Idiot Savant, and it aint no Rain Man

The Encyclopedia Britannica states the following about the idiot savant. Their "achievement is confined to a very limited area and ... shows little understanding of their ability because of average or subnormal intelligence."

An example of an idiot savant affliction is played by Dustin Hoffman in the movie “The Rain Man.” As a supporting actor to Tom Cruise, Mr. Hoffman played a character named Raymond. Raymond is a mathematical genius. He has the ability to add, subtract, divide, and multiply large sequences of numbers rapidly in his head. But when it comes to other simple matters, Raymond is down right feeble. An excellent analogy for Raymond’s disposition is that of a parrot. A parrot is able to mimic a human's voice, but has no understanding of what it is saying.

The noun Idiot Savant is a product of the English word Idiot and the French word Savant. In the French language, the word Savant means the learned one. I would assume, literally translated, Idiot Savant means a learned idiot. It is a self contradicting word. But it will serve a purpose and help us to explain the behaviors of some of the recently infamous Ethiopian intellectuals, the learned ones.

Since the May 2005 election concluded, I have been trying to understand why some of the well educated Ethiopians are obsessed with such a careless, hateful, and destructive approach to solve the current political impasse. Now I think know: they may be suffering from a disorder similar to the idiot savant. And as the result, they are desperately in need of a behavioral treatment. There is a little twist to their affliction, however. As the aforementioned descriptions of the disorder shows, Idiot Savant is someone who has been predisposed with a highly developed specific skill by unexplained natural phenomenon. Quite the opposite, the Ethiopian Idiot Savants achieved their confined knowledge through a guided learning process. This difference of their capacity to learn gives us a glimmer of hope that they may be cured of their disorder after attending intensive lessons sessions.

Allow me to further elaborate on how I diagnosed and reached to such a conclusion. Some of us, if not most of us Ethiopians who are living outside of Ethiopia have been victims of xenophobia and racism at one time or another. For example, in America, we have racist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan(KKK) and the White Aryan Resistance (WAR). These organizations subscribe to the ideology that alleges that the Aryan (white) race is superior than all the other races. These individuals are firm in their beliefs, and they threaten and often use violence to intimidate and subjugate all other races to the benefit of the White race. As a matter of fact, about 16 years ago, an Ethiopian named Mulugeta Siraw was beaten to death with a baseball bat by the members of the WAR organization in Portland, Oregon. The only reason for Mr. Seraw’s murder was the color of his skin. I vividly remember the leader of WAR, Tom Metzger, saying on national television that he does not want “the beautiful” black people in America. When I heard him say that, as much as I dreamed of coming to America, I was scared out of my skin and wanted to go back home where I would be welcomed. Because, as I was a newly arrived immigrant to the Pacific Northwest where these organizations are known to be based, I thought I was going to be the next victim. His statement was in response to why his followers murdered an Ethiopian immigrant, a foreigner, as opposed to an American born and breed black person. Fortunately, in America when a leader incites his followers to commit crime against innocent civilians, and his followers act on his direction, both his followers and himself will become legally liable. The lawyer who sued the WAR leader, his organization and followers on behalf of Mr. Seraw was a white American named Morris Dee from the Southern Law Center. Mr. Dee was a blonde hair, blue eye American. If ones race and looks were the required attribute for a feeling of superiority, Mr. Dee is better positioned to qualify as a pure Aryan race than the WAR leader himself. In the pursued lawsuit, Mr. Dee successfully argued the case against all the accused and secured a verdict of more than 10 million dollars. Those of you that are living in America may have seen or have come across people like the WAR leader and his organization members. A while back, before “reality shows” became in vogue, these type of individuals used to appear as invited guests on the ubiquitous TV talk shows. These racist individuals are known to display particularly deep rooted hate towards black Americans. In public mediums, members of these organizations were not ashamed to use derogatory and offensive names to describe people of the non-Aryan (white) race. They arrogantly yell at black Americans to go back to Africa. They foolishly declare that America belongs to white people only, and as such, non-white people should never be allowed to live in America. A close look at these organizations reveals that their membership is full of un-educated and unemployed individuals. One will be extremely hard pressed to find member individuals who are in middle class or highly educated Americans. As the result, one is led to conclude that these member individuals possessed subnormal intelligence. They probably are idiots lacking the intellectual capacity to learn and accept the need to tolerate race and ethnic differences. They failed to grasp the fact that race and ethnicity are innate characteristics of a fellow human being. One did not have a choice in the matter of selecting ones race and ethnicity during conception.

It is sad to note that some present-day Ethiopian intellectuals, who like to prefix or suffix their names with Dr., PhD, Engineer, and Professor, engage in activities similar to the members of the above mentioned racist organizations. This particular behavioral similarity led me to conclude that the educated Ethiopians possess subnormal intelligence when it comes to understanding innate characteristics. And at the same time, it is a commonly accepted notion that these Ethiopians are highly educated and have become experts in a confined and limited subject matter. In a way they are Savants, learned, Ethiopians. But they appear to have subnormal intellectual capacity when it comes to learning to tolerate and to engage with people of different opinions, to respecting other nationalities, to mastering the art of consensus building, and to presenting alternatives to important public policy issues. In another way, they behave like idiots. It may not be scientific and I cannot quote you an obscure European philosopher to prove my thesis, but it makes a whole lot of sense to me. Please read on, I hope you will find it interesting.

