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[ara baliozian]

FACTORS
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An Armenian who ascribes all our problems to outside factors beyond our control is an Armenian who also thinks there isn’t much we can do except wait until these factors take a turn in our favor, which may happen tomorrow or in a hundred years, or, if the past is an index, a thousand years….

No amount of big talk can alter the fact that we are small potatoes, and no amount of positive assessment can cover up the fact that our situation is negative. Whistling in the dark is not the same as courage. As I see it, our options are between fearless honesty on the one hand, and on the other, cowardly dishonesty parading under the banner of chauvinism.

In the same way that shopkeepers sell a product to make a profit, political parties publish newspapers and books to maintain or enhance their popularity, power, and prestige; and in the same way that shopkeepers may price themselves out of the market, political parties may lose their credibility by lying too much.

I have always been suspicious of people who brag about their own real or imaginary assets. He who says "I am smart," seldom is. He who says, "I am wealthy," never is. And he who says "I am an honorable man," or "I am a patriotic Armenian," is either a charlatan or a bloodsucker.

[MJ]

ara baliozian
Member
Member # 271
posted June 08, 2001 06:37AM
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ARMENIAN TYPES
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Some day I may write a little book about Armenian types, an updated gallery of rascals and flim-flam artists, or, if you wish, contemporary variants of characters that have already made appearances in Baronian (HONORABLE BEGGARS), Odian (COMRADE PANCHOONIE), and Massikian (DOWNPOUR).
Preliminary sketches follow:
THE MASSACRIST
After reading a book on the Genocide he thinks he has exhausted the subject of Armenian history, culture, and identity.

THE PUNDIT
His so-called expertise is based on the assumption that, since most Armenians are functional illiterates and hidebound dupes, they are bound to look up to him as an authority on any given subject.

THE COMMISSAR OF CULTURE
After acquiring a worthless title in a two-bit political party, organization, or club, he feels fully qualified to tell much better men than himself what to think, feel, and sometimes even how to live.

THE ACTIVIST
A wheeler-dealer who refuses to do what he can today but promises to do what he cannot tomorrow.

THE GENIUS
After convincing himself or his floozy that he is one, he thinks his problems are over, he has got it made, and he has nothing to worry about because, as an immortal, he fears nothing and no one, not even death.

THE SPEECHIFIER
A loud-mouth verbal swindler who is his own most consistent and faithful dupe.

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ara baliozian

[MJ]

ara baliozian
Member
Member # 271
posted May 31, 2001 11:50AM
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ON THE LABYRINTH OF THE ARMENIAN MIND
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-the cunning manipulation of disconnected details into a coherent but totally false theory;
-the paralyzing inability to see someone else’s point of view no matter how valid;

-the blind acceptance of clichés and flatteries and the savage rejection of any assessment
that may be remotely objective or critical;

-the futile effort to cover selfish aims beneath a transparent veil of altruistic or patriotic
principles;

-the absurdly Quixotic notion that the noble profile of Mt. Ararat above
can obliterate the unbearable stench of filthy latrines below.

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ara baliozian