Negative stereotypes are often substantially true, but the talking classes have no way of dealing with such cases. At any rate, most don’t – but Peter Godwin does.
Back in 2001, Godwin wrote a wonderful, wonderful article about Gypsies, an article that should be an example to all of us. Here’s how he does it:
He starts with the annual Gypsy pilgrimage to Les-Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, a small town in the Camargue. The local don’t welcome the Gypsies: partly it’s the theft and mounds of garbage, but there are personal reasons as well. He talks with the owner of a local cafe – who points to his empty eye socket. ” I lost it in a fight with a Gypsy. He pulled a knife on me.”
He visits a village of Slovakian gypsies – 10% of Slovakia, and set to become the majority by 2060. That’ll be the day.
The village is nested to an established Slovakian village. “A little brook choked with rags and bottles, tins and plastic bags, runs down through the Gypsy quarter, whose 300 residents are crammed into shacks made of logs and mud. Improvised roofs of sheet metal are weighed down against the tugging wind with rocks and old tires. It is a scene of medieval squalor.”
Not a single Gypsy there had a job. That all ended in 1989: only the Communists manged to get any work out of them. They lived off welfare, but were not the lowest of the low: they looked down on another nearby Gypsy village, who ate dogs. “We often sell dogs to them,” says Irena. Godwin then talked to a Slovak shopkeeper, who hated the Gypsies a whole lot. ” “They should put all the Gypsies in a paper boat and send them to Africa.” She also complained that the local Gypsies stole their dogs, for some reason. Godwin meets another Gypsy in her store, asks him if he has any dog lard for sale, and is instructed to follow him home – to a much more prosperous-looking village. ‘ Immediately I’m surrounded by a great crowd, many of whom are proffering jars of congealed dog fat. “We feed dog lard to our babies, and it makes them strong,” says Horváth. ‘
Godwin gos on to Romania, where the Gypsy traditions are different – many were metalworkers, and most were slaves until the late 1800s. Many became rich selling off the metal from the old Communist factories, and I get the impression that their method of gaining title to that salvage might not withstand close scrutiny. Godwin talks to Ştefan Mihai, a prosperous metal merchant. Ştefan say that he has not encountered much anti-Gypsy prejudice, but he has plenty of his own. “We absolutely won’t do business with any Roma we don’t know, because they are dangerous. But with Romanians it’s different. They don’t try to cheat you like Roma do. We have no problem with Romanians—we employ them as chauffeurs and bodyguards.”
Later, Godwin visits some Gypsies in a small Transylvanian village. ‘A young man and his friends are telling me about tsigani de casatsi—house Gypsies—”bad ones, who don’t work on the land like us but just steal for a living.” [ Like us !] Without warning, he wrenches my notebook from my hands and shoves me against the car. I am punched in the kidneys, and my arm is twisted behind me. A blade is held to the side of my neck, and suddenly I am surrounded by roaring Gypsies, maybe 30 of them, more appearing every few seconds from the surrounding houses. My translator, Mihai, is punched in the head. “Money! Money! Money!” his tormentors bellow. ” They take all his money.
There is a nice photograph, this being National Geographic. It shows a group of teen-age Gypsy beggars, with simulated sores and ulcers for enhanced begging ability. The 15 year-old girl looks pregnant. The caption says “Only the pregnancy is real.”
Evidently you can say anything you want, even the truth, if you pad every hilarious account of incompetence and depravity with skilled assurances that you’re not prejudiced. The last line is typical : “historically their skill has been to survive among a great diversity of hosts, among those always more powerful and entitled than themselves, enduring both the fist of hostility and the bear hug of forced assimilation by remaining nomads of the spirit.”
Reminds me of a Jersey way of talking, in which you can get away with saying that someone has frequent sexual congress with his alpaca, as long as you keep interjecting “But I don’t mean that in a bad way”.
West Hunter 
You’re funnier when I’m hammered.
The actual article for anyone curious:
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/print/features/world/europe/romania/gypsies-text
That is just horrifying.
Historically, people who didn’t notice that the whispering gypsies were smiling at them too broadly were probably far, far less likely to procreate.
It’s really comical how much work it takes for Cathedralism to suppress this visceral, exceedingly sane reaction of horror towards the “Nomad”. The article is as compelling as a botfly extraction video on youtube.
I thought it was hilarious.
Jews are high-functioning gypsies.
Nonsense.
It certainly is. But after this post, you’re going to have to watch out for all the mega-skilled gypsy hackers who will now be targeting your blog and online activities, the mega-literate gypsy journalists who will be sharpening their keyboards in preparation to roast your reputation, and the mega-IQ’d gypsy academics (particularly in math and physics depts) who will start laying mines for you in academia. Not to mention the far-reaching tentacles of Gossad, the notorious gypsy spy agency. I have a feeling you’ve finally taken on too big a target, as far as intellectual power and societal clout go.
Nonsense. It’s the gadje that are anti-semites.
Roma in Glaucoma:”So their population is growing much faster than the majority, and you think they’re dysfunctional?”
Population growth under modern (non-Malthusian) conditions has very little to do with functionality.Indeed, dysfunctionality (a complete lack of future time orientation) can be a great help in terms of breeding rates.
Roma in Glaucoma;” It makes perfect sense, except to people who want to pretend otherwise. What defines gypsies is their benevolent and altruistic attitude to non-gypsies.”
Hardly. What defines them is that they are so dysfunctional that they cannot function without a host society. Imagine, for example, a Gypsy nation…..the whole project would either never get off the ground or collapse in short order….
Roma in Glaucoma:”They are not at all “dysfunctional” in expressing that attitude in various richly vibrant ways. If they had higher IQs, the attitude would remain and they’d find more effective ways of expressing it.”
No, if they had higher i.q.s, they would start founding companies, engaging in scientific research, planning for the long term, etc.
Roma in Glaucoma;’Gypsies have chosen to live as a minority and do not want to live on their own, because then they’d be unable to express their benevolence and altruism towards non-gypsies.”
No, Gypsies live as a minority population because they are too dysfunctional to survive on their own.
@syon
Roma in Glaucoma:”So their population is growing much faster than the majority, and you think they’re dysfunctional?”
Population growth under modern (non-Malthusian) conditions has very little to do with functionality.
It depends how you define “functional”, doesn’t it?
Indeed, dysfunctionality (a complete lack of future time orientation) can be a great help in terms of breeding rates.
There’s a thing called evolutionary biology that I recommend you look into. Yes, under different evolutionary circumstances, costs and benefits vary. So human beings have evolved different psychologies and different time orientations.
Roma in Glaucoma;” It makes perfect sense, except to people who want to pretend otherwise. What defines gypsies is their benevolent and altruistic attitude to non-gypsies.”
