Chris, this interview is the only example that I am aware of where he is speaking naturally in one of his languages. I am sure he is capable in the others as well but lot of people would like to see evidence.
I also saw a video of him speaking German and I thought he did well. The rest of the videos are of him reading and we do not see him interacting with other people, or even with the video camera. I am sure that he is fluent in the other languages, it is just that there are no examples.
To Benny this kind of act is just for “showing off”, according to his latest post dated 29 April 2011. He even labelled it as “monkey dance” and he hated it.
“Demonstrating to the world how great you are by speaking a bunch of languages is the ultimate ego-inflation. It’s the best party trick ever; being multilingual can be as good as being a dancing monkey in terms of getting attention; at least to the person who thinks it will work.” - Benny
I am not sure if this “monkey dance” thing includes people posting up videos on the web speaking multiple languages, like someone called the “Irish Polyglot”.
(Benny, you seem to be offended when I create a new thread discussing your blog posts. This time I am re-using the thread you created. I know you are going to accuse me of taking things out of context, but I realize that copying your whole post here will be a waste of elections. Like you said, all the answers are in your blog)
Benny does not like to make videos speaking his languages, and to judge by your quote here, Edwin, he does not like looking at them either. His privilege. Of course he expresses himself in typical Bennyesque bluster but that is also his privilege.
But for a look at some of the “online ego-inflated, party trickster, multilingual dancing monkeys, tying to get attention”, check out this link.
Moses, appears to have been left out, and certainly Susana Zaraysky and Robert (Ilovelanguages) of our community, are outstanding and should be on the list. There are many others. I enjoy them. When I see a person speaking one or more foreign language well, I am inspired.
More out of context quoting there Edwin. You of course didn’t need to quote the entire article as I said:
“I find it mind boggling when I look online in forums, and on some websites when I see how some polyglots treat one another, both towards me and towards others I’ve personally talked to and know are genuine.”
You are somewhat right to use the “dancing monkey” in this different context though. While Steve mistakenly says “Benny does not like to make videos speaking his languages” (seriously?? You know I have over a hundred of them on Youtube right? Such a claim is VERY misleading) The truth is that I want to make relevant videos that I’m interested in. I would be nothing more than LingQ’s dancing monkey if I gave into demands to make a video for the sole purpose of proving myself to this community, that has given me nothing but grief. You’ll see videos of me in all my languages with time as I find interesting things to interview people about.
I will make videos in all my languages for a purpose and to show off to LingQ is NOT that purpose. I love speaking in other languages TO NATIVES to share something interesting with them. I hate speaking other languages to English speakers who aggressively call me a fake. When many people see polyglot videos, they’ll get “inspired”, but also feel like they are watching a genius performing something out of reach. I prefer to focus on convincing them that THEY can be inspirational rather than put myself on a pedestal.
Almost every reply I make in this forum is to defend myself and correct misquotes and allogations instead of discussing something interesting. I do believe I will have to give up again and just let you all continue to quote me out of context, make claims about my motivations that are far from true and never mention particular things I say as positive. The interview with Steve will go ahead as planned, but why should I come back to comment here to do nothing but defend myself?
This “community” has done an excellent job of making me feel totally unwelcome once again. The echo chamber can continue without my correcting its many falsities once more.
@Tony & @Chris & @James But thanks to some of you for at least offering the other side of this argument. Much appreciated!
Benny said: “Almost every reply I make in this forum is to defend myself and correct misquotes and allogations instead of discussing something interesting.”
C’mon Benny, it’s your choice alone which post to reply to and which not. I have been very polite all along here, I have posted a follow up comment for you on the “Feelers” thread, you didn’t come back. Our friend Robert from Ilovelanguages posted interesting comments relevant to our discussion and we have had a new post on comprehension (“Friedemann’s questions”) but you chose to post here instead. Why don’t you just ignore some of the posts here and instead add to the many good and interesting discussions here? I do the same. I am not loved by everyone here either, right Dooo?
I really like to have you sticking around here and hear your opinions on language learning!
I agree with Friedemann. Your presence here is appreciated by at least some of us, like myself, so please don’t feel shunted or pushed away based on the (admittedly quite numerous) threads about you. Your comments and thoughts on the topics Friedemann mentioned would be most interesting! It would be nice to have you at least as a semi-regular contributor here.
Also, Friedemann, I don’t think anyone here dislikes you…at least I can’t imagine why. I do recall a brief dustup in the past between you and “Meathead Jones”, who I think is JayB on the forums here (correct me if I’m wrong), but that’s all in the past now, so…
I am not sure Steve or Dooo would want to marry me, but yes, we get along mostly, after all we keep coming back.
