May 16, 2010
***************************************************
REPLIES
************************************************
FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH BETTY MIDLER
****************************
Q: What is the quality you most like in a man?
A: Guts.
Q: What is the quality you most like in a woman?
A: Balls.
*
FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH BRIGITTE BARDOT
*****************************************************
Q: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
A: Nothing about me. Everything about others.
*
FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH SALMAN RUSHDIE
*****************************************************
Q: What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
A: Faith.
Q: What is your greatest fear?
A: Irrelevance.
*
See VANITY FAIR'S PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE (New York, 2009)
#
May 17, 2010
***************************************************
MORE REPLIES TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
************************************************
MAUREEN DOWD
*************************************
Q: How would you like to die?
A: After my enemies.
*
DUSTIN HOFFMAN
********************************
Q: On what occasion do you lie?
A: When people ask , “How are you?” The real answer I save for my therapist.
Q: Who are your favorite writers?
A: Nineteenth-century Russians.
*
WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY
****************************************
Q: What or who is the greatest love of your life?
A: J.S. Bach.
*
SIDNEY POITIER
****************************
Q: Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
A: Jason Bourne.
*
WALTER MATTHAU
*******************************
Q: Which historical figure do you most identify with?
A: Jack the Ripper.
Q: What is your motto?
A: “F*ck you.”
*
DAVE BRUBECK
*****************************
Q: If you could choose what to come back as, what would it be?
A: J.S. Bach.
*
GORE VIDAL
********************************
Q: Who are your heroes in real life?
A: Dr Kevorkian.
#
May 18, 2010
***************************************************
MY ANSWERS TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
************************************************
Q: What is your idea of perfect happiness?
A: Playing Bach on the organ in an empty church.
Q: What is that you most dislike in others?
A: Intolerance.
Q: What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
A: Charm and a perfect set of white gleaming teeth.
Q: What do you consider your greatest achievement?
A: The fact that I have been writing for thirty-five years and I am still alive. Very few Armenian writers can say as much.
Q: Your favorite word?
A: Compassion.
Q: Your favorite writers?
A: Plato, Chekhov, Toynbee, Sartre, Zarian, Koestler, Simenon, Chandler, Lesley Blanch...among many others.
Q: Who are your heroes in real life?
A: Socrates, Diogenes, Gandhi.
Q: Your favorite heroes of fiction?
A: Jack Bower, Jason Bourne, Bugs Bunny, and Walker in POINT BLANK.
Q: Your happiest experience?
A: Receiving a letter from Saroyan saying he reads everything I write.
Q: Who is the greatest love of your life?
A: After my mother, J.S. Bach.
Q: Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
A: “If you know what I am saying,” when I don't know what I am saying.
Q: On what occasion do you lie?
A: When asked by a writer to assess his work.
Q: How would you like to die?
A: Suddenly, in my sleep.
Q: Which talent would you most like to have?
A: The ability to sing Neapolitan serenades.
Q: What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
A: Self-doubt.
Q: What is the trait you most deplore in others?
A: Subservience.
Q: What is your most marked characteristic?
A: Timidity.
Q: Which living person do you most despise?
A: Flunkies, hirelings, and brown-nosers.
Q: What is your favorite journey?
A: Greek islands, Italian cities, South-American jungles, and Caucasian mountains.
Q: If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be?
A: A concert pianist.
Q: What do you regard as the lowest of misery?
A: To be a homeless refugee in a poor country under an authoritarian regime in time of war.
Q: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
A: To be more diplomatic in my dealings with my fellow men.
#
May 19, 2010
***************************************************
MORE ANSWERS TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
************************************************
Q: Your favorite occupation?
A: Reading.
Q: Your greatest fear?
A: Losing my eyesight.
Q: Where would you like to live?
A: Since I can no longer live in the Armenian ghetto in Athens where I spent my early years – because it was torn down – in Venice.
Q: Your most treasured possession?
A: The complete organ and piano works of J.S. Bach.
Q: Your favorite saying?
A: “When the house is finished, death enters.”
*
DAVID STEINBERG
********************************
Q: If you could choose what to come back as, what would it be?
A: Frank Sinatra's dick-- the early years.
*
ON THE RADIO
****************************
“They don't eat bagels in Israel.”
*
SHRINKS
**************************
I am told I hate myself. If I do, it may be because I can't imagine anything more repulsive than being infatuated with oneself.
*
Everything I say about Armenians has been said before, and if not said, felt.
#
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Saturday, May 15, 2010
propaganda
May 13, 2010
***************************************************
POPES...AND RELATED ATROCITIES.
************************************************
I am reading a book on Renaissance popes. What rascals they were! They engaged in fornication, murder, torture, treason, wars of conquest...One of them promoted his teenage bastard son, who was not even a priest, to cardinal.
*
It is beyond me why some serious writers like Mauriac, Claudel, and Graham Greene took their Catholicism seriously. Why should anyone bother to identify himself as a Catholic when he could choose to be an honest man? Are the two mutually incompatible?
*
If one includes the number of heretics who were burned at the stake, the papacy has probably killed more people than the Mafia.
Besides these popes, American televangelists are no better than rank amateurs.
*
Organized religions are successful because like Ponzi schemes they promise much more than they deliver. They promise heaven and deliver hell. They promise 72 virgins (I wonder, what do they promise to virgins?) and they legitimize the murder of innocent civilians.
*
That's the way it is with charlatans: the more they promise, the less they deliver. The great Powers promised our historic lands, and they delivered massacres.
*
To be dependent on someone else's goodwill: I can't imagine a worst fate. We were dependent on Turkish goodwill for 600 years, until...
*
Even at its most savage, writing is the gentlest of arts, because no writer is in a position to force anyone to read what he writes. If you are disappointed in what you are reading, it may well be a result of inadequacy, not necessarily yours but mine.
*
It is easy to make mistakes, much harder to admit them.
*
In old age you become aware of your youthful mistakes.
*
We are all entitled to make one or two major mistakes and ten thousand minor ones.
*
For every honest man there are ten thousand crooks who are brainwashed to believe they are honest men.
#
May 14, 2010
***************************************************
FREIENDS AND ENEMIES
************************************************
I find the venom of my enemies more stimulating than the honey of my friends, in the same way that our Turcocentric ghazetajis find the lies of Turkish bureaucrats more stimulating than the truths of our writers – judging by the lies they quote and the truths they ignore.
And why?
Because asserting moral superiority is more flattering to their ego than examining their conscience.
But that's not the worst part of it.
The most dangerous misconception our Turcocentric ghazetajis spread is the notion that our genocide is history (in the sense that it belongs to the irrevocable past) rather than a self-inflicted ongoing operation. That is also why they are very eager to name the perpetrators of the first “red” genocide, but not of the second “white” one.
*
The trouble with asserting moral superiority is that it doesn't end there. Sooner or later and gradually it degenerates to dogmatism and ultimately infallibility; and we all know what happens to charlatans who assert infallibility: they end up victimizing innocent and defenseless civilians – from burning heretics at the stake to sexually assaulting children.
*
You want to know what is the difference between propaganda and literature?
Our propaganda says, we have enemies and we have friends.
Our literature says, the enemy is us.
*
Were the Great Powers of the West our enemies or friends?
If they were our friends, where were they when we needed them most?
*
In his JOURNALS Kierkegaard writes: “One man alone cannot help or save the age in which he lives, he can only express the fact that it will perish.”
To save the age?
If our Lord perished while trying, what chance to we miserable mortals have?
#
May 15, 2010
***************************************************
WHAT IS PROPAGANDA?
************************************************
The difference between a lie and propaganda is that a lie may be exposed but propaganda, even when exposed, continues to be believed.
*
All power structures (be they political parties, organized religion, or business corporations) engage in propaganda. That's because their number one concern is their own legitimacy rather than the truth.
*
All power that is not selfless service is illegitimate.
*
To believe and to recycle propaganda is infinitely more dangerous than to lie.
*
Propaganda is at the root of all intolerance, persecution, wars, and massacres.
*
Only dupes who cannot think for themselves believe in propaganda.
*
The world is a dangerous place and life a risky business because those who cannot think for themselves have always outnumbered those who can.
*
Millions of innocent civilians have died because their killers were brainwashed to believe their God was the only true God, and their race was God's chosen.
*
For every propaganda line there will be another that contradicts it.
*
All claims of superiority are false because no one has ever admitted to belong to an inferior race, nation, or tribe.
*
Moses was wrong if only because he failed to add the most important commandment of all, namely: “Thou shalt not believe in men who speak in the name of God for they engage in propaganda.”
