantists should not aim, in my opinion, to replace English for the IAL role. Rather, English and E-o should coexist. English are for those who love the status quo, and Esperanto are for those who seek an "alternative world" at work.
Esperanto fulfills the Goldilocks Principle: it is "good enough". Not "perfect", but "good enough", it works. Those, who seek perfection ("perfect neutrality, perfect vocabulary, perfect learn-ability, and the blah blah blah..."), would only end up as bitter kabeontoj.
Humanitarian work is congruent with Esperantism. It's worth doing, right?
For the Esperanto movement to become self-sufficient, an Esperanto "economy" is necessary. The problem, however, is "how?".
And lastly, Esperanto cannot survive without friendship. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said that the Esperantists are among the first ones to be sent to the Gulag because they had friends. Esperantists seeks out other Esperantists, says Esther Schor. This is what makes us a "community". This is what is behind our "unity".[/list]Well, maybe I have gone too sentimental. I'm sorry, if that's the case. You can disagree but that's all I wanted to say. Thanks.

Your points are all very good, patrik, and I agree with almost everything in your post.

I am sorry about your negative experience but I am not surprised. I avoid talking about Esperanto to people who don't know about it because I have received many negative reactions, even if I am only saying something very basic (what it is, and why it exists, and the fact that I speak it). I was often mocked for it when I was in school, and as an adult, in the workplace, I have found the same thing. I have found that if I mention it to someone, the first reaction is usually "That's cool/interesting", but they often make jokes about it, and I don't really find it funny. Actually I find it insulting and annoying. It is a language, not a joke.

The fact is that I have to be very careful when talking about my life to avoid mentioning Esperanto. It becomes uncomfortable because people will ask how I met someone, and the choice are either to lie, or to give a modified version of the truth, or to mention Esperanto and expose myself to constant jokes. I am really sick of hearing the jokes and I don't like to lie so in some cases I just make up something stupid, "We belong to the same club" or something.

This is all in spite of the fact that I am always careful not to try to "convert" anyone or get them to learn, and I mainly talk about the tangible benefits that I have personally had from learning (many friends, staying with people in foreign countries, etc)

1st things first: kabe-? Kion signifas tiu radiko?

Nice post Patrik - I agree that Esperanto is made to be the best thing ever, and the disillusionment period straight after is something that sort of undoes a lot of the boasting for Esperanto previously. It's a great lil' language, regardless of that chaotic and somewhat overrepresented aspect of Esperantist culture.

Regarding claims Esperanto is a cult, I think some of this may lay in the -ist ending, which sounds a bit like the ist in Scientologist (my Mac's spellcheck refuses to believe that's a word ), and I believe some disinformation may have been accidentally propogated by the calling of Zamenhoff a "oculist" (oculist vs. occultist - what's the illiterate and sensational internet community meant to see at first? ).

Regarding EO+EN, there were ads above for that not long ago, the EO+EN=IAL or something lot. Compromise seems like a brilliant idea. Unfortunately though, I suspect that Esperanto won't be able to gain enough traction vs. natural languages or revived language movements (sure, Modern Indo European isn't attractive at the moment, but time is endless, who knows what traction a revived "common" European language could muster.)

Esperanto has and will continue to serve its purpose though and live up to its debatably more proper name, Lingvo Internacia, for as long as it's used for communication, or not even that - essentially, as long as it or its ideas unite us and help us get over langauge barriers, it's doing its job. While being kicked while down by English/Chinese/(Hu)Manish/Earthish might be sad, I like to look at it from the view point that the core ideas (the soul of EO) are more valuable that the language itself (the body of EO).

Yay for friendship!
The planning of languages is an interesting scene

@Erinja: What kind of joke?

For me too the people generally doesn't really react well, but until know I didn't have any conversation that made me feel that upset. Maybe it's different in the U.S. :? (I guess that some American citizens, esperanto=communism)

The fact is that one have to explain the whole thing to make people understand the point, that it's not a fanatic thing, but can have utility (making friends from all other the world, etc).

And Erinja, if people around you doesn't accept what you are doing during your free time, It's better to ignore them, I guess.

,

ceigered: I believe some disinformation may have been accidentally propogated by the calling of Zamenhoff a "oculist" (oculist vs. occultist - what's the illiterate and sensational internet community meant to see at first? ).

I always thought of myself as being fairly well acquainted with the medical profession till I came across 'oculist' for the first time in a biography of Zamenhof and had to look it up. Can't we just drop the term and use the more familiar 'ophthalmologist'? Why stick with obsolete terms?

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/oculist

I don't really think of myself as an esperantist, just someone who, by experience, knows that this language actually does work, and is content with that. I have had to go very low profile on my support for esperanto in the last ten years, because my support for other minority causes was getting me labeled as a crank. I think we can keep spreading the message, though, by 'littering' our unwanted esperanto literature on buses, trains and doctors'/dentists'/ophthalmologists' surgeries, while preserving anonymity.

jan aleksan:@Erinja: What kind of joke?