Hardly. What defines them is that they are so dysfunctional that they cannot function without a host society.
You’re just being evasive. The question of survival within a host-society relates to the question of attitude to that host-society.
Imagine, for example, a Gypsy nation…..the whole project would either never get off the ground or collapse in short order….
Amerindians and Australian aborigines are known for alcoholism, drug-addiction and a whole host of other “dysfunctionalities.” Their projects have collapsed. But they are not known for preying on the majority that surrounds them. I’m sure that most of them would prefer that majority not to be there.
Roma in Glaucoma:”They are not at all “dysfunctional” in expressing that attitude in various richly vibrant ways. If they had higher IQs, the attitude would remain and they’d find more effective ways of expressing it.”
No, if they had higher i.q.s, they would start founding companies, engaging in scientific research, planning for the long term, etc.
Again, you’re being evasive. How does planning for the long term contradict the idea of benevolence and altruism towards the majority? A certain group “planned” the opening of the immigration floodgates in the US for decades before achieving its long-term goal. If gypsies had higher I.Q.’s, they would plan in the same way. They would create ideologies to benefit themselves and get laws passed protecting their benevolence and altruism from embarrassing scrutiny.
Roma in Glaucoma;’Gypsies have chosen to live as a minority and do not want to live on their own, because then they’d be unable to express their benevolence and altruism towards non-gypsies.”
No, Gypsies live as a minority population because they are too dysfunctional to survive on their own.
You’re not being honest. Cuckoos are too “dysfunctional” to survive on their own. Are we to suppose that cuckoos have been “dysfunctional” thru-out their evolutionary history? Cuckoos are very cunning in expressing their benevolence and altruism towards, e.g., reed-warblers. You could say they’re instinctive altruists. But if birds had language and cuckoos had high IQs, do you suppose that cuckoos might be arguing that “Species doesn’t exist”? Might they be condemning weed-warblers as “speciesists” for objecting to having cuckoo eggs laid in their nests? I suspect they might.
Roma:”It depends how you define “functional”, doesn’t it?”
Yes, it does. I define “functional” as being able to survive without the benefits of a host society.
Roma:”There’s a thing called evolutionary biology that I recommend you look into. Yes, under different evolutionary circumstances, costs and benefits vary. So human beings have evolved different psychologies and different time orientations.”
Yeah, evolutionary psychology….How do we go about falsifying its conclusions again?
Roma;’Amerindians and Australian aborigines are known for alcoholism, drug-addiction and a whole host of other “dysfunctionalities.” Their projects have collapsed.”
Yeah, a near extinction level event caused by the introduction of foreign pathogens will do that to you….
Roma;’ But they are not known for preying on the majority that surrounds them. I’m sure that most of them would prefer that majority not to be there.”
MMMM, what are Amerind and Aboriginal crime rates like? Are Amerind on White crime victimization rates commensurate with White on Amerind rates?For that matter, in Canada, the USA, and Australia, one could point to welfare as a form of social parasitism…
Roma:”Again, you’re being evasive. How does planning for the long term contradict the idea of benevolence and altruism towards the majority?”
Because long-term planning helps people to, I dunno, do things like earn a living in a manner that does not involve stealing.Try looking at crime rates sorted by intelligence (of course, one caveat involves the fact that the really stupid are too dumb to commit crime. The criminal sweet spot involves mild stupidity)
Roma;” A certain group “planned” the opening of the immigration floodgates in the US for decades before achieving its long-term goal.”
Don’t be coy, dear boy. We are all adults here. You mean Jews, right?Seems to me that they had a heapin-helpin of White Gentile help on that one…
Roma:”If gypsies had higher I.Q.’s, they would plan in the same way. They would create ideologies to benefit themselves and get laws passed protecting their benevolence and altruism from embarrassing scrutiny.”
MMMM, someone’s been reading Kevin MacDonald….You know, dear boy, I know radical Black activists in the Humanities who would make the same argument vis-a-vis White Gentiles….that White Gentiles have constructed a system that is designed to benefit only Whites: race-based slavery, capitalism , immigration (I once heard a Haitian academic explain to me that the West was decapitating the Third World by draining away their educated elite), rap music as a cultural weapon aimed at Blacks (Why don’t white music executives promote more socially affirmative Black music acts), etc….Are White Jews the White Gentile Man’s White Man?The guy whom you blame for all your ills?
Roma:”You’re not being honest. Cuckoos are too “dysfunctional” to survive on their own. Are we to suppose that cuckoos have been “dysfunctional” thru-out their evolutionary history? Cuckoos are very cunning in expressing their benevolence and altruism towards, e.g., reed-warblers. You could say they’re instinctive altruists.”
MMMM, let me guess, your favorite movie is The Midwich Cuckoos?
Roma:” But if birds had language and cuckoos had high IQs, do you suppose that cuckoos might be arguing that “Species doesn’t exist”? Might they be condemning weed-warblers as “speciesists” for objecting to having cuckoo eggs laid in their nests? I suspect they might.”
MMM, continuing with the animal analogy, does that mean that the White Christians who conducted the Black Slave trade are like slave-making ants?And what about the mass White on Amerindian rape that occurred in the New World? A pretty effectgive way of spreading the Euro genome, eh.
@syon
(apols for late and out-of-place reply)
Yes, it does. I define “functional” as being able to survive without the benefits of a host society.
Then neo-cons are highly dysfunctional. It’s possible that Israel is dysfunctional too. What is certain is that the US can survive w/o Israel.
Seems to me that they had a heapin-helpin of White Gentile help on that one…
Yes, help. I’m pleased that you accept mass immigration was the fruit of long-term planning by a benevolent and altruistic minority who wanted to benefit the majority. And it’s worked well to date.
MMMM, someone’s been reading Kevin MacDonald….
That’s a funny way of spelling “Paul Gottfried”:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/a-jewish-conservative-wonders-is-free-speech-really-a-jewish-tradition
Or “Larry Auster”:
http://www.amnation.com/VFR/ARCHIVES/024334.HTML
You ought to get in touch with the creationists. Tell them that when someone starts talking about evolution, natural selection, etc, they can demolish his arguments with: “MMMM, someone’s been reading Charles Darwin…” or “MMMM, someone’s been studying genetics…”
Yeah, a near extinction level event caused by the introduction of foreign pathogens will do that to you….
Yes, and the foreign pathogens went on to land on the moon, create advanced industrial civilizations, the First Amendment, the internet, etc. Now, fortunately, some bacteriophages are at work, helping the oppressed turn the pathogens into a minority and get rid of toxins like the First Amendment.
Roma;” A certain group “planned” the opening of the immigration floodgates in the US for decades before achieving its long-term goal.”
Don’t be coy, dear boy. We are all adults here.
