The Amhara

Laura Wood at The Thinking Housewife asked me for more information on a comment by Alex on her discussion about Jessica Rey, the swimsuit designer I discuss here.

One reader (Diana) criticized my critical approach on Rey saying:

I feel that perhaps I haven’t made myself clear. I did not mean to suggest that Kidist was “preaching to whites” or that non-white people couldn’t weigh in on racial problems. My issue is with the fact that Kidist herself writes about both African and American blacks and doesn’t appear to believe that she is one, since she speaks with disdain not only about non-Western culture, but about “black culture,” as if she is not “part” of it. I believe that this is misleading and dishonest.

Alex replies:

As I was taught in middle school back in the U.S.S.R., Ethiopians do not belong to the negroid race (the scientific term for the black race). Their skin is relatively dark but the facial features are more Indo-European (the scientific term for the white race) than negroid. They have such a large admixture of Indo-European genes that many of them consider themselves white, as Haile Selassie did. In my opinion, if an Ethiopian identifies and behaves as a white and criticizes the destructive, antisocial black culture, we should commend him instead of pointing out that his skin is darker than ours.

I replied:

Alex is essentially right, although I’ve never said that Ethiopians were white, but that we are non-negroid. And it is a distinct culture, the Amhara, which claims this (as I do). We had a discussion about this at VFR.

I will find the VFR discussion, and also give you a more objective review.

Here are the articles, posted at Larry Auster's View from the Right. As I wrote in the email to Laura, when sending her these articles:

As usual, Larry asks astute, learned questions, fairly and with a desire to know more.

I give a cultural overview of Ethiopians and Somalis here:
- On the Racial Character of Ethiopians and Somalis

- At the bottom of this discussion "Making Africa" I discuss that Ethiopia is different from other African countries because of the Amhara.

- And here is an article that Larry posted on Islamic Jihad in Ethiopia at the VFR:
Ethiopian Christian Tolerance, Ethiopian Islamic Jihad

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Posted By: Kidist P. Asrat
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