Sunday, November 27, 2005
*********************************
After describing in some detail the rhythmic exuberance and melodic inventiveness of the final movement of a Mozart piano concerto, most of which I no longer remember, the announcer concluded: “This is what it means to be alive!” Sometimes the easiest explanation is also the most unforgettable.
*
According to the press release of a new publisher, he is willing to consider any manuscript that qualifies as “entertaining trash.”
*
I have been in the business long enough to know that nothing I write matters, and on the day I start taking myself seriously I will have to declare intellectual bankruptcy.
*
Reason tells me it makes no sense writing for Armenians. Even so, I go on. Don’t ask me why because I don’t know. Far better men than myself have fallen silent after five, ten, or at most twenty years, because they couldn’t take the insults of a vocal minority, the hostility of the establishment, and the apathy of the majority. I have been writing for thirty years now and even if nothing changes, my guess is, I will go on writing for another thirty (if I am lucky enough to live that long). So what if I have only two readers left, both of whom misunderstand and contradict every line I write?
#
Monday, November 28, 2005
***************************************
COMPASSION FATIGUE
*********************************
A young woman has written a commentary in our paper today the title of which is “Hello I’m a person, not some guy’s stereotype.” By yakking endlessly about massacres and Turks we have reduced ourselves to the status of a stereotype – a victim nation – and the world is full of them.
*
People judge us by our contributions to the welfare of mankind, or how useful we can be to them, and not by how much we have suffered. This is true of individuals as well as groups. I will never forget the young, cool blonde co-worker of mine, Carol by name, who cut me short once with the words, “Listen, I’ve got problems of my own.” Politicians in need of our votes may not say as much, but they sure as hell think it.
*
“I’ve got problems of my own!” A good explanation as to why Naregatsi may well be the most praised and least read Armenian writer.
*
If I have learned one sure thing in life it is this: Never challenge the power of someone you are not in a position to kill with impunity. This applies to Turks as well as Armenians because power is power regardless of nationality.
#
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
***************************************
I don’t trust a writer who belongs to a political party. I don’t trust political parties and politics. I trust politicians even less. I will go further and say that I see them as my natural enemies.
*
Being Armenian is an abnormal condition. Being an Armenian writer is compounding the felony.
*
It’s all right to be prejudiced as long as you have an open mind.
*
History teaches us that it is easier to learn from it than to change it.
*
All empires are warlike. There has never been a pacifist empire. A pacifist empire might as well be a contradiction in terms. A pacifist empire would cease being an empire before you can say Jack S. Avanakian. That’s because an empire is like an attractive wench. Everyone wants a piece of the action and if she doesn’t resist she becomes a woman with a past and no future, and in today’s parlance, history.
*
The justice of victims can be as ruthless as the justice of victimizers.
#
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
************************************
There came a moment in my life when I suddenly realized that all the knowledge I had acquired until then was worthless. It follows, all the knowledge that I have acquired since may also be worthless sometime in the future. If men in positions of power and authority experience such moments, they must pretend otherwise. The same applies to men of faith. And yet, somewhere in the scriptures we read: “If you think you are wise, behave like a fool so that you may be wise,” or words to that effect. I suspect men of faith interpret these lines in such a way as not to question or doubt their faith-based assumptions, knowledge and understanding. And that’s another problem with men of faith: not only they must not question their fundamental assumptions, but also their interpretations of scriptures. Not only the Pope must pretend he does not doubt his faith seven times every day (as an Italian adage has it) but also he must pretend he has at no time questioned his own infallibility. The same applies to bishops, mullahs, and televangelists. Hence orthodoxies and heresies; hence religious wars and massacres; and hence Voltaire’s dictum, “Since it was a religious war, there were no survivors;” and Bertrand Russell’s maxim: “The aim of philosophy is to introduce doubt in an environment of certainties.”
*
Speaking of certainties: in a fascist environment the press is exclusively anti-enemy, and if there is no enemy, it invents one. In a democratic environment the emphasis is on exposing corruption and incompetence in one’s own power structure. By publishing 19 anti-Turkish articles in a 16-page weekly and ignoring our own filth, our press fully qualifies as a crypto-fascist medium.
Censorship is another prominent feature of fascism and all its crypto- and neo- variants. If I have said this before, it bears repeating. For, according to Socrates, “to know is to remember.”
#

Thursday, November 24, 2005
***************************************
Our prejudices are born with us and they are all rooted in the illusion that we are the center of the universe, our god is the only true god, and our country is always right. We know of course that countries don’t think, politicians do, and politicians are always wrong because they are motivated not by love of truth but by greed of power, prestige, and popularity.
