Thursday, January 22, 2009
****************************************
JINGOISM
**************************************************
“If I love my country I am justified in hating those of my countrymen who do not share my views.”
*
“If I speak in the name of patriotism it means my heart is in the right place, which also means no one can challenge my views, unless of course they are willing to make themselves vulnerable to charges of anti-Armenianism, pro-Ottomanism, and treason, which, as everyone knows, happens to be a crime punishable by death, and rightly so.”
*
“Since our failings are human failings shared by all of mankind, we should stop bitching about them.” It follows, exposing incompetence, intolerance, corruption, greed, and divisiveness, among other failings, is classified as bitching, which common sense tells us, is unmistakable evidence of anti-Armenianism.
*
According to an old Jewish saying, “Some people are such nobodies that when they go out of a room it feels like someone came in.” Something similar could be said of the jingoist arguments mentioned above. No matter how often they are contradicted and rejected they are voiced again and again as if they were gospel truths.
*
Armenians are a strange breed indeed: they can take centuries of subservience and brutal oppression but they can't stand straight talk. They believe in freedom but not in free speech. Figure that one out if you can.
#
Friday, January 23, 2009
****************************************
DZOUR NESDINK, SHIDAK KHOSSINK
**************************************************
Those who oppose free speech operate on two assumptions: (one) free or uncontrolled or unsupervised speech will inevitably lead to verbal abuse; and (two) they are themselves infallible when it comes to drawing the line that separates freedom from abuse. History tells us these two assumptions have been more open to abuse than free speech, and more crimes have been committed in the name of censorship than in the name of free speech.
*
In the same way that war is diplomacy by other means, genocide is censorship by other means.
*
Freedom without free speech is a fascist illusion.
*
No matter how hard I try I cannot agree with a belief system or ideology that legitimizes the violation of someone's fundamental human rights.
*
It is my ambition to speak of reality. Let others speechify, sermonize, and propagandize about their pet abstraction. A nation that does not have its feet firmly planted in reality is a nation that may survive (in the same way that animals in a zoo survive) but cannot live. Survival is life to the same degree that slavery is freedom.
*
Flaubert said: “Everything must be learned, from reading to dying.” And for an Armenian, engaging in dialogue with a fellow Armenian.
*
I preach but I don't always practice what I preach. When the other day I read that a member of this group wanted to have his name removed because he was “too busy,” my first uncensored thought was, “Busy doing what? -- beside pulling his dick.” Immediately I decided to keep this nasty thought to myself, and if I write it down now for everyone to see it's because I want to underline the discrepancy between theory and practice. I offer it not as a justification but as an explanation.
*
To be a good Armenian is not the same as being a good human being, and I'd much rather deal with a good human being than an Armenian who considers himself la crème de la crème.
*
And here is a rule without a single exception: An Armenian who considers himself la crème de la crème doesn't even qualify as la crème de la scum.
#
Saturday, January 24, 2009
****************************************
DEMOCRACY
**************************************************
Power does not mean imposing your will on others. Power means responsibility, accountability, and service. Politicians are not our lords and masters or highnesses and excellencies, but our servants. They do not represent God on earth but the will of the people, and the people is not an abstraction but you and me. The more power they have, the greater their burden of responsibility and accountability. I say these things because I had an Armenian education and I was not taught any of it. You might say, I enjoy sharing my discoveries. If there are those who are not aware of these things it may be because it took mankind millions of years to formulate them, and after having formulating them it took many more centuries of strife to realize them. That doesn't mean all power structures today are democratic. Far from it. As a matter of fact, undemocratic regimes today outnumber democracies, and even more to the point, the temptation of tyranny and fascism is a constant in all democracies.
*
How long before we reject the Ottoman and the Soviet from within us and are born again as human beings?
*
If I speak in the name of common sense and decency, am I then an enemy of the people who should be insulted and silenced? If you disagree with me it must be because you have a better explanation. If you do, why don't you let me know what it is and I will be more than happy to make it mine.
*
Remember, a good Armenian is first and foremost a good human being and he would be recognized as such not only by those who agree with him but also by those who disagree.
#
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
history
Sunday, January 18, 2009
****************************************
AGAINST DOGMATISM
**************************************************
A doctor in Australia speaking of people in isolated villages: “You must always have a translator with you because when they don't understand a question, they say yes.”
It is the same with underdogs everywhere. They think it is safer to say “yes, sir!” even when they are told to drop their pants and bend over.
We said yes to Christianity; we said yes to atheism under the Soviets; and in the Ottoman Empire some of us said yes to Islam. We said yes to capitalism in the Diaspora and yes to communism in the Homeland. And today we say yes to our bosses, bishops, benefactors, and their assorted gangs of neo-commissars and "mi kich pogh" panchoonies.
*
A famous Armenian soprano speaking of a Gomidas love song during a radio interview:
“Armenians are shy.”
“You mean coy.”
“No, shy.”
“You are not shy!”
We like to think, since most odars, not to say Armenians, are ignorant, we can say anything we want about Armenians and get away with it; and it comes as a shock when we are contradicted.
*
“To know is to remember,” Socrates used to say. It follows, to remind is to teach.
*
No matter what you say, there will be those who disagree with you. Remember, there are still flat-earth theorists and dupes who think Hitler and Stalin were messianic figures.
*
There are honest disagreements and there are Armenian disagreements. If throughout our millennial history consensus has been with us an unattainable Utopian goal, it’s because our disagreements are seldom honest disagreements.
*
Honest men with honest disagreements may agree to disagree and thus develop a consensus -- which means working together, as opposed to thinking alike.
#
Monday, January 19, 2009
****************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************************
“I don't like making enemies,” a writer tells me. And I cannot help thinking that the only way to avoid making enemies in our environment is by joining them, if only with your silence.
*
When I was young I trusted and respected my elders. But with old age comes mistrust and suspicion. So much so that whenever I run into an honest man these days I feel like a born-again human being.
*
Gone are the good old days when a commissar could permanently silence a dissident with a memo or a phone call with three monosyllables: “Shut him up!” Their only weapon now is verbal abuse. But the trouble with insults is that there are only a limited number of them and only a limited number of times they can be repeated. It has happened to me more than once that after repeatedly and almost daily abusing me for a year or two or even more, they have given up and fallen silent.
*
Obama's greatest achievement so far is that he survived the insults of his adversaries and is now willing to have them as advisers, and this not in the name of a belief system but common sense.
*
I am not surprised to read the following headline in one of our weeklies:
THOSE WHO WERE NOT AFRAID OF SOVIET INJUSTICE ARE NOW AFRAID OF ARMENIAN JUSTICE.
*
When an Armenian asks you a question, you can be sure of one thing: he knows the answer.
#
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
****************************************
ENEMIES
**************************************************
Emile Littré : “Man is a most unstable compound, and earth a decidedly inferior planet.”
*
When it comes to religion and politics, the prevalent attitude among leaders towards the masses is: the less they know and understand the better – because then they can be more easily manipulated and misled. As a result, we know more about the dark side of our enemies than they do; and we know less about ourselves than we should. It follows, anyone who dares to say all men are more or less the same, or Turks are our if not brothers than half-brothers is promptly labeled a traitor.
