Thursday, March 29, 2012
****************************************
RESIGNATION
******************************
Writers from Khorenatsi to Naregatsi, and more recently from Abovian to Zarian wrote to save the nation -- until they realized no one can save someone who doesn’t want to be saved.
*
When asked why I write, I say I write to kill time or I write because writing has become a habit. I doubt if I have changed anyone’s mind. If I have succeeded in anything it’s making enemies.
*
Reality holds all the cards. Compared to reality, arguments, even the best by the most competent philosophers, are no better than empty verbiage.
*
Some can read the writing on the wall; others prefer to behave like functional illiterates. To each his own.
*
We are born and we die. The same applies to tribes, nations, and empires. What goes on between birth and death we call life, and life consists in a series of hopes and disappointments, minor victories and major catastrophes.
*
When a man is on the wrong path, reality steps in; and reality is like a herd of elephants and we are no better than ants.
#
Friday, March 30, 2012
************************************
ON TURCOCENTRISM
*********************************************
For 600 years Turks played a central role in our collective existence.
There is no reason why they should continue to do so.
As for Genocide Recognition:
it should be obvious by now even to the most naïve
that in politics and international diplomacy
“truth” and “lies” are relative terms.
We may have a far better chance to succeed
if we choose toe present a united front during presidential elections.
But if we continue to divide our votes more or less evenly
between Republican and Democratic candidates,
then we have as much chance of success
as a snowball in hell.
If our Turcocentric ghazetajis do not stress
or even mention this aspect of our struggle,
it’s not because they are not aware of it
but because they are propagandists of the establishment
and their real aim is not justice
but to cover up the corruption, incompetence, and divisiveness
of our leaders whose first and most important priority
is to maintain their own powers, privileges, and titles (“chairs”)
as opposed to serving the interests of the community.
By covering up the divide-and-rule tactics of our leaders
and by ignoring their violations of human rights –
among them that of free speech and dissent –
our panchoonies and ghazetajis have freely chosen to behave
like our former masters – sultans and commissars –
they are thus a greater obstacle to achieving genocide recognition
than the pro-Turkish block in Washington.
#
Saturday, March 31, 2012
*********************************************
IF…
*********************
If in crimes of passion it’s “cherchez la femme,”
in crimes against humanity it’s
faith and patriotism – two of the most sinister words
in any language.
*
If Naregatsi’s LAMENTATION has a moral it is this:
We are as guilty of the crimes committed against us
as the perpetrators.
*
If you are a writer and if you are objective
in your assessment of our present situation,
no need to promote yourself.
Your enemies will do that for you free of charge;
as for friends – assuming you have any –
you will discover that most of them
will pretend they have never heard of you.
*
Why is it so hard for an Armenian to speak the truth?
Is it because the truth is unspeakable?
Or is it because he has been so thoroughly brainwashed
as to equate truth with treason?
#
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
let us reason together
Sunday, March 25, 2012
********************************************
MEDITATIONS
*******************************
A Canadian poetess on publishers:
“After you have been screwed in all possible ways
you run into someone who has read the KAMA SUTRA.”
This observation applies to so many situations in life.
Nay life itself for that matter, and more particularly
to dealing with fellow Armenians.
... *
It’s when you think you are too smart to be taken in
that you swallow the bait hook, line and sinker.
*
The world belongs to bullies, bullshitters, and brown-nosers.
The surest way of exposing your limitations
is by pretending to be better than you are.
*
All talk of reparations and annexation of historic lands
is no better than a Ponzi scheme. There is a Madoff in all our Panchoonies and Turcocentric ghazetajis.
Don’t get me wrong.
Mention of Hai Tahd scares the shit out of Turks.
But that’s all it does. All they have to do is take a shower
and they feel clean again.
*
The only way to be happy in this world
is to be deaf to silent screams.
*
When an old man falls in love
it’s never with an old woman but with a much younger one.
So much for the spiritual content of love.
*
Whenever I am tempted to take myself seriously
I can always rely on one of my Armenian readers
to bring me down to earth and to my senses.
To them I am eternally grateful.
#
Monday, March 26, 2012
**************************************
WARS
************************
All wars are just wars against an unjust enemy.
... *
The sanctity of life?
Don’t make me laugh.
The very same people who are against abortion
are also for war.
*
The only way to keep your sanity in an insane world:
take nothing seriously beginning with yourself.
*
Is it His absence or presence
that I feel more intensely?
#
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
****************************************
FROM DUST TO DUST
***********************************
All your life you try to do what’s right
and you end up doing what’s wrong.
That’s the only way to explain
the hemlock, the crucifixion, and the assassination –
Socrates, Christ, and Gandhi.
*
Every idea generates its own contradiction.
For every believer there will be a non-believer;
and to complicate matters even more,
some non-believers will parade as believers and vice versa.
*
Hitler was a man of vision
whose idea of heaven was hell
to Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and many others.
*
Where there is love there will be hatred.
For every positive there will be a negative
and the result will be zero or death or nothingness.
From dust to dust.
*
The world is full of idiots who think
(if you will forgive the overstatement)
they are smart enough to know what must be done
and they go right ahead and do it.
Think of our revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire…
*
Philosophers and historians have tried to explain these paradoxes
and so far they have failed to reach a consensus –
very much like our own thinkers whose existence (like that of god) has so far eluded a universally valid proof.
*
What am I driving at?
I am not sure.
Perhaps this:
If you sit on your ass and do nothing
or if you choose to die for a noble cause,
nothing will change and the world will go on
as before and as it has always done.
*
An ant may impress another ant
but not a pedestrian.
#
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
*************************************
LET US REASON TOGETHER
*********************************************
The 1% do not have to lie in order to deceive;
all they have to do is withhold the evidence.
First and foremost they are cover-up artists.
*
The greatest sin is allowing oneself
to be deceived, brainwashed, and systematically moronized.
*
The system is foolproof because
we are moronized with our own consent.
*
“Thou shalt not be deceived”
is not in the Decalogue because Moses was with the 1%.
*
The secret ambition of the 99% is to join the 1%.
It is this hope or ambition more than anything else
that keeps them in chains.
*
The 1% does not manufacture chains;
they hire the 99% for the job.
Schoolteachers and priests are first and foremost
hirelings of the 1%.
*
All great assertions have direct references
to this self-evident truth –
from “The Kingdom of God is within you,”
to “You have nothing to lose but your chains.”
*
You don’t need middle-men to tell you
what’s what and who’s who.
*
The hidden message of “I think therefore I am” is:
To repeat someone else’s thought
is to abdicate one’s right to exist as a human being.
*
The best answer to the question:
“Who the hell do you think you are?” is
“You are full of shit, that’s who I am.”
#
********************************************
MEDITATIONS
*******************************
A Canadian poetess on publishers:
“After you have been screwed in all possible ways
you run into someone who has read the KAMA SUTRA.”
This observation applies to so many situations in life.
