Ethiopian Society Is an Exceptional Complex And Ethical Society

Ethiopian Society Is an Exceptional Complex And Ethical Society

By Getachew Reda
San Jose, California
A reply to Ugandan journalist Timothy Kalyegira’s ‘The Diaspora Predicament’*
July 2, 2003

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Dear Mr. Kalyegira:

I read your commentary about Ethiopia, some two years back. I did respond twice to your comment via your email and you admitted you were convinced, to some of my arguments at the time. This time again, you came up with such ridiculous view about Ethiopians in the Diaspora. Therefore, Sir, this time again, I will try one more time to redirect your unfounded and unfair and destructive view about us in the Diaspora and in general about Ethiopians.

I will directly go to my view without quoting into your long comments for not taking reader’s time into consideration.

Dear Timothy:

You seem you doubt and seem to even undermine the Ethiopian history, the history that made your country Uganda and other African country proud. It may not be gentle for me if I am going into detail about Uganda looking for its ugly side in response to your vehement attack. It just simply doesn’t justify attacking entire population of Uganda because you one individual Ugandan citizen attacked my country Ethiopia and its people nonstop for your personal mission.

No doubt, you found it hard to understand the complexity of these highly ethical Ethiopians in your eye and for a reason you chose to destroy the image of Ethiopian society in a anyway you can to the outside readers. It is a bitter pill for you to admit how Ethiopians mange to survive as a country against all odds for thousands and thousands of years. It is bitter and it is true; you or no one will detour the continuation of the country to survive as a viable state, regardless of your defamation against its people.

“Ethiopians in the Diaspora are truly a people who belong to a very advanced and civil society. Ethiopians are not as you defined them in your untrustworthy words.

It is for their credit that against all odds, even living in a very hostile and racist societies, that they are able to maintain their “identity”, culture and social organizations where other groups with a lot more economic power are scrambling to be melted down in the hopelessly amorphous “American” social melee and or chauvinistic European society.”

One of the Ethiopian scholars, Ato Tecola W. Hagos, author of Democratization in Ethiopia (1991-1994) Harvard (Cambridge).

Ethiopians in the Diaspora are not as you describe them and defamed them. ‘’Ethiopians know who they are, they do not have to jump through hoops for the sake of recognition by the racist American and European society or anybody else.

A great number of Ethiopians are not as you tried to tar their image unfairly.
Immigrant Ethiopians have political organizations, their own churches (one of the original and older Churches of the world), their own mosque and sport clubs throughout the United States, Canada and Europe, with members representing a majority of Ethiopians in these countries.

A large number of Ethiopian families send their children to the Ethiopian Orthodox church to be instructed in their faith, their language and their alphabet.”

The prominent Ethiopian professor Tecola W.Hagos continues saying “ One can hardly say the same about other recent immigrant groups with similar disadvantage who tried to preserve their culture, religion and language without much help from outside sources.

By any social measurement, the civic- mildness and degree of collective effort of Ethiopians is extremely impressive, and is an affirmation of the determination of a people born out of an ancient and literate civilization and centuries of organized social life. After all Ethiopian civilization is truly independent of the West, or didn’t grow grafting itself onto some Western culture or colonial power. It is an African original!

Mr. Timothy:-

For Ethiopians, living with us in the US or elsewhere in the world outside of Ethiopia are not as you tried to misinform readers on your paper. The following is the true nature of Ethiopians.

“For Ethiopian living in the Us or elsewhere in the world outside of Ethiopia has always been a step down. You will never come across an Ethiopian who has taken up residence in a foreign country, who doesn’t hope to go back to Ethiopia at some later date. In recent times, in spite of the grinding poverty, brutal dictatorial regimes and the abuse of staff members of international organizations and NGOs, Ethiopians have remained, in general, a gentle, proud and courageous people.

Any other society faced with the same degree of adversity as that faced by Ethiopians, would have collapsed a long time ago”.

Though this time on your new defamation to the Ethiopians didn’t mention about the Ethiopian gesture, I might as well add to remind you and readers back to what you wrote about the gesture of Ethiopians, that you devalued on your paper two years ago.

“ The humble posturing of Ethiopians is very misleading. Underneath that submissive behavior lays a spirit of individuality and the love of freedom, which will rise, to the surface in a situation where the inner self is challenged. This is one of the reasons why verbal abuse or insult to an Ethiopian is worse than being physically trashed by an opponent. A good name is more valuable than fine cloth and all possessions (Ethiopian proverb). Ethiopians express this pride in the value of the ‘self’ in a very many proverbs and stories.

Dear Mr. Timothy-

It might be difficult for you to see the greatness of Ethiopians because you have a hidden agenda to defame Ethiopia and Ethiopians when ever and wherever you can get a chance to do so. But the greatness of Ethiopians in the Diaspora or Ethiopians in Ethiopia is explained by Professor Tecola W.Hagos as the following-

“ I suspect that Ethiopians make a number of American and European political leaders very uncomfortable, because Ethiopians did not acknowledge (at least not in this time) the exaggerated sense of self importance of Western men.

“ I know of no society which would not have degenerated into total chaos where its central government structure had collapsed and its police force disbanded. It was exactly such a situation in May 1991 that Ethiopians faced. With no government or police they maintained a degree of civility that would put to shame any Western democratic society.

“ By way of contrast, a blackout in New York city or Los Angeles or London or Paris would have been the scene of looting, murder and anti –social activities and tremendous scale which would have been resulted in total civic breakdown. Without doubt, Ethiopian society is an exceptional complex and ethical society. If one did not look beyond obvious poverty, if one meets in the street in Ethiopia one would not be able to underestimate the moral and ethical strength of Ethiopian society.

The food code, the code of duty to relatives and strangers, the code of honor, the idea of shame et Cetera, Ethiopians live by are unique characteristics of Ethiopians. As a result of living under such social codes, most Ethiopians are highly self disciplined and very much aware of needs of their fellow members of society”.

Mr. Timothy:

Our culture never been diluted in the Diaspora the way you lie without shame and research. Your observation and your testimony confess, you talk or observe to few individual Ethiopians. Not only you underestimate Ethiopians in the Diaspora but also, you start to redirect Ethiopia’s future destination Let me bring you back to what Professor Tuscola Whigs have to say about our culture, our nation and our civilization and dignity who does have much higher research and knowledge about Ethiopia and its people.

“ I have asserted the Ethiopians are a great people, with an original high culture and civilization and a lot more in tune with fundamental ethical principles than anyone else in the world. Ethiopia is a nation that has continuously existed a political entity longer than any civilization or country in existence today. The current poverty of Ethiopia should not give anyone the idea that foreigners and mercenaries can dictate the future of Ethiopia’s.

…….creating and sustaining a civilization is not child’s play or something to be scorned or waved aside especially by people whose ancestors could not cut it in their own home of origin, and people from countries where the West acted as a midwife delivering fully grown new nations. A little modesty in their part would have been appreciated”

Mr. Timothy: This is how we Ethiopians sound, look, act, behave and preserve our culture and dignity everywhere we go. Not the Ethiopians you falsely defamed in your hidden agenda. I have the hope, that you learn more of Ethiopia now than before.

To read Kalyegira’s article, click here.