It seems to me that the contemporary idiot savant Ethiopians are preoccupied with self aggrandizing and desperate desire to ascend to power as quickly as possible without giving thought to what might happen to post-EPRDF Ethiopia. To meet their desired end, they have made a pact with satanic spirit, and no one should doubt their propensity to use any accessible means including isolation, ethnic mongering, and defamation of people who do not agree with their proposed solution.

A case in point is the obsessive, compulsive behavior of Kinijit leaders and member intellectuals. It is worth noting here that before CUD(Kinijit) became a spirit, and when it had members who could be seen and touched, it was alleged that the organization’s leadership was made up of highly educated Ethiopians. Assuming that may have been the case, how come the upper echelon Kinijit, who are themselves the living and breathing examples of citizens who are afforded with democratic rights, attempted to isolate and deny the same right to the rest of the citizenry who happened to hold a differing political view? One can easily extrapolate from their proclamation that if these supposed intellectuals had an armed militia at their disposal, then would have summarily executed any and every opposition. I have heard some of you trying to liken the decree issues by CUD to isolate EPRDF supporters with Mandela like strategy. Please stop denigrating; be it with Mandela or Hitler, it is extremely troubling when people draw comparisons with history’s majestic and humiliated individuals, respectively. Suffice it to say that the comparison belittles the historical significance. Having said that, I have never heard Mandela engaged or advised his followers to isolate white South Africans. To the contrary, he embraced every South African national. He was well aware that without White South Africans support, the struggle to end apartheid wouldn’t be successful. There is a lesson to be learned here for Idiot Savant Ethiopians: without the full support of the people of Tigrai, any kind of struggle to rid EPRDF or maintain Ethiopian unity is a struggle in vain. If you believe that EPRDF is a dictatorship then you should know that, by their own nature, dictatorial regimes are known to be equal opportunity oppressors. This should lead you to consider that the people of Tigrai could be victims of the regime as much any other Ethiopian.

Our Idiot Savant Ethiopians seem to have engaged in perpetual ethnic mongering as well. The leaders of Kinijit and their voracious writers refer to the members of the Federal Police as “Agazi.” Their calculated everyday use of the Tigrinya sounding word “Agazi” is to give the impression that people who are enforcing the law of the land are all from Tigrai, and subsequently, it is premeditated to instigate other ethnic groups to rise up against the people of Tigrai. This is a completely misdirected strategy. Here is another lesson for the Idiot Savant: had you taken the time to learn, you would find out that these are the same Federal Police and Army personnel you would desperately need to maintain peace if and when you come to power. If you are to live up to your empty rhetoric of nationalism and Ethiopian unity, and unless there is a forethought plan to dismantle the defense forces, then how do you plan to deter the unconstitutional need for secession by some groups without the present Federal police and National army? One need not be a NASA scientist to realize the fact that the police personnel are only taking orders and carrying out their duty. They would do the same for you if you were the commander in chief. If you continue to disgruntle the police and the army, and if you ever come to power, they may not be there for you, or they may be there, which I seriously doubt, but they may refuse to obey your orders to fight OLF, ONLF, and all other liberation organizations.

Moreover, the Idiot Savant Ethiopians blame the entire ethnic group for the perceived or real faults of the few. They are convinced that anyone and everyone who disagrees with them must be from Tigrai. In point of fact, after reading my previous article about Gondar, one highly educated Dr. even suspected that I may be Bereket Simon’s brother. I am proud of my family and I would be equally proud if Mr. Simon was my brother as well. But I laughed on this absurdity. Because this supposed Doctor didn’t do his homework, otherwise, if he did, he would have known differently about Mr. Simon siblings. Ours is very unfortunate, we have an abundant number of educated individuals who lack the intellectual capacity to analyze the issues raised and present alternatives or rebuttals. They hurriedly engage in defamation or suspect a sinister motive whenever you disagree with them. More lessons to the Idiot Savant: you need to tolerate and entertain opposing views. No one, not even you, the enlighten one, has a monopoly on our current issues and solutions. We live in a time of James Carville and Mary Matallin. For your information, Mr. Carville is a die-hard democratic strategist and he managed President Clinton’s presidential campaign. He is credited for coining the term “It is the economy, stupid.” The term Clinton used to pave his road all the way to the White House. On the other hand you have Ms. Matallin who is equally a die-hard republican strategist and she managed President Bush’s (Sr.) presidential re-election campaign. One would say that these two individuals hold diametrically opposing sides when it comes to supporting a candidate or a political opinion. Regardless of their major and controversial differences, Mr. Carville and Ms. Matallin are a married couple. This gives a whole new meaning to the old adage “politics makes strange bedfellows.” It is fascinating to see them debate on Sunday morning political talk shows. Hear me out here, I am not asking you to go out and get married to EPRDF supporters, but as an enlightened citizen, the bar for tolerance are elevated for you. Your tolerance level is bound to be measured by a comparable yardstick.