*
Our enemy, our real enemy, is not the Turk but knowledge, understanding, and objective judgment. Socrates was guilty of exposing the ignorance of his “betters.” Galileo knew something that the scriptures did not. Solzhenitsyn did not think the men in the Kremlin were morally or intellectually superior, he was therefore guilty of objective judgment. As for writers like Zabel Yessayan, Charents, and Bakounts, among others: they were too smart to be taken in by Bolshevik propaganda – though smart in this context does not mean a higher IQ but the ability to use one's common sense and to think for oneself.
*
Napoleon once said, “A man with ideas is my enemy.” Which may suggest that rulers prefer to rule over the brainless. In their eyes, to expose the lies of their propaganda might as well be a crime against humanity.
*
The Turks have a saying: “Chok ghareshterma, bokhou chekar.” Freely translated:
“Don't get involved (or mix it up too much), you may expose the sh**.”
*
Those who have dared to confront tyrants have always been a tiny minority, and tiny enough to be almost invisible to the naked eye.
#
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
****************************************
HISTORY
**************************************************
We have advanced from one form of oppression to another accompanied by long-winded sermons and speeches in the name of God and Country. Who speaks in the name of the people? Who dares to see a cause-and-effect connection between our corruption, incompetence, divisiveness or lack of vision and our status as perennial victims? All we contribute to our narrative is lies. Consider our press: most of it is about Turkish criminal conduct and our minor celebrities. Our problems – from massacres to earthquakes – fall on us without warning like thieves in the night. “Mart bidi ch'ellank.”
*
We like to think, since we are not guilty of genocide, we are not fascists. But to silence dissent or to be deaf to dissenting voices is if not fascism than it is saying yes to fascism.
*
There is an idiot in all of us, including the most wise. Likewise, there is a killer in all of us, compliments of our crocodilian ancestors. This may explain why sometimes intelligent men are deceived by fools, and decent men are misled by criminal psychopaths; and here, I could make a long list of famous men who supported Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin.
#
****************************************
AGAINST DOGMATISM
**************************************************
A doctor in Australia speaking of people in isolated villages: “You must always have a translator with you because when they don't understand a question, they say yes.”
It is the same with underdogs everywhere. They think it is safer to say “yes, sir!” even when they are told to drop their pants and bend over.
We said yes to Christianity; we said yes to atheism under the Soviets; and in the Ottoman Empire some of us said yes to Islam. We said yes to capitalism in the Diaspora and yes to communism in the Homeland. And today we say yes to our bosses, bishops, benefactors, and their assorted gangs of neo-commissars and "mi kich pogh" panchoonies.
*
A famous Armenian soprano speaking of a Gomidas love song during a radio interview:
“Armenians are shy.”
“You mean coy.”
“No, shy.”
“You are not shy!”
We like to think, since most odars, not to say Armenians, are ignorant, we can say anything we want about Armenians and get away with it; and it comes as a shock when we are contradicted.
*
“To know is to remember,” Socrates used to say. It follows, to remind is to teach.
*
No matter what you say, there will be those who disagree with you. Remember, there are still flat-earth theorists and dupes who think Hitler and Stalin were messianic figures.
*
There are honest disagreements and there are Armenian disagreements. If throughout our millennial history consensus has been with us an unattainable Utopian goal, it’s because our disagreements are seldom honest disagreements.
*
Honest men with honest disagreements may agree to disagree and thus develop a consensus -- which means working together, as opposed to thinking alike.
#
Monday, January 19, 2009
****************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************************
“I don't like making enemies,” a writer tells me. And I cannot help thinking that the only way to avoid making enemies in our environment is by joining them, if only with your silence.
*
When I was young I trusted and respected my elders. But with old age comes mistrust and suspicion. So much so that whenever I run into an honest man these days I feel like a born-again human being.
*
Gone are the good old days when a commissar could permanently silence a dissident with a memo or a phone call with three monosyllables: “Shut him up!” Their only weapon now is verbal abuse. But the trouble with insults is that there are only a limited number of them and only a limited number of times they can be repeated. It has happened to me more than once that after repeatedly and almost daily abusing me for a year or two or even more, they have given up and fallen silent.
*
Obama's greatest achievement so far is that he survived the insults of his adversaries and is now willing to have them as advisers, and this not in the name of a belief system but common sense.
*
I am not surprised to read the following headline in one of our weeklies:
THOSE WHO WERE NOT AFRAID OF SOVIET INJUSTICE ARE NOW AFRAID OF ARMENIAN JUSTICE.
*
When an Armenian asks you a question, you can be sure of one thing: he knows the answer.
#
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
****************************************
ENEMIES
**************************************************
Emile Littré : “Man is a most unstable compound, and earth a decidedly inferior planet.”
*
When it comes to religion and politics, the prevalent attitude among leaders towards the masses is: the less they know and understand the better – because then they can be more easily manipulated and misled. As a result, we know more about the dark side of our enemies than they do; and we know less about ourselves than we should. It follows, anyone who dares to say all men are more or less the same, or Turks are our if not brothers than half-brothers is promptly labeled a traitor.
*
Our enemy, our real enemy, is not the Turk but knowledge, understanding, and objective judgment. Socrates was guilty of exposing the ignorance of his “betters.” Galileo knew something that the scriptures did not. Solzhenitsyn did not think the men in the Kremlin were morally or intellectually superior, he was therefore guilty of objective judgment. As for writers like Zabel Yessayan, Charents, and Bakounts, among others: they were too smart to be taken in by Bolshevik propaganda – though smart in this context does not mean a higher IQ but the ability to use one's common sense and to think for oneself.
*
Napoleon once said, “A man with ideas is my enemy.” Which may suggest that rulers prefer to rule over the brainless. In their eyes, to expose the lies of their propaganda might as well be a crime against humanity.
*
The Turks have a saying: “Chok ghareshterma, bokhou chekar.” Freely translated:
“Don't get involved (or mix it up too much), you may expose the sh**.”
*
Those who have dared to confront tyrants have always been a tiny minority, and tiny enough to be almost invisible to the naked eye.
#
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
****************************************
HISTORY
**************************************************
We have advanced from one form of oppression to another accompanied by long-winded sermons and speeches in the name of God and Country. Who speaks in the name of the people? Who dares to see a cause-and-effect connection between our corruption, incompetence, divisiveness or lack of vision and our status as perennial victims? All we contribute to our narrative is lies. Consider our press: most of it is about Turkish criminal conduct and our minor celebrities. Our problems – from massacres to earthquakes – fall on us without warning like thieves in the night. “Mart bidi ch'ellank.”
*
We like to think, since we are not guilty of genocide, we are not fascists. But to silence dissent or to be deaf to dissenting voices is if not fascism than it is saying yes to fascism.
*
There is an idiot in all of us, including the most wise. Likewise, there is a killer in all of us, compliments of our crocodilian ancestors. This may explain why sometimes intelligent men are deceived by fools, and decent men are misled by criminal psychopaths; and here, I could make a long list of famous men who supported Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin.