*
The only way to acquire a better understanding of the world is to master the difficult art of thinking against oneself. It is not enough to say, “I could be wrong.” We should say instead, “As long as we think in terms of us and them, we can’t be right.”
*
Until very recently most Americans believed Saddam was wrong and Bush right. If they are having second thoughts today it may be because their thinking follows not their prejudices but historic reality.
*
Twenty years ago I wrote a brief essay in which I summed up my convictions and I thought I had reached the end of the line and I had nothing further to say. But on waking up next morning I felt the urge to add a final note to emphasize one of the points made in my final essay. Twenty years later, on waking up this morning, once more I feel the need to underline and expand in the full knowledge that what I say will change nothing, and history will continue to be made by people who are convinced they are the center of the universe, their god is the only true god, and their country is always right.
#
Friday, November 25, 2005
***********************************
DIARY
*********************
“He was brainwashed and traumatized,” I heard someone say on the radio this morning. One could say that to be educated, or to feel and think as a member of a specific racial, religious, ethnic or tribal group means to be brainwashed and traumatized to some degree.
*
If to hate the many for the crimes of the few is racist, who among us can plead not guilty?
*
I have discovered a wonderful new American detective-story writer, K.C. Constantine (not his real name). His plots advance on dialogue which is fast, furious, often witty, and always profoundly human – Chekhov with a touch of Dostoevsky.
*
On the radio, Muti conducting Brahms’s 4th Symphony. In the first movement he emphasized not the charm but the monumental. I could not help thinking that this is what Brahms must have had in mind.
*
Whenever Mother sees me writing, she says “Are you the director of a bank?”
*
In Antranik Zaroukian’s NEW ARMENIA, NEW ARMENIANS, I read: “For six or seven centuries Armenia was only a dream in the heart of every Armenian. Dreams are nice if they lead you somewhere, nasty if they take you to a dead end…” He could have added, “…and nightmares when they come true.”
#
Saturday, November 26, 2005
**************************************
PARALLELS
*************************
In the paper this morning I read the following brief news item: “A 15-year old girl with a peanut allergy has died after being kissed by her boyfriend following his snack of peanut butter.”
*
Socrates is right: Ignorance is the source of all evil, and to know is to remember. Didn’t the boyfriend know about her allergy? If he knew, did he forget?
*
Ignorance may be the most innocent of all transgressions but in life it is sometimes the most severely punished.
*
What could be more natural for an oppressed people than to want to live in a free and independent homeland? What was it that made us forget the lessons of history? Why is it that before we decided to rise against the Empire we failed to ask the following questions? What did the West do during the Bulgarian and Greek massacres? How many innocent lives did their angry editorials, speeches, and pamphlets save? They didn’t even bother sending Lord Byron. He volunteered. And how many lives did he save? He couldn’t even save his own.
*
I see no difference between a regime that butchers writers and another that silences them. In both cases a unique perspective that may add to our understanding of the world is rejected and ignored.
##

Monday, November 21, 2005
************************************
THE MASSACRE CONTINUES…
************************************************
The purpose of the 9/11 Commission was to document and expose American incompetence and intelligence failures, rather than Al Qaida’s barbarism and crimes. If so far we haven’t had a 4/24 Commission it may be because the blame-game happens to be our favorite national sport.
*
There are those who believe by covering up our failures, we will have a better chance to enhance our prestige and emphasize our infallibility. We should not be surprise if this tactic works only with the very naive and inexperienced.
*
The majority of Americans believe today Bush invaded Iraq on bad intelligence. One could also say that we challenged the might of the Ottoman Empire on the false promises of the West.
*
In politics, as in life, mistakes happen all the time. What doesn’t happen with the same frequency is the readiness to admit them. And as Bush hesitates, the massacre continues.
#
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
*************************************
First time he cried wolf they rushed to his aid. Second time he cried wolf they said bon appetit to the wolf and good riddance to the little prick who got a kick out of pulling their dicks.
From Yeghishe (5th century) to Charents (20th century) our writers have been crying wolf by echoing the Biblical warning “a house divided against itself cannot stand,” and they have been ignored.
When on the eve of the Genocide Zohrab said the sky is about to fall, they said, “Zohrab effendi is exaggerating.”
Long before Zohrab, when Raffi said the Ottoman Empire was no place for Armenians because Turks had no respect for human life, he too was ignored.
Some people collect stamps. We collect defeats, disasters, and tragedies. We even brag about them. “First nation to suffer a genocide in the 20th century,” we declare at every opportunity as if that were something to crow about. We go further and brag about how smart we are, all the while ignoring, sometimes even silencing our writers.