OK Friedemann. I’ve replied to your recent thread.
The problem is that I come back after one year of not contributing to LingQ and what do I see? Several threads devoted to speaking about me negatively. If I was active in here, but ignored the vast amount of challenges, misquotes, snake-oil salesman accusations etc. I’d be ignoring what feels to me like a major part of this forum. I mean, look at how many threads say “Benny” in the title! (Ignoring how many bring up snide remarks about me if you simply search for Benny within other discussions). I’ve only started one of the “Benny” threads. It’s incredible how much energy is devoted to discussing something you clearly don’t like. This mentality makes me feel like I couldn’t resonate well with LingQ in the long term. I’m as good as the anti-Christ to many people here.
Replace my name with yours, read several threads here about grabbing me by the throat, how I’m bleeding people’s money out of them with false promises, how something that 30 people worked on that I’m very proud of is constantly claimed as worthless and overpriced by people who haven’t even bought it, and perhaps you’ll understand why I find this forum as a source of nothing but stress, not “interesting discussions”.
My time online talking about languages is better used focusing on encouraging others to do the same. Constantly arguing with LingQers doesn’t seem worthwhile to me. Most of you disagree with me too fundamentally and I’m not interested in changing that if what you do works well for you.
@Benny
People who come to your blog and have some interest in learning languages - what do they see (first): “Fluent in 3 months”.
They will of course not read your FAQ where you explain that this is only your private “goal” or “length of your stay” or something.
They think they can really achieve fluency by reading and following your tips on your site and in your ebook.
People (here and elsewhere) are devoting so much energy in “Anti-Benny” threads, because your blog has this VERY provocative title!
You give people a sense of language acquisition easiness that simply does not exist. Language learning is quite hard work, 10,000 words plus collocations are not easily to tackle. Not in 3 months. For most people even not in a much longer time period.
Another point is that you don’t give much evidence about your language abilities. I would like to see a video where you converse with a German for 10 minutes in German. Such a video does not exist, although you learned German for so long at school and did the C2 exam. Why?
(Sorry for my English.)
I’ve said this in another recent post, but I’ll say it again here:
I don’t want anyone to have the impression that I hate Benny, or wish him any ill - that’s absolutely NOT the case. I don’t think that he’s the “Anti-Christ”! I don’t have any personal “evil feelings” about him, etc.
I agree that it’d be interesting if he continued posting here. (But if he does, in my opinion he should stop banning Steve, Friedemann, et al from posting at his blog…)
I think we have to concede that many people find these forum fights very exciting and that they create a lot of attention and a lot of these Benny threads over the last year were probably unnecessary. People like to watch car wrecks and street fights, sadly enough…
I am banned on Benny’s blog, too. Why? I don’t know. I have nothing against Benny personally, in fact I am very grateful that he refunded me without any ado after I used his money-back-guarantee for his ebook that I didn’t find very useful for me.
Hi Hape! I was confused about your refund request as you had written an interesting review about it on your site (now deleted), and even requested to become an affiliate to advertise it on your site! But when requested, I of course stuck to the guarantee.
I don’t remember ever blocking you. I just checked and your last comment was very pleasant. If any of your comments aren’t coming through please email me and I’ll look into what the problem is.
Some folks like to watch car crashes, it’s true! But I seem to remember there was a Canadian film some years back (I think it was called “Crash”) which explored the concept that it could be even more fun to be IN the car crash…! 
As for Benny, I’ve decided that I’m going to back off and give him a break. (I still don’t agree with him.)
Thank you Jay, it’s most appreciated.
Friedemann, as you can see I contributed to the discussion on your thread. I believe I expressed my view clearly and maturely and an interesting discussion was taking place. But such a thing is unacceptable in LingQ forums, so Edwin had to “alert” Steve to flick through one of my posts very quickly 
Of course, this involved ignoring everything I said in the thread that actually was relevant to the discussion.
Once again it’s turned into a circus. I simply can’t even contribute to a discussion without a thread spiralling out of control. This is why I offer again that I just give up entirely on commenting in LingQ.
At least that will mean that Benny threads will drop back down to their normal apparent level of 20% of LingQ activity, instead of dominating almost the entire forum whenever I contribute actively. I’m sure a lot of people will appreciate being able to discuss things OTHER than me…
"This is why I offer again that I just give up entirely on commenting in LingQ. "
Run along, Benny.