#
***************************************************
POPES...AND RELATED ATROCITIES.
************************************************
I am reading a book on Renaissance popes. What rascals they were! They engaged in fornication, murder, torture, treason, wars of conquest...One of them promoted his teenage bastard son, who was not even a priest, to cardinal.
*
It is beyond me why some serious writers like Mauriac, Claudel, and Graham Greene took their Catholicism seriously. Why should anyone bother to identify himself as a Catholic when he could choose to be an honest man? Are the two mutually incompatible?
*
If one includes the number of heretics who were burned at the stake, the papacy has probably killed more people than the Mafia.
Besides these popes, American televangelists are no better than rank amateurs.
*
Organized religions are successful because like Ponzi schemes they promise much more than they deliver. They promise heaven and deliver hell. They promise 72 virgins (I wonder, what do they promise to virgins?) and they legitimize the murder of innocent civilians.
*
That's the way it is with charlatans: the more they promise, the less they deliver. The great Powers promised our historic lands, and they delivered massacres.
*
To be dependent on someone else's goodwill: I can't imagine a worst fate. We were dependent on Turkish goodwill for 600 years, until...
*
Even at its most savage, writing is the gentlest of arts, because no writer is in a position to force anyone to read what he writes. If you are disappointed in what you are reading, it may well be a result of inadequacy, not necessarily yours but mine.
*
It is easy to make mistakes, much harder to admit them.
*
In old age you become aware of your youthful mistakes.
*
We are all entitled to make one or two major mistakes and ten thousand minor ones.
*
For every honest man there are ten thousand crooks who are brainwashed to believe they are honest men.
#
May 14, 2010
***************************************************
FREIENDS AND ENEMIES
************************************************
I find the venom of my enemies more stimulating than the honey of my friends, in the same way that our Turcocentric ghazetajis find the lies of Turkish bureaucrats more stimulating than the truths of our writers – judging by the lies they quote and the truths they ignore.
And why?
Because asserting moral superiority is more flattering to their ego than examining their conscience.
But that's not the worst part of it.
The most dangerous misconception our Turcocentric ghazetajis spread is the notion that our genocide is history (in the sense that it belongs to the irrevocable past) rather than a self-inflicted ongoing operation. That is also why they are very eager to name the perpetrators of the first “red” genocide, but not of the second “white” one.
*
The trouble with asserting moral superiority is that it doesn't end there. Sooner or later and gradually it degenerates to dogmatism and ultimately infallibility; and we all know what happens to charlatans who assert infallibility: they end up victimizing innocent and defenseless civilians – from burning heretics at the stake to sexually assaulting children.
*
You want to know what is the difference between propaganda and literature?
Our propaganda says, we have enemies and we have friends.
Our literature says, the enemy is us.
*
Were the Great Powers of the West our enemies or friends?
If they were our friends, where were they when we needed them most?
*
In his JOURNALS Kierkegaard writes: “One man alone cannot help or save the age in which he lives, he can only express the fact that it will perish.”
To save the age?
If our Lord perished while trying, what chance to we miserable mortals have?
#
May 15, 2010
***************************************************
WHAT IS PROPAGANDA?
************************************************
The difference between a lie and propaganda is that a lie may be exposed but propaganda, even when exposed, continues to be believed.
*
All power structures (be they political parties, organized religion, or business corporations) engage in propaganda. That's because their number one concern is their own legitimacy rather than the truth.
*
All power that is not selfless service is illegitimate.
*
To believe and to recycle propaganda is infinitely more dangerous than to lie.
*
Propaganda is at the root of all intolerance, persecution, wars, and massacres.
*
Only dupes who cannot think for themselves believe in propaganda.
*
The world is a dangerous place and life a risky business because those who cannot think for themselves have always outnumbered those who can.
*
Millions of innocent civilians have died because their killers were brainwashed to believe their God was the only true God, and their race was God's chosen.
*
For every propaganda line there will be another that contradicts it.
*
All claims of superiority are false because no one has ever admitted to belong to an inferior race, nation, or tribe.
*
Moses was wrong if only because he failed to add the most important commandment of all, namely: “Thou shalt not believe in men who speak in the name of God for they engage in propaganda.”
#
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
my aim
May 9, 2010
***************************************************
TO MAKE A LONG STORY SHORT
************************************************
Just because something happens, it does not mean it is God's will.
God has given us a brain and if we don't use it, we can't blame our blunders on God or, for that matter, on the Devil.
But the blame-game is the favorite sport of all losers, and we are no exception.
*
“Turks, Turks, Turks,” say our leaders; never “the buck stops here.”
*
To say we need solutions is to imply that our literature is a waste of time – a convenient line with which to suppress dissent or anyone who refuses to flatter our ego.
*
We are not as good as we think we, Naregatsi tells us. We may even be worse than we like to admit. Which may explain why Naregatsi is our greatest and least read writer.
*
If you want the truth, give up all hope for flattery.
*
Where there are divisions, there will also be dupes who are easily taken in by false arguments.
*
Nice Armenians exist, but only in Saroyan, who was himself far from nice, or so we are told by his wife and son in their memoirs.
*
There is no money in dissent, hence the scarcity of dissenters.
There is money in flattery, hence the abundance of brown-nosers.
*
A victim who collaborates with his victimizer ceases to be a victim.
#
May 10, 2010
***************************************************
AS OTHERS SEE US
************************************************
We have friends. So do Turks. In a review of Norman Stone's THE ATLANTIC AND ITS ENEMIES, I read: “...he (Norman Stone) has become a passionate advocate for Turkey against a very powerful Armenian diaspora.” (THE SPECTATOR, 24 April 2010, page 32.)
I suspect what is meant here is not that we are powerful but that we have some mighty powerful arguments in our favor.
*
To cover up a scandal or a lie may be easy, but to cover up a million corpses is much more difficult. The Turks say the corpses are not Armenian but Turkish. What they ignore is the fact that you cannot bury a million bodies in the middle of a desert where no battle was fought.
A very powerful Armenian diaspora?
Don't make me laugh!
*
In the same issue of THE SPECTATOR I also read the following: “...the real abuse by Roman Catholic priests may not be the groping of child bodies but priestly subversion of child minds.”
I agree! Brainwashing is as serious a crime as sexual molestation of defenseless boys and girls.
Organized religions compound their felonies by
(one) asserting infallibility, and
(two) by legitimizing intolerance.
*
Thucydides: “The strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must.”
By dividing themselves and engaging in endless internecine conflicts, the ancient Greeks and contemporaries of Thucydides fell prey to Macedonians, Romans, and Ottoman Turks. And very much like us, they continue to divide themselves today. And again like us, they continue to find themselves at the mercy of powers beyond their control.
*
Philip Pullman: “Wisdom works secretly and quietly, not in the great courts and palaces of the earth, but among ordinary people.”
#
May 11, 2010
***************************************************
COMMISSARS
************************************************
To how many of my critics and detractors I could say, some day if I ever write an essay titled “Portrait of a commissar,” I will use you as a source of inspiration. Like all commissars, you are better at shooting writers than understanding them. I wonder why. Is it because it is easier to shoot them in the neck than trying to understand them?
*
Like all skinheads and fanatics, all commissars are wrong if only because they assert infallibility, which amounts to a bordello madam asserting virginity.
*
It is much easier to say “It was God's will,” rather than, “It was our fault.”
*
In all anti-democratic environments, the people are brainwashed to support and believe in liars and starve those who expose them.
*
Why should God interfere when men adopt the Devil as their role model?
After giving us what we need to survive and shape our destiny, God tells us, “It's up to you to decide if you want to live like free men or die like slaves.”
You may now guess what has been our choice.
*
“Many cities of men he saw and learned their minds,” Homer says of Odysseus. We too have seen many cities and a large variety of men, but what have we learned? -- except perhaps to brag about how smart we are and blame others for our misfortunes.
*
You want solutions?
Read the Bible.
“A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
“Where there is no vision the people perish.”
And the people perish because
“When the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.”
*
Unlike Protestants, Catholics are not encouraged to read the Bible. Neither, it seems, are Armenians – judging by the number of readers who demand solutions from me, as if I were a better writer than the Holy Ghost.
*
Even so, I thank my detractors, for they are my most faithful readers.
#
May 12, 2010
***************************************************
MY AIM IN LIFE
************************************************
To make the incomprehensible comprehensible.
Also to convince the brainwashed
that they have been brainwashed.
Not an easy task, especially if the brainwashed
have also been brainwashed to believe they are smart.