Sartre is right: literature is a useless passion. It saves no one.
To friends who tell me not to give up, I say I haven’t so far, but I am beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. This no doubt will be read with pleasure by readers who think of me as a prick who gets a kick out of pulling their dicks.
#
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
*****************************************
WRITERS
*********************
Treat them like welfare cases in need of handouts. If they don’t get the message, reduce them to the status of beggars, then starve and silence them. As a tactic adopted by our bosses in their treatment of writers who refuse to recycle the party line, this may be slow but it is as effective as the tactic adopted by the likes of Talaat and Stalin. That’s because power is power regardless of nationality, faith and ideology.
*
Whenever I am asked why is it that so far I have done nothing to encourage a future generation of writers, I say, “More than writers, the nation is in need of readers.”
*
In the mail today, a short poem and letter that says: “Do you think my son has talent? Should I encourage him to be a writer?” “Only if you hate him,” I am tempted to reply. Instead I say: “No need to encourage him. If he really wants to be a writer he will be one even if you discourage him.”
*
One can also understand oneself by first understanding the unspoken assumptions of the community within which one lives.
*
The problem with solutions is not finding them (I could name four solutions in a single line: honesty, transparency, objectivity, mutual tolerance) but implementing them. Never say therefore “we need solutions,” but “we need leaders who behave not as bosses but as public servants.”
#

Thursday, November 17, 2005
**************************************
SEVEN SYMPTOMS OF FASCISM
1.
When leaders operate on the assumption that they know better than the people, and use their superior brand of knowledge to enhance their power and prestige as opposed to exercising it in the interest of the people. To put it more bluntly, they believe their privileged knowledge authorizes them to behave like masters rather than servants.
*
2.
When they explain the nation’s problems by putting the blame on others rather than on the corruption, incompetence, and blunders of their predecessors. Hitler blamed Germany’s problems on Jews, and we blame ours on Turks, the degenerate West, and our own traitors and collaborators with the enemy.
*
3.
When the men at the top assume their personal integrity is such that accountability becomes an irrelevant concept.
*
4.
When they prefer the company of yes-men and brown-nosers to that of critics and dissidents.
*
5.
When they speak in the name of an ideology, which they confuse with theology.
*
6.
When they control the press by setting editorial policy and they confuse dissent with hostility or disloyalty.
*
7.
When a leader and his gang of elitist cronies view their subjects as lesser men.
#
Friday, November 18, 2005
************************************
PROBLEMS AND THEIR SOLUTIONS
************************************************
Whenever I speak of our problems, I am told in no uncertain terms, “We know all about them. What we need is solutions,” the implication being, unless I make our problems disappear by verbal magic, I might as well shut up and mind my own business.
Common sense, common knowledge, and common decency (rare commodities among us) tell us, the first and most important step in solving a problem is to state it as clearly, objectively, and accurately as possible. But as long as our men at the top reject all charges of incompetence, we will consistently fail to do that.
If one is to believe our leaders, their conduct and the conduct of their predecessors has been beyond reproach. If you dare to question that absurd assertion, you will be labeled an enemy of the people and silenced (I speak from experience).
In such an environment, where denial has become second nature in our leadership, only divine intervention will solve our problems, and so far there is no evidence to suggest that somebody up there is remotely interested in getting involved in our affairs.
#
Saturday, November 19, 2005
**************************************
LITERATURE AND POLITICS
**********************************
The function of literature is to understand and explain reality. The aim of political parties is to understand and explain only a fraction of reality, and more specifically, the fraction that will enhance their power and popularity. As a result, the medium of politics is not the truth but only a fraction of the truth, which is how propaganda is defined: a fraction of the truth.
*
Like most people I have committed my share of blunders and I spend a fraction of every day regretting them. Which is why I find the conduct of our wheeler-dealers, charlatans, and propagandists incomprehensible. They go about their business of sermonizing, speechifying, and editorializing as if they were role models leading exemplary lives.
*
If I am not a self-righteous and a self-satisfied jackass it may because I can’t afford to surround myself with yes-men and brown-nosers who will remind me every day that I am as infallible as the Pope of Rome and as magnificent as Suleiman.
*
And speaking of the Pope: I read the following press release in our local paper today: “The Vatican’s chief astronomer said yesterday that ‘intelligent design isn’t science and doesn’t belong in science classrooms.'”
*
If Genghis Khan was to the left of the Vatican, Bush and Co. must be to the right of Genghis Khan.