It’s not a question of being coy: thanks to the certain group and its love of free enquiry and open debate, it’s not wise to be open about one’s opinions, even in the US, where the foreign pathogens still have the First Amendment in place.
MMM, continuing with the animal analogy, does that mean that the White Christians who conducted the Black Slave trade are like slave-making ants?
I wasn’t aware that Arab Muslims, black animists and white Mosaicists were white Christians. You don’t seem to know what the slave trade involved. And have slave-making ants ever become slave-freeing ants? Because only one group has ever turned against slavery of its own accord and fought to abolish it. Can you guess who it was?
And what about the mass White on Amerindian rape that occurred in the New World? A pretty effectgive way of spreading the Euro genome, eh.
I can’t speak for what Catholic whites did, but you’ll have to provide some stats so I can compare what happened to Amerindians with the mass rape currently being committed against whites in the US, UK, France, Sweden, Norway etc.
MMM, since Blacks were not responsible for World War 1, WW2, The Cold War, etc, does that mean that they are less costly to the world than Whites and Asians?
Yes, it does mean that. They cost less and contribute far less. Devastation at high speed demands high intelligence. But blacks can do pretty well with machetes, as Rwanda proved. They also cause a few problems now and then when given control of the advanced civilizations created by others. E.g., Zimbabwe, Detroit, South Africa.
Roma:”Nor have gypsies given the world great humanitarians like Karl Marx and Leon Trotsky and great scientific researchers like Sigmund Freud and Stephen Jay Gould.”
On the other hand, Gypsies have not given the world people like Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, Albert Einstein, Fritz Haber, etc
Admirable individuals, but their group did not create the fields in which they worked and none of them did anything that white gentiles could not have done.
And, of course, White Gentiles have given us people like Napoleon, Leopold II (his humanitarian activities in the Congo are so well-chronicled…), Hitler , etc….Compared to all the crimes committed by White Gentiles, Gypsies seem positively harmless….
Heavens, I’m shocked to learn that white gentiles have done bad things. They’ve also created societies that have allowed these things to flourish: free speech, science, liberal democracy, sublime art, literature and music. All of which is now under threat, thanks to mass immigration. And you’ve already accepted whose long-term benevolence and altruism are responsible for mass immigration.
Roma:”Then neo-cons are highly dysfunctional. It’s possible that Israel is dysfunctional too. What is certain is that the US can survive w/o Israel.”
Well, the neo-cons seem no more dysfunctional than most political groups.Politics, after all, is just an organized form of insanity….As for Israel being dysfunctional, depends on the point of comparison. Compared to, say, Libya, Israel is very functional indeed. And, yeah, the USA can certainly survive without Israel. For that matter, the existence of Israel does the USA more harm than good.But, then again, so does the existence of Ireland…
Roma;”Yes, help. I’m pleased that you accept mass immigration was the fruit of long-term planning by a benevolent and altruistic minority who wanted to benefit the majority. And it’s worked well to date.”
Help of a vital kind….If Gentiles elites did not want it, it would never have happened.
Roma:That’s a funny way of spelling “Paul Gottfried”:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/a-jewish-conservative-wonders-is-free-speech-really-a-jewish-tradition
Or “Larry Auster”:”
Now, don’t be coy.Good old Kevin MacDonald is all over everything that you have written.
Roma:”You ought to get in touch with the creationists. Tell them that when someone starts talking about evolution, natural selection, etc, they can demolish his arguments with: “MMMM, someone’s been reading Charles Darwin…” or “MMMM, someone’s been studying genetics…””
Did mentioning Kevin MacDonald “demolish” your arguments? I was just attempting to bring the old boy into the spotlight.Of course, Kev is such a shoddy thinker…
Roma:”Yes, and the foreign pathogens went on to land on the moon, create advanced industrial civilizations, the First Amendment, the internet, etc. Now, fortunately, some bacteriophages are at work, helping the oppressed turn the pathogens into a minority and get rid of toxins like the First Amendment.”
……And this relates to the devastating impact of Old World pathogens (smallpox, measles, etc) on New World populations?You see, dear boy, when i said foreign pathogens I really meant foreign pathogens. Unlike you, I call a spade a spade.
Roma:’It’s not a question of being coy: thanks to the certain group and its love of free enquiry and open debate, it’s not wise to be open about one’s opinions, even in the US, where the foreign pathogens still have the First Amendment in place.”
…And by “certain group” you mean Jews. Talk about being gutless, dear boy.
Roma:’I wasn’t aware that Arab Muslims, black animists and white Mosaicists were white Christians. ”
“white Mosaicists”: That’s adorable. Just try writing “Jews.” You’ll feel much better.
Roma;’You don’t seem to know what the slave trade involved. ”
Actually, I’m quite up on it. Just spent the last semester working on a paper on Haiti….So, yes, I do find it very intriguing how you can’t seem to face the fact of White Gentile dominance in the Atlantic slave trade. Perhaps it’s too painful for you?Perhaps that might make White Gentiles seem a bit too Gypsy-like in their morality?After all, what was Black slavery but a case of an in-group brutalizing an out group. One code of law for Whites and another for Blacks.
Roma;”And have slave-making ants ever become slave-freeing ants? Because only one group has ever turned against slavery of its own accord and fought to abolish it. Can you guess who it was?”
The same group that “turned against slavery” once it no longer served their financial interests?
Roma;”I can’t speak for what Catholic whites did,”
You can’t? You only speak for Protestants? Well, then, how about the mass White on Black rapes that occurred in the Protestant American South?
Roma:”but you’ll have to provide some stats so I can compare what happened to Amerindians with the mass rape currently being committed against whites in the US, UK, France, Sweden, Norway etc.”
Just do a quick google search on Y European chromosome in Mexico. For Cortes and his boys, Mexico was one giant rapathon. Really helped to spread the Euro genome.
Roma:”Yes, it does mean that.”
So, Gentile Whites are a danger to all humanity.
Roma:”They cost less and contribute far less.”
Yes, but since they can’t destroy the planet, doesn’t that make Gyspsies better than White Gentiles?
Roma:”Devastation at high speed demands high intelligence. But blacks can do pretty well with machetes, as Rwanda proved. ”
….And, of course, all of my Black Leftists friends would eagerly point out White Gentiles were ultimately to blame for Rwanda. Legacy of colonialism and all that…
Roma:”They also cause a few problems now and then when given control of the advanced civilizations created by others. E.g., Zimbabwe, Detroit, South Africa.”
And, of course, it was White Gentiles who, in the pursuit of profits (The God of the White Gentiles) conquered and subjugated South Africa and Zimbabwe….Not to mention the fact that it was White Gentiles who Brought Blacks as chattel slaves to the New World in the first place. So, No White Gentile run slave plantations, no Black run Detroit.