I maintain our history,
or what they call nowadays, our narrative,
proves that some of us may indeed be smart in the marketplace,
but most of us are dumb in politics.
What if I am wrong and my critics right?
That's always a possibility of course,
but a very remote one, if my critics believe
what I believed thirty years ago.
As for those of my critics who think
they have all the answers:
No one but the Good Lord has all the answers --
I use the Good Lord as a point of reference.
I don't assert His existence.
I assume it.
There is a difference.
As for our genocide:
I believe the narrative of our nationalist historians
and Turcocentric ghazetajis to be wrong
in so far as it stresses Turkish responsibility
and covers up the incompetence of our leadership.
Lamentation is important.
But learning from our blunders is even more so.
Turkish responsibility does not justify
our own past and present irresponsibility.
#
***************************************************
TO MAKE A LONG STORY SHORT
************************************************
Just because something happens, it does not mean it is God's will.
God has given us a brain and if we don't use it, we can't blame our blunders on God or, for that matter, on the Devil.
But the blame-game is the favorite sport of all losers, and we are no exception.
*
“Turks, Turks, Turks,” say our leaders; never “the buck stops here.”
*
To say we need solutions is to imply that our literature is a waste of time – a convenient line with which to suppress dissent or anyone who refuses to flatter our ego.
*
We are not as good as we think we, Naregatsi tells us. We may even be worse than we like to admit. Which may explain why Naregatsi is our greatest and least read writer.
*
If you want the truth, give up all hope for flattery.
*
Where there are divisions, there will also be dupes who are easily taken in by false arguments.
*
Nice Armenians exist, but only in Saroyan, who was himself far from nice, or so we are told by his wife and son in their memoirs.
*
There is no money in dissent, hence the scarcity of dissenters.
There is money in flattery, hence the abundance of brown-nosers.
*
A victim who collaborates with his victimizer ceases to be a victim.
#
May 10, 2010
***************************************************
AS OTHERS SEE US
************************************************
We have friends. So do Turks. In a review of Norman Stone's THE ATLANTIC AND ITS ENEMIES, I read: “...he (Norman Stone) has become a passionate advocate for Turkey against a very powerful Armenian diaspora.” (THE SPECTATOR, 24 April 2010, page 32.)
I suspect what is meant here is not that we are powerful but that we have some mighty powerful arguments in our favor.
*
To cover up a scandal or a lie may be easy, but to cover up a million corpses is much more difficult. The Turks say the corpses are not Armenian but Turkish. What they ignore is the fact that you cannot bury a million bodies in the middle of a desert where no battle was fought.
A very powerful Armenian diaspora?
Don't make me laugh!
*
In the same issue of THE SPECTATOR I also read the following: “...the real abuse by Roman Catholic priests may not be the groping of child bodies but priestly subversion of child minds.”
I agree! Brainwashing is as serious a crime as sexual molestation of defenseless boys and girls.
Organized religions compound their felonies by
(one) asserting infallibility, and
(two) by legitimizing intolerance.
*
Thucydides: “The strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must.”
By dividing themselves and engaging in endless internecine conflicts, the ancient Greeks and contemporaries of Thucydides fell prey to Macedonians, Romans, and Ottoman Turks. And very much like us, they continue to divide themselves today. And again like us, they continue to find themselves at the mercy of powers beyond their control.
*
Philip Pullman: “Wisdom works secretly and quietly, not in the great courts and palaces of the earth, but among ordinary people.”
#
May 11, 2010
***************************************************
COMMISSARS
************************************************
To how many of my critics and detractors I could say, some day if I ever write an essay titled “Portrait of a commissar,” I will use you as a source of inspiration. Like all commissars, you are better at shooting writers than understanding them. I wonder why. Is it because it is easier to shoot them in the neck than trying to understand them?
*
Like all skinheads and fanatics, all commissars are wrong if only because they assert infallibility, which amounts to a bordello madam asserting virginity.
*
It is much easier to say “It was God's will,” rather than, “It was our fault.”
*
In all anti-democratic environments, the people are brainwashed to support and believe in liars and starve those who expose them.
*
Why should God interfere when men adopt the Devil as their role model?
After giving us what we need to survive and shape our destiny, God tells us, “It's up to you to decide if you want to live like free men or die like slaves.”
You may now guess what has been our choice.
*
“Many cities of men he saw and learned their minds,” Homer says of Odysseus. We too have seen many cities and a large variety of men, but what have we learned? -- except perhaps to brag about how smart we are and blame others for our misfortunes.
*
You want solutions?
Read the Bible.
“A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
“Where there is no vision the people perish.”
And the people perish because
“When the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.”
*
Unlike Protestants, Catholics are not encouraged to read the Bible. Neither, it seems, are Armenians – judging by the number of readers who demand solutions from me, as if I were a better writer than the Holy Ghost.
*
Even so, I thank my detractors, for they are my most faithful readers.
#
May 12, 2010
***************************************************
MY AIM IN LIFE
************************************************
To make the incomprehensible comprehensible.
Also to convince the brainwashed
that they have been brainwashed.
Not an easy task, especially if the brainwashed
have also been brainwashed to believe they are smart.
I maintain our history,
or what they call nowadays, our narrative,
proves that some of us may indeed be smart in the marketplace,
but most of us are dumb in politics.
What if I am wrong and my critics right?
That's always a possibility of course,
but a very remote one, if my critics believe
what I believed thirty years ago.
As for those of my critics who think
they have all the answers:
No one but the Good Lord has all the answers --
I use the Good Lord as a point of reference.
I don't assert His existence.
I assume it.
There is a difference.
As for our genocide:
I believe the narrative of our nationalist historians
and Turcocentric ghazetajis to be wrong
in so far as it stresses Turkish responsibility
and covers up the incompetence of our leadership.
Lamentation is important.
But learning from our blunders is even more so.
Turkish responsibility does not justify
our own past and present irresponsibility.
#
Saturday, May 8, 2010
lies...
May 6, 2010
***************************************************
WITNESSES FOR THE PROSECUTION
****************************************************
Our history keeps unfolding like a worst case scenario.
And what has been the contribution of our leadership to this fiasco?
Treason, betrayal, and collaboration with the enemy.
And the contribution of our historians?
Lies and propaganda.
We are a people like any other people, we are told.
To which I can only say:
When was the last time we beheaded a single king or boss?
Am I advocating public executions?
Hell no! Only pointing out a difference.
But enough about what I think. Allow me to introduce my witnesses:
*
Shavarsh Missakian on our degeneration:
“The Armenian Diaspora is losing its character. Our language, our literature, and our traditions are degenerating. Even our religious leaders have abandoned their calling and turned into cunning wheeler-dealers. Our press thrives on meaningless controversies. I see charlatanism and cheap chauvinism everywhere but not a single trace of self-sacrifice and dedication to principles and ideals. What's happening to us? Where are we heading? Quo vadis, O Armenian people?”
*
Levon Pashalian on our bosses:
“A familiar figure in our collective existence is the wealthy and arrogant community leader who, by obstructing the path of all those who wish to reform and improve our conditions, perpetuates a status quo whose sole aim is his own personal profit and aggrandizement.”
*
Philip Mansel on massacres:
“Some Armenian leaders hoped for a massacre in the belief that it would provoke the intervention of the Great Powers.”
*
Shirvanzadeh on our ghazetajis:
“The narrow partisan propaganda line that is espoused by our press is the enemy of all literature.”
*
Nigoghos Sarafian:
“Our history is a litany of lamentation, anxiety, horror, and slaughter. Also deception and abysmal naiveté mixed with the smoke of incense and the sound of sharagans.”
*
Derenik Saribekian on collaboration with the enemy:
“It is safer to defend the interests of wolves against sheep than the other way around.”
*
Nothing further, your Honor!
#
May 7, 2010
***************************************************
DECLINE AND FALL
************************************************
What makes strong nations weak?
Corruption, incompetence, divisions, and internecine conflicts.
What makes weak nations weaker?
Ditto.
Knowing this why do we allow our leaders to divide us?
Because they are more like wolves and we are more like sheep.
*
About corruption: is there anything we can do about it?
We begin by exposing it. Not an easy undertaking.
Why not?
Because the corrupt don't like to be exposed, and the incompetent will never admit incompetence. Those in power will never give it up without a bloody fight, Hegel tells us, and so it is. Consider the number of emperors, kings, and czars that were assassinated or beheaded. But even more to the point, consider the number of thinkers who were persecuted, silenced, exiled, and executed.
*
If I speak of our many problems but don't provide a single solution (as my critics are fond of saying) it may be because I write for readers who are brainwashed to believe we are in the best of hands and we never had it so good.