#

Sunday, November 13, 2005
*************************************
WHAT ELSE IS NEW?
**********************************
The rich view the poor as lazy and the poor return the compliment by viewing the rich as exploiters, blood-suckers, and crooks motivated by greed.
*
Once in a while I see letters to the editor in our local paper berating the poor for their dependence on government handouts. Surviving on minimum wage in an environment where plumbers can make as much as $40.00 for four minutes’ work, and dentists $80.00 for eight minutes’ work (I speak from experience) is not easy. And speaking of government handouts: what about grants to corporations and academics, not to mention loopholes in the tax code designed to benefit the rich rather than the poor.
*
I have published thousands of commentaries and written many more letters to readers and friends, and none of them ends with the words “Mi kich pogh oughargetsek” (send us a little money). But every other day I receive a letter from an Armenian organization or church that ends with Panchoonie’s punch line. You may now guess who is accused of repeating himself.
*
Money will not save a nation, but accountability, solidarity, and vision may. Consider the fall of empires: it was not lack of money that did it, but too much of it.
*
When two think alike, the chances are either one or both are not thinking.
#
Monday, November 14, 2005
***********************************
SOMEBODY UP THERE DOESN’T LIKE US
************************************************
Sorry, but I can’t come up with any other explanation.
And if Somebody up there doesn’t like us
it may be because we are not a particularly likeable people.
If He liked us, why did He abandon us
at the mercy of ruthless tyrants, bloodthirsty savages,
and incompetent bunglers?
Six centuries under sultans
followed by seven decades under Bolsheviks.
Far from being the chosen people,
we may well qualify as the unchosen and the abandoned.
Naregatsi may have a point:
like the stars in the firmament
and the grains of sand in all the deserts
and on all the beaches of the world,
our sins must be numberless.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings.
But no matter how hard I try,
I can’t come up with any other explanation.
If you can, I am all ears.
But please, no more sermonizing and speechifying.
No more bragging and lamenting.
I have had enough of both.
And be forewarned that
after decades of exposure
to recycled chauvinist crapola,
I come equipped with a highly sensitive shit detector.
#
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
*************************************
ON PREJUDICE
**************************
Faith does more than move mountains. It allows an idiot to think he knows better. I was such a thoroughly brainwashed Catholic as a boy that I was sure anyone who did not share my faith was a lesser man.
*
I was taught many things as a boy except to consider my fellow men as equals. Later, when I learned the meaning of the word prejudice, it did not even occur to me to connect it to myself and my attitude towards non-Catholics. And much later when I too was treated with prejudice in a non-Catholic environment, my first reaction was confusion, disorientation, malaise, and alienation. Again, the word prejudice never entered my mind.
*
We begin by thinking we are the center of the world and we end by thinking our nation, or civilization, or race, or religion is superior to all others.
*
What’s sinister about religions and ideologies is not what they teach but what they fail to teach.
*
During the last few days I read several commentaries about the French riots, one of which was titled “French Riots are part of global clash of civilizations,” and another “Blame French riots on poverty and lack of civil rights.” According to the first pundit, the only answer is “for the two civilizations to keep their distance”; according to the second, the elimination of racism and prejudice. The implication in the first pundit’s answer: prejudice is as old as mankind and no amount of education and legislation will eradicate it completely. The answer of the second pundit: maybe so but we must move in that direction if we want to avert World War III or a long series of catastrophic clashes.
Who is right? I don’t know, but I have the following suggestion to anyone who wants to make a contribution to world peace: Whenever you think your country or god is better than someone else’s, ask yourself: By whose criteria? If the answer is by your own or your educators, you can be sure of one thing: you may not be an idiot but you think like one.
#
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
***************************************
INTELLIGENT DESIGN
**********************************
In our environment flattery will get you everywhere. That too is part of our Ottoman heritage. If you doubt my word, try the following experiment. Write a letter to an editor praising his weekly, and another, under a different name, criticizing it, and see which gets into print pronto.
Once when I wrote a letter critical of an editorial, I received the following message from the editor: “We don’t as a rule print letters critical of our editorials.” Why not? No explanation was given. As Saroyan’s wife writes in her memoirs: “When I say la, you must understand lalabloo.”
If the flunkey of a boss, bishop, or benefactor wrote the editorial, criticizing it would amount to heresy, perhaps even sacrilege. As for violating a reader’s fundamental human right of free speech: imagine if you can raising the issue in the presence of a sultan.
