In Search of the Sons of Barnum

I discovered an interesting email in my inbox following the disclosure of The Esperanto League story reported in yesterday’s liquid soap. The email was from a Mr George Roper from New York who seemed to write in riddles, so much so, that at first I thought it was a hoax email. However, he wrote again later in the day, informing me that he had worked as a publicist many years ago, but would not disclose which PR agency in New York he had worked for. He claimed that his company had been approached to work on what was described as a “sensitive” account.

Roper went on to intimate (he was rather ambiguous as he said he was afraid he may be caught passing on such informaton to a third party)that the Esperanto League was in fact part of a greater and more sinister organisation which involved white supramacist groups all over the world.

From Roper’s email he seemed to be suggesting that Zamenhof’s original intention of creating an easy to learn language to foster international understanding, was being totally ignored. Instead Esperanto was being used as an alternative purely “white language” by white supremacist groups all over the world. Hundreds of thousands of members of these groups had now learnt and adopted the language.

Those original followers of Esperanto who wanted to see the language officially adopted were commonly known as Finvenkistoj, from fina venko meaning “final victory”. The white supremacist organisations saw this as a sign that they should adopt the language for their own use.

Intrigued, I asked Roper for more information via a return email. I heard nothing. Then an hour or so later an email came through from Belle Vue hospital in NY from a psychiatrist.

George Roper had been a patient there for over 15 years. The work he had been forced to do on The Esperanto League had driven him to a life of seclusion and finally self harming. He never practised PR again, and would reside in Belle Vue for the rest of his days.