#
Saturday, January 17, 2009
being armenian
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
****************************************
BEING ARMENIAN
**************************************************
“What's wrong with assimilation?” an assimilated Armenian once asked me, and I could not give him an answer.
*
In everything I say I speak not as an Armenian but as a human being who has done his utmost to go beyond political, racial, national, or tribal labels.
*
“You repeat yourself,” a Turcocentric ghazetaji who publishes a weekly anti-Turkish tirade once informed me. And when I said, “How many different ways are there of saying Turks are guilty of genocide?” he insulted me.
*
An Armenian who gets involved in Armenian affairs acquires two sets of unsettled scores: (one) against Turks, (two) against fellow Armenians who disagree with him.
*
Armenians use insults like voodoo pins – for long-distance murder.
*
A friend (may he rest in peace) once delivered the following dictum: “The only way to survive in this world is by adopting a form of insanity.” And I can't help thinking that the words of a dead man have a finality that the living cannot match.
*
The fate of the book hangs on the first paragraph, the same way that “the fate of the house depends on the wedding night” (Balzac).
*
Q: “Should I write every day or only when I am inspired?”
A: “If you have something to say, every day; otherwise, once or twice a year should be sufficient.”
#
Thursday, January 15, 2009
****************************************
GETTING AT THE SOURCE
**************************************************
The closer you get at the truth, the more enemies you make.
*
It is in disagreement that an Armenian exposes his true nature.
*
An intellectual's first enemies are not politicians but pseudo-intellectuals who rise not in defense of god and country but grub and ego. Their role model is neither Abovian nor Zarian but Talaat and Stalin. Their unstated aim is the extermination of the intellectual class. Verbal abuse comes more easily to them then a simple assertion of disagreement.
*
Sooner or later we must all come to terms with the fact that we belong to a nation that has been victimized not only by foreign but also by domestic enemies, and of the two, the domestic have been more dedicated and persistent.
*
The hardest thing for an Armenian to admit is that the enemy may not always be the other but himself. Only when we are willing to admit this, may we begin to understand the source of our tribalism and divisiveness.
*
To those who think I have no right to speak for them, only for myself, allow me to reiterate that I have at no time denied the fact that my analysis of the Armenian psyche is rooted in self-analysis. It is this realization that has saved me from applying for membership in one of our mafias. I have at no time felt the need to join a criminal organization to be a perpetrator.
*
The miracle is not that we have survived, but that there are still more or less smart and decent human beings willing to identity themselves as Armenian even when they are half-Greek, half-Russian, or half-Jewish.
#
Friday, January 16, 2009
****************************************
WHAT IS LITERATURE?
**************************************************
In his WRITING IN THE DARK: ESSAYS ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS (New York, 2008), David Grossman says, what made him decide to be a writer was the urge to invent stories. I thought of Scheherazade who invented stories in order to postpone her death. One could say that we too, like Scheherazade, write to postpone the death of the nation. But unlike Scheherazade, we don't write to entertain our masters but to expose the lies of their propaganda. This may explain why Scheherazade succeeded in realizing her goal and we have failed.
Fascists in Italy, Nazis in Germany, and Bolsheviks in the USSR lied to the people too and they were exposed not by writers (who tried very hard but failed) but by the reality principle. Italy and Germany lost a war and the USSR went bankrupt.
How to explain the fact that our lies have had a much longer lifespan?
We were a nation1500 years ago and we like to believe we still are. But are we? In the 20th century alone we experienced three genocides, one “red” (in the Ottoman Empire) and two “white” (assimilation in the Diaspora and exodus in the Homeland).
We have become a beggar among nations and at the mercy of – in the words of Avedik Issahakian (not exactly a critic or dissident) -- “earthquakes, bloodthirsty neighbors, and brainless leaders.” You may now guess which of these three “curses” (Issahakian's word) have been emphasized by our “brainless leaders” and their propagandists.
For every writer that mentions “brainless leaders,” we have dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of academics, historians, ghazetajis, speechifiers, and sermonizers who do their utmost to cover up the corruption, incompetence, and divisiveness of our leaders and to emphasize our “bloodthirsty neighbors and earthquakes.” And here is where intellectuals come in – to uncover that which is hidden from us.
I repeat myself?
And what do you think our propagandists do?
Another question: Has anyone ever complained that our propagandists, ghazetajis, speechifiers, and sermonizers repeat themselves? And what about our panchoonies? How many different ways are there of saying, “Mi kich pogh oughargetsek.”
To those who say, notwithstanding our prophets of doom and gloom, we have endured and we shall continue to endure, I ask: What if most of us, especially the best and the brightest, did not endure and will not endure?
#
Saturday, January 17, 2009
****************************************
DIARY
**************************************************
A Palestinian mother in Gaza: “My children can no longer play in the street.”
A suggestion: Why don't they take their damn war somewhere like Sahara or the Gobi desert?
*
Memo to myself: “Depressing thoughts are carcinogenic agents. You think too much about Armenians.”
*
My dissenting views are so extreme, it seems, that even our dissenters disagree with me.
*
If our past were a poem, it would be a lamentation to some, and a triumphal march to others.
*
When a reader insults me, I think, at least he has read and reflected on what I have written, and that's good enough for me. Beggars can't be choosers.
*
It is widely known among citizens of a democracy that politics is the second oldest profession and that in many ways it resembles the first. Fascists agree but they think this does not apply to them.
#
****************************************
BEING ARMENIAN
**************************************************
“What's wrong with assimilation?” an assimilated Armenian once asked me, and I could not give him an answer.
*
In everything I say I speak not as an Armenian but as a human being who has done his utmost to go beyond political, racial, national, or tribal labels.
*
“You repeat yourself,” a Turcocentric ghazetaji who publishes a weekly anti-Turkish tirade once informed me. And when I said, “How many different ways are there of saying Turks are guilty of genocide?” he insulted me.
*
An Armenian who gets involved in Armenian affairs acquires two sets of unsettled scores: (one) against Turks, (two) against fellow Armenians who disagree with him.
*
Armenians use insults like voodoo pins – for long-distance murder.
*
A friend (may he rest in peace) once delivered the following dictum: “The only way to survive in this world is by adopting a form of insanity.” And I can't help thinking that the words of a dead man have a finality that the living cannot match.
*
The fate of the book hangs on the first paragraph, the same way that “the fate of the house depends on the wedding night” (Balzac).
*
Q: “Should I write every day or only when I am inspired?”
A: “If you have something to say, every day; otherwise, once or twice a year should be sufficient.”
#
Thursday, January 15, 2009
****************************************
GETTING AT THE SOURCE
**************************************************
The closer you get at the truth, the more enemies you make.
*
It is in disagreement that an Armenian exposes his true nature.
*
An intellectual's first enemies are not politicians but pseudo-intellectuals who rise not in defense of god and country but grub and ego. Their role model is neither Abovian nor Zarian but Talaat and Stalin. Their unstated aim is the extermination of the intellectual class. Verbal abuse comes more easily to them then a simple assertion of disagreement.