And speaking of sultans: I will never forget the day I met one of our national benefactors – strike “met,” make it, saw him from a distance. Because as soon as his presence became known, he was immediately surrounded by a defensive phalanx of brown-nosers.
And speaking of brown-nosers: when asked to name his role models, this very same benefactor’s right-hand man who parades as an intellectual leader, named – you guessed – the national benefactor, who as far as I know has never said or written a single line worth publishing.
There has been a great deal of talk lately about Intelligent Design. As I look back at our history and what’s happening today in our Homeland and Diaspora, I can’t help asking: Where is the Design? Where is the Intelligence?
#[/B]

Friday, November 11, 2005
******************************************
We study history to learn from it. As junkies of medievalism and massacrism, the only thing our historians have taught us is to brag or lament.
*
According to a well-know maxim, “No one wins a war,” and since all war-makers operate on the assumption that they will be the victors (because no one in his right mind goes to war to lose it), it follows, all war-makers are wrong.
*
Armenians make great emperors (Basil I), politicians (Deukmejian), and diplomats (Mikoyan), but only outside Armenia. In Armenia and Armenian environments in Diaspora they produce nothing but second-rate bunglers who either brag or lament with the full support of our academics, brown-nosers, and dime-a-dozen know-it-all pundits. We have been and continue to be at the mercy of mediocrities whose number one enemy is excellence and whose number one concern is number one.
*
A headline in our local paper today reads: “Canadians increasingly cynical about government.” The article goes on to explain that only one in four Canadians trust their politicians. My guess is, only one in 400 or perhaps even 4000 Armenians trust theirs.
#
Saturday, November 12, 2005
************************************
What’s the use of writing if nothing changes?
But if perceptions change, reality may follow.
One can always hope, of course.
Yes, provided one does not confuse hope with wishful thinking.
But what if hope is another word for wishful thinking?
One must go on if only because the alternative is silence and despair.
*
In today’s editorial cartoon a war veteran is reading his daily paper with headlines on the front page about political scandals, indictments, and wheeling-and-dealing, as he muses: “My comrades and I fought for this?” And as I scan the headlines about Turks and Turkey (19 of them) in the latest issue of an Armenian weekly (16 pages) I cannot help wondering: “Did our writers work and die for this?”
*
Strange country, stranger people! They utter a cliché or a platitude and call it a philosophy. In a land devoid of philosophers, everyone is a philosopher.
#

Sunday, November 06, 2005
*************************************
All professions are conspiracies against the laity, Shaw said, and he wrote plays with long prefaces (longer than the plays themselves) to prove it. Americans say something very similar when they ask, “What’s your racket?”
*
Dialogue may lead to consensus but endless contradictions (Armenophile and Turcophile academics being cases in point) lead nowhere but to a dead end; and, as it is to be expected, laymen prefer to believe the side that’s to their own interest. But self-interest driven by chauvinist sentiments is an unreliable guide that leads not to truth but to lies.
*
Writes E.H. Gombrich in his LITTLE HISTORY OF THE WORLD: “Children must learn from history how easy it is for human beings to be transformed into inhuman beings.” If children learn that, they will know something adults to no.
*
I no longer ask myself if the enemy is a savage beast. I ask instead, “Does that make me a role model of compassion and understanding? And if I allow my enemy to dehumanize me, am I not a far more dangerous beast to myself than he is?”
#
Monday, November 07, 2005
*************************************
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE STORY
******************************************
Until about a year ago I did not know and I did not care to know the other side of the story because I was brought up to believe savage beasts do not deserve a side. I know better now. But before I set out to present a brief sketch, please remember that truth is the first casualty of war.
The Great Powers and Russia were dismembering the Empire and had designs on the carcass. Only Germany was on their side and Germans had problems of their own.
It was at this very critical time when rumor spread that giaours in the Balkans were raping and crucifying Turkish girls. True or false? It makes no difference. As I said at the outset and it bears repeating, truth has always been the first casualty of all wars.
The rape and crucifixion of helpless and innocent Turkish girls by infidels, who also massacred indiscriminately all Turks in their midst, provoked and in their eyes justified retaliation of the worst kind.
Call it propaganda. Call it a Big Lie. Call it what you will, but while you are doing that remember that Big Lies and propaganda are not uniquely Turkish aberrations. Neither is genocide.
#
Tuesday, November 08, 2005
**************************************
To dehumanize Turks is subliminal genocide, or to do to them in the abstract what they did to us in the flesh.
*
In my encounters with Armenians in the public eye I have noticed that their public assertions seldom match with their private comments. One could say that double-talk is another attribute we share with the rest of mankind.
