notes and comments

Friday, December 25, 2010
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HUMBUG (II)
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One of the professed aims of all believers is to make the world a better place, but they succeed only in butchering one another. You may have an explanation for this, but I don't.
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May I state here and now and once and for all that I too am a believer, and I believe in the Unknowable and the Incomprehensible, and categorically reject anyone and everyone who says he speaks in the name of a comprehensible and knowable God.
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We are told to judge a tree by its fruit. If we judge the Book by the number of innocent men and women it has victimized, we shall have to conclude that it is a tree not of knowledge and understanding but of prejudice, ignorance, intolerance, cruelty, exploitation, deception, and crimes against humanity.
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And now from the sublime to the ridiculous: in all my life as a working stiff I have received four paychecks that have bounced and all four were from Armenian editors and publishers – that is to say, by the very same individuals who shape perceptions of reality.
This is either a meaningless coincidence or one pregnant with meaning. If the second, we have two choices: to cover up or to deny the reality of this meaning or to confront it.
I am all for confronting it.
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Denialism is an aberration that consists in rejecting the reality of verifiable facts in the name of patriotism. It follows, both Armenian and Turkish denialism spring from the same source: namely, Ottomanism. Or as Nixon once put it: “When the President does it, it's not illegal.”
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Once upon a time there was a mighty Persian king who hated the Greeks so much that he ordered one of his servants to say “Remember the Greeks” with every meal he served.
I see myself as that servant who with everything he writes he says, “Remember our crooks.”
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I have seen the light and it is pitch-black darkness.
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Roald Dahl's famous last words, “Ow, F*ck!”
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Sunday, December 26, 2010
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FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
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If you want to understand your fellow men,
their belief systems or religions is as good a starting point as any.
To begin with, there are “the people of the Book”
(meaning the Old Testament)
who identify themselves (in chronological order)
as Jews, Christians, and Muslims,
and who say they believe in the same God
but call one another infidels and heretics.
And then there are Buddhists who consider
all talk of God, messiahs, and prophets as so much stuff and nonsense.
If you can reconcile these inconsistencies and contradictions
you may – repeat, may – begin to understand your fellow men;
or more reasonably, to conclude that
trying to understand them is a waste of time.
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Monday, December 27, 2010
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FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
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We speak and behave as if we had nothing to do with our misfortunes, whereas I think we had everything to do with them.
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When theory meets reality, one of them is bound to lose, and it's never reality.
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When I committed my greatest blunders, it didn't even occur to me to think that I may be doing the wrong thing.
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We are not what we pretend to be; we may even be the exact opposite.
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The negative should be covered up? That would be like treating a disease by ignoring its symptoms.
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Just because our chains are invisible it doesn't mean they don't exist.
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To be an Armenian means to be the citizen of an alien empire. Fifteen centuries ago we could speak of Armenian identity and culture. Today we can only speak of a culture that has been thoroughly bastardized by alien influences – among them Ottoman, Soviet, and American.
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There is more merit in being a humble human being than a proud Armenian. He who speaks of pride deals in lies.
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An Armenian is more interested in settling scores than in discussing issues.
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We pretend to understand others better than we understand ourselves.
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Tuesday, December 28, 2010
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FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
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No one is immune to deception.
If smart men with the best education money can buy
and at the top of their game can be taken in
by the likes of Wall Street CEOs and Madoff,
who dares to assert immunity?
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Trust a man if you must
but only if he speaks against his own interests and is dirt poor.
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Philosophy after Plato,
music after Bach,
art after Leonardo:
what I see is not progress but degeneration.
Contemporary art is to me as phony as Madoff.
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Turks are convinced they have been
misunderstood, misrepresented and maligned by the infidel West.
The Armenian genocide explains nothing because
to begin with it never happened.
What really happened was that
troublemakers within the Empire
(among them Armenians) started it
by assassinating Turks
and raping and massacring innocent Turkish civilians.
Everything that followed is now shrouded in the fog of war.
All talk of genocide is therefore politically motivated,
and politics is a filthy business
with one notable exception: Kemal.
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To the overwhelming majority of well-educated and smart Turks,
Kemal is a combination of Washington, Lincoln, and Mahatma Gandhi.
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Wednesday, December 29, 2010
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FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
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What keeps me going is propaganda.
I am like the plumber whose business card said:
“Your sh*t is my bread and butter.”
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There are so many contradictory belief systems
that the first line of every credo should read:
“I believe in lies.”
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My definition of lie:
“Any verbal expression that legitimizes intolerance
and ultimately war and massacre.”
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No one has ever heard of a society
that has survived and prospered
because its leadership silenced dissenting voices.
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Me a pessimist? No way!
It takes a large amount of foolish optimism
and colossal arrogance to aim at success
when far better men than myself have failed.
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My greatest achievement so far:
I have survived fifty Canadian winters.
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