Even further, the Idiot Savants appear to have no future vision for Ethiopia either. With exquisite writing, they conjure images of Ethiopia that are ugly and pessimistic. Equally disappointing is their deafening silence when the conditions in Ethiopia appear to be encouraging and optimistic. You never see them writing when an aluminum factory started operating in Ethiopia with the future capacity to produce 3000 lb.; they conveniently ignore it when an Indian horticulture company moved half of its operation to Ethiopia; they dismiss it when news came out about the Government’s plan to educate Ethiopians using the Internet technology with the potential to put Ethiopia years ahead of the developed countries. The Idiot Savants are simply obsessed with fanning negative news and keep reminding us, time and again, that the current leaders were former guerilla fighters. You know what, the former guerilla fighters have been engaged in politics full time for over 30 years. Now they are elder statesmen with over 14 years of governing Ethiopia. They have lived through countless organizational, internal, and external challenges and controversies. That is what we like to call a graduate of the “school of hard knocks” and a leader tested with fire. You need to possess a superb ability to manage, play and win in the game of politics for as long as they have. I seriously doubt that even an IV league college like the Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government can give you the skills required to navigate through the contemporary Ethiopian political landscape.

Now let us wake up and smell the coffee, we have too much of it and we know how to make it. Believe you me, the world is not what it used to be barely five years ago, and certainly Ethiopia is not what it was fourteen years ago. Times have changed; the days of forced assimilation of other nationalities are long gone. Here is one final lesson to the Idiot Savant: when an Ethiopian says “Yetemare Yigdelegne” (rather die in the hands of a literary), they meant it figuratively. They meant to imply that a learned person would never kill them. As the Ethiopians have a great deal of respect for the Savant ones, and expect them to be non-violent, considerate and visionary. And on the other hand, Ethiopians expect the Idiots to be violent and war mongering. Do not let the Idiot character win over and mistake their wise saying for its literal meaning. They never envisioned you leading them to a street violence nor did they expect you to conscript them into a guerilla fighter. It is imperative to realize the fact that it is no longer possible for one to assign a Governor of Tigray, Gondar, Harar, Wollega from the comfort zone of the Menelik palace. For better or for worse, all regions are learning and have started electing their own administrators. That is the best alternative if Ethiopians are to enjoy an ever lasting unity based on peaceful coexistence, a country where each nationality and region is allowed to administers its own affairs, and community where diversity of any kind, be it race, ethnic, religious, or ideology is tolerated and respected. A case in point is the discussion I had with a person of a Harari descendent about two weeks ago in Dallas during my business related visit. He mentioned to me that he is going back to Ethiopia to visit and film a documentary in Ethiopia. He is full of pride when he talks about how the members of the Harari administration, just like the Addis Ababa administration, are elected by local residents and how people’s lives and sense of belonging has improved. He told me that the Harari’s are now proud Ethiopians more than ever before. But he mentioned, however, recently because of the Kinijit rhetoric of nationalism and ethnic mongering, that his people are gravely concerned. He flat out told me that it is a generally accepted notion in the Harari community that when Kinijit is done marginalizing Tigrai, if ever one can absurdly dream, the next target group on Kinijit agenda is the Harari people. I also had a discussion with an Ethiopian from Somali Kilil, and he also voiced a similar concern towards Kinijit. It may not be far from the truth, through deductive reasoning, if one ventures and speculates that Oromos and other nationalities may harbor the same attitude towards Kinijit. Now that is scary. It gives you a whole different perspective when you hear it from “the horse’s mouth”. And I encourage you, the idiot savant, to seek out and discuss pertinent issues with diverse nationalities. Here is one medium when one needs to follow the discussion of the Harari community, please point your browser to http://malasay.com/forum/index.php URL.

I know there is more to say on this subject, but in the interest of time, let us conclude this period. I hope I have provided a brief lesson and encouraged the idiot savant Ethiopian to think about changing his way of thinking. If not, in the famous words of the Terminator, the current governor of California, “I will be Back” for a second session.

Before I conclude, however, I like to say a few words to my fellow lay Ethiopian men and women: an educated person is only an expert on a particular subject matter. The more educated, the more detached he/she becomes from real life experience as he/she spends more time in a laboratory experimenting. The best analogy I heard is from a friend of mine. He said that for one to be fully knowledgeable, one has to learn everything and come full circle, and in a circle there are 360 degrees. And most educated Ethiopians, at best, have only one degree worth of knowledge, and unless they complete the rest of 359 degrees, we should not entrust them with our lives and our country.

God bless Ethiopia. And may God speed your journey to cover the full circle.

If need be, please contact Aklilu Abreha at dnasmara1@yahoo.com