Thursday, June 08, 2006
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NATIONS, TRIBES, CLIQUES AND GANGS
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Nikol Aghbalian (1873-1947), Tashnak leader, scholar, and educator: “We Armenians are products of the tribal mentality of Turks and Kurds, and this tribal mentality remains stubbornly rooted even among our leaders and elites.”
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We tend to confuse tribalism with patriotism. In reality, they have contradictory meanings. When we place loyalty to the tribe or party above loyalty to the nation, we also divide, fragment, weaken, and thus make the nation more vulnerable to the enemy. It follows, to be loyal to the tribe or party (that is, a fraction of the nation) means to betray the nation; and because I have been saying this I have become an enemy of the people in the eyes of our partisans.
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What have we learned from history? Answer: to sermonize, to speechify, and to propagandize, that is to say, to misrepresent reality and to be accountable only to an abstraction like the people, the nation, or god. To be accountable only to a god whom we have created in our own image is to be accountable to none.
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I learn something new every day and I cannot help reflecting that I must be just about the luckiest man alive for managing to survive for so many years with so much ignorance.
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Nikol Aghbalian: “When man does not submit himself to the rule of law, he will have to submit himself to the rule of men, that is to say, cliques and gangs.”
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Friday, June 09, 2006
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I first came across the expression “dysfunctional national psyche” in reference to the Nazis. But it seems to me it could equally apply to any society whose worldview or understanding of reality is based on propaganda.
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In your dealings with your fellow men, it may be useful to remember that whenever you are in a position to check what they say, they may speak the truth; otherwise the chances are they will lie.
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In politics, very often our choice is between a brainwashed majority that cannot think and a minority that cannot act.
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The only way to understand some people is to think of them as denizens of a parallel universe in which laws governing reality are so incomprehensible that betrayal is seen as patriotism, apostasy as conversion, darkness as light, and vices as virtues.
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I began questioning my interpretation of history on the day I realized that most of my misery was self-inflicted.
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A good writer is also a bad writer you feel the need to go on reading.
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Saturday, June 10, 2006
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TWO QUESTIONS
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To readers who complain that I repeat myself, I ask: Since no one is in a position to coerce you into reading me, why don’t you read a thousand other writers who don’t repeat themselves?
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Another question: Why should I agree with views that I held thirty years ago when I was a brainwashed dupe?
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If I have asked these questions before it may be because so far I have not received a satisfactory reply.
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It was said of communists that they were slaves of former slaves. It could be said of us that we are dupes of former dupes.
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There is no clearly marked yellow brick road leading to truth. Sometimes it is necessary to cross swamps. Truth can be a dirty business.
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ON FRIENDSHIP
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Antoine de Saint-Exupery: “Some people think getting to know someone is a waste of time. They prefer to buy things. But since there are no stores that sell friends, they no longer have any friends.”
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Jules Renard: “There are no friends, only moments of friendship.”
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Chamfort: “I gave up the friendship of two men because one of them never spoke of himself and the other never spoke of me.”
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Talleyrand: “Don’t speak evil of yourself. Your friends will do enough of that.”
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