Roma:”Admirable individuals, but their group did not create the fields in which they worked”
And this means what, precisely?One might as well deprecate Shakespeare by pointing out that the English did not invent drama. They had to depend on the Greeks for that innovation.
Roma:”and none of them did anything that white gentiles could not have done.”
MMM, I could make the same point about Marx, could’t I? Especially when one bears in mind the critical role of White Gentiles like Hegel and Feuerbach in shaping his thinking…
Roma;”Heavens, I’m shocked to learn that white gentiles have done bad things.”
Yup, so many bad things that one is entitled to wonder how much better off the world would be without them…
Roma;” They’ve also created societies that have allowed these things to flourish: free speech, science, liberal democracy, sublime art, literature and music.”
MMM, I’m quite sure that chattel slaves working under the Mississippi sun, millions of butchered Blacks in the Congo, the nearly exterminated Australian Aborigines, the dispossessed Amerindians, etc, etc, are quite glad that their sacrifices on behalf of White Gentiles have wrought so much benefit for White Gentiles..
Roma:”All of which is now under threat, thanks to mass immigration.”
……And why should people of color care, seeing as how they have suffered under the whip of White Gentile cruelty?
Roma;” And you’ve already accepted whose long-term benevolence and altruism are responsible for mass immigration.”
If by “long-term benevolence and altruism” you mean White Gentile Business and political elites, yeah.
SYON
You know, Syon, not only does English not seem to be your mother-tongue, Earth doesn’t seem to be your mother-planet. I’ve seen you post on Steve Sailer’s blog too. Hope you don’t throw up when you see him write about HBD, mass immigration, financial crime, the greed of big business, the neo-cons, etc.
Roma:”Then neo-cons are highly dysfunctional. It’s possible that Israel is dysfunctional too. What is certain is that the US can survive w/o Israel.”
Well, the neo-cons seem no more dysfunctional than most political groups.
Then please tell me how “most political groups” have directed the US to spend multi-billions strengthening its Islamic enemies and alienating its European allies. Are you aware how much it cost to turn Iraq into a friend of Iran, for example?
Politics, after all, is just an organized form of insanity….
Yes, we’re all sinners. But some of us are bigger sinners than others: see previous reply.
As for Israel being dysfunctional, depends on the point of comparison.
Surely it depends on your definition: able to survive on its own? You don’t seem to think it is functional, by that definition.
Compared to, say, Libya, Israel is very functional indeed.
Yes, Libya, where neo-con/liberal policy worked its usual wonders. And is Israel really more functional than Libya? Does Libya depend on the US to survive? I prefer Israel to any other country in that region, but I’d also prefer it not to be such a big influence on the way the US behaves in that region.
And, yeah, the USA can certainly survive without Israel. For that matter, the existence of Israel does the USA more harm than good.But, then again, so does the existence of Ireland…
Or Detroit. But when we compare the harm done to the US, they’re not all equal.
Roma;”Yes, help. I’m pleased that you accept mass immigration was the fruit of long-term planning by a benevolent and altruistic minority who wanted to benefit the majority. And it’s worked well to date.”
Help of a vital kind….If Gentiles elites did not want it, it would never have happened.
Gentile elites have existed for 1,000s of years. Mass immigration hasn’t. So some other factor seems to have been at work in the recent past.
Roma:”Yes, and the foreign pathogens went on to land on the moon, create advanced industrial civilizations, the First Amendment, the internet, etc. Now, fortunately, some bacteriophages are at work, helping the oppressed turn the pathogens into a minority and get rid of toxins like the First Amendment.”
……And this relates to the devastating impact of Old World pathogens (smallpox, measles, etc) on New World populations?You see, dear boy, when i said foreign pathogens I really meant foreign pathogens. Unlike you, I call a spade a spade.
Ah, so you weren’t being subtle, you were bravely naming-and-shaming micro-organisms. I’d warn you to expect a knock on the door, but there’s no point. You’ll never hear it.
Roma:’It’s not a question of being coy: thanks to the certain group and its love of free enquiry and open debate, it’s not wise to be open about one’s opinions, even in the US, where the foreign pathogens still have the First Amendment in place.”
…And by “certain group” you mean Jews. Talk about being gutless, dear boy.
You really have no grasp of Terran life, do you? Self-preservation is not “gutless”, it’s sensible. Should North Koreans who dislike their benevolent and altruistic masters show some guts and say so?
Roma;’You don’t seem to know what the slave trade involved. ”
Actually, I’m quite up on it. Just spent the last semester working on a paper on Haiti….
Is that high-tech, fiercely libertarian Haiti, proof of what blacks create for themselves when free of white oppression?
So, yes, I do find it very intriguing how you can’t seem to face the fact of White Gentile dominance in the Atlantic slave trade. Perhaps it’s too painful for you?Perhaps that might make White Gentiles seem a bit too Gypsy-like in their morality?
The slave-trade was far too well-organized for it to be described like that, but it could not have existed if only white gentiles had been involved. It ended only because white gentiles wanted it to.
After all, what was Black slavery but a case of an in-group brutalizing an out group. One code of law for Whites and another for Blacks.
Yes. If you knew anything about HBD, you’d know why particularist morality exists and how widespread it is. You’d also know whites are the least particularist, most universalist group of all. You might want to look at some Israeli laws based in-group/out-group morality. Those laws be denounced very loudly by the usual suspects if they existed in the US.
Roma;”And have slave-making ants ever become slave-freeing ants? Because only one group has ever turned against slavery of its own accord and fought to abolish it. Can you guess who it was?”
The same group that “turned against slavery” once it no longer served their financial interests?
Did it ever? And are you claiming no ethical considerations at all were involved? If so, do ethics ever influence human behavior? If they don’t, why are you singling whitey out? If ethics do influence some groups, but never whitey, then why are you blaming whitey for something that is obviously part of his biological nature?
Roma;”I can’t speak for what Catholic whites did,”
You can’t? You only speak for Protestants? Well, then, how about the mass White on Black rapes that occurred in the Protestant American South?
How about it? It didn’t happen. Unless you’re using a Marxist or Andrea-Dworkinite definition of rape.
Roma:”but you’ll have to provide some stats so I can compare what happened to Amerindians with the mass rape currently being committed against whites in the US, UK, France, Sweden, Norway etc.”
Just do a quick google search on Y European chromosome in Mexico. For Cortes and his boys, Mexico was one giant rapathon. Really helped to spread the Euro genome.
When do you think you’ll get your Nobel for the new genetic technique you’ve invented? I didn’t know genetics could determine the degree of consent involved in the introduction of Y-chromosomes to a population. And what are the stats for inter-racial rape in the US? Do they support your idea that whites are prone to mass rape of non-whites? Or are statistics and logic tools of the racist white hegemony?