Normally just a comment meant to be funny, but not funny at all.

Like, if someone wrote a report that is hard to read, someone might say,"Maybe it was written in Esperanto!"

Or "Let Erin do [whatever task], she speaks Esperanto!"

Or some kind of snide comment, "A [name of something], eh? How do you say that in Esperanto, I wonder?"

I try to ignore it.

It's meant to be funny but it isn't.

I really enjoyed reading this post. I've had similar responses as well. My mom is pretty indifferent about Esperanto, and my dad thinks that it's a huge waste of my time. It can be frustrating at times. I don't tell many of my friends because they would react similarly.

However, I don't think you have to be an idealist to want to learn Esperanto. I'm very cynical and realistic, but I still love to learn the language. My motivation for learning it isn't fueled by the hope of it one day becoming the "international language", but rather by my love of languages and meeting people from different cultures.

What's Esperanto for you?

I am Japanese and I belong to Esperanto -
Societo de Kawasaki(ESKa).

I've heared that the Esperanto is like a "jewel".

If you don't have it, it's OK.

But if you have it, it will glow with happiness(makes your heart rich).

Thanks for all the responses~! It's always a good feeling when people agree with my thoughts.

@Erinja: Well, being mocked at seems to be a common experience to Esperantists. But I think it is good. It humbles us (just as ceigered mentioned), and it leads us to this feeling of empathy toward the marginalized and the minority groups. I do feel sometimes that becoming an Esperantist is like being a Jew, the closest thing to converting into Judaism. I've mentioned Esther Schor, and I agree with her observations in this article: Crocodiling in Esperanto in the Streets of Hanoi

@ceigered: "kabei" means "to suddenly leave the Esperanto movement, having been active within it". It came from the nickname of Kazimierz Bein.

Well, if you're referring to Hokan Lundberg's idea, I don't mean that. I see the Esperanto movement as a "parallel alternative world order" (NOT in the sense of being a secret group planning a conspiracy). It's like living an alternative culture, well, like a sort of escape from the cruel real world. Let English (or Interlingua!) handle the mess! Most people are willing to live in such an unfair world, like those people inside the Matrix. In fact, I think that the EU should rather pick Interlingua as its official language because they fit. I'd rather see Esperanto in the margins than seeing it becoming some soulless tool being used for political purposes. See my point?

@jan aleksan: I wonder, how do atheist Esperanto-speakers feel when they are accused of being part of a "cult"? That would have been bad.

@Akwino: I do think that we have to make our "presence" [or even "existence"] felt. The fact is that the Esperanto movement cannot sustain itself without active propaganda. Despite existing for 133 years, we still promote our cause by such basic means. The biggest setback for us were the rise of both Hitler and Stalin (which lead to near-extinction of the Esperantist movement), and the Cold War (which facilitated somehow the rise of English); and we are still "licking our own wounds".

I think that in order to become self-sustaining, we have to reach a "critical mass" of active Esperantists, whose actions would surely grab the world's attention. These Esperantists would conduct their business in Esperanto and be more active in doing humanitarian work, like relief operations, helping indigenous groups, peacekeeping, and lots of community work. We were on our way of reaching that, and then, the war came and washed away most of that.

@jswell94: Long time no see! Thank you for enjoying the thread! It's indeed frustrating, but it could be rewarding as well. Attending a congress can certainly give you a morale boost and lots of opportunities, as well. Just keep up the good work and seek the friendly Esperantists!

erinja:

jan aleksan:@Erinja: What kind of joke?

Normally just a comment meant to be funny, but not funny at all.

Like, if someone wrote a report that is hard to read, someone might say,"Maybe it was written in Esperanto!"

Or "Let Erin do [whatever task], she speaks Esperanto!"

Or some kind of snide comment, "A [name of something], eh? How do you say that in Esperanto, I wonder?"

I try to ignore it.

It's meant to be funny but it isn't.

Perhaps a cultural difference, because I know we Australians find many things funny that Americans would be mortified about and vice-versa(and we have different versions of pride (e.g. "Australians are way more humble than the rest of the world" - that is, until someone actually SAYS something like that!) ), but for the first comment I'd play along and say something like "I dunno, this makes more sense than Esperanto" (followed by a mock translation), and the second I'd just go "Damn right I do, and I can even do flips on the trampoline too!".

And the last I'd just insult them "A banana, eh? How do you say that in EO?" "I do believe it's something along the lines of "joranaso"". (clearly I don't mean "Ace of the skid club" )

Perhaps though they're the kind of co-workers who don't pay out humorously but out of sheer bitterness, in which case gotta love that lot.