As for readers who tell me they know all about our problems but what they need is solutions, I say: We can't abracadabra our way out of our problems, and there are no verbal formulas or programs with numbered steps that will reform our leaders, who expect us to believe they are doing their best and if their best is not good enough it is because we are all at the mercy of historical, cultural, political, and environmental conditions beyond our control.
And if you believe that, you will believe anything!
#
May 8, 2010
***************************************************
ON HISTORIANS
************************************************
Herodotus, the“father of history,” is also known as the “father of lies.” Ever since then historians have called one another liars. Two of the greatest historians of the last century, Arnold J. Toynbee and Oswald Spengler, have attracted more critical fire and verbal abuse by fellow historians than any other historian dead or alive. For more on this subject, see Toynbee's STUDY OF HISTORY,volume 12, subtitled RECONSIDERATIONS, where he discusses and replies to his critics, one of whom – Hugh Trevor-Roper, a fellow Englishman – was so abusive that reading him, Toynbee writes in a footnote, was like being verbally electrocuted.
*
We are products not of our culture, religion, climate, and environment, but of our collective experiences, that is to say, our history, or rather, the lies of our historians, which have done more to shape our worldview and character than reality and truth, or our literature and culture, of which the average Armenian knows nothing and cares even less – unless of course you classify shish-kebab and pilaf under culture.
*
My human right of free speech has been violated unanimously by our publishers and editors and I can't think of a single reader, writer, academic or vodanavorji who has raised a single objection. I have been reduced to the status of an abominable no man all because I refuse to recycle the lies of our historians or to flatter the colossal egos of our leaders.
*
To those who accuse me of being a denialist, I suggest they read my ARMENIAN GENOCIDE AND THE WEST.
*
You want to prosper in our environment?
Lie!
*
To those who say I am not published in our press because I am a bad writer, I say: I could make a long list of far better writers than myself who not only were silenced but also betrayed, exiled or executed. And if you say, since I have not been exiled or shot, it means we are moving in the right direction, I say, I am not exiled because I live in self-imposed exile in the middle of nowhere, which I call “my Siberia.” And the only reason I have not been betrayed and shot is that I have done nothing against the laws of the land, namely Canada, which is a democracy, and in a democracy writers don't get shot for exercising their human rights.
As I have said before and it bears repeating: Progress is not our most important product.
#
***************************************************
WITNESSES FOR THE PROSECUTION
****************************************************
Our history keeps unfolding like a worst case scenario.
And what has been the contribution of our leadership to this fiasco?
Treason, betrayal, and collaboration with the enemy.
And the contribution of our historians?
Lies and propaganda.
We are a people like any other people, we are told.
To which I can only say:
When was the last time we beheaded a single king or boss?
Am I advocating public executions?
Hell no! Only pointing out a difference.
But enough about what I think. Allow me to introduce my witnesses:
*
Shavarsh Missakian on our degeneration:
“The Armenian Diaspora is losing its character. Our language, our literature, and our traditions are degenerating. Even our religious leaders have abandoned their calling and turned into cunning wheeler-dealers. Our press thrives on meaningless controversies. I see charlatanism and cheap chauvinism everywhere but not a single trace of self-sacrifice and dedication to principles and ideals. What's happening to us? Where are we heading? Quo vadis, O Armenian people?”
*
Levon Pashalian on our bosses:
“A familiar figure in our collective existence is the wealthy and arrogant community leader who, by obstructing the path of all those who wish to reform and improve our conditions, perpetuates a status quo whose sole aim is his own personal profit and aggrandizement.”
*
Philip Mansel on massacres:
“Some Armenian leaders hoped for a massacre in the belief that it would provoke the intervention of the Great Powers.”
*
Shirvanzadeh on our ghazetajis:
“The narrow partisan propaganda line that is espoused by our press is the enemy of all literature.”
*
Nigoghos Sarafian:
“Our history is a litany of lamentation, anxiety, horror, and slaughter. Also deception and abysmal naiveté mixed with the smoke of incense and the sound of sharagans.”
*
Derenik Saribekian on collaboration with the enemy:
“It is safer to defend the interests of wolves against sheep than the other way around.”
*
Nothing further, your Honor!
#
May 7, 2010
***************************************************
DECLINE AND FALL
************************************************
What makes strong nations weak?
Corruption, incompetence, divisions, and internecine conflicts.
What makes weak nations weaker?
Ditto.
Knowing this why do we allow our leaders to divide us?
Because they are more like wolves and we are more like sheep.
*
About corruption: is there anything we can do about it?
We begin by exposing it. Not an easy undertaking.
Why not?
Because the corrupt don't like to be exposed, and the incompetent will never admit incompetence. Those in power will never give it up without a bloody fight, Hegel tells us, and so it is. Consider the number of emperors, kings, and czars that were assassinated or beheaded. But even more to the point, consider the number of thinkers who were persecuted, silenced, exiled, and executed.
*
If I speak of our many problems but don't provide a single solution (as my critics are fond of saying) it may be because I write for readers who are brainwashed to believe we are in the best of hands and we never had it so good.
As for readers who tell me they know all about our problems but what they need is solutions, I say: We can't abracadabra our way out of our problems, and there are no verbal formulas or programs with numbered steps that will reform our leaders, who expect us to believe they are doing their best and if their best is not good enough it is because we are all at the mercy of historical, cultural, political, and environmental conditions beyond our control.
And if you believe that, you will believe anything!
#
May 8, 2010
***************************************************
ON HISTORIANS
************************************************
Herodotus, the“father of history,” is also known as the “father of lies.” Ever since then historians have called one another liars. Two of the greatest historians of the last century, Arnold J. Toynbee and Oswald Spengler, have attracted more critical fire and verbal abuse by fellow historians than any other historian dead or alive. For more on this subject, see Toynbee's STUDY OF HISTORY,volume 12, subtitled RECONSIDERATIONS, where he discusses and replies to his critics, one of whom – Hugh Trevor-Roper, a fellow Englishman – was so abusive that reading him, Toynbee writes in a footnote, was like being verbally electrocuted.
*
We are products not of our culture, religion, climate, and environment, but of our collective experiences, that is to say, our history, or rather, the lies of our historians, which have done more to shape our worldview and character than reality and truth, or our literature and culture, of which the average Armenian knows nothing and cares even less – unless of course you classify shish-kebab and pilaf under culture.
*
My human right of free speech has been violated unanimously by our publishers and editors and I can't think of a single reader, writer, academic or vodanavorji who has raised a single objection. I have been reduced to the status of an abominable no man all because I refuse to recycle the lies of our historians or to flatter the colossal egos of our leaders.
*
To those who accuse me of being a denialist, I suggest they read my ARMENIAN GENOCIDE AND THE WEST.
*
You want to prosper in our environment?
Lie!
*
To those who say I am not published in our press because I am a bad writer, I say: I could make a long list of far better writers than myself who not only were silenced but also betrayed, exiled or executed. And if you say, since I have not been exiled or shot, it means we are moving in the right direction, I say, I am not exiled because I live in self-imposed exile in the middle of nowhere, which I call “my Siberia.” And the only reason I have not been betrayed and shot is that I have done nothing against the laws of the land, namely Canada, which is a democracy, and in a democracy writers don't get shot for exercising their human rights.
As I have said before and it bears repeating: Progress is not our most important product.
#
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
confessions
May 2, 2010
***************************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************
There are good Armenians and there are bad Armenians, or so I am told.
I am a bad Armenian because I hate myself and I hate Armenians, or so I am told.
Rouben Mamoulian was a bad Armenian because he never helped a single Armenian.
I once knew an Armenian conductor who, after inviting an Armenian pianist to play with his orchestra, said “Never again!”
*
Never again!
Two words used by victims with the implication, “Unless we are the perps.”
*
Once when asked why I don't encourage young Armenian writers, I said “We need readers not writers.” No one dared to object.
*
One of the functions of lawyers is to defend the lawless.
*
When asked if I believe in God, I say, “I don't believe in the God of imams, popes,
and televangelists.”
It seems to me, speaking about God or trying to understand the inconceivable and the incomprehensible, is like trying to drink the sea with a spoon.
*
If you are an Armenian and have an opinion , you can always rely on a fellow Armenian to call you a fool and an ignoramus.
*
A safe assumption: Anything that flatters the ego is false.
*
When, at the turn of the last century, Turks heard Armenian Evangelicals singing "Onward Christian soldiers," they thought the giaours were planning another crusade.
*
If I took my critics seriously, I would have two instead of only one ulcer.