Roma:”Yes, it does mean that.”
So, Gentile Whites are a danger to all humanity.
Yes, more intelligent races are more of a “danger” than less intelligent ones. So the most intelligent race, by your logic, is the most dangerous of all. And indeed, when we look into the development of nuclear weapons, your logic does seem to be borne out.
Roma:”They cost less and contribute far less.”
Yes, but since they can’t destroy the planet, doesn’t that make Gyspsies better than White Gentiles?
No, it makes them less “dangerous” to the planet. Deep-sea sponges, bristlecone pines and pseudo-scorpions are less dangerous still.
Roma:”Devastation at high speed demands high intelligence. But blacks can do pretty well with machetes, as Rwanda proved. ”
….And, of course, all of my Black Leftists friends would eagerly point out White Gentiles were ultimately to blame for Rwanda. Legacy of colonialism and all that…
I didn’t need to be told what black leftists think. Unless you think the same as they do, you’ve introduced their half-witted ideas (“Only whitey has free will” etc) simply to muddy the water.
Roma:”They also cause a few problems now and then when given control of the advanced civilizations created by others. E.g., Zimbabwe, Detroit, South Africa.”
And, of course, it was White Gentiles who, in the pursuit of profits (The God of the White Gentiles) conquered and subjugated South Africa and Zimbabwe….
Ah, the God of Profit. Tell me, which group is most over-represented among billionaires and financial criminals? And how does subjugation under Mugabe compare to subjugation under Ian Smith? How do rape, murder and general crime stats under apartheid compare with the same stats now?
Not to mention the fact that it was White Gentiles who Brought Blacks as chattel slaves to the New World in the first place. So, No White Gentile run slave plantations, no Black run Detroit.
That isn’t even half-witted. No Big Bang, no black-run Detroit either. But that rather evades the question of who is to blame for black “dysfunction”, doesn’t it?
Roma:”Admirable individuals, but their group did not create the fields in which they worked”
And this means what, precisely?One might as well deprecate Shakespeare by pointing out that the English did not invent drama. They had to depend on the Greeks for that innovation.
It means precisely what it says: white gentiles have shown they are capable of creating their own advanced fields of science and culture. I wasn’t “deprecating” Einstein: I was pointing out that his group did not create physics or math. Shakespeare’s group did create drama.
Roma:”and none of them did anything that white gentiles could not have done.”
MMM, I could make the same point about Marx, could’t I? Especially when one bears in mind the critical role of White Gentiles like Hegel and Feuerbach in shaping his thinking…
Yes, you could make the same point about Marx, but you couldn’t produce evidence to back it up. Please name a gentile ideologue who has been as harmful as Marx. Should be easy, given how many gentiles there have been.
Roma;”Heavens, I’m shocked to learn that white gentiles have done bad things.”
Yup, so many bad things that one is entitled to wonder how much better off the world would be without them…
So many? You agree with Susan Sontag that they’re “the cancer of human history”? Then I assume you’re living in an advanced liberal democracy against your will and would happily emigrate to the Andaman Islands if you could, to get the stench of hi-tech, free speech, etc, out of your nostrils. Yes?
Roma;” They’ve also created societies that have allowed these things to flourish: free speech, science, liberal democracy, sublime art, literature and music.”
MMM, I’m quite sure that chattel slaves working under the Mississippi sun, millions of butchered Blacks in the Congo, the nearly exterminated Australian Aborigines, the dispossessed Amerindians, etc, etc, are quite glad that their sacrifices on behalf of White Gentiles have wrought so much benefit for White Gentiles..
Again, not even half-witted. All human groups have abused power over others to the extent that they have the power to win it and exercise it. Only one human group has voluntarily relinquished its power to abuse and only one human group has created societies in which these things flourish: free speech, science, liberal democracy, sublime art, literature and music.
Roma:”All of which is now under threat, thanks to mass immigration.”
……And why should people of color care, seeing as how they have suffered under the whip of White Gentile cruelty?
See previous reply.
Roma;” And you’ve already accepted whose long-term benevolence and altruism are responsible for mass immigration.”
If by “long-term benevolence and altruism” you mean White Gentile Business and political elites, yeah.
See reply above re. gentile elites.
Miller:”Jews are high-functioning gypsies.”
Since dysfunctionality defines being a Gypsy, that makes absolutely no sense.
Since reading Paul Fussell’s ‘Bad: Or; the Dumbing of America’ and ‘Lavengro’ the same month, I’ve thought Gypsy culture came from Paphlagonia refugees.
Since dysfunctionality defines being a Gypsy, that makes absolutely no sense.
So their population is growing much faster than the majority, and you think they’re dysfunctional? It makes perfect sense, except to people who want to pretend otherwise. What defines gypsies is their benevolent and altruistic attitude to non-gypsies. They are not at all “dysfunctional” in expressing that attitude in various richly vibrant ways. If they had higher IQs, the attitude would remain and they’d find more effective ways of expressing it.
“Dysfunctionality”, in the true sense, is a marker of, e.g., Amerindians and Australian aborigines, but then they are conquered, demoralized peoples who have not chosen to live as minorities and would happily live on their own again. Gypsies have chosen to live as a minority and do not want to live on their own, because then they’d be unable to express their benevolence and altruism towards non-gypsies. Or goyim, as they affectionately (and respectfully) call us.
Sorry: lapsus keyboardi there. For goyim, read gadje. Funny how both the Jays and the Gees have affectionate and respectful terms for the out-group, isn’t it?
Roma in Glaucoma:”So their population is growing much faster than the majority, and you think they’re dysfunctional?”
Population growth under modern (non-Malthusian) conditions has very little to do with functionality.Indeed, dysfunctionality (a complete lack of future time orientation) can be a great help in terms of breeding rates.
Roma in Glaucoma;” It makes perfect sense, except to people who want to pretend otherwise. What defines gypsies is their benevolent and altruistic attitude to non-gypsies.”
Hardly. What defines them is that they are so dysfunctional that they cannot function without a host society. Imagine, for example, a Gypsy nation…..the whole project would either never get off the ground or collapse in short order….
Roma in Glaucoma:”They are not at all “dysfunctional” in expressing that attitude in various richly vibrant ways. If they had higher IQs, the attitude would remain and they’d find more effective ways of expressing it.”
No, if they had higher i.q.s, they would start founding companies, engaging in scientific research, planning for the long term, etc.
Roma in Glaucoma;’Gypsies have chosen to live as a minority and do not want to live on their own, because then they’d be unable to express their benevolence and altruism towards non-gypsies.”
No, Gypsies live as a minority population because they are too dysfunctional to survive on their own.
