it depends if the goal is to get rid of reformists or encourage them to better use their creativity

Depends on the reformist, doesn't it?

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, lots of reform ideas come from well-meaning but ill-informed newbies who respond with "oops, ok" when you tell them that you can't just go changing stuff willy-nilly. We want to tell them what the situation is and then encourage them to make better use of their creativity. Esperanto offers many ways to be creative with your speech, within certain rules.

But some reform ideas come from people who essentially have no intention whatsoever of learning Esperanto as it is. They would rather attempt to strong-arm others into enacting their reform proposals, with various tactics including 'logic' (explaining how their reforms make the language so much easier), vague threats ("I'm not going to learn your language if it doesn't have this feature"), and accusations of closed-mindedness ("It's because you guys refuse to listen to my great ideas that your language doesn't have more speakers")

That second group, I'd honestly be happier if they moved along to another language. I never knew anyone who behaved like that and later became a fluent Esperanto speaker who contributed to the community's development.

The main thing I don't like about the reformist-style threads is that they create an unpleasant atmosphere in the forums. Understandably, many respond and defend Esperanto. But an argument escalates, the reformer is upset, and the Esperantists are upset. Not good all round.

I think the message should start with an acknowledgement of the fact that 'reformers' often have good motives. But the fundamental problem seems to be that many newcomers don't recognize or know about the history/community of Esperanto and its speakers, and so they often don't show the same politeness and respect here as they probably would on any other site for a national language. Hopefully the message could get this point across.

We should stress that the Lernu site is open to everyone, and the people here are all very welcoming and willing to help. Many members here spend a lot of time helping new learners do the courses etc. People feel a sense of affinity to the idea of Esperanto and so they are happy to contribute.

But, it would only seem fair if newcomers show politeness and respect to:

a) The Esperanto language itself in the form that it is used by the community of speakers. And yes, there is indeed a community of speakers. Dramatic over-night changes are thus impossible - nobody can force a whole community to suddenly change the way they use the language. So, Esperanto is not just a theoretical thing, but something that is used in practice. This very fact makes the language more attractive to learn.

b) The creators of this excellent website. Many hours have been spent putting this site together and maintaining it. They made this site to encourage the use of Esperanto, not to offer people a place to moan about it all the time.

c) The users of Lernu, who mostly have a genuine interest in learning Esperanto in its traditional form. They are willing to accept it as it is and they don't generally seek to reform it.

Many Lernu members have put a lot of effort into learning Esperanto - it is important to them. These users should not have to constantly justify themselves and feel obliged to defend the language in these threads started by reform-minded people.

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We're all for free expression etc, but it's also only fair to expect people to respect the aims of the website when they join. There are many places on the web where people can discuss new types of constructed languages. We could include links to all the major sites for this kind of thing, whilst encouraging the reform-minded people to also stick with Lernu to learn about Esperanto.

Miland:
Dear Sir

Thank you for your message suggesting reforms to the Esperanto language.

I should inform you that the fundamentals of the language were fixed at the first World Congress in 1905 and are permanent, for all practical purposes. This commitment to the fundamentals has given the language its stability.

While a gradual evolution does occur with time, any changes have to become accepted by a consensus of the community of users of the language. I am sure that you will understand that beginners are not qualified to propose such changes.

We would encourage all sympathetic enquirers to learn Esperanto, as it really is, and see for themselves that Zamenhof's International Language is an effective solution for the world's language problem.

Yours Sincerely

...

I think the tone is a bit too too cold and formal. It should be possible to make the letter friendly and understanding, but also clear about our position.

Telling the story of the splitting up of Volapük and the Esperantidos would help explain why Esperantists don't want to change the basis of Esperanto expressed in the Fundamento. Anyone that's concerned about Esperanto being stuck in time and unable to adapt can read Claude Piron's article about the evolution of Esperanto which hasn't affected the basic grammar but has actually taken advantage of Esperanto's flexibility.

I've just been wondering about the 'moan bin'. The name itself might upset some people. Mutual respect has to be shown, and so perhaps the use of 'bin' wouldn't be such a good idea!

A more radical idea would be a forum section named 'General discussion on Constructed Languages' - this is a respectful sounding name. Any Esperanto reform-minded people could hang out there, whilst the rest of us get on with the language as it is in the other forum sections.