Nay life itself for that matter, and more particularly
to dealing with fellow Armenians.
... *
It’s when you think you are too smart to be taken in
that you swallow the bait hook, line and sinker.
*
The world belongs to bullies, bullshitters, and brown-nosers.
The surest way of exposing your limitations
is by pretending to be better than you are.
*
All talk of reparations and annexation of historic lands
is no better than a Ponzi scheme. There is a Madoff in all our Panchoonies and Turcocentric ghazetajis.
Don’t get me wrong.
Mention of Hai Tahd scares the shit out of Turks.
But that’s all it does. All they have to do is take a shower
and they feel clean again.
*
The only way to be happy in this world
is to be deaf to silent screams.
*
When an old man falls in love
it’s never with an old woman but with a much younger one.
So much for the spiritual content of love.
*
Whenever I am tempted to take myself seriously
I can always rely on one of my Armenian readers
to bring me down to earth and to my senses.
To them I am eternally grateful.
#
Monday, March 26, 2012
**************************************
WARS
************************
All wars are just wars against an unjust enemy.
... *
The sanctity of life?
Don’t make me laugh.
The very same people who are against abortion
are also for war.
*
The only way to keep your sanity in an insane world:
take nothing seriously beginning with yourself.
*
Is it His absence or presence
that I feel more intensely?
#
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
****************************************
FROM DUST TO DUST
***********************************
All your life you try to do what’s right
and you end up doing what’s wrong.
That’s the only way to explain
the hemlock, the crucifixion, and the assassination –
Socrates, Christ, and Gandhi.
*
Every idea generates its own contradiction.
For every believer there will be a non-believer;
and to complicate matters even more,
some non-believers will parade as believers and vice versa.
*
Hitler was a man of vision
whose idea of heaven was hell
to Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and many others.
*
Where there is love there will be hatred.
For every positive there will be a negative
and the result will be zero or death or nothingness.
From dust to dust.
*
The world is full of idiots who think
(if you will forgive the overstatement)
they are smart enough to know what must be done
and they go right ahead and do it.
Think of our revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire…
*
Philosophers and historians have tried to explain these paradoxes
and so far they have failed to reach a consensus –
very much like our own thinkers whose existence (like that of god) has so far eluded a universally valid proof.
*
What am I driving at?
I am not sure.
Perhaps this:
If you sit on your ass and do nothing
or if you choose to die for a noble cause,
nothing will change and the world will go on
as before and as it has always done.
*
An ant may impress another ant
but not a pedestrian.
#
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
*************************************
LET US REASON TOGETHER
*********************************************
The 1% do not have to lie in order to deceive;
all they have to do is withhold the evidence.
First and foremost they are cover-up artists.
*
The greatest sin is allowing oneself
to be deceived, brainwashed, and systematically moronized.
*
The system is foolproof because
we are moronized with our own consent.
*
“Thou shalt not be deceived”
is not in the Decalogue because Moses was with the 1%.
*
The secret ambition of the 99% is to join the 1%.
It is this hope or ambition more than anything else
that keeps them in chains.
*
The 1% does not manufacture chains;
they hire the 99% for the job.
Schoolteachers and priests are first and foremost
hirelings of the 1%.
*
All great assertions have direct references
to this self-evident truth –
from “The Kingdom of God is within you,”
to “You have nothing to lose but your chains.”
*
You don’t need middle-men to tell you
what’s what and who’s who.
*
The hidden message of “I think therefore I am” is:
To repeat someone else’s thought
is to abdicate one’s right to exist as a human being.
*
The best answer to the question:
“Who the hell do you think you are?” is
“You are full of shit, that’s who I am.”
#
Saturday, March 24, 2012
just a thought
Thursday, March 22, 2012
****************************************
JUST A THOUGHT
************************************
You would think that after more than a thousand years
of defeats, massacres, and subservience to alien tyrants,
our leaders would have enough sense to say,
“Let us give solidarity a try for a change –
we may have better luck that way.”
It must be obvious by now that propaganda moronizes
not only the people but also blinds the leadership.
*
A regime that terrorizes will view dissent
as a crime against humanity.
*
To see connections that have been carefully covered up:
that’s one of the functions of detectives and critics.
*
There is a familiar type of Armenian
who is cunning enough to know that
one way to have the last word
is to make himself so repellent that
anyone with the minimum sense of hygiene
will do his utmost to stay as far away from him as possible.
#
Friday, March 23, 2012
******************************************
NEOLOGISMS
*********************************
“santorum”: a byproduct of anal intercourse.
*
“To die on the job” or
“To take the Nelson Rockefeller option”:
death by orgasm.
*
POETRY
**********************
Marx’s “religion is the opium of the people”
is preceded by
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed,
the heart of a heatless world,
and the soul of a soulless condition.”
Now, that’s what I call real poetry!
*
DIALOGUE, ARMENIAN STYLE
*****************************************
Not all dialogues end in consensus by means of compromise.
Some end in death.
Case in point:
Shane to Wilson:
“I’ve heard about you.”
“What have you heard, Shane?”
“That you are a low-down Yankee liar.”
“Prove it.”
Another example will be found in
Hemingway’s long short story THE KILLERS.
#
Saturday, March 24, 2012
*******************************************
OBSERVATIONS
***************************
From the persecution of heretics
to the massacre of defenseless civilians:
infallibility may be said to be the source of all violence.
*
Neither the sultan nor the pope
ever thought of himself as prone to error.
*
Where there are leaders and followers
there will be charlatans and dupes.
*
One could say that the role of god in history
has been to legitimize crimes against humanity.
Or, where god enters, the devil is sure to follow.
*
Religions are the greatest enemies of god.
*
If willingness to kill and die
in the name of an illusion or lie
is a sure symptom of insanity,
it follows our planet must be
the insane asylum of the solar system.
#
****************************************
JUST A THOUGHT
************************************
You would think that after more than a thousand years
of defeats, massacres, and subservience to alien tyrants,
our leaders would have enough sense to say,
“Let us give solidarity a try for a change –
we may have better luck that way.”
It must be obvious by now that propaganda moronizes
not only the people but also blinds the leadership.
*
A regime that terrorizes will view dissent
as a crime against humanity.
*
To see connections that have been carefully covered up:
that’s one of the functions of detectives and critics.
*
There is a familiar type of Armenian
who is cunning enough to know that
one way to have the last word
is to make himself so repellent that
anyone with the minimum sense of hygiene
will do his utmost to stay as far away from him as possible.
#
Friday, March 23, 2012
******************************************
NEOLOGISMS
*********************************
“santorum”: a byproduct of anal intercourse.
*
“To die on the job” or
“To take the Nelson Rockefeller option”:
death by orgasm.
*
POETRY
**********************
Marx’s “religion is the opium of the people”
is preceded by
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed,
the heart of a heatless world,
and the soul of a soulless condition.”
Now, that’s what I call real poetry!