*
We are so unused to using our brains that anyone who dares to think for himself is branded as a dispenser of unmitigated b.s.
#
Wednesday, November 09, 2005
**************************************
Journalism identifies wolves and sheep. Investigative reporting exposes wolves in sheep’s clothing. Literature tries to understand and explain why wolves, sheep, and wolves in sheep’s clothing behave as they do. One could also say that the aim of literature is to make the incomprehensible comprehensible.
*
Whenever something goes wrong, I begin by analyzing my own motives and conduct. I ask myself, “Where did I go wrong?” That’s because I have a far better chance to change myself than the world or my enemy. It is different with politicians and killers, who begin by pleading not guilty, and when the evidence says otherwise they plead either extenuating circumstances or insanity. That’s because both politicians and killers belong to a different species. They are lesser homo sapiens. They may even be the missing link.
*
If I blame all the world’s problems on politicians and criminals, do I absolve the rest of mankind? I do, except for dupes who by surrendering their intelligence to someone that doesn’t have much of it himself, become co-conspirators.
*
Thursday, November 10, 2005
**********************************
If you want to see beauty you can see it everywhere. For thousands of years artists have been observing beauty in the most unlikely places and they have not run of places yet. And if you want to see ugliness, you can see it everywhere too, beginning with your own heart. I speak from experience.
*
Americans love to quote their critics, including foreign critics.
Quoting them has become part of their entertainment industry.
*
Writing for Armenians amounts to making yourself a target for their poison arrows. That’s why I keep it short – to present a smaller target. Were I better writer, I would keep it shorter.
*
The unspoken message of most comments: “I am smarter than you,” and not “I have something to add.”
#

Thursday, November 03, 2005
***************************************
One good thing about Naregatsi: he consistently refused to play the blame-game card; and one good thing about our naming him our greatest writer, “our Shakespeare,” is the unspoken admission that our admiration may well be an extension of the fact that we collectively lack his honesty and courage.
*
If Turks are Asiatic barbarians, what does that make us? What kind of moral and political standards were we able to acquire as slaves of Asiatic barbarians during six centuries of subservience?
*
An explanation that implies moral superiority is a convenient explanation; and such an explanation is bound to be biased if only because all claims of moral superiority are false.
*
Conformism is also a form of subservience. To repeat a version of the past that enjoys the approval of a power structure is also a symptom of slave mentality,
*
If the average Turk or Armenian is willing to recycle state propaganda, it may be because Ottomanism continues to shape his perception of reality.
*
When it comes to our perception of reality, Ottomanism can be as misleading as Americanism or Armenianism. That’s because reality is neither Ottoman nor American or Armenian. Mountains and rivers, lies and truth, love and hate, honesty and dishonesty do not recognize national boundaries.
#
Friday, November 04, 2005
************************************
ON BIAS
****************
Bias, like the force of gravity, is everywhere, as invisible as an abstraction and as concrete as a ton of bricks or an avalanche. Even when we speak of facts and nothing but facts, bias enters into their selection.
Like lawyers, historians know that by carefully selecting facts and documents they can prove anything, even the innocence of a ruthless serial killer. In several recent editions of the ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA, for instance, Talaat is described as “an idealist and a man of integrity.”
What I said about lawyers and historians also applies to religious leaders and theologians. When Hemingway said a good writer should be equipped with a reliable “shit-detector,” he was talking about the ability to detect bias.
Whenever you express an opinion, ask yourself the following question: “If I can’t trust bishops, popes and ayatollahs, or rabbis and gurus who speak in the name of God or Truth, why should I trust politicians who speaks in the name of power? — knowing full well that politicians and their propaganda have played a central role in all wars and massacres?”
*
I put my trust only in men who speak against their own interests. Or, in the words of Jean-Paul Sartre on the final page of his memoirs: “I depend only on men who depend on God and I don’t believe in God.”
#
Saturday, November 05, 2005
*************************************
A genocide begins with the murder of a single innocent being simply because he belongs to a specific ethnic or religious group.
*
Genocide has nothing to do with number of victims. If an Armenian kills a Turk because he is a Turk, that’s a crime against humanity.
*
A Turk once said to me: “My grandfather was killed by an Armenian. What do I do about it?” If true, and I have no way to prove otherwise, we owe this Turk an apology.
*
If Turks refuse to apologize, why should we? Because it is the right thing to do and because to say it is not is to accept Turks as role models of moral conduct.
*
We should not wait for the Turks to ask for an apology. Neither should we coerce the Turks to apologize. A coerced apology is a meaningless gesture. If I owe someone an apology and I refuse to apologize until my arm is twisted, that’s not an apology but a maneuver to avoid pain.