*
Good men don't judge bad men, because good men (if they exist) are too busy examining their own heart.
*
If an Armenian tells you he doesn't hate Turks, it may be because he loves to lie even more.
*
From a popular Armenian song:
"An Armenian loves to eat (oudel)
and he eats to hate (adel)."
#
May 3, 2010
***************************************************
CALL IT MEGALOMANIA
**************************************
My mission in life: to de-Ottomanize and to de-Stalinize my fellow Armenians; which amounts to saying: to humanize the dehumanized, to civilize barbarians, and to deprogram the brainwashed. Not an easy task. Which is why so far I have failed and the chances that I will ever succeed are so remote that they might as well be invisible to the most powerful telescope.
*
A LOVE STORY
*****************************
In a review of an Iranian novel mention is made of a classical Sufi love poem titled "KHOSROW AND SHIRIN, written nine centuries ago by Nizami and telling of the romance between a great Persian king and an Armenian princess.”
*
A SOLEMN PROMISE
******************************
On the day I will stop infuriating fools, fanatics, and fascists (but I repeat myself) I will give up writing.
*
PHYSICAL AND METAPHYSICAL REFLECTIONS
*******************************************************
What we don't know about the physical world or the visible universe far exceeds what we know. As for the metaphysical world – that which lies beyond the visible – we know nothing. Nothing! That doesn't stop us from blabbering endlessly about God, the Mother of God, the Son of God, the immortality of the soul, heaven and hell, and angels and devils.
*
CHARLATANS: A DEFINITION
*********************************************
Sermonizers and speechifiers who speak endlessly about things they know nothing about. Shaw is right: “All professions are conspiracies against the laity.”
*
TODAY'S QUOTATION
***********************************
William McAdoo: “It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.”
#
May 4, 2010
***************************************************
THAT WHICH WE SHARE
**************************************
Our failings are universal, I am reminded once in a while by readers who are so afraid to confront their own failings that they adopt the school of thought that says “misery likes company.”
There are divisions everywhere, granted; also corruption and incompetence, not to speak of prejudice and ignorance. But is that the end of the story?
*
In a book on the social behavior of animals, I read today: “The analysis of DNA demonstrates that only 2% of our genetic code differs from that of chimpanzees.”
In some respects, animals may be ahead of us:
“Female chimpanzees (unlike female humans) do not experience menopause, and thus can remain fertile into old age.”
Elsewhere: “It is not so much that elephants are like us. They are us, and we them.”
*
We like to say that Naregatsi is our Shakespeare and Dante combined. But who reads Naregatsi? Not even Armenians. At least I have never heard an Armenian quote a single line by Naregatsi.
*
Armenians are a fraction of mankind in the same way that a day is a fraction of eternity.
*
“An Englishman cannot be a slave,” they sing in “Rule Britannia.”
And what do we sing? “Mer hairenik, tshvar ander.”
*
About Armenians and slavery:
“Once upon a time we were slaves. We are now slaves of former slaves.”
We take to slavery like a duck takes to water, a baby to mother's milk, and newlyweds to their bed.
Instead of being subservient to the Sultan, we are now subservient to our bosses, bishops, and benefactors. Progress cannot be said to be our most important product.
*
An autobiographical short story by an American writer begins with the words: “As one who works with words for a living...”
An Armenian writer could introduce himself with the same words except one: instead of “living” he would have to say “dying.”
#
May 5, 2010
***************************************************
CONFESSIONS
**************************************
In the Homeland, our elections are marred by irregularities, or so I am told by observers. In the diaspora, we have no elections. We must therefore conclude that our representatives represent no one but themselves and their respective mafias. As for our so called democracy, respect for human rights, and rule of law: they are nothing but fictions of our imagination.
We have been so thoroughly Ottomanized and Sovietized that we consider these aberrations business as usual.
When will we see the light?
It is said of blind men that when their sight is restored, they take refuge in dark rooms.
*
To refuse to flatter fools is not the same as being negative.
*
Heroes are like cops: they are never there when you need them.
*
We flatter ourselves when we say the world, or a fraction of it, is against us. The truth is much worse, as always. The world is for itself and we may not even register on its consciousness. It would be even more accurate to say that the world cares about us as much as we care about ourselves.
*
Unlike Turks we are good at picking fights we can't win. Several of our poets have even addressed some nasty words against the Good Lord Himself. At this point I don't mind admitting that, by picking a fight against our bosses, bishops, benefactors and their army of hirelings, flunkies, dupes and brown-nosers, I too have picked a fight I can't win, and I have thus joined the ranks of my ancestors as a perennial loser.
#
***************************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************
There are good Armenians and there are bad Armenians, or so I am told.
I am a bad Armenian because I hate myself and I hate Armenians, or so I am told.
Rouben Mamoulian was a bad Armenian because he never helped a single Armenian.
I once knew an Armenian conductor who, after inviting an Armenian pianist to play with his orchestra, said “Never again!”
*
Never again!
Two words used by victims with the implication, “Unless we are the perps.”
*
Once when asked why I don't encourage young Armenian writers, I said “We need readers not writers.” No one dared to object.
*
One of the functions of lawyers is to defend the lawless.
*
When asked if I believe in God, I say, “I don't believe in the God of imams, popes,
and televangelists.”
It seems to me, speaking about God or trying to understand the inconceivable and the incomprehensible, is like trying to drink the sea with a spoon.
*
If you are an Armenian and have an opinion , you can always rely on a fellow Armenian to call you a fool and an ignoramus.
*
A safe assumption: Anything that flatters the ego is false.
*
When, at the turn of the last century, Turks heard Armenian Evangelicals singing "Onward Christian soldiers," they thought the giaours were planning another crusade.
*
If I took my critics seriously, I would have two instead of only one ulcer.
*
Good men don't judge bad men, because good men (if they exist) are too busy examining their own heart.
*
If an Armenian tells you he doesn't hate Turks, it may be because he loves to lie even more.
*
From a popular Armenian song:
"An Armenian loves to eat (oudel)
and he eats to hate (adel)."
#
May 3, 2010
***************************************************
CALL IT MEGALOMANIA
**************************************
My mission in life: to de-Ottomanize and to de-Stalinize my fellow Armenians; which amounts to saying: to humanize the dehumanized, to civilize barbarians, and to deprogram the brainwashed. Not an easy task. Which is why so far I have failed and the chances that I will ever succeed are so remote that they might as well be invisible to the most powerful telescope.
*
A LOVE STORY
*****************************
In a review of an Iranian novel mention is made of a classical Sufi love poem titled "KHOSROW AND SHIRIN, written nine centuries ago by Nizami and telling of the romance between a great Persian king and an Armenian princess.”
*
A SOLEMN PROMISE
******************************
On the day I will stop infuriating fools, fanatics, and fascists (but I repeat myself) I will give up writing.
*
PHYSICAL AND METAPHYSICAL REFLECTIONS
*******************************************************
What we don't know about the physical world or the visible universe far exceeds what we know. As for the metaphysical world – that which lies beyond the visible – we know nothing. Nothing! That doesn't stop us from blabbering endlessly about God, the Mother of God, the Son of God, the immortality of the soul, heaven and hell, and angels and devils.
*
CHARLATANS: A DEFINITION
*********************************************
Sermonizers and speechifiers who speak endlessly about things they know nothing about. Shaw is right: “All professions are conspiracies against the laity.”
*
TODAY'S QUOTATION
***********************************
William McAdoo: “It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument.”
#
May 4, 2010
***************************************************
THAT WHICH WE SHARE
**************************************
Our failings are universal, I am reminded once in a while by readers who are so afraid to confront their own failings that they adopt the school of thought that says “misery likes company.”
There are divisions everywhere, granted; also corruption and incompetence, not to speak of prejudice and ignorance. But is that the end of the story?
*
In a book on the social behavior of animals, I read today: “The analysis of DNA demonstrates that only 2% of our genetic code differs from that of chimpanzees.”
In some respects, animals may be ahead of us:
“Female chimpanzees (unlike female humans) do not experience menopause, and thus can remain fertile into old age.”
Elsewhere: “It is not so much that elephants are like us. They are us, and we them.”
*
We like to say that Naregatsi is our Shakespeare and Dante combined. But who reads Naregatsi? Not even Armenians. At least I have never heard an Armenian quote a single line by Naregatsi.
*
Armenians are a fraction of mankind in the same way that a day is a fraction of eternity.
*
“An Englishman cannot be a slave,” they sing in “Rule Britannia.”
And what do we sing? “Mer hairenik, tshvar ander.”
