evidence

Sunday, March 13, 2011
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MEMO TO MY CRITICS
(IF YOU WILL FORGIVE THE OVERSTATEMENT)
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If wrong, I can be corrected.
I don’t pretend to have all the facts
or to be infallible.
Neither do I pretend to know everything.
All my assertions are based
on theories, guesses, speculations, and assumptions
that may be exposed as false.
If you disagree with me, state your reasons.
However, if you choose to insult me
anonymously and from a safe distance,
you run the risk of being identified
as a cowardly loud-mouth dupe
who will believe everything he is told
by individuals who pretend to know better.
*
I am willing to concede that
if I had all the facts and knew everything
I would probably think otherwise.
If, on the other hand, you think you are right
because the majority is on your side,
may I remind you that majorities
have been known to be wrong and often are.
To enjoy majority support is meaningless.
Stalin in the USSR,
Hitler in Germany,
Mao in China,
Mussolini in Italy,
Mubarak in Egypt,
Ben Ali in Tunisia,
And Gafdhafi for 43 years in Libya
(to mention only a handful of names)
had the support of the majority.
*
There are still Armenians in America today
who believe Stalin was good to us.
There are still skinheads all over the world
who look up to Hitler as a great statesman.
I say and repeat: if wrong, I can be corrected.
By engaging in verbal abuse and name-calling
you convince no one
even if you are a boss
who speaks in the name of an ideology
(that may well be politically bankrupt);
even if you are a benefactor
who speaks in the name of capital
(before which every Armenian is brought up
to genuflect and osculate derrieres);
and even if you are a bishop
who speaks in the name of God
Who in His infinite wisdom
has consistently refused to get involved in our affairs.
#
Monday, March 14, 2011
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REFLECTIONS
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If you think I represent everything
that is evil in Armenian life
and you represent everything that is good,
allow me to share my experience on the subject.
When I was young
I too was convinced I was better than others.
But as I grew older
I discovered that this type of self-assessment
became progressively more difficult.
I now count myself among the lowest of the low.
*
If it pleases you to think you are a better man than me,
be my guest. But allow me to warn you
that you live in a fool’s paradise
that is as ephemeral as the illusions of youth,
as baseless as the propaganda of fascist regimes,
and as phony as the promises of a politician.
*
Do I know better?
I am not sure.
But I do know that it makes good sense
to reject everything that flatters my ego.
#

Tuesday, March 15, 2011
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A ROSE IS A ROSE
*****************************
A rose is a rose.
So is a moron a moron
and we have our share of them.
With one difference:
ours think they are not just smart
but smarter than anyone else,
including their fellow Armenians.
They confuse propaganda with patriotism,
objective judgment with treason,
and Ottomanism with Armenianism.
More Bolshevik than Stalin,
more Catholic than the Pope,
more intolerant than the Sultan,
they rate themselves as true defenders of the faith.
This may explain why Turks have
internationally recognized and respected dissidents
and we have none.
That may also explain why
we had better writers under the Sultan
than we have today under our own bosses,
bishops, benefactors, and brown-nosers.
Hence the popular Armenian adage:
“Mart bidi ch’ellank.”
Freely translated and paraphrased:
“We will never amount to anything.”
#
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
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CONSIDER THE EVIDENCE
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Dictatorship means first and foremost
to live in an environment
where an ordinary citizen with an average IQ
is not allowed to use his common sense
and to call a spade a spade.
Consider our genocide as a case in point;
we speak of it as if it were a great tragedy,
which it certainly was.
We never refer to it as a wake-up call.
*
For 600 years we adopted a passive stance.
We were brainwashed to believe
the men at the top knew better.
On the eve of the great tragedy
our own men at the top
(namely, our revolutionaries on the one hand
and our men within the Ottoman administration
on the other) failed to reach a consensus.
Instead of dialogue they engaged in two monologues
that never crossed.
*
Our situation today remains unchanged.
We have learned nothing.
We remain divided in the name of tribal loyalties
and continue to think of consensus
as if it was an irrelevant concept.
We have replaced “Red” massacre
with its “White” variant – namely,
assimilation in the Diaspora,
exodus in the Homeland.
Our fundamental assumptions
and “truths” – we never had it so good,
we are in good hands,
the Russians are our big brothers –
are Big Lies; and the Bigger of all Lies:
respect for human rights,
free speech, and dialogue may be good
for the corrupt and degenerate West but not for us
because we are smarter and we know better.
*
I am not asking you to believe everything I say.
All I ask is that you consider the evidence.
#