*
DIALOGUE, ARMENIAN STYLE
*****************************************
Not all dialogues end in consensus by means of compromise.
Some end in death.
Case in point:
Shane to Wilson:
“I’ve heard about you.”
“What have you heard, Shane?”
“That you are a low-down Yankee liar.”
“Prove it.”
Another example will be found in
Hemingway’s long short story THE KILLERS.
#
Saturday, March 24, 2012
*******************************************
OBSERVATIONS
***************************
From the persecution of heretics
to the massacre of defenseless civilians:
infallibility may be said to be the source of all violence.
*
Neither the sultan nor the pope
ever thought of himself as prone to error.
*
Where there are leaders and followers
there will be charlatans and dupes.
*
One could say that the role of god in history
has been to legitimize crimes against humanity.
Or, where god enters, the devil is sure to follow.
*
Religions are the greatest enemies of god.
*
If willingness to kill and die
in the name of an illusion or lie
is a sure symptom of insanity,
it follows our planet must be
the insane asylum of the solar system.
#
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
la creme
Sunday, March 18, 2012
****************************************
LA CRÈME DE LA CRÈME
******************************************
First, they lead us to massacre
after which they have trouble convincing the world
that the massacre took place and is not
a figment of our collective imagination;
after which they violate the human right of anyone
who dares to say anything remotely critical about them;
after which they expect us to believe
we never had it so good
because we are in the best of hands;
after which they enjoy the support of the community –
or at least a fraction of it.
*
When our “aghber”s in the Homeland call us aghber,
they expect us to believe they,
and by extension their own leadership,
subscribe to a superior brand of Armenianism
and butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths
or anywhere else for that matter.
*
If any one of our writers had survived
Talaat’s and Stalin’s bloodbath,
what would he have said about this gigantic hoax
perpetrated against the nation?
No need to use our imagination.
We already have the testimony of a witness for the prosecution –
an intellectual giant and a man of unimpeachable integrity:
Gostan Zarian – and I quote:
“Our political parties have been of no political use to us.
Their greatest enemy is free speech.”
#
Monday, March 19, 2012
*********************************************
THE ARMENIAN WAY
***********************************
The very same individuals who so far have succeeded only
in dividing the community now say
“Armenians are ungovernable.”
If you can blame others, why assume responsibility?
That’s the Armenian way.
The scandal is not that some Armenians,
who ought to know better,
make absurd assertions but that they are believed.
*
If I were to say for every truth
there are ten thousand lies,
there will always be a reader who will say
the right number is not 10,000 but 9,999 or 10,001.
I know this to be a fact because once upon a time
I was such a reader.
*
Some of my readers remind me of sharks
circling and waiting for traces of blood to appear in the water.
#
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
*******************************************
REFLECTIONS
**************************
What I write may be described as a faint echo
of what for better men than I have said.
(For more on this subject
see my DICTIONARY OF ARMENIAN QUOTATIONS.)
*
A self-righteous Armenians can be as ruthless
as a bloodthirsty Turk.
(After writing this line I am reminded of Zarian’s dictum:
“An Armenian’s tongue can be sharper
than a Turk’s yataghan.”)
*
A smart Armenian?
I would like to meet one even if it means
revising all my favorite arguments.
*
If I appear as a perennial loser
it may be because I challenge those in authority
only with my reason,
whereas they can retaliate with the might
of Almighty God and capital --
make it Almighty Capital and god.
#
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
*******************************************
IN PRAISE OF DOUBT
*************************************
When a man says he has fathered eleven sons
and he is proud of all ten of them,
the question you want to ask is,
“What’s wrong with the eleventh?”
Likewise, when a man asserts his certainties,
you want to know more about his doubts.
The chances are such a man will pretend to have none.
Sultans, emperors, dictators, popes, imams, rabbis:
they are all men with certainties.
Reason is powerless against them.
Only time can prove them wrong.
Sometimes not even that.
The blunders and crimes of the papacy are endless.
And yet, it has lost none of its popularity and prestige
in the eyes of millions.
*
What an Armenian finds inconceivable
is the possibility of another Armenian
knowing something he doesn’t.
*
Friends tell me to block or delete annoying messages
posted by individuals who contribute nothing to a discussion.
If so far I have rejected their advice
it’s because I believe in free speech
which gives everyone an equal chance
to make an ass of himself in public.
*
One way to win an argument
is by being incomprehensible.
#
****************************************
LA CRÈME DE LA CRÈME
******************************************
First, they lead us to massacre
after which they have trouble convincing the world
that the massacre took place and is not
a figment of our collective imagination;
after which they violate the human right of anyone
who dares to say anything remotely critical about them;
after which they expect us to believe
we never had it so good
because we are in the best of hands;
after which they enjoy the support of the community –
or at least a fraction of it.
*
When our “aghber”s in the Homeland call us aghber,
they expect us to believe they,
and by extension their own leadership,
subscribe to a superior brand of Armenianism
and butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths
or anywhere else for that matter.
*
If any one of our writers had survived
Talaat’s and Stalin’s bloodbath,
what would he have said about this gigantic hoax
perpetrated against the nation?
No need to use our imagination.
We already have the testimony of a witness for the prosecution –
an intellectual giant and a man of unimpeachable integrity:
Gostan Zarian – and I quote:
“Our political parties have been of no political use to us.
Their greatest enemy is free speech.”
#
Monday, March 19, 2012
*********************************************
THE ARMENIAN WAY
***********************************
The very same individuals who so far have succeeded only
in dividing the community now say
“Armenians are ungovernable.”
If you can blame others, why assume responsibility?
That’s the Armenian way.
The scandal is not that some Armenians,
who ought to know better,
make absurd assertions but that they are believed.
*
If I were to say for every truth
there are ten thousand lies,
there will always be a reader who will say
the right number is not 10,000 but 9,999 or 10,001.
I know this to be a fact because once upon a time
I was such a reader.
*
Some of my readers remind me of sharks
circling and waiting for traces of blood to appear in the water.
#
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
*******************************************
REFLECTIONS
**************************
What I write may be described as a faint echo
of what for better men than I have said.
(For more on this subject
see my DICTIONARY OF ARMENIAN QUOTATIONS.)
*
A self-righteous Armenians can be as ruthless
as a bloodthirsty Turk.
(After writing this line I am reminded of Zarian’s dictum:
“An Armenian’s tongue can be sharper
than a Turk’s yataghan.”)
*
A smart Armenian?
I would like to meet one even if it means
revising all my favorite arguments.
*
If I appear as a perennial loser
it may be because I challenge those in authority
only with my reason,
whereas they can retaliate with the might
of Almighty God and capital --
make it Almighty Capital and god.
#
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
*******************************************
IN PRAISE OF DOUBT
*************************************
When a man says he has fathered eleven sons
and he is proud of all ten of them,
the question you want to ask is,
“What’s wrong with the eleventh?”