#

Sunday, October 30, 2005
************************************
In my dealings with most Armenians I have discovered that being an Armenian is not an asset but a liability. As a friend of mine who grew up among Armenians and Turks in Cyprus is fond saying, “Armenians treat Turks with greater respect than fellow Armenians.”
*
In the eyes of our Oriental carpet dealers and philistines in general, writers are no better than potential beggars to be avoided at all cost. I have met only one Oriental carpet dealer and one national benefactor who sought me out and were eager to shake my hand: the first wanted me to translate his memoirs into English, and the second wanted me to help him write his memoirs.
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The aim of all power structures is either to kill you or tell you what to think.
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The more benevolent a despot, the more ruthless his underlings and henchmen.
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The best practical advice I have had from a Canadian writer: “Never serve chicken salad to chicken shit.” If I am a failure, it may be because like most Armenians I have tendency to ignore good advice.
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Whenever I am accused of hating my fellow Armenians, I remember an eminent English critic’s description of Jane Austen’s fiction: “regulated hatred.” Hatred of what or whom? Hatred of the aristocracy, of course. Or, as my wise Canadian friend would say, hatred of chicken shit who pretend to be chicken salad.
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Monday, October 31, 2005
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In a recent issue of HARATCH (Paris) I read a lengthy review by an Armenologist (Mutafian) of a textbook on Armenian history by another Armenologist (Mahe). If Mutafian is to be believed, almost every other paragraph in Mahe’s opus contains an error. That’s the way it is with experts: their best efforts go into exposing the misconceptions and inaccuracies of the competition.
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A sociologist published a book recently in which he proves that crowds act more wisely than individuals.
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If laymen are wiser than experts, it may be because laymen are like members of a jury, in a position to compare the testimony of experts (who, as a rule, contradict one another) and to reach a consensus (which experts are unable or unwilling to do).
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Experts are seldom independent operators or objective observers. Rather, they are products of specific cultural and political environments or schools of thought; they work for institutions, serve vested interests, elites, or regimes. Very much like lawyers, they defend a set of ideas and question the validity of all ideas or witnesses that may introduce doubts into their assertions of certainty.
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When crowds misbehave, as they tend to do in time of war and revolution, it is because they are misled by leaders with personal stakes and conflicting goals. If it weren’t for the Sultan or the Young Turks and our revolutionary leaders, the chances are there would have been no massacres and Turks and Armenians would now be living side by side in peace.
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Rosa Parks was not a historian, a sociologist, or a political leader. She was the quintessential anonymous face in the crowd. She used her common sense, did the right thing, and changed the course of history. What we need, what mankind needs, are more individuals like Rosa Parks and fewer experts and academics with axes to grind.
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Any one of us may change history if he uses his common sense, does the right thing, and ignores the sophistries of academics and the rhetoric of political leaders.
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A nationalist historian who believes in his own version of history has a dupe for a reader.
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Tuesday, November 01, 2005
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What happened I know. Ever since I was a child I have known. As an adult I want to know why. The conventional explanation repeated ad nauseam (Asiatic barbarians, degenerate West) might satisfy a dupe but not an adult who has acquired the ability to think for himself.
As an Armenian I don’t feel morally superior to anyone and I consider all assertions of moral superiority bogus. Only Jews believe they are the Chosen People and only Nazis believed they belonged to a Superior Race. An Armenian who asserts moral superiority convinces no one but himself and his fellow dupes. I don’t have to engage in academic double-talk or philosophical gobbledygook to reach this conclusion. All I have to do is exercise the minimum degree of common sense and objectivity.
Many readers have questioned my judgment simply because I dare to question racist slogans and nationalist propaganda – the very same mental aberrations whose victims we have been. To say or imply that Asia is populated by barbarians and the West by degenerates is to dehumanize mankind, and to dehumanize is stage one of all man’s inhumanity to man, including genocide.
If we are no better than the rest of mankind, it follows all men are brothers and deserve our understanding. To understand Turks is not the same as denying the reality of the Genocide. It only means that no matter how hard we try we are not equipped to understand everything.
If God exists, He may be infallible in His judgments. But as human beings we can only hope to understand today something we did not understand yesterday. If that’s being a denialist, then I say the English language is not our common medium of communication.
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Wednesday, November 02, 2005
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Whenever I read a book I learn a few things even when the subject is a familiar one; and since there are thousands of books that I have not read, what I don’t know far exceeds what I know.