Roma:”Yes, if gypsies were 2 sd’s higher, they’d behave like neo-cons. If neo-cons were 2 sd’s lower, they’d behave like gypsies. As it is, gypsies are orders of magnitude less destructive and costly to the West than neo-cons.”
MMM, since Blacks were not responsible for World War 1, WW2, The Cold War, etc, does that mean that they are less costly to the world than Whites and Asians?
Roma:”Nor have gypsies given t
he world great humanitarians like Karl Marx and Leon Trotsky and great scientific researchers like Sigmund Freud and Stephen Jay Gould.”
On the other hand, Gypsies have not given the world people like Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, Albert Einstein, Fritz Haber, etc
And, of course, White Gentiles have given us people like Napoleon, Leopold II (his humanitarian activities in the Congo are so well-chronicled…), Hitler , etc….Compared to all the crimes committed by White Gentiles, Gypsies seem positively harmless….
Kip the Roma up a couple of SDs in IQ, but leave the rest of their genetics and culture intact and maybe they’d fit into the Ashkenazi Jewish role quite tidily, maybe a bit more tidily than a subset of undistinguished gentiles with an SD improvement.
But when I say that I’m making a statement on the overwhelming power of cognitive ability to determine how much a group is involved in crime, not a statement it’s at all useful that Roma and Ashkenazis are higher and lower functioning mirrors of one another in their place in their national economies.
Hmm… Solid point! Take a full set of Matt, add a couple of IQ SD’s, grind it, and it will still fit the role of slime quite tidily, too.
Yes, if gypsies were 2 sd’s higher, they’d behave like neo-cons. If neo-cons were 2 sd’s lower, they’d behave like gypsies. As it is, gypsies are orders of magnitude less destructive and costly to the West than neo-cons. Nor have gypsies given the world great humanitarians like Karl Marx and Leon Trotsky and great scientific researchers like Sigmund Freud and Stephen Jay Gould.
Roma:”Yes, if gypsies were 2 sd’s higher, they’d behave like neo-cons. If neo-cons were 2 sd’s lower, they’d behave like gypsies. As it is, gypsies are orders of magnitude less destructive and costly to the West than neo-cons.”
MMM, since Blacks were not responsible for World War 1, WW2, The Cold War, etc, does that mean that they are less costly to the world than Whites and Asians?
Roma:”Nor have gypsies given t
he world great humanitarians like Karl Marx and Leon Trotsky and great scientific researchers like Sigmund Freud and Stephen Jay Gould.”
On the other hand, Gypsies have not given the world people like Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin, Albert Einstein, Fritz Haber, etc
And, of course, White Gentiles have given us people like Napoleon, Leopold II (his
humanitarian activities in the Congo are so well-chronicled…), Hitler , etc….Compared to all the crimes committed by White Gentiles, Gypsies seem positively harmless….
There was an EU scandal when Slovakia’s Roma children were sent directly to schools for mentally retarded. Obviously they are suffering from an environmental factor, such as having been fed dog fat as babies.
Let me comment a preventive: Nonsense!
What possible selection pressures could have produced people like this? Did the dumbest, fattest, most dysfunctional useless slob get to reproduce the most?
I think it’s the other way round. They’re the human normal – very close inbreeding, high fertility, high mortality – and it’s the European environment that is distinctive.
In earlier days their mortality rate matched their fertility rate so they were a small group filling a small rural niche that didn’t need high IQ. In later days their rural niche shrank while lower average IQ and other factors put them at the bottom of the new industrial labor pool and at the same time medical care provided by the host population reduced their mortality leading to greatly increased numbers.
Classic welfare underclass.
“They’re the human normal – very close inbreeding, high fertility, high mortality – and it’s the European environment that is distinctive.”
Probably a lot of truth to this. There certainly has been nothing like modern EU-ified Europe in history, whereas lots of people have acted more of less like the Gypsies over the years.
There was a post by razib on his site : http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/gnxp/2012/12/the-origins-of-the-romani-determined-definitively/#.Ub9J2PnRiSo
so…gypsies are low-caste indians…maybe its that?
I’m not sure what you mean by “small rural niche”.
They haven’t really ever stayed put somewhere and worked the land. They’re a migratory group that has depended on non-rural activities.
A “classic welfare underclass” has not been the norm and is a fairly modern development.
The human normal since the establishment of agriculture has been to stay put and work the land in homogeneous environments. The gypsy experience of constant mobility and surviving on non-farming activities among foreign populations has been quite different from the norm.
Using the method from comments in the previous “Against Biology” post, in a heritability 0.5 situation, if the top 40% of the population is lost, then a trait will decline by 1/3 SD in a generation or if the top 20% is lost, then a trait will decline by 1/6 SD.
“Success” to some degree being a trait, this should happen (perhaps more slowly) to underclass groups everywhere (at varying degrees of intensity), as their more successful members tend to leave their breeding population (to some degree, if there is any assortive mating on “success”). But European mainstream underclass groups also gain from constant infusion of people who are genetically lucky, but environmentally unlucky, which softens the process. Which might particularly be true if genetically or environmentally lucky people tend to have more children.
Gypsies (of either the Irish or Roma type) might not have this so much*. They’re not gaining the people who are genetically normal, but environmentally unlucky, nor the people who are genetically and environmentally normal (or lucky), but due to limited space in the upper class niches get pushed into the underclass. Just losing their people who are either fortunate genetically (which lowers their group mean) or environmentally (which does not change their group mean).
The puzzling element is where their demographic strong growth has comes from, but if it turns out that this doesn’t precede the switch around where either lower female education or lower male/female intelligence became associated with fecundity (the 19th century?), this is less puzzling.
*They have large % European ancestry, but that still might compatible with far less downflow than the ethnically European underclass received.
Godwin’s been rereading his Swift, and to good effect. Nice to see some satire liven up the usually earnest National Geographic.
“As we drive off, we do an inventory of our injuries. Apart from bruises and shock, my main injury is to my hitherto benign image of the Roma as a wronged and misunderstood people.” — had the National Geographic editors read Swift?
Given the industrialized mass murder committed by white Europeans, I can’t get all that exercised by the Gypsie’s retail violence.
I agree. Pre-industrial mass murder (Rwanda) is the way to go.
Idiot.
If (w)hite industrial society builds an infrastructure that lets other groups flourish and fill the ecosystem to the demise of (w)hite Europeans, exactly who is killing whom?
Hypothetically if Gypsies were extremely racist towards non-gypsies and viewed them as prey then it wouldn’t be surprising if their victims developed a hostile attitude towards them.
(Although mass murder is going too far.)
That’s like saying “given the mass rape comitted by the Red Army in WWII, I can’t really get all that worked up about the guy in the next room raping my wife”.
No one thinks like this, and only liberals trying to defend the undefendable even pretend to. Try again.
