MJ

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 20, 2001 11:08 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- P.S. ****************************** To be an Armenian and to expect to have the agreement of your fellow Armenians is to be in this world but not of this world. Whenever a fellow Armenian expresses surprise or even shock at my views, I am tempted to ask: Where were you born? Where did you grow up? Where do you live? In the Garden of Eden? But even in the Garden there was a snake who didn’t see eye to eye with the Good Lord. My advice to you is: If you want to survive as an Armenian among Armenians, don’t take yourself seriously, smile, have a good laugh at yourself and your fellow men. Life will be more fun that way. Remember, my friend, the alternative is cancer and early death. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 03, 2001 06:46 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AS I SEE IT ************************ A pervert is also someone who perverts the meaning of what he reads. If you want to love a man, talk to his friends. If you want to hate him, talk to his enemies. If you want to understand him, talk to both. To choose America as our enemy amounts to certifying our status as perennial losers. There is an old Egyptian saying (which I just made up): "Tackle the rat in your own backyard before you decide to wrestle with the crocodile in the Nile." A reader writes that my writings give him a headache. I could make a long list of Armenian writers who were starved, murdered, committed suicide, had heart attacks or died of cancer. What’s a little headache? It’s easy to have all the answers if you have not yet begun asking the right questions. A reader once accused me of dehumanizing my fellow Armenians. Whereas one of my most frequent reproaches to myself is that again and again I have attempted to humanize them by trying to reason with them and again and again I have been disappointed, insulted, torn to shreds, and cannibalized. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 02, 2001 11:11 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BROTHERS ************************ Whenever I speak of our commissars, charlatans, brown-nosers, panchoonies or anyone else whom I consider my enemy, I never forget Thomas Mann’s words on Hitler in his essay titled "A Brother." "A brother – a rather unpleasant and mortifying brother. He makes me nervous, the relationship is painful to a degree. But I will not disclaim it. For I repeat: better, more productive, more honest, more constructive than hatred is recognition, acceptance, the readiness to make oneself one with what is deserving of our hate." Further down: "Thanks to his baseness, he has indeed succeeded in exposing much of our own." And elsewhere: "The intellectual man is almost as much interested in painful truths as the fool in those which flatter him." -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 26, 2001 11:36 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CHARLATANS AND JACKASSES ************************************* It is a well-known fact that we have our share of charlatans; also jackasses (some of them loud-mouth skinheads with university degrees) who have not yet mastered the complex art of reading and understanding simple sentences in the English language. When I criticize our bosses, bishops, benedefecators and their assorted janissaries (about 1% of the population) they accuse me of insulting Armenians, and they ignore the fact that the overwhelming majority of Armenians (at least 99% of them) among them the alienated and assimilated, the disenfranchised and discontented, the expelled and excommunicated, the unorthodox and the unemployed, the agnostic and atheist, the poet and the prostitute – are not charlatans but their victims, and to refuse to see this is and must be the quintessence of charlatanism. There is an old Chinese saying: "In darkness sometimes difficult to distinguish hawk from vulture." Also charlatans and jackasses. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 01, 2001 07:50 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- RANDOM THOUGHTS ****************************** There are as many versions of the past as there are nations, tribes, religions, ideologies, and historians. Only God knows what happened and why but so far He has refused to share his version with us. Even when two historians agree on the facts they will disagree on their interpretations. If two historians agreed on everything, one of them would be redundant. Thou shalt not confuse your version of the past with that of the Good Lord. Thou shalt not confuse your prejudices with principles. Thou shalt not confuse your limited knowledge with infinite wisdom. And thou shalt not make your views dependent on your ego, especially if the size of your ego exceeds that of your brain, or if it is equal but with a faster growth-rate. To how many of my detractors I could say: "Thank God you are not in politics!" Let me amend that: It’s because our political life has been dominated by individuals like you that we now find ourselves in such a mess. In his STUDY OF HISTORY Toynbee tells us nations and empires are not killed: they commit suicide. Corruption, degradation, and disintegration are not imposed by enemies, barbarians, or historic forces or environmental conditions but by inner failings. Thou shalt not blame your inner failings on others. