The Half-breed in Injun & Gypsy Society

While the half-breed in the societies of the Native Americans, the Injuns, was - apparently - and still is always fully accepted as a "paid up" member of the Tribe and People, the same, it seems, unfortunately, cannot be said as regards the standing and the acceptance of the Poshrat or Didikai within the Romani-Gypsy Society. That, I think, personally, is a shame in general and a shame on us as a People. While I understand the mistrust towards anything that is Gohja because of the way we have been treated by them thru the ages the poshrat or didikai should be made welcome, however, and given a place at the yag.

It also appears that the half-breed more often than not donned war paint and took up arms in the defense of his Injun tribe, and this sometimes even if and when they lived very much like whites in cabins and were trappers and traders. Fair enough, there were also half-breeds that worked for the whites and even those that "betrayed" other Injuns but often those were members of an enemy tribe, theoretically. When, however, really pushed by the white man and the Indians came together the Injun half-breed in the main stood side-by-side with his full-blooded Injun brothers and also died alongside them. In the same way as the Injun half-breed suffered prejudice from the whites, despite the fact that he was half-white the Gypsy and poshrat does, more often than not, if he announces his Gypsy ancestry to the world and therefore he should be accepted by us as one of us. The poshrat, especially if his ancestry is known, should never be, unless for reasons of having misbehaved towards the People, shunned by us just for the fact that he is poshrat. However, to our great shame this is very often done. I know personally of some young Sinti mushes in Germany, who are half-Sinti, and, aside from the fact that the clans know their Sinti ancestry to be tatcho, are not being accepted, mainly, because they have not been raised well in the Culture and they do not rokker the Chib or because it was the mother who was Sintizza and the father either Jenisch or Gohjo. No such distinction was made by the Nazis when people who were but 1/16th Gypsy were dragged to the concentration camps and ultimately to the deaths in the gas chambers. If it was good enough for those to be murdered as Zigeuner, as Gypsies, then we have no right whatsoever to deny them.

© M Veshengro Smith, April 2006