Likewise, when a man asserts his certainties,
you want to know more about his doubts.
The chances are such a man will pretend to have none.
Sultans, emperors, dictators, popes, imams, rabbis:
they are all men with certainties.
Reason is powerless against them.
Only time can prove them wrong.
Sometimes not even that.
The blunders and crimes of the papacy are endless.
And yet, it has lost none of its popularity and prestige
in the eyes of millions.
*
What an Armenian finds inconceivable
is the possibility of another Armenian
knowing something he doesn’t.
*
Friends tell me to block or delete annoying messages
posted by individuals who contribute nothing to a discussion.
If so far I have rejected their advice
it’s because I believe in free speech
which gives everyone an equal chance
to make an ass of himself in public.
*
One way to win an argument
is by being incomprehensible.
#
Saturday, March 17, 2012
hyenas
Thursday, March 15, 2012
********************************************
HYENAS
*****************************
Mitt Romney: I keep thinking of him as the offspring
of Bugs Bunny and a Tasmanian she-devil.
The only reason some Republicans pretend to love him
is that they hate Obama even more;
and they have so many reasons to hate him:
he is a Democrat, black,
and engages in class warfare.
What class warfare?
Instead of calling it class warfare
they should call it the triumph of greed.
In war people die.
As far as I know no one among the 1%
has shed a single drop of blood.
We have a saying: “Kogh sirde togh.”
Freely translated: “Larceny, paranoia.”
*
Ben Ali, Mubarak, Gadhaffy: they were not just bad leaders but also and above all physically repulsive hyenas.
In their choice of leaders Muslims appear to be
deaf, dumb, and stupid.
And I wonder, Are we any better?
Dzour nesdink shidag khossink.
#
Friday, March 16, 2012
***************************************
FASCISTS
**********************************
Once a fascist, always a fascist.
Other nations – including Georgia to the north – had their fascist phase and are now democracies even when it meant going to war against Russia.
Not us.
That’s because we have been brainwashed to believe
we are too smart to be brainwashed.
Even after the Hamidian massacres,
an intellectual giant like Zohrab stubbornly remained steadfast in his subservience and faith in the Turkish ruling classes.
Even when on the eve of the Genocide he changed his mind
and warned his fellow Armenians of the coming catastrophe,
they said “Zohrab effendi is exaggerating.”
They trusted Turks more than their fellow Armenian
even when he happened to be a highly respected intellectual, lawyer, and diplomat of Zohrab’s stature.
Too smart to be brainwashed?
Rather, too blind to read the writing on the wall.
To those who say, “What do you expect us to do? Go to war against Russia?” No, nothing of the kind.
But what we can do is at least try to convince the Kremlin
that as a democracy we can be much more useful to them. Compared to Stalin, Putin is a faceless bureaucratic nonentity.
His fall is inevitable.
Russia will democratize.
But I have every reason to suspect
even after Russia democratizes,
Armenia will remain fascist with the full support
of our even more anti-democratic institutions in the Diaspora. Once a fascist, always a fascist.
#
Saturday, March 17, 2012
***************************************
BIG LIES
***********************
If we define tyranny or fascism as the rule of the 1%,
we shall have to conclude that American democracy is a farce;
it is in fact a pseudo-democracy.
But American democracy does not interest me as much as Armenian democracy, which might as well be an oxymoron – with the emphasis on the last two syllables: a democracy by morons for morons. And now go right ahead and call Armenians smart.
*
There are some truths that are self-evident,
such as, “I think therefore I am not” – though the opposite
(“I don’t think therefore I am not”) is far from true.
There are other so-called truths
that owe their existence to propaganda --
that is to say the approval by a power structure,
repetition, and general consent.
Some of the worst and most dangerous lies are “truths” of this kind – “truths” of organized religions, for instance,
or “truths” legitimized by non-representative or anti-democratic power structures, such as: the authority of a king, sultan, or pope bears God’s seal of approval.
Again and again history has exposed this type of truth to be a Big Lie, and yet, people, the masses, the majority of mankind continue not only to believe in them but are also willing
to kill and die in their defense.
*
And now, from metaphysics to physics,
or as Marxists used to say,
“Let us rise from the general to the specific.”
My question to you, gentle reader, is:
Are you or have you ever been a dupe
who believes this type of Big Lie to be
the truth, the only truth, and nothing but the truth?
No need for an answer now.
Just reflect on it in your spare time even if it means once a year or once in your lifetime."
#
********************************************
HYENAS
*****************************
Mitt Romney: I keep thinking of him as the offspring
of Bugs Bunny and a Tasmanian she-devil.
The only reason some Republicans pretend to love him
is that they hate Obama even more;
and they have so many reasons to hate him:
he is a Democrat, black,
and engages in class warfare.
What class warfare?
Instead of calling it class warfare
they should call it the triumph of greed.
In war people die.
As far as I know no one among the 1%
has shed a single drop of blood.
We have a saying: “Kogh sirde togh.”
Freely translated: “Larceny, paranoia.”
*
Ben Ali, Mubarak, Gadhaffy: they were not just bad leaders but also and above all physically repulsive hyenas.
In their choice of leaders Muslims appear to be
deaf, dumb, and stupid.
And I wonder, Are we any better?
Dzour nesdink shidag khossink.
#
Friday, March 16, 2012
***************************************
FASCISTS
**********************************
Once a fascist, always a fascist.
Other nations – including Georgia to the north – had their fascist phase and are now democracies even when it meant going to war against Russia.
Not us.
That’s because we have been brainwashed to believe
we are too smart to be brainwashed.
Even after the Hamidian massacres,
an intellectual giant like Zohrab stubbornly remained steadfast in his subservience and faith in the Turkish ruling classes.
Even when on the eve of the Genocide he changed his mind
and warned his fellow Armenians of the coming catastrophe,
they said “Zohrab effendi is exaggerating.”
They trusted Turks more than their fellow Armenian
even when he happened to be a highly respected intellectual, lawyer, and diplomat of Zohrab’s stature.
Too smart to be brainwashed?
Rather, too blind to read the writing on the wall.
To those who say, “What do you expect us to do? Go to war against Russia?” No, nothing of the kind.
But what we can do is at least try to convince the Kremlin
that as a democracy we can be much more useful to them. Compared to Stalin, Putin is a faceless bureaucratic nonentity.
His fall is inevitable.
Russia will democratize.
But I have every reason to suspect
even after Russia democratizes,
Armenia will remain fascist with the full support
of our even more anti-democratic institutions in the Diaspora. Once a fascist, always a fascist.
#
Saturday, March 17, 2012
***************************************
BIG LIES
***********************
If we define tyranny or fascism as the rule of the 1%,
we shall have to conclude that American democracy is a farce;
it is in fact a pseudo-democracy.
But American democracy does not interest me as much as Armenian democracy, which might as well be an oxymoron – with the emphasis on the last two syllables: a democracy by morons for morons. And now go right ahead and call Armenians smart.