*
Sooner or later we must all come to terms with the fact that we belong to a nation that has been victimized not only by foreign but also by domestic enemies, and of the two, the domestic have been more dedicated and persistent.
*
The hardest thing for an Armenian to admit is that the enemy may not always be the other but himself. Only when we are willing to admit this, may we begin to understand the source of our tribalism and divisiveness.
*
To those who think I have no right to speak for them, only for myself, allow me to reiterate that I have at no time denied the fact that my analysis of the Armenian psyche is rooted in self-analysis. It is this realization that has saved me from applying for membership in one of our mafias. I have at no time felt the need to join a criminal organization to be a perpetrator.
*
The miracle is not that we have survived, but that there are still more or less smart and decent human beings willing to identity themselves as Armenian even when they are half-Greek, half-Russian, or half-Jewish.
#
Friday, January 16, 2009
****************************************
WHAT IS LITERATURE?
**************************************************
In his WRITING IN THE DARK: ESSAYS ON LITERATURE AND POLITICS (New York, 2008), David Grossman says, what made him decide to be a writer was the urge to invent stories. I thought of Scheherazade who invented stories in order to postpone her death. One could say that we too, like Scheherazade, write to postpone the death of the nation. But unlike Scheherazade, we don't write to entertain our masters but to expose the lies of their propaganda. This may explain why Scheherazade succeeded in realizing her goal and we have failed.
Fascists in Italy, Nazis in Germany, and Bolsheviks in the USSR lied to the people too and they were exposed not by writers (who tried very hard but failed) but by the reality principle. Italy and Germany lost a war and the USSR went bankrupt.
How to explain the fact that our lies have had a much longer lifespan?
We were a nation1500 years ago and we like to believe we still are. But are we? In the 20th century alone we experienced three genocides, one “red” (in the Ottoman Empire) and two “white” (assimilation in the Diaspora and exodus in the Homeland).
We have become a beggar among nations and at the mercy of – in the words of Avedik Issahakian (not exactly a critic or dissident) -- “earthquakes, bloodthirsty neighbors, and brainless leaders.” You may now guess which of these three “curses” (Issahakian's word) have been emphasized by our “brainless leaders” and their propagandists.
For every writer that mentions “brainless leaders,” we have dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of academics, historians, ghazetajis, speechifiers, and sermonizers who do their utmost to cover up the corruption, incompetence, and divisiveness of our leaders and to emphasize our “bloodthirsty neighbors and earthquakes.” And here is where intellectuals come in – to uncover that which is hidden from us.
I repeat myself?
And what do you think our propagandists do?
Another question: Has anyone ever complained that our propagandists, ghazetajis, speechifiers, and sermonizers repeat themselves? And what about our panchoonies? How many different ways are there of saying, “Mi kich pogh oughargetsek.”
To those who say, notwithstanding our prophets of doom and gloom, we have endured and we shall continue to endure, I ask: What if most of us, especially the best and the brightest, did not endure and will not endure?
#
Saturday, January 17, 2009
****************************************
DIARY
**************************************************
A Palestinian mother in Gaza: “My children can no longer play in the street.”
A suggestion: Why don't they take their damn war somewhere like Sahara or the Gobi desert?
*
Memo to myself: “Depressing thoughts are carcinogenic agents. You think too much about Armenians.”
*
My dissenting views are so extreme, it seems, that even our dissenters disagree with me.
*
If our past were a poem, it would be a lamentation to some, and a triumphal march to others.
*
When a reader insults me, I think, at least he has read and reflected on what I have written, and that's good enough for me. Beggars can't be choosers.
*
It is widely known among citizens of a democracy that politics is the second oldest profession and that in many ways it resembles the first. Fascists agree but they think this does not apply to them.
#
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
freedom
Sunday, January 11, 2009
****************************************
MEGALOMANIA
**************************************************
Our public library (kpl.org) has acquired a new paperback edition of MEIN KAMPF. They have discarded some of my favorite books – among them Tolstoy's HADJI MURAD, Lesley Blanch's SABRES OF PARADISE, Klaus Mann's autobiography, and Joachim Maass's THE GOUFFE CASE – but retained Hitler, and they say crime doesn't pay.
*
In my teens and early twenties when I wanted to read everything from A to Z, I also gave Hitler's KAMPF and Marx's KAPITAL a try, but I no longer remember if I finished them. It is easy to start reading a book but difficult finishing them. Of the dozen or so books that I borrow from the library every week I may or may not finish reading one or at most two. Like Sartre (“I'd much rather read a crime novel than Wittgenstein”) I'd rather read an entertaining second-rater than a ponderous big shot who takes himself seriously and expects to be taken seriously.
*
Taking oneself seriously: that's another one of our maladies. A reader once said to me, “Maybe the writers you quote (from Khorenatsi to Zarian) failed because they went about it the wrong way.” There is no limit to our megalomania – from the turn-of-the-century revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire (“frogs trying to rape and elephant”) to Turcocentric ghazetajis today parading as defenders of the faith and saviors of the nation. Which is one reason why I hesitate to identify myself as a critic or a dissident or even a writer. I feel more comfortable calling myself a "sh** disturber.”
#
Monday, January 12, 2009
****************************************
ON PROGRESS
**************************************************
We are a nation of small potatoes ruled by cabbages who pretend to be kings.
*
My morning paper informs me that, according to a watchdog agency, “democracy declined significantly in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan and Moldova.”
*
We like to think of ourselves as progressive, but the truth is progress has never been our most important product. At the turn of the last century our political parties were run by intellectuals. Today they are run by businessmen, that is to say, by bottom-feeders whose greatest concern is the bottom line. If that's progress, it's more like the progress of a disease. In whatever we have done, we have followed our masters, be they Turks or Russian – not the two brightest stars in the firmament of democratic rule and progress.
*
I write as I do because I don't care for the sound of my own voice. I was brought up to be a narcissist. I now see more merit in self-loathing.
*
If I were a success, I wouldn't write as I do because I would do my utmost not to bite the hand that lays the golden egg.
*
Where a part-time janitor makes more money than a full-time writer, there will be an abundance of recycled crap and a total absence of ideas.
*
It is extremely difficult for me to be civil to individuals who in a different time and place would have been my executioners.
#
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
****************************************
LET FREEDOM RING
**************************************************
Freedom means participation in power.
Freedom means telling our fund-raisers: We demand accountability and certification from an independent forensic accountant.
Freedom means to treat our political leaders not as masters but as public servants.
Freedom means saying “No!” to our bosses, bishops, benefactors, and their assorted hirelings, flunkeys, and brown-nosers without fear of retaliation.
Freedom means lessons in civics in our schools, so that our children will grow up learning not only about Turkish atrocities but also about the meaning of democracy and the articles of our constitution.
Freedom means saying to our political bosses: Unless you engage in dialogue and develop a consensus we will not support you.
Freedom means saying to our bishops: Unless you stop building new churches when old ones remain unattended, we will walk out on your sermons.