But of course, you could question why on earth we should host a moan section. And the idea of the discussion area about conlangs could be rather over the top. After all, there are other websites specifically designed for the discussion of constructed languages, and the creation of new ones. Perhaps just links to these places would be better?

This is a site for Esperanto, after all. I'm sure that Slovak site that's being created won't have a section called 'For those who prefer Czech'

erinja:But some reform ideas come from people who essentially have no intention whatsoever of learning Esperanto as it is.

yes, these types are utterly impossible. I have no problems calling the section for these people the 'moan bin'. This is the main type of thing we need to somehow weed out of the forums.

Maybe 'moan bin' is indeed a good idea. We could be pretty relaxed about things, let people open up threads on whatever, just as it is now. But if it becomes obvious that someone's just here to pick a fight with those that like the traditional and widely accepted form of Esperanto, then an administator could freeze it and ask the participants to make their way to the bin to fight it out, if they so please. Of course, I would advise the Esperantists not to follow the troll into the bin, but that's entirely up to them.

I think it would usually be obvious quite soon just whether a particular thread would deserve to go in the bin. Maybe people could vote on it, even?!

On the moan bin, you've expressed many of the doubts I've had for a while about lernu hosting a place where people could complain.

But the fact remains that people come here and complain. I have previously offered links to other online forums, such as Unilang, but if someone really wants to discuss reforming Esperanto, they tend to get more responses here at the lernu forums.

It's really not lernu's responsibility to provide people a place to come and whine but on the other hand, they come and whine uninvited, and if sent off-site, they tend to come back. If they even go off-site in the first place. If someone is engaging them in discussion in our forum, then why would they leave the site? And if they are not actually prohibited from discussing these topics on our site, then why should they leave? I think no one wants to change the terms of service to prohibit these discussions.

Sometimes I wonder whether it wouldn't be best to make an informational page at lernu about why Esperanto isn't open to planned reforms. But I doubt that would really solve things for the forum.

Lernu already has a forum section for discussion about languages. Technically reform discussions would belong there. But of course it is an Esperanto-only forum.

erinja:
But the fact remains that people come here and complain. I have previously offered links to other online forums, such as Unilang, but if someone really wants to discuss reforming Esperanto, they tend to get more responses here at the lernu forums.

Is that because the forums for other conlangs are not very good? I don't really know of any myself.

These moaners need to go and set up their own moaning forum somewhere. Surely they'd have a better time discussing these things amongst like-minded people? Coming here is always going to lead nowhere for them as people here tend to like Esperanto as it is.

But, I suppose they're just happy about the opportunity to argue it out with someone. And as you say, there are always loads of people here willing to join in the fight. But they do this as they really like Esperanto and so it's only natural that they want to defend something that they like. But, people here shouldn't have to be faced with this kind of hassle all the time

erinja:I think no one wants to change the terms of service to prohibit these discussions.

This could really be worth considering, though. This is, after all, a site to learn Esperanto. It's reasonable enough to expect users to respect the aims of the site, as well as its users. If people don't like Esperanto as it is, they don't have to join this site. They can make their own site, form another group of like-minded people. Coming here is never going to work out for them. It just creates a whole load of hassle in the meantime.

erinja:Lernu already has a forum section for discussion about languages. Technically reform discussions would belong there. But of course it is an Esperanto-only forum.

If people moan about Esperanto in Esperanto, then at least they've made a genuine effort to understand it. I can bear that much more than these people that clearly don't have a clue, which tends to be the case when they make their comments in English or any other national language.

I have previously sent people to Unilang when they insisted on talking endlessly about languages other than Esperanto in the English forum.

Unilang has a forum about Esperanto and while I don't read it, I've visited it once or twice and it seems that someone's reform proposal might be more welcome there than here (I have observed certain users there using decidedly non-standard Esperanto). However their forums are not nearly so lively as ours, so a would-be reformist may rapidly become frustrated at the lack of responses to their great ideas, and return here.

There is an active Conlang listserv which I understand to be not too friendly towards Esperanto. That seems perfect for the reformists. However, most people would rather read a forum than receive messages through a listserv, I think. I know that personally I am well past the point of listservs, though I participated in them actively more than 10 years ago. Nowadays I get enough regular e-mail that I have to deal with that I do not want any more mail filling up my inbox.