*
About Armenians and slavery:
“Once upon a time we were slaves. We are now slaves of former slaves.”
We take to slavery like a duck takes to water, a baby to mother's milk, and newlyweds to their bed.
Instead of being subservient to the Sultan, we are now subservient to our bosses, bishops, and benefactors. Progress cannot be said to be our most important product.
*
An autobiographical short story by an American writer begins with the words: “As one who works with words for a living...”
An Armenian writer could introduce himself with the same words except one: instead of “living” he would have to say “dying.”
#
May 5, 2010
***************************************************
CONFESSIONS
**************************************
In the Homeland, our elections are marred by irregularities, or so I am told by observers. In the diaspora, we have no elections. We must therefore conclude that our representatives represent no one but themselves and their respective mafias. As for our so called democracy, respect for human rights, and rule of law: they are nothing but fictions of our imagination.
We have been so thoroughly Ottomanized and Sovietized that we consider these aberrations business as usual.
When will we see the light?
It is said of blind men that when their sight is restored, they take refuge in dark rooms.
*
To refuse to flatter fools is not the same as being negative.
*
Heroes are like cops: they are never there when you need them.
*
We flatter ourselves when we say the world, or a fraction of it, is against us. The truth is much worse, as always. The world is for itself and we may not even register on its consciousness. It would be even more accurate to say that the world cares about us as much as we care about ourselves.
*
Unlike Turks we are good at picking fights we can't win. Several of our poets have even addressed some nasty words against the Good Lord Himself. At this point I don't mind admitting that, by picking a fight against our bosses, bishops, benefactors and their army of hirelings, flunkies, dupes and brown-nosers, I too have picked a fight I can't win, and I have thus joined the ranks of my ancestors as a perennial loser.
#
Saturday, May 1, 2010
q/a
April 29, 2010
***************************************************
CORRECT ME IF I AM WRONG
**************************************
Arrogance: The difference between how smart we are and how smart we think we are. Or rather, the difference between how smart we think we are and how dumb we really are.
*
From the war of Troy to those of Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan in our own days, we can say with some degree of certainty that war-makers are never right.
*
Our revolutionaries challenged the might of the Ottoman Empire not because we loved freedom too much (we never did...even now, in a free country like America, we continue to be afraid of free speech – see below) but because we were deceived into thinking the Empire was on its deathbed and the Great Powers were on our side.
*
Who is taken in by lies? Only dupes who allow wishful thinking to cloud their judgment.
*
Our genocide is a major tragedy. But it is also a disastrous defeat, and as such it should be analyzed objectively -- if, that is, we want to learn from our blunders. To call it a tragedy and engage in endless lamentation does nothing but certify our status as perennial victims.
To those who say our conditions of life in the Empire were so unbearable that we had no choice but to act. Maybe so, but the aim of action is not to make things worse but better. Oppression is degrading. Sadistic oppression is unbearable. But genocide is infinitely worse!
*
To say that we rose against the Empire because we loved freedom too much, is to ignore our history and the fact that for most of our existence we were the obedient and loyal subjects of ruthless and bloodthirsty tyrants from Suleiman to Stalin. So much so that in the Ottoman Empire our masters called us “the most loyal millet (ethnic group).” We were loyal to the point of betraying to the authorities our ablest men.
*
As for our love of freedom and fear of free speech: according to Hagop Garabents (Jack Karapetian) – not a dissident or critic but a pro-establishment novelist, essayist, and short story writer: “Once upon a time we fought and shed our blood for freedom. We are now afraid of free speech.”
I have quoted this line before and I will continue to quote it to remind our dupes that we are not what we pretend to be, and there is a natural tendency in all of us to speak with a forked tongue.
*
Churchill once said: “History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.” Which is why I don't trust our nationalist historians – they are invariably too kind to the nation at the expense of the truth. As for our political leaders: like all political leaders they are closer to being compulsive liars than honest witnesses or selfless servants. To believe in what they say is to be a certifiable dupe.
#
April 30, 2010
***************************************************
QUESTION
**************************************
Is what I write of any use to anyone?
I don't know and I don't care to know.
I prefer to think no one gives a damn. At least that way I have history on my side (see below). If I were to believe what I write matters, I would begin to take myself seriously and gradually degenerate into a pompous ass. Instead of sharing my understanding I would sermonize and speechify, and of sermonizers and speechifiers we already have more than our share.
*
HISTORY
*******************************
Betrayed to the authorities, abused, silenced, neglected, starved, and driven to suicide or executed, our ablest writers have been conveniently buried and forgotten. I have said this before and it bears repeating. Why should anyone give a damn about what a minor scribbler says?
*
MEMO TO MY CRITICS
*************************************
To those of my readers who are eager to inform me that I am on the wrong path, I say: “Relax! No harm done. No one gives a damn. Why should you?”
*
ANOTHER QUESTION
*****************************
Our children are brought up and even encouraged to brag about our Golden Age (5th century AD). But has anyone bothered to read any one of our golden masterpieces? Or having read them, has understood what they say? And what they say is what every honest witness has said: corruption and divisions breed incompetence, and to ignore our blunders or to cover them up is to sign the death warrant of the nation.
We have survived for millennia and we will continue to survive?
A man condemned to die the death of a thousand cuts will also survive up to the 999th cut.
What if, instead of survivors, we are “dead men walking”?
*
IF
**************
If I write what no one want to read it may be because there are many others who make a comfortable living – thank you very much – by writing what they are told to write. And what are they told to write? What else but Turks, massacres, and “mi kich pogh...”
*
THE ROOTS OF INTOLERANCE
*********************************************
To elevate an opinion, and often a false one, to an ideology, and an ideology to a belief system is a mistake we all make when we are young and not yet able to think for ourselves. This descent from the human to the thoroughly dehumanized is so gradual that more often than not it escape notice. And that's where I come in.
*
CONFESSION
****************************
I may be prejudiced. As a writer – make it, scribbler – I tend to identify with writers as opposed to their executioners. What about you?
Allow me to end with a quotation:
Antranik Zaroukian: “What kind of people are we? What kind of leadership is this? Instead of compassion, mutual contempt. Instead of reason, blind instinct. Instead of common sense, fanaticism.”
Even more to the point:
“They speak of the cross and nail us to it again as they speak.”
#
May 1, 2010
***************************************************
FAILINGS
**************************************
“I am not a Marxist!” That's the smartest thing Marx said.
As for capitalists being bloodsuckers: that has never been a secret. There is even a line to that effect in the Bible.
Christ never said “I am not a Christian,” probably because he never thought of himself as the founder of a new religion.
Speaking for myself: I am a human being first, an Armenian second, and an Armenianist, never!
*
Judging by the number of wars, revolutions, massacres, and genocides: a man is first and foremost a killing machine in search of a reason to justify his lust for blood – religion being one of them.
*
You are an honest man?
Prove it!
Show me your scars.
*
I repeat myself?
Not as often as our Panchoonies and Jack S. Avanakians.
*
You want to know why I haven't been lynched so far? Because I live in the middle of nowhere, and nowhere is hard to locate on the map.
*
There are failings and there are rotten failings. Example of a rotten failing: the fundamental human right of free speech is an invention of the degenerate West.
*
Speaking of Oshagan and his friends, Zarian once remarked: “When they speak of homeland they mean Istanbul.” One could also say, when we speak of Armenianism, we mean Ottomanism.
*
Unlike doctors, writers don't have a Hippocratic Oath. As a result, they are as willing to sell their soul as a whore is to sell her body. (I am now paraphrasing Zohrab.)
*
If Americans prefer to believe Turks rather than us, it may be because it is in their own interest to do so. The rule is, everyone does what's in his own best interest. But like all rules, this one too has its exception: namely, us. We do whatever we undertake to do because it is against our own self-interest.
#
ararat magazine
Bobelian's Children of Armenia. by Ara Baliozian comments: 0 ... Canadian writer Ara Baliozian was born in Athens, Greece, and educated in Venice, Italy. ...
www.araratmagazine.org/2010/04/bobelian-children-of-armenia/ - Cached
##
***************************************************
CORRECT ME IF I AM WRONG
**************************************
Arrogance: The difference between how smart we are and how smart we think we are. Or rather, the difference between how smart we think we are and how dumb we really are.
*
From the war of Troy to those of Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan in our own days, we can say with some degree of certainty that war-makers are never right.
*
Our revolutionaries challenged the might of the Ottoman Empire not because we loved freedom too much (we never did...even now, in a free country like America, we continue to be afraid of free speech – see below) but because we were deceived into thinking the Empire was on its deathbed and the Great Powers were on our side.