Freedom means saying to our benefactors: As long as you sink your money into partisan enterprises, thus reinforcing our divisions, we will call you a dupe of charlatans and bloodsuckers and have a good laugh whenever your name is mentioned.
Freedom means telling our Turcocentric academics and ghazetajis: Enough is enough! We have had our share of lamentation for our victims and hatred of the perpetrators. Enough massacre editorials, articles, memoirs, monuments, demonstrations, and museums. It is now time that we move on and solve our present problems, among them two “white” genocides – that is, assimilation in the Diaspora and emigration in the Homeland.
Have we ever known this kind of freedom throughout our millennial history?
The freedom to say “Yes, sir!” is not freedom but subservience, which is another form of slavery. To exchange one form of subservience (be it Ottoman or Soviet) with another is not freedom but a swindle.
Wake up, Armenians. You have nothing to lose but your chains!
#
****************************************
MEGALOMANIA
**************************************************
Our public library (kpl.org) has acquired a new paperback edition of MEIN KAMPF. They have discarded some of my favorite books – among them Tolstoy's HADJI MURAD, Lesley Blanch's SABRES OF PARADISE, Klaus Mann's autobiography, and Joachim Maass's THE GOUFFE CASE – but retained Hitler, and they say crime doesn't pay.
*
In my teens and early twenties when I wanted to read everything from A to Z, I also gave Hitler's KAMPF and Marx's KAPITAL a try, but I no longer remember if I finished them. It is easy to start reading a book but difficult finishing them. Of the dozen or so books that I borrow from the library every week I may or may not finish reading one or at most two. Like Sartre (“I'd much rather read a crime novel than Wittgenstein”) I'd rather read an entertaining second-rater than a ponderous big shot who takes himself seriously and expects to be taken seriously.
*
Taking oneself seriously: that's another one of our maladies. A reader once said to me, “Maybe the writers you quote (from Khorenatsi to Zarian) failed because they went about it the wrong way.” There is no limit to our megalomania – from the turn-of-the-century revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire (“frogs trying to rape and elephant”) to Turcocentric ghazetajis today parading as defenders of the faith and saviors of the nation. Which is one reason why I hesitate to identify myself as a critic or a dissident or even a writer. I feel more comfortable calling myself a "sh** disturber.”
#
Monday, January 12, 2009
****************************************
ON PROGRESS
**************************************************
We are a nation of small potatoes ruled by cabbages who pretend to be kings.
*
My morning paper informs me that, according to a watchdog agency, “democracy declined significantly in Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan and Moldova.”
*
We like to think of ourselves as progressive, but the truth is progress has never been our most important product. At the turn of the last century our political parties were run by intellectuals. Today they are run by businessmen, that is to say, by bottom-feeders whose greatest concern is the bottom line. If that's progress, it's more like the progress of a disease. In whatever we have done, we have followed our masters, be they Turks or Russian – not the two brightest stars in the firmament of democratic rule and progress.
*
I write as I do because I don't care for the sound of my own voice. I was brought up to be a narcissist. I now see more merit in self-loathing.
*
If I were a success, I wouldn't write as I do because I would do my utmost not to bite the hand that lays the golden egg.
*
Where a part-time janitor makes more money than a full-time writer, there will be an abundance of recycled crap and a total absence of ideas.
*
It is extremely difficult for me to be civil to individuals who in a different time and place would have been my executioners.
#
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
****************************************
LET FREEDOM RING
**************************************************
Freedom means participation in power.
Freedom means telling our fund-raisers: We demand accountability and certification from an independent forensic accountant.
Freedom means to treat our political leaders not as masters but as public servants.
Freedom means saying “No!” to our bosses, bishops, benefactors, and their assorted hirelings, flunkeys, and brown-nosers without fear of retaliation.
Freedom means lessons in civics in our schools, so that our children will grow up learning not only about Turkish atrocities but also about the meaning of democracy and the articles of our constitution.
Freedom means saying to our political bosses: Unless you engage in dialogue and develop a consensus we will not support you.
Freedom means saying to our bishops: Unless you stop building new churches when old ones remain unattended, we will walk out on your sermons.
Freedom means saying to our benefactors: As long as you sink your money into partisan enterprises, thus reinforcing our divisions, we will call you a dupe of charlatans and bloodsuckers and have a good laugh whenever your name is mentioned.
Freedom means telling our Turcocentric academics and ghazetajis: Enough is enough! We have had our share of lamentation for our victims and hatred of the perpetrators. Enough massacre editorials, articles, memoirs, monuments, demonstrations, and museums. It is now time that we move on and solve our present problems, among them two “white” genocides – that is, assimilation in the Diaspora and emigration in the Homeland.
Have we ever known this kind of freedom throughout our millennial history?
The freedom to say “Yes, sir!” is not freedom but subservience, which is another form of slavery. To exchange one form of subservience (be it Ottoman or Soviet) with another is not freedom but a swindle.
Wake up, Armenians. You have nothing to lose but your chains!
#
Saturday, January 10, 2009
R/s
Thursday, January 8, 2009
****************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************************
A Muslim scholar in Canada has written a book critical of Islam and now lives in fear of assassination.
*
It is only natural for those who are part of the problem to pretend not to see the solution.
*
Before you attain greatness you must achieve honesty, and of the two, achieving honesty may well be the more demanding enterprise.
*
Once upon a time, in the Middle Ages, we were celebrated for being good fighters. We still are, but only against the wrong enemy: ourselves.
*
More often than not, it is in our efforts to appear smart that we expose ourselves as fools.
*
It makes little sense to support one side against another when both belong to the dustbin of history.
*
In all political movements, lust for power is invariably hidden behind noble slogans; the greater the lust, the nobler the slogans.
#
Friday, January 9, 2009
****************************************
OBSERVATIONS
**************************************************
To know nothing is better than to know only one side of the story.
*
Writing history should be more akin to examining our conscience as opposed to emphasizing the positive and covering up the negative.
*
It is not enough for an Armenian to win an argument, he must also annihilate his adversary.
*
After three decades of hard work I am now in a position to state with some degree of certainty and pride that I have made more enemies than friends.
*
Like most men, computers must be programmed in order to think.
*
It makes little sense keeping up with the Joneses if the Joneses are busy keeping up with the Smiths.
*
When top dogs don't trust one another, underdogs quarrel among themselves.
*
You work hard all your life, you make a fortune, you share your fortune with ingrates who insult you: who says benefactors are better off than scribblers?
#
Saturday, January 10, 2009
****************************************
REFLECTIONS
**************************************************
The most visible feature of a nation is not its Golden Age or its celebrities, but its degree of solidarity. No one takes seriously a nation that has been manipulated by the divide-and-rule tactics of other nations for most of its existence.
*
To alienate a fraction of the people is to amputate the nation.
*
When I said the greatest insult to a writer is to ignore him, they stopped insulting me. If only I could solve all my problems with the same ease.
*
“The buck stops here”: the four most un-Armenian words in the English language.
*
Do I write because I like to annoy the hell out of dupes, bigots and charlatans?
Why not? Isn’t that as good a reason as any?