*
There are some truths that are self-evident,
such as, “I think therefore I am not” – though the opposite
(“I don’t think therefore I am not”) is far from true.
There are other so-called truths
that owe their existence to propaganda --
that is to say the approval by a power structure,
repetition, and general consent.
Some of the worst and most dangerous lies are “truths” of this kind – “truths” of organized religions, for instance,
or “truths” legitimized by non-representative or anti-democratic power structures, such as: the authority of a king, sultan, or pope bears God’s seal of approval.
Again and again history has exposed this type of truth to be a Big Lie, and yet, people, the masses, the majority of mankind continue not only to believe in them but are also willing
to kill and die in their defense.
*
And now, from metaphysics to physics,
or as Marxists used to say,
“Let us rise from the general to the specific.”
My question to you, gentle reader, is:
Are you or have you ever been a dupe
who believes this type of Big Lie to be
the truth, the only truth, and nothing but the truth?
No need for an answer now.
Just reflect on it in your spare time even if it means once a year or once in your lifetime."
#
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
on genocide
Sunday, March 11, 2012
*******************************************
ON GENOCIDE
****************************
Our genocide is an expression not only of Turkish criminality but also our arrogance and incompetence; and when we emphasize the first and cover up the second, we fool no one but ourselves. We thus become our own deceivers and dupes.
*
ON GOOD AND EVIL
*******************************
If we assume the existence of other dimensions beside our own, we must also admit the possibility that in at least one of them all our contradictions, including that of good and evil, or God and the Devil, will be resolved or reconciled.
*
ON WOMEN
***************************
The woman you fall in love with and the woman you marry are two different beings even when they are one and the same. Hence the Greek myth of the lovely bride who on the wedding night reveals herself to be a tangled knot of hissing serpents. Something similar could be said of ideologies and belief systems: they look lovely until put into practice. Hence the saying “When dreams come true they turn into nightmares.”
*
ON SURVIVAL
********************************
If we are survivors, what would you call cockroaches – an endangered species? Am I comparing Armenians to cockroaches? No, of course not! I have never heard a cockroach brag.
#
Monday, March 12, 2012
**************************************
ROTGUT
*********************************
Some readers disagree with me simply because
they hate to be reminded that two plus two makes four.
*
My taste buds have been so thoroughly corrupted by cheap booze that if some day I am offered a glass carbonated urine and told it’s champagne from the Napoleonic era
I will pretend to enjoy every drop of it.
That’s exactly the situation with the average Armenian
and propaganda. He has been exposed to so many big lies that he believes propaganda to be a harmless version of reality and our leaders have our own best interests at heart.
*
There is addiction to big lies as surely there is addiction to nicotine, alcohol, painkillers, and heroin. What rotgut does to your taste buds, propaganda does to your brain cells.
#
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
**********************************************
IDEAS
*******************************
“A man with an idea is my enemy,” Napoleon is quoted as having said.
Hitler and Stalin took ideas seriously too.
So much so that they murdered anyone whose ideas they didn’t like.
Which is why a smart Armenian is one who pretends to have none.
*
A smart Armenian equates life with propaganda and ideas with death.
*
The ideas of our Turcocentric ghazetajis may be summed up with three words: Turks, Turks, and Turks.
*
Our so-called patriotism and nationalism never rise above tribalism.
*
If you want to understand the soul of a nation, read its writers.
If you want to know the way people deceive themselves, read a collection of political speeches.
#
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
**********************************************
A STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND
*******************************************
You think I am too critical of my fellow Armenians and I think no one can be critical enough.
*
If you love for the wrong reasons you will hate for the right ones.
*
I was brought up to love my fellow Armenians. No one ever warned me to stay away from them – as Michael (THE GREEN HAT) Arlen did his son (PASSAGE TO ARARAT).
*
So what if I will never be a popular writer? Armenians don’t need popular writers; they already have Arlen and Saroyan – that should be more than enough for the rest of their historic existence.
*
When will we grow up as a nation? On the day we discuss our problems without mentioning Turks.
*
If Socrates married a shrew, who among us will dare to say he will not make the same mistake?
*
I was educated by monks and I have no illusions about them. And yet, I lead a monastic existence. Figure that one out if you can.
#
*******************************************
ON GENOCIDE
****************************
Our genocide is an expression not only of Turkish criminality but also our arrogance and incompetence; and when we emphasize the first and cover up the second, we fool no one but ourselves. We thus become our own deceivers and dupes.
*
ON GOOD AND EVIL
*******************************
If we assume the existence of other dimensions beside our own, we must also admit the possibility that in at least one of them all our contradictions, including that of good and evil, or God and the Devil, will be resolved or reconciled.
*
ON WOMEN
***************************
The woman you fall in love with and the woman you marry are two different beings even when they are one and the same. Hence the Greek myth of the lovely bride who on the wedding night reveals herself to be a tangled knot of hissing serpents. Something similar could be said of ideologies and belief systems: they look lovely until put into practice. Hence the saying “When dreams come true they turn into nightmares.”
*
ON SURVIVAL
********************************
If we are survivors, what would you call cockroaches – an endangered species? Am I comparing Armenians to cockroaches? No, of course not! I have never heard a cockroach brag.
#
Monday, March 12, 2012
**************************************
ROTGUT
*********************************
Some readers disagree with me simply because
they hate to be reminded that two plus two makes four.
*
My taste buds have been so thoroughly corrupted by cheap booze that if some day I am offered a glass carbonated urine and told it’s champagne from the Napoleonic era
I will pretend to enjoy every drop of it.
That’s exactly the situation with the average Armenian
and propaganda. He has been exposed to so many big lies that he believes propaganda to be a harmless version of reality and our leaders have our own best interests at heart.
*
There is addiction to big lies as surely there is addiction to nicotine, alcohol, painkillers, and heroin. What rotgut does to your taste buds, propaganda does to your brain cells.
#
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
**********************************************
IDEAS
*******************************
“A man with an idea is my enemy,” Napoleon is quoted as having said.
Hitler and Stalin took ideas seriously too.
So much so that they murdered anyone whose ideas they didn’t like.
Which is why a smart Armenian is one who pretends to have none.
*
A smart Armenian equates life with propaganda and ideas with death.
*
The ideas of our Turcocentric ghazetajis may be summed up with three words: Turks, Turks, and Turks.
*
Our so-called patriotism and nationalism never rise above tribalism.
*
If you want to understand the soul of a nation, read its writers.
If you want to know the way people deceive themselves, read a collection of political speeches.
#
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
**********************************************
A STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND
*******************************************
You think I am too critical of my fellow Armenians and I think no one can be critical enough.
*
If you love for the wrong reasons you will hate for the right ones.
*
I was brought up to love my fellow Armenians. No one ever warned me to stay away from them – as Michael (THE GREEN HAT) Arlen did his son (PASSAGE TO ARARAT).