Gypsies *are* 50+% European, genetically speaking. We ought to share the blame.
If they’re 50% Indian, genetically speaking, are Indians to blame for what Gypsies do?
All I meant was that if we are going to look to genes to explain aspects of their culture, we should also ask what kind of Europeans might have found themselves assimilating into gypsy society.
Derek
“I’m not sure what you mean by “small rural niche”.”
They traditonally lived in rural areas engaged in small niche activities like horse-trading, fortune-telling etc.
.
“A “classic welfare underclass” has not been the norm and is a fairly modern development.”
Yes it is a modern development. The original question was:
“What possible selection pressures could have produced people like this? Did the dumbest, fattest, most dysfunctional useless slob get to reproduce the most?”
I think there are two parts to the answer. Firstly gypsy culture started off with what is very common in the world but less so in Europe i.e. very close inbreeding and very high fertility balanced by very high mortality. This was followed by a shrinking in the rural economy combined with a reduction in mortality i.e. the environment around them changed to the classic welfare underclass environment.
Horse-trading and fortune telling take place in relatively urban environments and by traveling among populations.
Gypsy culture “started off” with a clear departure from what has been the human normal since the establishment of agriculture: staying put and working the land in homogeneous environments. Rural groups that stay put and work the land themselves in homogeneous environments, such as the Amish, are different from the gypsies despite being relatively inbred and fertile.
“Horse-trading and fortune telling take place in relatively urban environments and by traveling among populations.”
If you think gypsies were historically urban then you don’t know what you’re talking about.
.
“Gypsy culture “started off” with a clear departure from what has been the human normal”
Not in terms of marriage culture: marry very young, close inbreeding, high fertility, high mortality, which is common everywhere but Europe.
I said ‘relatively urban’ and ‘by traveling among populations.’
If you think horse traders and fortune tellers set up shop in the middle of empty wheat fields, then you don’t know what you’re talking about.
Relatively inbred and fertile people like the Amish differ from the gypsies because unlike the gypsies they’re rural groups that stay put and work the land themselves in homogeneous environments.
I have traveled many times in Transylvania and know gypsies from various villages. Those vary. Some I would not go to again, not even in a group. My Romanian sons know far more. (Their prejudices against tsigani remain strong.) I read up on them considerably when I first encountered them in 1998. GW is correct that horse-trading and fortune-telling are not predominantly urban. Historically, bear-training, metalwork, and musicianship were also their trades, which are also just as workable in small settlements as large, if one is mobile. There are Roma in cities, but are more commonly found in villages adjoining larger gadje settlements. Some are itinerant, some relatively settled.
Many assimilated into the Romanian population (at least) during the communist era, when they were rather forced to. As the Roma look somewhat distinctive – even I have some accuracy – there may have been some difference in who moved out and up, versus who remained.
Son #4 now lives in Tromso, where Roma are moving in. The Norwegians are ordinarily quite strict about who may stay and work, but the Roma are confounding them. In Scandinavian fashion, they remain convinced that if they just give them jobs and educational opportunities, everything will come right. They are merely misunderstood. Chris shakes his head “You can give them apartments, jobs, and educations if you want, but they’re still going to be gypsies.”
Assistant Village Idiot,
Peripatetic horse-traders and fortune tellers are not “rural” in the same sense as settled people who grow and live off their own food.
I saw a euphemism last week that was new to me: “former horse dealers”.
mark
“All I meant was that if we are going to look to genes to explain aspects of their culture, we should also ask what kind of Europeans might have found themselves assimilating into gypsy society.”
The point i was trying to make was the description in the article isn’t much different from the standard welfare underclass pattern after a few generations – with particularly low IQ populations getting that way much faster (and maybe ending up worse). So i’m wondering if gypsies weren’t as bad in the fairly recent past as well as there being a lot fewer of them.
I remember being among a group of academics in a very prominent Ivy League university when the subject of Gypsies came up. Everyone – myself included – was quite shocked at the vehemence and vitriol with which an Albanian post-doc denounced the whole race. Of course, we all neglected the fact that she had experience with them (they are a sizable minority in Albania) and we didn’t. Since then, I’ve learned that almost anyone who has had even limited contact with the race – and that includes lefty American tourists – learns through experience to despise, loathe, and yes, even fear them.
There’s something about very inbred groups. Even when they’re not consciously hostile they look at you like food.
can anyone venture a guess at the average IQ of Roma Gypsies?
” Since then, I’ve learned that almost anyone who has had even limited contact with the race – and that includes lefty American tourists – learns through experience to despise, loathe, and yes, even fear them.”
I guess I’m one of those rare exceptions. In my early twenties I was bumming around the UK and needed a break from my traveling companions, so I decided to go to a folk festival just outside London with some musically talented people I had met a few times in a local pub. Once there we ended up camping with a larger group of people they were acquainted with, many or most of whom turned out to be Gypsies, or so I was told. They did not look substantially different from most British, maybe they weren’t real gypsies? The experience didn’t exactly dispel the stereotypes (we had a huge feast one morning for breakfast and everything appeared stolen even the salt and pepper shakers I recognized from the festival dining tent and they did leave a lot of trash around). One older, sweet newly-wed couple had tea in their tent in the mornings with an antique silver service. The husband did not know where he was born, just on the road. One evening their whippet dogs caught a rabbit and we had stew and sat around the fire singing hilarious bawdy songs. In the mornings I taught the little kids how to play baseball. They were the most popular, coolest group at the festival. They mocked the earnest “authentic” traditional dancers behind their backs and after starting out performing straight traditional music quickly lapsed into playing whatever music they felt like with their traditional instruments including old beatle songs which the crowd loved and sang along. It was a memorable few days, they were very amusing and kind to me and I have only fond memories of the experience.
You probably spent time with Travelers. They’re a different group from the gypsies . (but my experiences with them in England are that Traveler culture is similarly dysfunctional to gypsy culture).
Oh, okay. Irish Travelers? Still while they may have been dysfunctional from some perspectives they were free spirited which means something in today’s world. Something you don’t see often, maybe is some envy behind all the abuse.
“Since then, I’ve learned that almost anyone who has had even limited contact with the race – and that includes lefty American tourists – learns through experience to despise, loathe, and yes, even fear them.”
It was Rome, 1995. I went to protest for Roma Rights, but someone stole my sign. It was handmade too.
So how similar are the gypsies to the scheduled classes? It could explain the difficulties India has with them. Why did they leave India? Were they nomads in India? They are fascinating from a distance.
What interests me about the gypsies is that they have a place in the future. We have a growing group (no relation to real gypsies) I call the cash economy cast outs that could easily become more and more gypsy like in just a few generations. New times create new hustles and as the easy path to the middle class becomes harder and harder to follow a gypsy like underclass is likely to grow.