*
Who is taken in by lies? Only dupes who allow wishful thinking to cloud their judgment.
*
Our genocide is a major tragedy. But it is also a disastrous defeat, and as such it should be analyzed objectively -- if, that is, we want to learn from our blunders. To call it a tragedy and engage in endless lamentation does nothing but certify our status as perennial victims.
To those who say our conditions of life in the Empire were so unbearable that we had no choice but to act. Maybe so, but the aim of action is not to make things worse but better. Oppression is degrading. Sadistic oppression is unbearable. But genocide is infinitely worse!
*
To say that we rose against the Empire because we loved freedom too much, is to ignore our history and the fact that for most of our existence we were the obedient and loyal subjects of ruthless and bloodthirsty tyrants from Suleiman to Stalin. So much so that in the Ottoman Empire our masters called us “the most loyal millet (ethnic group).” We were loyal to the point of betraying to the authorities our ablest men.
*
As for our love of freedom and fear of free speech: according to Hagop Garabents (Jack Karapetian) – not a dissident or critic but a pro-establishment novelist, essayist, and short story writer: “Once upon a time we fought and shed our blood for freedom. We are now afraid of free speech.”
I have quoted this line before and I will continue to quote it to remind our dupes that we are not what we pretend to be, and there is a natural tendency in all of us to speak with a forked tongue.
*
Churchill once said: “History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.” Which is why I don't trust our nationalist historians – they are invariably too kind to the nation at the expense of the truth. As for our political leaders: like all political leaders they are closer to being compulsive liars than honest witnesses or selfless servants. To believe in what they say is to be a certifiable dupe.
#
April 30, 2010
***************************************************
QUESTION
**************************************
Is what I write of any use to anyone?
I don't know and I don't care to know.
I prefer to think no one gives a damn. At least that way I have history on my side (see below). If I were to believe what I write matters, I would begin to take myself seriously and gradually degenerate into a pompous ass. Instead of sharing my understanding I would sermonize and speechify, and of sermonizers and speechifiers we already have more than our share.
*
HISTORY
*******************************
Betrayed to the authorities, abused, silenced, neglected, starved, and driven to suicide or executed, our ablest writers have been conveniently buried and forgotten. I have said this before and it bears repeating. Why should anyone give a damn about what a minor scribbler says?
*
MEMO TO MY CRITICS
*************************************
To those of my readers who are eager to inform me that I am on the wrong path, I say: “Relax! No harm done. No one gives a damn. Why should you?”
*
ANOTHER QUESTION
*****************************
Our children are brought up and even encouraged to brag about our Golden Age (5th century AD). But has anyone bothered to read any one of our golden masterpieces? Or having read them, has understood what they say? And what they say is what every honest witness has said: corruption and divisions breed incompetence, and to ignore our blunders or to cover them up is to sign the death warrant of the nation.
We have survived for millennia and we will continue to survive?
A man condemned to die the death of a thousand cuts will also survive up to the 999th cut.
What if, instead of survivors, we are “dead men walking”?
*
IF
**************
If I write what no one want to read it may be because there are many others who make a comfortable living – thank you very much – by writing what they are told to write. And what are they told to write? What else but Turks, massacres, and “mi kich pogh...”
*
THE ROOTS OF INTOLERANCE
*********************************************
To elevate an opinion, and often a false one, to an ideology, and an ideology to a belief system is a mistake we all make when we are young and not yet able to think for ourselves. This descent from the human to the thoroughly dehumanized is so gradual that more often than not it escape notice. And that's where I come in.
*
CONFESSION
****************************
I may be prejudiced. As a writer – make it, scribbler – I tend to identify with writers as opposed to their executioners. What about you?
Allow me to end with a quotation:
Antranik Zaroukian: “What kind of people are we? What kind of leadership is this? Instead of compassion, mutual contempt. Instead of reason, blind instinct. Instead of common sense, fanaticism.”
Even more to the point:
“They speak of the cross and nail us to it again as they speak.”
#
May 1, 2010
***************************************************
FAILINGS
**************************************
“I am not a Marxist!” That's the smartest thing Marx said.
As for capitalists being bloodsuckers: that has never been a secret. There is even a line to that effect in the Bible.
Christ never said “I am not a Christian,” probably because he never thought of himself as the founder of a new religion.
Speaking for myself: I am a human being first, an Armenian second, and an Armenianist, never!
*
Judging by the number of wars, revolutions, massacres, and genocides: a man is first and foremost a killing machine in search of a reason to justify his lust for blood – religion being one of them.
*
You are an honest man?
Prove it!
Show me your scars.
*
I repeat myself?
Not as often as our Panchoonies and Jack S. Avanakians.
*
You want to know why I haven't been lynched so far? Because I live in the middle of nowhere, and nowhere is hard to locate on the map.
*
There are failings and there are rotten failings. Example of a rotten failing: the fundamental human right of free speech is an invention of the degenerate West.
*
Speaking of Oshagan and his friends, Zarian once remarked: “When they speak of homeland they mean Istanbul.” One could also say, when we speak of Armenianism, we mean Ottomanism.
*
Unlike doctors, writers don't have a Hippocratic Oath. As a result, they are as willing to sell their soul as a whore is to sell her body. (I am now paraphrasing Zohrab.)
*
If Americans prefer to believe Turks rather than us, it may be because it is in their own interest to do so. The rule is, everyone does what's in his own best interest. But like all rules, this one too has its exception: namely, us. We do whatever we undertake to do because it is against our own self-interest.
#
ararat magazine
Bobelian's Children of Armenia. by Ara Baliozian comments: 0 ... Canadian writer Ara Baliozian was born in Athens, Greece, and educated in Venice, Italy. ...
www.araratmagazine.org/2010/04/bobelian-children-of-armenia/ - Cached
##
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
enemies
April 25, 2010
***************************************************
COMPASSION
**************************************
Compassion, I am told, is a missing ingredient in my commentaries. What I am not told is, compassion for whom? The victim or the victimizer, the deceiver or his dupe?
*
A critic is judged by his degree of objectivity; a sermonizer by his compassion (which means suffering with); a physician, on the other hand, is judged by the accuracy of his diagnoses; and a lawyer by his ability to prove the innocent guilty (if he is with the prosecution) and the guilty innocent (if he is with the defense).
What I am trying to say here is that, all lines of work have their own specific and narrow aims, and it would be a mistake for a critic to muscle in the territory of sermonizers, or for that matter, for a lawyer to discard his whig, don a white coat and with a stethoscope around his neck, walk into a hospital and pretend to know what he is talking about.
*
As Armenians, shall we ascribe all our problems to our writers and critics for their lack of compassion? Like the rest of mankind, we too have been exposed to sermonizers for almost two millennia now. What has been the result? More lies, more corruption, more incompetence, more victims, more blunders, and more propaganda. As they say in Washington: “You want a friend who will love you even if you are an s.o.b. or a dealer in b.s. (caca de toro), get a dog!”
#
April 26, 2010
***************************************************
AND ANOTHER THING
**************************************
Underestimating the opposition might as well be synonymous with defeat.
At the turn of the last century the Ottoman Empire was labeled “the Sick Man of Europe.” That's when our revolutionaries decided to challenge its might and went as far as daring the Sultan to massacre us, assuming if he was foolish enough to do so, the Great Powers of the West and the Czar of all the Russias would fall on him like a ton of bricks. No one said the Empire was less like a sick man and more like a wounded tiger, that is to say, at its most dangerous phase.
Our greatest enemy then and now is not the Turk but our damaged perception of reality.
*
And now, consider the case of Palestinians today: they too underestimated the opposition when they chose to go on the warpath. They thought, as Muslims – once upon a time mighty warriors and empire builders – they outnumbered Jews a thousand to one. Besides, who were these Jews who dared to occupy their lands? Nothing but scrawny money-changers who had not fought and won a single war during the last two thousand years.
*
How right are those of my readers who tell me I should get busy flattering egos instead of exposing derrières and questioning the integrity of our leaders, their institutions, and their fund-raising campaigns?
And speaking of fund-raising: If the deciding vote is cast by the bottom line, it only means the decision-makers think not with their brains (assuming they have any) but with their bottoms.
*
It has been said, “We begin to grow up on the day someone we love dies.”
We died.
What have our leaders learned?
Did they ever love us?
#
April 27, 2010
***************************************************
AS OTHERS SEE US
**************************************
Last night on the evening news on TV there was talk of organized Armenian gangs in Los Angeles. Now a few more million people know we are not what we pretend to be.
But then who is?