*
So what if I will never be a popular writer? Armenians don’t need popular writers; they already have Arlen and Saroyan – that should be more than enough for the rest of their historic existence.
*
When will we grow up as a nation? On the day we discuss our problems without mentioning Turks.
*
If Socrates married a shrew, who among us will dare to say he will not make the same mistake?
*
I was educated by monks and I have no illusions about them. And yet, I lead a monastic existence. Figure that one out if you can.
#
Saturday, March 10, 2012
critix
Thursday, March 08, 2012
*********************************************
CRITICIZING THE CRITIC
**********************************************
Just because some readers agree with what I say
that doesn’t make me infallible.
The opposite is also true:
just because some say I am not just wrong but dangerous, bad, and hostile to the nation, that doesn’t necessarily mean they are in a position to deliver a final verdict.
*
There are also some readers who are eager to inform me that
when I say Armenians are bad,
I do nothing but project my own failing onto them.
These readers must be mind readers because
that’s exactly what I do.
*
Like most Armenians I too believed what I was told
by my schoolteachers, parish priests, and scout masters.
I was born and raised in an Armenian ghetto,
I had an Armenian education and went to church regularly.
I even served mass.
Very probably I have kissed more hands and asses
than most Armenians.
Even as an adult I wrote newspaper commentaries and books
in which I did nothing but recycle chauvinist crapola.
*
And now from the specific to the general:
the only way to explain and justify the majority of Russians
under Stalin, Germans under Hitler, Italians under Mussolini,
Turks under Talaat and Kemal (and I could go on…)
is to say that they suffered from infantilism.
They never learned to think for themselves;
they trusted their superiors implicitly
and they repeated slogans and clichés
with the consciousness of retarded parrots.
*
My message to my critics is therefore very brief and to the point:
“Grow up!”
#
Friday, March 09, 2012
*****************************************
CONTEMPT
******************************
A good friend of mine has coined a word for self-satisfied dupes
who take themselves seriously: he calls them “inknahivans.”
Not being as inventive, I call them inbred morons.
More accessible. More blunt. My style.
*
Churchill’s contempt for Gandhi
and Nabokov’s contempt for Sartre (also of Freud and Mann)
have the same root:
the contempt of the aristocracy
for the bourgeoisie.
The blind leading the blind
and the incompetent leading the ignorant:
there you have it: an explanation of so many of our catastrophes.
Our history might as well be variations on this theme.
*
As for solution: I doubt if there is a single Armenian today
who does not know what our problems and their solutions are.
Even a child knows where divisions are the problems,
solidarity is the solution.
Where worship of money is the problem,
respect for ideas is the solution.
Where censorship is the rule,
free speech is the solution.
#
Saturday, March 10, 2012
*********************************************
ACCUSATIONS
**********************************
“You have a low opinion of your fellow Armenians.”
Not all of them. I speak only of Armenians I have known and dealt with.
*
“You are an atheist.”
It is not the existence of God that I reject but the things that are done in His name.
*
“You have been writing for thirty years now. What have you changed?”
Nothing. But I do not consider that my fault. Communities, societies, nations, even empires, civilizations, and cultures can fail as surely as individuals.
*
“How can you judge Armenians without setting foot on Armenian soil?”
The soil has never been my target.
*
“You have pro-Turkish sympathies.”
I respect all honest men regardless of nationality – and that includes Turks as well as Armenians.”
*
“You speak of Armenian affairs but you refuse to get involved in them.”
We have more than our share of “mi kich pogh” Panchoonies. As for speechifiers and sermonizers: If I were to speak my mind as opposed to recycling the usual crap, I would be tarred, feathered, and driven out on a jackass by the Jack S. Avanakians in the audience.
*
“You are not a historian. Your knowledge of Armenian history is sketchy. And yet you deliver judgments on the subject.”
You don’t have to know everything about anything in order to form an opinion. My knowledge of Russian, German, and Italian history is sketchy too but I know that Stalin, Hitler, and Mussolini were on the wrong track. I know about human rights and free speech – concepts alien to our ruling classes. I know that democracy is better than fascism, authoritarianism, and paternalism – the fallacy that says those in power know better because they are wiser. If anything the opposite is true. Power has at no time improved anyone’s character or enhanced his wisdom; and anyone who says otherwise is a liar.
#
*********************************************
CRITICIZING THE CRITIC
**********************************************
Just because some readers agree with what I say
that doesn’t make me infallible.
The opposite is also true:
just because some say I am not just wrong but dangerous, bad, and hostile to the nation, that doesn’t necessarily mean they are in a position to deliver a final verdict.
*
There are also some readers who are eager to inform me that
when I say Armenians are bad,
I do nothing but project my own failing onto them.
These readers must be mind readers because
that’s exactly what I do.
*
Like most Armenians I too believed what I was told
by my schoolteachers, parish priests, and scout masters.
I was born and raised in an Armenian ghetto,
I had an Armenian education and went to church regularly.
I even served mass.
Very probably I have kissed more hands and asses
than most Armenians.
Even as an adult I wrote newspaper commentaries and books
in which I did nothing but recycle chauvinist crapola.
*
And now from the specific to the general:
the only way to explain and justify the majority of Russians
under Stalin, Germans under Hitler, Italians under Mussolini,
Turks under Talaat and Kemal (and I could go on…)
is to say that they suffered from infantilism.
They never learned to think for themselves;
they trusted their superiors implicitly
and they repeated slogans and clichés
with the consciousness of retarded parrots.
*
My message to my critics is therefore very brief and to the point:
“Grow up!”
#
Friday, March 09, 2012
*****************************************
CONTEMPT
******************************
A good friend of mine has coined a word for self-satisfied dupes
who take themselves seriously: he calls them “inknahivans.”
Not being as inventive, I call them inbred morons.
More accessible. More blunt. My style.
*
Churchill’s contempt for Gandhi
and Nabokov’s contempt for Sartre (also of Freud and Mann)
have the same root:
the contempt of the aristocracy
for the bourgeoisie.
The blind leading the blind
and the incompetent leading the ignorant:
there you have it: an explanation of so many of our catastrophes.
Our history might as well be variations on this theme.
*
As for solution: I doubt if there is a single Armenian today
who does not know what our problems and their solutions are.
Even a child knows where divisions are the problems,
solidarity is the solution.
Where worship of money is the problem,
respect for ideas is the solution.
Where censorship is the rule,
free speech is the solution.
#
Saturday, March 10, 2012
*********************************************
ACCUSATIONS
**********************************
“You have a low opinion of your fellow Armenians.”
Not all of them. I speak only of Armenians I have known and dealt with.
*
“You are an atheist.”
It is not the existence of God that I reject but the things that are done in His name.
*
“You have been writing for thirty years now. What have you changed?”
Nothing. But I do not consider that my fault. Communities, societies, nations, even empires, civilizations, and cultures can fail as surely as individuals.
