As you may know, non-human animals communicate with signs, body gestures, voices and so on. On the other hand, a sane and thinking man needs logic or at least common sense , not just language, for effective communications. In other words communication without logic is a reflection of emotions not that of reason. Logic ran out of the meeting when people assemble to discuss concepts such as humanity, justice, freedom and so on from the angle of their ethnicity and religion. It is hard to make sense out of any individual who preaches that his ethnic or religious group needs more of this and that without any shred of concern for others. Someone may choose his own religion but no human on earth could choose his own ethnicity. Someone may describe his religion but he cannot prove objectively that his religion is special and the best of all. Whenever we try to solve national problems religiously, and ethnically, we end up committing divorce from reason and getting married to emotion.
I remember as a child that elders praying, not only for humans, but also for animals, plants, the earth, the stars, the moon, the sun, and so on. I remember when these just-men and women stretch their arms towards the open sky in request of world peace and prosperity without mentioning ethnicity, religion or geographical frontier. In my opinion this is the highest form of wisdom since it vision surpasses the narrow compasses of thought such as ethnicity and religion. But, what in the universe has happened to us, their descendants? We brag we have attended colleges and universities and show our decorated certificates obtained from major educational intuitions. What, in fact, have we learned? logic/ reason? or bizzarre instincts and behaviors? What sort of reason dictates someone to dress the vast blanket of justice only to certain religious groups. What forms of logic allows someone to demand justice for certain language speaking people and not for the others?
Rousseau was right when he said “a learned man is a depraved animal; education does not make a man good, it only makes him cleaver-usually for mischief”. Those of us who considered ourselves learned are often found to be mischievous. We create our own statistics, we publicize our own proportions, and we propagate untested theories in order to justify our illogical and unreasonable motives . Instead of backing up our claims and assertions with research based evidences, we confuse people citing unexamined legends. Putting PhDs, MDS and masters at the end of our names, we make generalization from untested one or two incidents forgetting the importance of effect estimates and p- values. Yes, Rousseau was right when he said “since learned men had appeared , honest men were nowhere to found”. We even see church and mosque “scholars” building their bodies while they preach us- their followers, to forget our flesh and work for our souls.
The “uneducated” Ethiopian people had lived peacefully together when there was no functioning security apparatus in the nation. Even as we speak, it is not the police or any other visible force that foster tolerance among the different sections of the society. In fact, the ethnically intoxicated rulers and the uncivilized security apparatus often tries to ignite ethnic and religious flames but the people put out these satanic fires instantly. This fact heralds the existence of virtuous men and women who transcends man made religious and ethnic boundaries in Ethiopian communities. But what will happen overtime when the immoral and non-believer rulers annihilate virtue, wisdom, morality and ethics by destroying the essence of churches, mosques and the legendary cultural institutions such as shimiglina? What will happen when, we, the ethnically poisoned pseudo intellectuals, are added to this foreseeable problems.?
The learned man think twice and count ten before you get in to illogical and unreasonable narrow-minded ethnic and religious diatribe that could lead to the demise of society . Please abstain from claiming that your groups of people deserve this and that while you do not have a slice of interest to care about the rest. The fact of the matter is any human needs food, shelter, clothes and so on irrespective of his ethnicity and religion. The truth is every human needs and deserves freedom and justice. Why, then, we should reduce ourselves as little as beads and get in to a narrow ethnic and religious prisms? Why should we claim someone from one ethnic group deserves better food, clothes, shelter, freedom, justice and so on before or more than others? How much extra does it cost us if we say every human needs food, shelter, clothes, freedom and justice? Why should we limit our motion in a segregated ethnic and religious boundaries while we could move around anywhere with little hindrance?
Examine yourself educated man! just pinch your skin deep! You feel pain, right? The other guy who does not belong to your ethnic or religious group has also nerve endings to feel pain. If you stay away from food for two days, you feel terribly hungry, right? The other man who does not belong to your ethnic/or religious group feels hungry like you as well. You like to use your sense organs the way you like, right? The other man who does not belong to your ethnicity/religion or locality likes to do the same thing too. You want to have freedom from any sort of tyranny, right? The other man who does not worship with you in the same church, mosque or synagogue wants to have freedom too. You want to see justice reign, right? The other man whom you do not care about wants to see the same thing too. The learned man please get out of emotion and follow logic and reason. Try to embellish your education with virtue and wisdom. Please listen to me! The non-virtuous or unwise man is the source of chaos, not peace.
Do not go with the wind, educated man! Resist any illogical and unreasonable temptations. If you follow logic, reason, evidence and stick to the true, you could have the power to deliver peace to the universe let alone to a nation. Please stop jabbering about narrow perceptions such as ethnicity and religion and start discussing universal concepts such as humanity, truth, virtue, morality, ethics, freedom, fairness, justice and so on. Stop digging ditches to separate societies apart and start to build bridges to bring communities together. Stop voluntarily imprisoning yourself in a glass of ethnicity/religion and try to be a free man. Educated man, Please dislodge yourself out of a narrow ethnic and religious prism. Learned man! search and find the truth. Please make your pen ink a remedy to heal not a poison to kill.
Thank you.