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 22, 2001 09:55 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- JUST A GUESS **************************** Armenians and Turks, Armenians and Armenians: if the past is an index their future looks grim. Armenians and Armenians: they may not agree on protocol but they agree on all essential points. Armenians and Turks: they may agree on protocol but they agree on nothing else. The Reconciliation Commission may grab a few headlines but it will accomplish nothing but expose our incurable tribalism. Because, if Armenians cannot settle their peripheral differences among themselves, the chances they will come to terms with the Turks might as well be nil. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 10, 2001 12:11 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MORE ON THE RECONCILIATION COMMISSION *********************************************** In our local paper today I read the following definition: "Committee: A group of the unfit appointed by the unwilling to do the unnecessary." And speaking of the unfit and the unnecessary: I also read today in THE ARMENIAN WEEKLY (a Tashnak publication) a scathing, crude and vitriolic exposé (my style) of the Armenian Assembly by an old friend of mine who, alas, is no longer a friend: Dr. Henry Astarjian. If anyone out there knows the good doctor, please ask him to post his article on this forum. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted June 22, 2001 11:09 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MEMOIRS / PAGE ONE *********************** My father lost everything he owned – and I mean everything except the shirt on his back – on two separate occasions: first time during World War I in Turkey, second time during World War II in Greece. The poor fellow spent the rest of his life trying to survive in a hostile world. He never had a chance to tell me what the score was. He probably didn’t know it himself; or, if he did, he didn’t see any purpose in inflicting painful truths on me. As for my schoolteachers: they were half-educated slum-dwellers like the rest of us and their most important priority was survival too. They had no choice but to recycle the party line imposed on them by their superiors. And when, at the age of fourteen, I met an elder distant cousin (widely read, well-informed and with a university degree) willing to share his thoughts on life, history, and literature, my first thought was to dismiss everything he said as the words of a dangerous eccentric, a madman, a lunatic. It took me several years to realize that, when you are brainwashed by ignorant or dishonest men, honesty at first appears as the height of dishonesty. What follows may well be a non sequitur, but please bear with me. I am reminded of the old familiar joke that goes something like this: If you give a man a fish, he will eat for a day. But if you teach him how to fish, he will waste the rest of his life in a boat drinking beer. I suppose something similar applies to recycled chauvinist crap: dish it out to vulnerable children and they will get addicted to it for the rest of their lives; and when they are served real food, they will get sick to the stomach and they will hurl. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 28, 2001 11:45 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OBSERVATIONS **************************** Question: Why do Armenians read Armenian weeklies? Answer: To see their names there or to have something to do while sitting on the hovannes (=john). An imbecile is easy to brainwash and it is with the greatest ease that he brainwashes himself to believe he is just about the smartest fellow around. If "education is the cheap defense of nations" (Edmund Burke), brainwashing must be the surest symptom of moral bankruptcy. Some people fail only after they achieve success. When midgets are in charge, giants become outlaws. Memoirs by survivors and novels inspired by the massacres: I am beginning to see them as atrocities by other means. The torch of truth burns many asses. Someday a solution that creates more problems will be known as "an Armenian solution." -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 22, 2001 12:18 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OBSERVATIONS ************************* A dishonest man cannot criticize an honest one; he can only express resentment, contempt, venom and rage. Some readers demand solutions from me as if they were ordering pizza – with or without anchovies. They expect me to succeed where centuries of Armenian literature failed. To which I can only say: Thank you for your confidence in my abilities, but I assure you, I don’t deserve it. It’s in the nature of mediocrity to want to drag the rest of mankind down to its own level. Jewish proverb: "Men occasionally find a new truth, but never an old button." Albert Einstein: "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 17, 2001 07:08 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AXIOMS / 3 *********************** We are brainwashed against our will but we remain brainwashed by consent. To be brainwashed means to have a fraction of our