And yet, we keep brainwashing our children to believe we are better and silencing those who dare to disagree.
We need a positive outlook on life, we are told by negative individuals. And by negative individuals I mean Panchoonies, Jack S. Avanakians, and their dupes whose main concern is covering up who they really are and what they are really up to. In other words, Armenians who speak in the name of Armenianism and practice Ottomanism and Sovietism.
By negative individuals I mean cowards who are afraid to take a good look at themselves in the mirror – afraid of what they may see there.
To cover up their treason, they speechify on patriotism.
Our organized criminal gangs: where did they learn their trade?
By observing our “betters” of course -- that is to say, our commissars in the Homeland, and in the Diaspora, our bosses and bishops – or our mini-sultans and crypto-imams.
How to reconcile our criminal gangs with our demand for Genocide recognition?
That indeed is the question.
All nations have their share of criminal gangs.
If true, then let us have the decency to admit once and for all that we are no better than the rest of mankind, including Turks. And if, unlike Turks, we are not guilty of genocide, it's not because we are better. Because to say we are better than Turks is to confuse military inferiority with moral superiority.
And now, let us pray, if we still have a prayer.
#
April 28, 2010
***************************************************
THE ENEMY WITHIN
**************************************
We were defeated because our enemies outnumbered us.
True or false?
To imply that God created more Turks than Armenians is to accuse Him of being pro-Turkish and anti-Armenian. Like all nations and empires Turks too began their career as a collection of small tribes. With one difference. They were successful in forging alliances with one another. Forging alliances has never been our forte. Being subservient to barbarians comes more easily to us than coming to terms with our own brothers.
*
We are told geography is destiny. We were divided because of our mountains and valleys.
Consider the case of North-American Indians: not only they lived on flatlands but they also outnumbered white men. And yet they lost. They lost because they were divided. Too many chiefs...
*
If in crime it's “cherchez la femme,” in politics it's “cherchez the enemy within.” If, on the other hand, you put the blame on others (another line of thinking popular with us) you condemn yourself to die an ignoramus.
*
More cases in point:
Hitler won at first because he was successful in uniting the German-speaking people. But he lost because he divided his fellow Germans into friends and enemies. As a result, he lost some of the most creative minds in his realm.
Something similar could be said of Stalin's USSR. It was not American capitalism or the Pope of Rome that defeated Communism, but Stalin.
*
Is my criticism wrong because I don't understand my fellow Armenians?
Nobody is perfect. If you read only infallible writers, you should stick to Papal Encyclicals. If I am wrong, the next question we should ask is: Are our propagandists right?
As for understanding my fellow Armenians: I don't have to understand why they think as they do because I too was brought up to think like them. I have been there.
A layman may be forgiven for believing what he is brainwashed to believe. But he cannot and should not be forgiven for thinking he knows better and what he knows is the alpha and omega of human knowledge and wisdom. That's neither knowledge nor wisdom but arrogance or hubris, which is invariably punished by the gods.
#
***************************************************
COMPASSION
**************************************
Compassion, I am told, is a missing ingredient in my commentaries. What I am not told is, compassion for whom? The victim or the victimizer, the deceiver or his dupe?
*
A critic is judged by his degree of objectivity; a sermonizer by his compassion (which means suffering with); a physician, on the other hand, is judged by the accuracy of his diagnoses; and a lawyer by his ability to prove the innocent guilty (if he is with the prosecution) and the guilty innocent (if he is with the defense).
What I am trying to say here is that, all lines of work have their own specific and narrow aims, and it would be a mistake for a critic to muscle in the territory of sermonizers, or for that matter, for a lawyer to discard his whig, don a white coat and with a stethoscope around his neck, walk into a hospital and pretend to know what he is talking about.
*
As Armenians, shall we ascribe all our problems to our writers and critics for their lack of compassion? Like the rest of mankind, we too have been exposed to sermonizers for almost two millennia now. What has been the result? More lies, more corruption, more incompetence, more victims, more blunders, and more propaganda. As they say in Washington: “You want a friend who will love you even if you are an s.o.b. or a dealer in b.s. (caca de toro), get a dog!”
#
April 26, 2010
***************************************************
AND ANOTHER THING
**************************************
Underestimating the opposition might as well be synonymous with defeat.
At the turn of the last century the Ottoman Empire was labeled “the Sick Man of Europe.” That's when our revolutionaries decided to challenge its might and went as far as daring the Sultan to massacre us, assuming if he was foolish enough to do so, the Great Powers of the West and the Czar of all the Russias would fall on him like a ton of bricks. No one said the Empire was less like a sick man and more like a wounded tiger, that is to say, at its most dangerous phase.
Our greatest enemy then and now is not the Turk but our damaged perception of reality.
*
And now, consider the case of Palestinians today: they too underestimated the opposition when they chose to go on the warpath. They thought, as Muslims – once upon a time mighty warriors and empire builders – they outnumbered Jews a thousand to one. Besides, who were these Jews who dared to occupy their lands? Nothing but scrawny money-changers who had not fought and won a single war during the last two thousand years.
*
How right are those of my readers who tell me I should get busy flattering egos instead of exposing derrières and questioning the integrity of our leaders, their institutions, and their fund-raising campaigns?
And speaking of fund-raising: If the deciding vote is cast by the bottom line, it only means the decision-makers think not with their brains (assuming they have any) but with their bottoms.
*
It has been said, “We begin to grow up on the day someone we love dies.”
We died.
What have our leaders learned?
Did they ever love us?
#
April 27, 2010
***************************************************
AS OTHERS SEE US
**************************************
Last night on the evening news on TV there was talk of organized Armenian gangs in Los Angeles. Now a few more million people know we are not what we pretend to be.
But then who is?
And yet, we keep brainwashing our children to believe we are better and silencing those who dare to disagree.
We need a positive outlook on life, we are told by negative individuals. And by negative individuals I mean Panchoonies, Jack S. Avanakians, and their dupes whose main concern is covering up who they really are and what they are really up to. In other words, Armenians who speak in the name of Armenianism and practice Ottomanism and Sovietism.
By negative individuals I mean cowards who are afraid to take a good look at themselves in the mirror – afraid of what they may see there.
To cover up their treason, they speechify on patriotism.
Our organized criminal gangs: where did they learn their trade?
By observing our “betters” of course -- that is to say, our commissars in the Homeland, and in the Diaspora, our bosses and bishops – or our mini-sultans and crypto-imams.
How to reconcile our criminal gangs with our demand for Genocide recognition?
That indeed is the question.
All nations have their share of criminal gangs.
If true, then let us have the decency to admit once and for all that we are no better than the rest of mankind, including Turks. And if, unlike Turks, we are not guilty of genocide, it's not because we are better. Because to say we are better than Turks is to confuse military inferiority with moral superiority.
And now, let us pray, if we still have a prayer.
#
April 28, 2010
***************************************************
THE ENEMY WITHIN
**************************************
We were defeated because our enemies outnumbered us.
True or false?
To imply that God created more Turks than Armenians is to accuse Him of being pro-Turkish and anti-Armenian. Like all nations and empires Turks too began their career as a collection of small tribes. With one difference. They were successful in forging alliances with one another. Forging alliances has never been our forte. Being subservient to barbarians comes more easily to us than coming to terms with our own brothers.
*
We are told geography is destiny. We were divided because of our mountains and valleys.
Consider the case of North-American Indians: not only they lived on flatlands but they also outnumbered white men. And yet they lost. They lost because they were divided. Too many chiefs...
*
If in crime it's “cherchez la femme,” in politics it's “cherchez the enemy within.” If, on the other hand, you put the blame on others (another line of thinking popular with us) you condemn yourself to die an ignoramus.
*
More cases in point:
Hitler won at first because he was successful in uniting the German-speaking people. But he lost because he divided his fellow Germans into friends and enemies. As a result, he lost some of the most creative minds in his realm.
Something similar could be said of Stalin's USSR. It was not American capitalism or the Pope of Rome that defeated Communism, but Stalin.
*
Is my criticism wrong because I don't understand my fellow Armenians?
Nobody is perfect. If you read only infallible writers, you should stick to Papal Encyclicals. If I am wrong, the next question we should ask is: Are our propagandists right?
As for understanding my fellow Armenians: I don't have to understand why they think as they do because I too was brought up to think like them. I have been there.
A layman may be forgiven for believing what he is brainwashed to believe. But he cannot and should not be forgiven for thinking he knows better and what he knows is the alpha and omega of human knowledge and wisdom. That's neither knowledge nor wisdom but arrogance or hubris, which is invariably punished by the gods.
#
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