*
It is not at all unusual for our chauvinists to preach Armenian culture and to practice Ottoman barbarism.
#
****************************************
FROM MY NOTEBOOKS
**************************************************
A Muslim scholar in Canada has written a book critical of Islam and now lives in fear of assassination.
*
It is only natural for those who are part of the problem to pretend not to see the solution.
*
Before you attain greatness you must achieve honesty, and of the two, achieving honesty may well be the more demanding enterprise.
*
Once upon a time, in the Middle Ages, we were celebrated for being good fighters. We still are, but only against the wrong enemy: ourselves.
*
More often than not, it is in our efforts to appear smart that we expose ourselves as fools.
*
It makes little sense to support one side against another when both belong to the dustbin of history.
*
In all political movements, lust for power is invariably hidden behind noble slogans; the greater the lust, the nobler the slogans.
#
Friday, January 9, 2009
****************************************
OBSERVATIONS
**************************************************
To know nothing is better than to know only one side of the story.
*
Writing history should be more akin to examining our conscience as opposed to emphasizing the positive and covering up the negative.
*
It is not enough for an Armenian to win an argument, he must also annihilate his adversary.
*
After three decades of hard work I am now in a position to state with some degree of certainty and pride that I have made more enemies than friends.
*
Like most men, computers must be programmed in order to think.
*
It makes little sense keeping up with the Joneses if the Joneses are busy keeping up with the Smiths.
*
When top dogs don't trust one another, underdogs quarrel among themselves.
*
You work hard all your life, you make a fortune, you share your fortune with ingrates who insult you: who says benefactors are better off than scribblers?
#
Saturday, January 10, 2009
****************************************
REFLECTIONS
**************************************************
The most visible feature of a nation is not its Golden Age or its celebrities, but its degree of solidarity. No one takes seriously a nation that has been manipulated by the divide-and-rule tactics of other nations for most of its existence.
*
To alienate a fraction of the people is to amputate the nation.
*
When I said the greatest insult to a writer is to ignore him, they stopped insulting me. If only I could solve all my problems with the same ease.
*
“The buck stops here”: the four most un-Armenian words in the English language.
*
Do I write because I like to annoy the hell out of dupes, bigots and charlatans?
Why not? Isn’t that as good a reason as any?
*
It is not at all unusual for our chauvinists to preach Armenian culture and to practice Ottoman barbarism.
#
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
lines
Sunday, January 4, 2009
****************************************
ON PHONIES
**************************************************
There is a tendency in all phonies to see only the phony in others. Face to face with an honest man, they feel ill at ease and their first instinct is to bring him down to their own level. Consider what happened to Zarian, one of the very few authentic giants in our literature. Every mediocrity in both the Homeland and Diaspora accused him of being a KGB or a CIA agent, or even a plagiarist. When Shahnour accused Siamanto of plagiarism, he quoted chapter and verse. When Zarian himself accused Charents of plagiarism, he mentioned Marinetti and Mayakovsky. But as far as I know none of our phonies ever stated whom did Zarian plagiarize.
*
Once upon a time fascists identified themselves as fascists. Not anymore. Nowadays they speak in the name of nationalism, as if fascism and nationalism were mutually exclusive concepts; and when they silence dissent, they do so as if it were their patriotic duty.
*
Some of my readers remind me of sharks circling and waiting for traces of blood to appear in the water.
*
Why do I write as I do? Because no one else does.
*
If the laws in Dickens's time were applied to American chief executive officers today, a great many of them who now travel in their own private jets would be in jail. It is such a pity that technological progress has become inseparable with moral degeneracy.
#
Monday, January 5, 2009
****************************************
ON IDEAS
**************************************************
Armenians who are obsessed with Turkish criminal conduct are eager to inform me that my ideas lack originality.
*
The awareness of doing the right thing is better than fame, fortune, and happiness.
*
If you have only one idea, you have no choice. If you have two ideas, you have a choice. Two is better than one because freedom is better than slavery.
*
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.
*
Annihilating your enemy in the name of victory is the Ottoman way. So is verbally abusing those who disagree with you.
*
What matters is not how we treat our friends, but how we treat our enemies.
*
An enemy is one we have failed to convince that it will be to his advantage to be our friend.
*
To be savaged by fools and fanatics is the surest sign of being on the right path.
#
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
****************************************
AD HOMINEM
**************************************************
Let better men than myself reach for the truth. All I want is avoid being absurd.
*
History teaches us to recognize blunders when we see them. If history, including our own, continues to be a succession of blunders, it may be because the number of blunders is infinite, the human brain at its most creative in their invention, and self-deception a constant.
*
Self-deception allows us to be absurd and self-righteous at the same time.
*
To those who wonder how dare I speak in the name of the nation when no one elected me, my answer is: I speak only as a human being and I don't need majority support to think, feel, and reason as a human being.
*
A typical Armenian is an open wound and a closed mind.
*
Anonymous: "A genius has his limitations. A fool does not."
*
Voicing morally superior sentiments is not the same as being morally superior. If it were, every sermonizer would be a saint.
*
Commissars of culture and culture are mutually exclusive concepts.
#
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
****************************************
PARALLEL LINES
**************************************************
It is safe to assume that not all chief executive officers in America are crooks. But when the honest ones saw the writing on the wall, spoke up and said, “We can no longer afford private jets, million-dollar salaries, big bonuses, and golden parachutes,” they were silence by the crooks who said, “Relax! We are too big to fail. Uncle Sam will bail us out.” And Uncle did because the easiest thing in the world is to be generous with someone else's money. (I have already read a pundit who called Obama “an empty suit.")
*
Something similar happened to our revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire when they were warned they were no better than frogs trying to rape an elephant. To which our revolutionaries replied: “Relax! We are not in this alone. The great powers of the West are on our side. The Turks wouldn't dare!” But the Turks dared because they knew the great powers were not our Uncle Sam and wouldn't spill a single drop of blood to save us.
*
And speaking of blood: We have shed our blood and we have done so copiously in defense of alien and even hostile empires, among them the Byzantine, the Ottoman, and the Soviet (350,000 dead during World War II alone). If we judge a tree by its fruit, a man by his actions, and a nation's IQ by its history, we may have to conclude that we are not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
#
****************************************
ON PHONIES
**************************************************
There is a tendency in all phonies to see only the phony in others. Face to face with an honest man, they feel ill at ease and their first instinct is to bring him down to their own level. Consider what happened to Zarian, one of the very few authentic giants in our literature. Every mediocrity in both the Homeland and Diaspora accused him of being a KGB or a CIA agent, or even a plagiarist. When Shahnour accused Siamanto of plagiarism, he quoted chapter and verse. When Zarian himself accused Charents of plagiarism, he mentioned Marinetti and Mayakovsky. But as far as I know none of our phonies ever stated whom did Zarian plagiarize.
*
Once upon a time fascists identified themselves as fascists. Not anymore. Nowadays they speak in the name of nationalism, as if fascism and nationalism were mutually exclusive concepts; and when they silence dissent, they do so as if it were their patriotic duty.