Anneallen3 – I think Rushton published an IQ study of a Gypsy village in, I think Bulgaria or some such place. As I recall the average IQ was around 70. I’ve no idea how representative his sample was.
Anneallen3 –
http://akarlin.com/tag/cognitive-abilities-test/
Roma 87.8 vs Irish Traveller 87.4 vs White British 100.8 vs Black Caribbean 94 vs Chinese 107.5 on this British cognitive abilities test.
@Isabel
“In my early twenties I was bumming around the UK”
Was this in the 80s? There was a dropout sub-culture called New Age Travellers that grew out of a kind of late hippy / early punk merger that travelled around various open-air music festivals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_age_travelers
It gradually faded out after the Battle of the Beanfield.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beanfield
That could explain the young people I met in the pub, who I traveled to the festival with, but what about the grey-haired newlyweds with the silver tea service, the families and rabbit-hunting whippets, the rabbit stew and the old songs…did the New Age Travelers befriend the “real” Travelers? Or emulate them down to specifics? Funny too that I remember the word gypsies being used, not Travelers. It’s all so foggy now. I have photos somewhere.
You could generally tell by appearance. The New Age Travellers looked like a cross between punks and hippies – including some actual old hippies. “Regular” Gypsies who still move around look like rural people i.e. not very smartly dressed and lots of bad-weather clothing. (I may be out of date on that but as this meeting seems to be from a while back it may be okay). Irish Travellers generally dress in a very standard working class way but have very strong Irish acents.
“did the New Age Travelers befriend the “real” Travelers?”
Certainly possible.
Neither group fit that description at all, though the young musicians did seem to travel to festivals regularly (though we drove there from the midlands in a regular car) and seemed to know the musicians in the gypsy group from previous festivals. The larger group did seem rural etc but I don’t remember the accents. It seemed like everywhere I went people had totally different accents and I was fairly overwhelmed just trying to follow conversations.
The whippets belonged to a young couple, the wife was very aloof though I did play with the kids (I think the husband was one of the musicians) and the dogs were not treated as pets and were tied to their caravan all day. I do remember them playing a song that was very sad, and everyone joined in, “Farewell to the 30ft trailer” just watched it on youtube, I remembered the words after all these years.
There are homeless kids hanging around my city who call themselves travelers and fit your description but this experience was nothing like that, I think it was pretty authentic.
Do not try to shrink me, gypsy. I serious.
“What possible selection pressures could have produced people like this?”
Part of it is their nomadic pastoralist seeming background. Not staying put or holding down a job, high inbreeding, turning easily to banditry, etc. — that’s not so out of place for desert Arabs, Somalis, or Celtic hillbillies (relative to the Euro-American norm of course). Mobility is the key: you can prey on settled people since they’d exhaust themselves chasing you. You know how to survive on the move, whereas their subsistence mode ties them to a specific plot of land.
But why are Gypsies so far out there even compared to other nomadic predator types? I think it must have been the previous version of government-enforced multiculturalism — the Ottoman Empire. The bulk of the Gypsy population has always been southeastern Europe / the Balkans, thinning out even by the time you reach Romania or central Europe.
First, where is the last place you would want to have Gypsies live in order to dilute away their pastoralist culture of honor and violence? Probably the Balkans. For most of recorded history (and before), the host populations themselves have been outside of the culture of law that prevailed in northern and western Europe.
Then add on top of that the Ottoman imperative to keep tensions among groups minimized. They didn’t want any group vs. group conflicts because that would destabilize their steady collection of taxes. This is somewhat distinct from Greg and Henry’s point in the 10,000 Year Explosion about selection on individuals for docility in a hierarchical society. This is the head honcho forcing one group to not attack another group under his control.
This is the gist of what I got from Gypsies in the Ottoman Empire: A Contribution to the History of the Balkans, by Elena Marushiakova. I read it nearly 6 years ago, so can’t offer too much specific detail. But there were apparently common policies like the local host population was not allowed to seek immediate justice against Gypsy criminals or retaliate, that this was for the Ottoman higher-ups alone.
And there was a sense that those higher-ups rarely got around to cleaning the place up. The local populations were always in a state of anger that they were being preyed on by Gypsies and could not do anything about it, while their foreign rulers sat around doing nothing either. I wonder how much this particular feature of Ottoman rule contributed to the visceral hatred that all Balkan peoples had toward the Empire.
Marushiakova’s book also has some embarrassing facts culled from Ottoman sources, like how there were certain towns where a majority of Gypsy women made a living from prostitution. And again how the host population saw that as a blight on their community but couldn’t do anything about it because, hey, as long as the pasha was getting some tax money from all the parties concerned, don’t you guys worry about how those guys earn their living. You must learn to be tolerant of vibrant diversity.
BTW, that book on Gypsies in the Ottoman Empire is very short — about 100 pages. So if you can find it and you’re curious, you could learn a lot in just one day’s reading.
I don’t think gypsies are like those nomadic pastoralist groups who live among themselves in the wilderness tending their flocks and waging physical war with other nomadic pastoralists or settled populations.
Gypsies are nomads who have depended on centralized authorities protecting them. If they didn’t have this protection and had to depend on their warring ability, they would have been wiped out. Under this protection, they then live off of various trading activities and schemes skimming from non gypsies.
Nomadic pastoralists live off of themselves and off of nature in the wilderness, not ruled by centralized authorities, or become the centralized authorities over settled populations via their military prowess.
Jacob
“I don’t think gypsies are like those nomadic pastoralist groups who live among themselves in the wilderness tending their flocks and waging physical war with other nomadic pastoralists or settled populations.”
They’re similar in marriage culture.
Great piece. I still remember my first encounter. I was working in a supermarket while in high school and a caravan of them stopped and looted the place. I didn’t have a clue, but the manager sure did. This is reprinted with commentary here:
http://ex-army.blogspot.com/2013/06/gypsy-fun-in-europe.html
@ Greying Wanderer
Dog breeders make different types of dog breeds by instituting the same marriage culture. All the dog marriages are arranged marriages arranged by the dog breeder.
Yes, they create and maintain specific breeds by arranging marriages within different specific breeds: Bulldogs, Poodles, Pugs etc, a bit like what many human populations, like Gypsies, do with clans.
Right, the same marriage culture is responsible for very different dog breeds such as wolfhounds and toy breed dogs.
>>>> For Cortes and his boys, Mexico was one giant rapathon
The AmerInd females mostly willingly lined up to be impregnanted by the new Alpha conquerors. It’s what female mammals do.
Reference: “War Brides” chapter of heartiste.wordpress.com
>>> Gypsy culture “started off” with a clear departure from what has been the human normal since the establishment of agriculture
I haven’t seen evidence that agriculture is more than 15k years old. That’s nothing.