Although televised political advertisements are not allowed in France, each city hall is required to provide space — usually consisting of self-supporting, interlocking metal panels — for parties to present their campaign posters. And last week, the metal panels went up all around town with the latest offerings for the EU Parliament elections coming up on June 7. Outside of the poster for the Parti Anti Sioniste — which looks like a concert poster for an X Clan-Matisyahu-Black Flag triple bill — I hadn’t really paid much attention to them.
But passing by the row of them on the way to the park yesterday, I noticed one that actually made me stop and take a second look: Europe Démocratie Espéranto. And yes, their political platform really does essentially consist of adopting Esperanto as the EU’s official language. If you’re like me, you immediately thought to yourself, The EU already has adopted Esperanto as its official language, they just call it English. Well, the EDE’s got a plank addressing that, too, whereby it encourages the teaching of a wider diversity of European languages in school:
So, to sum up: Esperanto good, English bad and Europe Démocratie Espéranto unlikely to make major inroads in Strasbourg.