*
Some of my readers remind me of sharks circling and waiting for traces of blood to appear in the water.
*
Why do I write as I do? Because no one else does.
*
If the laws in Dickens's time were applied to American chief executive officers today, a great many of them who now travel in their own private jets would be in jail. It is such a pity that technological progress has become inseparable with moral degeneracy.
#
Monday, January 5, 2009
****************************************
ON IDEAS
**************************************************
Armenians who are obsessed with Turkish criminal conduct are eager to inform me that my ideas lack originality.
*
The awareness of doing the right thing is better than fame, fortune, and happiness.
*
If you have only one idea, you have no choice. If you have two ideas, you have a choice. Two is better than one because freedom is better than slavery.
*
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.
*
Annihilating your enemy in the name of victory is the Ottoman way. So is verbally abusing those who disagree with you.
*
What matters is not how we treat our friends, but how we treat our enemies.
*
An enemy is one we have failed to convince that it will be to his advantage to be our friend.
*
To be savaged by fools and fanatics is the surest sign of being on the right path.
#
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
****************************************
AD HOMINEM
**************************************************
Let better men than myself reach for the truth. All I want is avoid being absurd.
*
History teaches us to recognize blunders when we see them. If history, including our own, continues to be a succession of blunders, it may be because the number of blunders is infinite, the human brain at its most creative in their invention, and self-deception a constant.
*
Self-deception allows us to be absurd and self-righteous at the same time.
*
To those who wonder how dare I speak in the name of the nation when no one elected me, my answer is: I speak only as a human being and I don't need majority support to think, feel, and reason as a human being.
*
A typical Armenian is an open wound and a closed mind.
*
Anonymous: "A genius has his limitations. A fool does not."
*
Voicing morally superior sentiments is not the same as being morally superior. If it were, every sermonizer would be a saint.
*
Commissars of culture and culture are mutually exclusive concepts.
#
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
****************************************
PARALLEL LINES
**************************************************
It is safe to assume that not all chief executive officers in America are crooks. But when the honest ones saw the writing on the wall, spoke up and said, “We can no longer afford private jets, million-dollar salaries, big bonuses, and golden parachutes,” they were silence by the crooks who said, “Relax! We are too big to fail. Uncle Sam will bail us out.” And Uncle did because the easiest thing in the world is to be generous with someone else's money. (I have already read a pundit who called Obama “an empty suit.")
*
Something similar happened to our revolutionaries in the Ottoman Empire when they were warned they were no better than frogs trying to rape an elephant. To which our revolutionaries replied: “Relax! We are not in this alone. The great powers of the West are on our side. The Turks wouldn't dare!” But the Turks dared because they knew the great powers were not our Uncle Sam and wouldn't spill a single drop of blood to save us.
*
And speaking of blood: We have shed our blood and we have done so copiously in defense of alien and even hostile empires, among them the Byzantine, the Ottoman, and the Soviet (350,000 dead during World War II alone). If we judge a tree by its fruit, a man by his actions, and a nation's IQ by its history, we may have to conclude that we are not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
#
Saturday, January 3, 2009
lines
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
****************************************
MY ANSWER
**************************************************
Once in a while a gentle reader takes it upon himself to remind me that what I say doesn't apply to everyone because it is based on self-analysis, and that it is wrong to project my own conflicts and contradictions onto the nation.
I have at no time denied the fact that my analysis of our complexes is based on self-analysis. In my formative years and for a good fraction of my adult life I was a typical Armenian with all the prejudices, preconceptions, and fallacies that I now enjoy tearing to shreds. Neither have I ever denied that I was a devout believer of every single lie that was foisted on me by our “betters.” It is only very recently that I became aware of our reality as opposed to the fiction in which I lived. To put it differently: I was taught to be a narcissist, and after many years of slumber in a fool's paradise, I woke up one day with the realization that I was neither smart nor honest.
If you tell me what a nation needs to achieve greatness is confidence in its own ability to confront and overcome challenges, and that at this point in our history what we need is not my kind of negativism that demoralizes us and turn us into defeatists like myself; I say, that is your perception of what I do based on your status as a dupe, and that to promote liberation from the lies of our propagandists is far from being negative or defeatist. It is, in point of fact, quintessentially positive and invigorating. I further maintain to be enslaved by comfortable lies is as bad as being enslaved by Turks. But to see this clearly you must first extricate your head from the sand in which you have it buried.
#
Thursday, January 1, 2009
****************************************
LEARNING FROM GENGHIS KHAN
**************************************************
The first words on the back cover of Conn Iggulden's historical novel, GENGHIS: LORDS OF THE BOW, are: “After uniting warring clans...”
*
Once upon a time all empire were a single clan. Their career as empire began when one clan persuaded another to join forces on the grounds that two clans together are less vulnerable to aggression from other clans.
*
Clans are bad enough. Warring clans might as well be an open invitation to conquerors.
*
God did not create more Mongols, Chinese, Russians or Americans. If we are few today it's because some of us saw the writing on the wall and switched loyalties.
*
Let the fool enjoy his folly so that he may be wise, even if wisdom comes at the hour of his death.
*
When Indians burned widows, did any one of them ever bother to raise the question: “Why don't we ask the widows if they like to be burned?” Civilizations should be judged by the manner they treat the weak and defenseless.
*
If you want to understand Armenians, don't read their nationalist historians; read instead a history of Armenian literature. The only reason we don't burn writers the way Indians burn widows is that we prefer to ignore them, which amounts to burying them alive.
*
Because I refuse to share their obsession with massacres and money, they call me negative. One way to be positive in their eyes is to adopt “Yes, sir!” as a mantra.
#
Friday, January 2, 2009
****************************************
DIVIDING LINES
**************************************************
Speaking of his mother, Edward Gorey says in an interview: “She had a stroke when she was about eighty and her entire character changed. All her hypocritical love for humanity vanished.” (ASCENDING PECULIARITY: EDWARD GOREY ON EDWARD GOREY. Interviews by Karen Wilkin, page 95.)
This type of dividing line in one's life happens to all of us; and when readers disagree with me violently, I cannot help thinking that their disagreement has not yet reached the line that divides propaganda from reality.
When did I change my mind about my fellow Armenians? In my case it was not so much a line but the last straw that broke the camel's back.
*
As children we should be taught to reflect that every conviction and dogma in our belief system may well be wrong and there may be more merit in their contradictions. That, it seems to me, should be the underlying principle in all educational systems.
*
In her review of LEFT IN DARK TIMES by Bernard-Henri Levy, Claire Berlinski mentions a Turkish friend of hers who “like most Turks” has been brought up to believe “the Armenians had it coming.” (NATIONAL REVIEW, December 15, 2008, page 32.)
*
A true sign of insanity, it has been said, is the belief that everyone else is crazy. In my view, another sure symptom of insanity is the belief that the world is run by intelligent men who place the interests of their people and mankind in general above their own and anyone who says otherwise must be nuts.