*
“How can you judge Armenians without setting foot on Armenian soil?”
The soil has never been my target.
*
“You have pro-Turkish sympathies.”
I respect all honest men regardless of nationality – and that includes Turks as well as Armenians.”
*
“You speak of Armenian affairs but you refuse to get involved in them.”
We have more than our share of “mi kich pogh” Panchoonies. As for speechifiers and sermonizers: If I were to speak my mind as opposed to recycling the usual crap, I would be tarred, feathered, and driven out on a jackass by the Jack S. Avanakians in the audience.
*
“You are not a historian. Your knowledge of Armenian history is sketchy. And yet you deliver judgments on the subject.”
You don’t have to know everything about anything in order to form an opinion. My knowledge of Russian, German, and Italian history is sketchy too but I know that Stalin, Hitler, and Mussolini were on the wrong track. I know about human rights and free speech – concepts alien to our ruling classes. I know that democracy is better than fascism, authoritarianism, and paternalism – the fallacy that says those in power know better because they are wiser. If anything the opposite is true. Power has at no time improved anyone’s character or enhanced his wisdom; and anyone who says otherwise is a liar.
#
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
insanity
Sunday, March 04, 2012
********************************************
INSANITY
****************************
If world history has been shaped by conventional wisdom, give me insanity so that I may keep my sanity.
Like Brando’s
“I could have been a contender,” sometimes I cannot help thinking, I could have been a plumber with a regular income, a family, children, grandchildren, a circle of beer-guzzling pals…But perhaps on some other level am I not a plumber? -- and more precisely like the American plumber who had the following motto printed on his business card: “Your shit is my bread and butter.”
Which reminds me of the dissident who, when asked to identify himself, replied: “I am a shit-disturber.”
We live in an environment where dealing in crap is more profitable than exposing it.
*
Mirabeau on Talleyrand: “He would sell his soul for money, and he would-be right, for he would be exchanging dung for gold.” It is to be noted that Mirabeau was beheaded in his early forties, and Talleyrand died in bed in his eighties.
For more on this subject see A FIRST-RATE MADNESS: UNCOVERING THE LINKS BETWEEN LEADERSHIP AND MENTAL ILLNESS by Nassir Ghaemi (New York, 2011), where we are told that mental illness may indeed be a necessary ingredient in all great leadership.
There may be some truth in that.
But I suspect there may be even more truth in the assertion that what drives great leaders insane is power.
#
Monday, March 05, 2012
*******************************************
THE NEW ARMENIAN
************************************
One of the worst mistakes a woman can make, Dorothy Parker tells us, is to fall in love. That’s because by falling in love she places all her eggs in a single bastard.
Throughout our history we too have placed all our eggs in single bastards: if it’s not the Sultan, it’s the commissar; and if it’s not the commissar, it’s our own bosses, bishops, and benefactors.
*
Scientists around the world, we are told, discover and name new species all the time. I wonder if they will ever discover the new Armenian that Zarian spoke about: the Armenian who neither curses nor laments his fate; neither begs nor protests; neither boasts of his past achievements nor his present celebrities.
The new Armenian knows what must be done and does it. He knows that so far he has been on the wrong path. He understands that his so-called virtues are extensions of weakness, cowardice, and greed; and his vices results of ignorance and stupidity.
*
Because I dare to say these things am I your enemy?
Only if you think with the old brain.
Did I say brain?
Please forgive the overstatment.
#
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
************************************
SO WHAT ELSE IS NEW?
*********************************************
It is not my wisdom that I try to share but my outrage.
Catholics have their child-molesting priests;
Russians their plutocrats and former KGB agents;
the Yanks their 1%; and you think we never had it so good
because we are in the best of hands?
*
Trying to reason with an Armenian who has made up his mind (if you will forgive the overstatement) is akin to mating with a shark.
*
Every line of work has its recurring experiences. With lawyers it’s the career criminal who wants to plead not guilty; with Armenian writers it’s cyberbullies pretending to speak in the name of God and Country.
*
We don’t have a silent majority. What we have is a brainwashed majority capable of processing only platitudes delivered by baloney artists.
*
Once upon a time there was a man called Financial Success and he had a twin brother called Moral Bankruptcy.
#
Wednesday, March 07, 2012
*****************************************
THE IRONY OF ALL IRONIES
************************************************
We are most catastrophically wrong
when we think we are absolutely right.
History provides us with so many examples
of this most common of all aberrations:
Paris falling in love and abducting Helen.
The Athenian jury condemning Socrates to death
on the assumption that they were getting rid of a nuisance.
The pope persecuting, torturing, and even killing anyone who dared to question his infallibility.
Napoleon attacking Russia.
Hitler declaring war on two fronts.
Stalin purging his ablest men thus planting the seeds of his empire’s disintegration.
The United States adopting the domino theory in Vietnam;
and before that, the South declaring war on the North
in defense of its right to enslave fellow human beings.
And now, closer to home:
notwithstanding the Biblical injunction, adopting the absurd notion that a house divided against itself has a better chance to stand;
our revolution at the turn of the last century in the Ottoman Empire which has been compared to a mouse trying to rape an elephant; and last but far from least, cyberbullies attacking dissidents who support free speech and democratic reforms in both the Homeland and the Diaspora, and doing so in the name of patriotism.
#
********************************************
INSANITY
****************************
If world history has been shaped by conventional wisdom, give me insanity so that I may keep my sanity.
Like Brando’s
“I could have been a contender,” sometimes I cannot help thinking, I could have been a plumber with a regular income, a family, children, grandchildren, a circle of beer-guzzling pals…But perhaps on some other level am I not a plumber? -- and more precisely like the American plumber who had the following motto printed on his business card: “Your shit is my bread and butter.”
Which reminds me of the dissident who, when asked to identify himself, replied: “I am a shit-disturber.”
We live in an environment where dealing in crap is more profitable than exposing it.
*
Mirabeau on Talleyrand: “He would sell his soul for money, and he would-be right, for he would be exchanging dung for gold.” It is to be noted that Mirabeau was beheaded in his early forties, and Talleyrand died in bed in his eighties.
For more on this subject see A FIRST-RATE MADNESS: UNCOVERING THE LINKS BETWEEN LEADERSHIP AND MENTAL ILLNESS by Nassir Ghaemi (New York, 2011), where we are told that mental illness may indeed be a necessary ingredient in all great leadership.
There may be some truth in that.
But I suspect there may be even more truth in the assertion that what drives great leaders insane is power.
#
Monday, March 05, 2012
*******************************************
THE NEW ARMENIAN
************************************
One of the worst mistakes a woman can make, Dorothy Parker tells us, is to fall in love. That’s because by falling in love she places all her eggs in a single bastard.
Throughout our history we too have placed all our eggs in single bastards: if it’s not the Sultan, it’s the commissar; and if it’s not the commissar, it’s our own bosses, bishops, and benefactors.
