In an amazing coincidence, many of the suggestions you get will be the suggester's current favorite language. Many of these recommendations will be esoteric or unpopular languages. These people will say you should learn language X first because of the various features language X. They'll forget that they did not learn language X first, and while language X is powerful, it might not be easy to set up a development environment. Tutorials might be lacking. Newbie support might be lacking. Etc.

Others have said this but you can't hear it enough: It is not mandatory to learn computer programming. If you force yourself, you probably won't enjoy it.

So, what language should you learn first? Well the answer is... (drumroll) it depends! Mostly, it depends on what you are trying to do. (Side note: You can get a lot of help on mailing lists or IRC if you say, "I'm trying to do X." instead of, "I'm having a problem getting feature blah blah blah to work.")

I have no particular goal in mind that demands a practical orientation. My aim is to acquire general knowledge of computer programming to be used as starting point that I can build upon.

I paused after reading this. The main way people learn to program is by writing programs and getting feedback from peers/mentors. If you're not coding something you find interesting, it's hard to stay motivated for long enough to learn the language.

My advice is to learn a language that a lot of people learn as a first language. You'll be able to take advantage of tutorials and support geared toward newbies. You can always learn "cooler" languages later, but if you start with something advanced you might give up in frustration. Common first languages in CS programs are Java and C++, but Python is catching on pretty quickly. It also helps if your first language is used by people you already know. That way they'll be able to mentor/advise you.

Finally, I should give some of my background. I've been writing code for a while. I write code for work and leisure. My first language was QBasic. I moved on to C, C++, TI-BASIC, Perl, PHP, Java, C#, Ruby, and some others. I've played with but don't really know Lisp, Lua, and Haskell. My favorite language right now is Python, but I'm probably still in the honeymoon phase since I've been using it for less than a year.

Argh, see what I said at the start? I recommended Python and my favorite language is currently Python!