*
In a recent issue of the ARMENIAN REPORTER (December 20), there is a remarkable letter to the editor by Ara Sarafian outlining in some detail the present situation of Armeno-Turkish relations, which clearly implies that when it comes to the Genocide issue, our Turcocentric ghazetajis may be doing more harm than good. I urge Ara Sarafian to post this letter on Armenian discussion forums on the Internet.
#
Saturday, January 3, 2009
****************************************
ON APOLOGIES
**************************************************
As a rule governments don't like apologizing for past crimes but they may change their mind when under pressure from their own people, or so we are told in THE POLITICS OF OFFICIAL APOLOGIES by Melissa Nobles, where we also learn: “The Armenians are not going to get an apology any time soon, in spite of a worldwide public campaign, from the Turkish government for the atrocities committed during World War I because most Turks are not prepared to accept that their government bore responsibility.”
*
The best interview in THE PARIS REVIEW INTERVIEWS, volume I (New York, 2006) is the one with Dorothy Parker, a relatively minor writer; the most boring is the one with T.S. Eliot – a pezzo novanta. Unlike Eliot who speaks only about himself and his work, Dorothy Parker speaks of many things and is never long-winded.
*
Armenians who vilify Turks and Turks who vilify Armenians don't think of themselves as racists because they assume the whole world knows what bloodthirsty savages Turks are and what nasty, disloyal scum Armenians are. But the whole world knows nothing of the kind and cares even less. To most of the world Turks and Armenians might as well be Hutus and Tutsis. As an Armenian, the only thing I know about Hutus and Tutsis is that they are tribes in Africa. The average Canadian doesn't even know where Armenia is. To him we might as well be Romanians or Arameans.
#
****************************************
MY ANSWER
**************************************************
Once in a while a gentle reader takes it upon himself to remind me that what I say doesn't apply to everyone because it is based on self-analysis, and that it is wrong to project my own conflicts and contradictions onto the nation.
I have at no time denied the fact that my analysis of our complexes is based on self-analysis. In my formative years and for a good fraction of my adult life I was a typical Armenian with all the prejudices, preconceptions, and fallacies that I now enjoy tearing to shreds. Neither have I ever denied that I was a devout believer of every single lie that was foisted on me by our “betters.” It is only very recently that I became aware of our reality as opposed to the fiction in which I lived. To put it differently: I was taught to be a narcissist, and after many years of slumber in a fool's paradise, I woke up one day with the realization that I was neither smart nor honest.
If you tell me what a nation needs to achieve greatness is confidence in its own ability to confront and overcome challenges, and that at this point in our history what we need is not my kind of negativism that demoralizes us and turn us into defeatists like myself; I say, that is your perception of what I do based on your status as a dupe, and that to promote liberation from the lies of our propagandists is far from being negative or defeatist. It is, in point of fact, quintessentially positive and invigorating. I further maintain to be enslaved by comfortable lies is as bad as being enslaved by Turks. But to see this clearly you must first extricate your head from the sand in which you have it buried.
#
Thursday, January 1, 2009
****************************************
LEARNING FROM GENGHIS KHAN
**************************************************
The first words on the back cover of Conn Iggulden's historical novel, GENGHIS: LORDS OF THE BOW, are: “After uniting warring clans...”
*
Once upon a time all empire were a single clan. Their career as empire began when one clan persuaded another to join forces on the grounds that two clans together are less vulnerable to aggression from other clans.
*
Clans are bad enough. Warring clans might as well be an open invitation to conquerors.
*
God did not create more Mongols, Chinese, Russians or Americans. If we are few today it's because some of us saw the writing on the wall and switched loyalties.
*
Let the fool enjoy his folly so that he may be wise, even if wisdom comes at the hour of his death.
*
When Indians burned widows, did any one of them ever bother to raise the question: “Why don't we ask the widows if they like to be burned?” Civilizations should be judged by the manner they treat the weak and defenseless.
*
If you want to understand Armenians, don't read their nationalist historians; read instead a history of Armenian literature. The only reason we don't burn writers the way Indians burn widows is that we prefer to ignore them, which amounts to burying them alive.
*
Because I refuse to share their obsession with massacres and money, they call me negative. One way to be positive in their eyes is to adopt “Yes, sir!” as a mantra.
#
Friday, January 2, 2009
****************************************
DIVIDING LINES
**************************************************
Speaking of his mother, Edward Gorey says in an interview: “She had a stroke when she was about eighty and her entire character changed. All her hypocritical love for humanity vanished.” (ASCENDING PECULIARITY: EDWARD GOREY ON EDWARD GOREY. Interviews by Karen Wilkin, page 95.)
This type of dividing line in one's life happens to all of us; and when readers disagree with me violently, I cannot help thinking that their disagreement has not yet reached the line that divides propaganda from reality.
When did I change my mind about my fellow Armenians? In my case it was not so much a line but the last straw that broke the camel's back.
*
As children we should be taught to reflect that every conviction and dogma in our belief system may well be wrong and there may be more merit in their contradictions. That, it seems to me, should be the underlying principle in all educational systems.
*
In her review of LEFT IN DARK TIMES by Bernard-Henri Levy, Claire Berlinski mentions a Turkish friend of hers who “like most Turks” has been brought up to believe “the Armenians had it coming.” (NATIONAL REVIEW, December 15, 2008, page 32.)
*
A true sign of insanity, it has been said, is the belief that everyone else is crazy. In my view, another sure symptom of insanity is the belief that the world is run by intelligent men who place the interests of their people and mankind in general above their own and anyone who says otherwise must be nuts.
*
In a recent issue of the ARMENIAN REPORTER (December 20), there is a remarkable letter to the editor by Ara Sarafian outlining in some detail the present situation of Armeno-Turkish relations, which clearly implies that when it comes to the Genocide issue, our Turcocentric ghazetajis may be doing more harm than good. I urge Ara Sarafian to post this letter on Armenian discussion forums on the Internet.
#
Saturday, January 3, 2009
****************************************
ON APOLOGIES
**************************************************
As a rule governments don't like apologizing for past crimes but they may change their mind when under pressure from their own people, or so we are told in THE POLITICS OF OFFICIAL APOLOGIES by Melissa Nobles, where we also learn: “The Armenians are not going to get an apology any time soon, in spite of a worldwide public campaign, from the Turkish government for the atrocities committed during World War I because most Turks are not prepared to accept that their government bore responsibility.”
*
The best interview in THE PARIS REVIEW INTERVIEWS, volume I (New York, 2006) is the one with Dorothy Parker, a relatively minor writer; the most boring is the one with T.S. Eliot – a pezzo novanta. Unlike Eliot who speaks only about himself and his work, Dorothy Parker speaks of many things and is never long-winded.
*
Armenians who vilify Turks and Turks who vilify Armenians don't think of themselves as racists because they assume the whole world knows what bloodthirsty savages Turks are and what nasty, disloyal scum Armenians are. But the whole world knows nothing of the kind and cares even less. To most of the world Turks and Armenians might as well be Hutus and Tutsis. As an Armenian, the only thing I know about Hutus and Tutsis is that they are tribes in Africa. The average Canadian doesn't even know where Armenia is. To him we might as well be Romanians or Arameans.
#
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