*
Scientists around the world, we are told, discover and name new species all the time. I wonder if they will ever discover the new Armenian that Zarian spoke about: the Armenian who neither curses nor laments his fate; neither begs nor protests; neither boasts of his past achievements nor his present celebrities.
The new Armenian knows what must be done and does it. He knows that so far he has been on the wrong path. He understands that his so-called virtues are extensions of weakness, cowardice, and greed; and his vices results of ignorance and stupidity.
*
Because I dare to say these things am I your enemy?
Only if you think with the old brain.
Did I say brain?
Please forgive the overstatment.
#
Tuesday, March 06, 2012
************************************
SO WHAT ELSE IS NEW?
*********************************************
It is not my wisdom that I try to share but my outrage.
Catholics have their child-molesting priests;
Russians their plutocrats and former KGB agents;
the Yanks their 1%; and you think we never had it so good
because we are in the best of hands?
*
Trying to reason with an Armenian who has made up his mind (if you will forgive the overstatement) is akin to mating with a shark.
*
Every line of work has its recurring experiences. With lawyers it’s the career criminal who wants to plead not guilty; with Armenian writers it’s cyberbullies pretending to speak in the name of God and Country.
*
We don’t have a silent majority. What we have is a brainwashed majority capable of processing only platitudes delivered by baloney artists.
*
Once upon a time there was a man called Financial Success and he had a twin brother called Moral Bankruptcy.
#
Wednesday, March 07, 2012
*****************************************
THE IRONY OF ALL IRONIES
************************************************
We are most catastrophically wrong
when we think we are absolutely right.
History provides us with so many examples
of this most common of all aberrations:
Paris falling in love and abducting Helen.
The Athenian jury condemning Socrates to death
on the assumption that they were getting rid of a nuisance.
The pope persecuting, torturing, and even killing anyone who dared to question his infallibility.
Napoleon attacking Russia.
Hitler declaring war on two fronts.
Stalin purging his ablest men thus planting the seeds of his empire’s disintegration.
The United States adopting the domino theory in Vietnam;
and before that, the South declaring war on the North
in defense of its right to enslave fellow human beings.
And now, closer to home:
notwithstanding the Biblical injunction, adopting the absurd notion that a house divided against itself has a better chance to stand;
our revolution at the turn of the last century in the Ottoman Empire which has been compared to a mouse trying to rape an elephant; and last but far from least, cyberbullies attacking dissidents who support free speech and democratic reforms in both the Homeland and the Diaspora, and doing so in the name of patriotism.
#
Saturday, March 3, 2012
power
Thursday, March 01, 2012
***************************************
ON POWER
*************************
No matter how you slice it,
you will always end up with the 1%
engaged in deceiving, misleading, and exploiting the 99%.
Take away the mumbo jumbo and
a so-called great or charismatic leader
will be exposed as an ordinary Joe like you and me
who is trying to do his best
and ends up doing the worst.
By mumbo jumbo I mean what goes on today in the United States – primaries: speeches, debates, TV ads, interviews…
So what is the solution?
There is none!
I like this sentence by Toynbee:
“Comprehension sometimes consists in just a correct understanding of questions that are unanswerable.”
Only to the brainwashed everything is as clear as daylight.
#
Friday, March 02, 2012
*************************************
ASSUMPTIONS
*******************************
Our most fundamental assumptions may be invisible to us but they are clearly visible to others.
*
We are not all white, neither are our enemies all black. We are not even shades of gray. We are brown…
*
As I see it, the main function of our pundits, academics and ghazetajis is to convince the 99% that we owe our survival to our 1%. This may suggest the only contribution of our 99% to our history has been to provide victims.
*
If I succeed it will be only because I have added my inaudible whisper to the chorus of countless predecessors.
*
We are better at burying than resurrecting.
*
Berlusconi: “Am I faithful? Frequently.”
#
Saturday, March 03, 2012
***************************************
ON THE THEORY OF RELATIVITY
IN HUMAN AFFAIRS
************************************************
Our Turcocentric ghazetajis love honest Turks like Orhan Pamuk and Taner Akcam but hate honest Armenians. In their eyes Turkish political leaders are the scum of the earth and their Armenian counterparts la crème de la crème.
In the eyes of their own people Genghis Khan, Timurlang, and Kemal are great men.
You want to know more about our own General Antranik?
Ask an Azeri or read an Azeri historian. You may not get the truth but you may have a more balanced view.
In the eyes of some Georgians (also Armenians and Russians) Stalin was a great leader.
Propaganda is a bad judge of character.
A hero is never a hero in the eyes of his victims.
In the eyes of some great men other great men are midgets. (See Churchill on Gandhi.)
Greatness, very much like success in Hollywood, is relative: the closer the relative, the greater the success.
#
***************************************
ON POWER
*************************
No matter how you slice it,
you will always end up with the 1%
engaged in deceiving, misleading, and exploiting the 99%.
Take away the mumbo jumbo and
a so-called great or charismatic leader
will be exposed as an ordinary Joe like you and me
who is trying to do his best
and ends up doing the worst.
By mumbo jumbo I mean what goes on today in the United States – primaries: speeches, debates, TV ads, interviews…
So what is the solution?
There is none!
I like this sentence by Toynbee:
“Comprehension sometimes consists in just a correct understanding of questions that are unanswerable.”
Only to the brainwashed everything is as clear as daylight.
#
Friday, March 02, 2012
*************************************
ASSUMPTIONS
*******************************
Our most fundamental assumptions may be invisible to us but they are clearly visible to others.
*
We are not all white, neither are our enemies all black. We are not even shades of gray. We are brown…
*
As I see it, the main function of our pundits, academics and ghazetajis is to convince the 99% that we owe our survival to our 1%. This may suggest the only contribution of our 99% to our history has been to provide victims.
*
If I succeed it will be only because I have added my inaudible whisper to the chorus of countless predecessors.
*
We are better at burying than resurrecting.
*
Berlusconi: “Am I faithful? Frequently.”
#
Saturday, March 03, 2012
***************************************
ON THE THEORY OF RELATIVITY
IN HUMAN AFFAIRS
************************************************
Our Turcocentric ghazetajis love honest Turks like Orhan Pamuk and Taner Akcam but hate honest Armenians. In their eyes Turkish political leaders are the scum of the earth and their Armenian counterparts la crème de la crème.
In the eyes of their own people Genghis Khan, Timurlang, and Kemal are great men.
You want to know more about our own General Antranik?
Ask an Azeri or read an Azeri historian. You may not get the truth but you may have a more balanced view.
In the eyes of some Georgians (also Armenians and Russians) Stalin was a great leader.
Propaganda is a bad judge of character.
A hero is never a hero in the eyes of his victims.
In the eyes of some great men other great men are midgets. (See Churchill on Gandhi.)
Greatness, very much like success in Hollywood, is relative: the closer the relative, the greater the success.
#
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