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If I have learned one thing so far it is to reject all dogmas and to question all certainties, especially dogmas and certainties in the name of which millions have killed or died. I have learned this not only from books but also from personal experience.
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When as a boy someone suggested that what I had been taught until then had been stuff and nonsense, I was not outraged. On the contrary, I immediately assumed I was dealing with an eccentric who should be humored and ignored. It was very gradually that I became aware of my status as a thoroughly brainwashed dupe.
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If dogmas and certainties are more popular it is because they are supported and actively promoted by power structures. Benefactors, for instance, know that money is no better than excrement (and Freud agrees) unless it is used to acquire power and prestige. Something similar could be said about religious, political leaders and their propaganda.
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“Makers of idols don’t believe in them,” says an old Chinese proverb, and if Italians are to be believed, “Even the Pope doubts his faith seven times every day.”
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Propaganda pays, philosophy starves. Because Socrates said, “Of the gods we know nothing,” he was condemned to death. If history, our own history, teaches us anything, it is this: all ideologies and religions are no better than bloodthirsty idols.
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Thursday, October 27, 2005
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If you compare the contents of your local daily with those of an Armenian weekly, you may notice that odar papers cover an encyclopedic array of subjects and issues, while the Armenian weeklies seem to be obsessed with Turks. Today, for instance, after counting thirteen headlines on Turks in the latest issue of an Armenian weekly of 16 pages, I gave up in disgust. Focusing on Turks also means (a) reinforcing our image as victims, and (b) ignoring or covering up our own present problems of which we have more than our share.
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Even when, on those rare occasions, we focus on a specific Armenian problem, we do so monomaniacally. During the last couple of months, for instance, I have been reading a veritable eruption of articles, commentaries, and letters to the editor about a couple of Armenian-American benefactors who were cheated by a crook in Yerevan and abused by a thoroughly corrupt or inept justice system.
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My question is: Why is it that some Armenians who have been fully aware of corrupt practices in the Homeland from day one are heard from only when they are personally stung by them? Don’t they know that by keeping silent they actively legitimize the very same system whose victims they now claim to be? What about the countless other victims, who cannot afford lawyers, are in no position to make headlines, and whose sole alternatives are either emigration or prostitution?
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Friday, October 28, 2005
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In what we think and believe we are all dependent on experts and we tend to forget that experts, very much like Armenophile and Turcophile historians, seldom agree on anything. They may be able to reach a consensus in another planet or life, but in this one, never! If it were up to laymen like us, we would continue to think the earth is flat.
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In the eyes of laymen, televangelists and ayatollahs, or for that matter, popes and bishops are more trustworthy than Socrates.
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In our belief systems we resemble parrots, and in our defense of these belief systems, we behave more like cannibals.
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No one has ever killed or died in defense of the flat-earth theory, but millions have been massacred in the name of a fictitious god.
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All wars and massacres may be said to be consequences of laymen and dupes (but I repeat myself) placing their trust in the judgment of preachers and politicians, whose very survival depends on their self-assessed expertise to rewrite history.
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Religious leaders not only rewrite history but also the word of god, to the point that a god of love, compassion, and mercy becomes a god of prejudice, intolerance, hatred, and murder. Figure that one out if you can.
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Saturday, October 29, 2005
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Armenians come in all sizes and shapes and not all of them are what they pretend to be. Some look like Germans, others like Mongols, Arabs, Jews, and Indians. I even know an Armenian whose name is Kurdoghlanian (literally, son of a Kurd). Speaking of myself: since, on a clear day, I can trace my ancestry all the way back to my father, I could be a combination or permutation of several dozen tribes in all the colors of the rainbow. When I was a little boy, I remember, two neighborhood Greek girls nicknamed me Hirohito.
Raffi may have been wrong when he said “treason and betrayal are in our blood.” What is in our blood may well be divided loyalties and in such a situation to be loyal to one side means to betray the other. And those who want to be loyal to humanity, as opposed to a fraction of it, may have to betray two or more sides.
Something similar could be said of Turks. Since intermarriage (to be politically correct about it) was practiced for centuries in the Ottoman Empire, identifying oneself as a Turk today may serve some vague political classification but is not and cannot be a racial or national or tribal designation.
What about Canadians and Americans? I will never forget the answer of an unbelievably attractive teenager when I asked for her nationality. “Canadian,” she replied; and when I pressed for more details, she said: “Polish, German, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, Indian, French….”
The Turks maintain what they did to us at the turn of the last century can’t be called genocide because it had nothing to do with race; it was civil war. Which raises the question: Does civil war justify indiscriminate fratricidal massacre?
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