brain paralyzed. An Armenian who asserts we are better than others is a brainwashed Armenian. The historic evidence (see below), common sense, and objective judgment all combine to suggest that we are as bad as most and worse than some. To say that we are better is to imply our representatives are better too and they are therefore capable of doing what must be done. To assume that our representatives are our betters is to adopt a passive stance. Assuming a passive stance comes naturally to a nation that throughout its millennial history has been subservient to warlords, sultans, and commissars. Our warlords have divided and tribalized us, sultans have massacred us, and commissars have systematically eliminated our ablest men. Warlords, sultans and commissars are no longer with us but we continue to be divided and decimated by our representatives who continue to brainwash us to believe we have nothing to worry about, they are doing what must be done, and all we have to do is adopt a passive stance and trust our destiny into their own hands. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 15, 2001 07:04 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PROBLEMS / SOLUTIONS ********************************** When it comes to solving problems, the complexity of a problem is not as significant as its context. By context we mean the cultural environment, the power structure, and the social forces that have generated the problem. The context of a problem will determine its solution. The most difficult problem has a better chance to be solved in a reasonable context than the easiest problem in an unreasonable one. If the solution of a problem is found, it does not necessarily mean the end of the problem, especially if the problem is set in an unreasonable context. A solution that ignores the context of the problem will be only a useless verbal formula. If a problem is set in an unreasonable context, the more reasonable its solution the more violently it will be rejected. If we assume that mental and emotional development is a process involving successive states of equilibrium, it follows that equilibrium has been an absent factor in our collective existence, whose context has been shaped by centuries of brutal oppression, massacre, genocide, deportation, cultural shock, destitution and slum life. It follows, even if a messianic figure with the ability to solve all our problems were to appear among us, he would be crucified, and worse: he would be ignored, silence, buried alive, and forgotten. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 21, 2001 06:57 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTES / COMMENTS ******************************* It is the easiest thing in the world to tell the difference between an honest disagreement and a smart-aleck contradiction. A smart-aleck contradiction is 99% arrogance and 1% nonsense. There are two ways of reacting to an unfamiliar idea: "I disagree with you," and "You are an idiot!" The first is a statement of fact, the second, a confession. The validity of an idea my also be gauged by the number of fools who conspire to reject it. A fool’s insults are more to be valued than his praises. A fool will never admit to being a fool. Murderers may confess, fools never! Mohammedan proverb: "If you hear that a mountain has moved, believe; but if you hear that a man has changed his character, believe it not." Elizabeth Barrett Browning: "The Devil is most devilish when respectable." -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 12, 2001 06:56 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- INTERCHANGEABLE UNITS ********************************* After reading a nasty comment by a Turk about one of my recent essays wherein the word genocide may have occurred – and when I say nasty, I mean boiling with hatred and bristling with four-letter words…I mean verbal massacre… -- I was tempted to reply and inform him I am personally acquainted with several Armenians just like him and I would be more than happy to introduce him to them. But remembering de Gaulle’s dictum – "Nothing enhances authority better than silence" – I ignored the bastard. But if he writes again, I may ignore de Gaulle… Moral I: Nasty Armenians and nasty Turks: they might as well be twins when it comes to style and content. Moral II: (To paraphrase Lenin): A skinhead is a skinhead regardless of national identity. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 27, 2001 07:04 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTES & COMMENTS ***************************** A good friend of mine, a medical doctor, tells me, based on his own statistical studies, trying to communicate with Armenians can be 10.89 times more carcinogenic than smoking five packs of unfiltered cigarettes a day. An Armenian loves to contradict but hates to be contradicted. Some of my readers think I say strange, unorthodox, unpatriotic things because they have not read our writers. It is almost as if they were equating Armenianism with total ignorance of Armenian literature. They remind me of Catholics who are not encouraged to read the Bible lest they misunderstand it. An Armenian will get so emotionally involved in his efforts to prove that he knows better and he is wiser that he will fail to notice that he has taken leave of his senses and is uttering inanities worthy of a certified moron. "We have problems, sure! (goes a typical Armenian cliché) but so have other nations. Name a single nation without problems." Yes, of course! But our problems are of genocidal dimensions, and unlike other nations, we are dysfunctional; and because we refuse to acknowledge that fact, we fail to come to grips with reality. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 10, 2001 11:08 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Q/A (iii) *************************** What have I done for Armenia? I have translated some of her writers into English. A couple of skinheads, who have not read my translations and don’t know which writers I have translated, have said that my translations are bad and my choice of writers worse. But academics who have both read and reviewed my translations have delivered a more favorable verdict. What has Armenia – or rather, my fellow Armenians have done for me? They have done their utmost to reduce me to the status of a Soviet-style non-person. And I can almost hear the voice of a reader who is familiar with the history of our literature saying: "So what else is new?" -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 30, 2001 12:25 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- REPLY ********************* Once in a while, one of our phony patriotic imbeciles (of whom we have our share) takes it upon himself to accuse me of anti-Armenianism, and no matter how often I am advised by friends not to dignify such meaningless nonsense with a reply, I cannot resist the temptation of reiterating my position. If you are for freedom of speech, you will be against censorship (and we have more than our share of it, as everyone ought to know by now). If you are for democracy, you will be against fascism (ditto). If you are for honesty, you will be against crooks and charlatans (ditto). I could make a much longer list but you get the picture. In short, I can’t be anti-Armenian for the simple reason that I am anti-many things regardless of national origin. To put it more bluntly, I write the way I write to remind our self-satisfied swine that they are not God’s gifts to mankind and if they continue to engage in charlatanism, they must be prepared to be exposed for what they are. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 01, 2001 06:52 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- …AND THEREBY HANGS A TALE *************************************** Once in a while a reader takes it upon himself to remind me that I repeat myself. May I confess that I too don’t much care to be exposed to the same ideas and slogans over and over again ad nauseam and ad infinitum. Which is why I avoid churches and partisan functions; also sermonizers (always against sin) and speechifiers (always for patriotism). My only hope now is that those who find me repetitious, monotonous, consistently negative, will avoid me too; and I can’t help wondering why is it that so far they have failed to do so: I find that wasteful on their part, also irresponsible and thoughtless. And now the tale I promised at the outset: Once upon a time there was a man who lived in a comfortable house in a nice neighborhood. One day, when, after a pleasant walk in the part, he returned home, he saw thick black smoke coming out of his attic window. "Fire! Fire!" he started yelling and running up and down the street, "Help! Help! Please, call 911. Fire. Help. Please. 911!" But nobody did a damn thing. Instead he heard such comments by neighbors and passersby as, "We heard you the first time. Relax. Help is on its way. Don’t be such a pessimist. Be more constructive. Be more optimistic. Things are looking up. You are repeating yourself. You sound like a broken record. Don’t raise your voice, we are not deaf. We can see the fire, we are not blind. You sound monotonous. Such an alarmist! Enough is enough. Shut up! Ignore him…" What happened next is easy to guess. The fire spread and the whole neighborhood burned down. Moral I: If your house is on fire and if you live in an Armenian neighborhood, don’t repeat yourself and be more constructive. Moral II: If you are a neighbor, ignore the message, ignore the messenger, but don’t ignore the context, especially if you are yourself part of it. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 04, 2001 06:59 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MY CUP RUNNETH OVER NIAGARALLY… ****************************************** During the last twenty years or so, it has happened to me no more than once or at most twice, that a reader has written to inform me that he disagrees with me but not as much as he used to when he started reading me. From such glimmers of hope revolutions are born. And they say I am a pessimist, a purveyor of bad tidings, a somber hombre, a gloom-doom dude!…. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 07, 2001 11:00 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTES / COMMENTS ********************************** It is impossible to be too cynical about Armenian politics – that combination of conniving, cunning, arrogant leaders without vision and their abysmally naïve and loud-mouth dupes. Theoretically speaking, the insults of a self-satisfied semi-simian sriga should be as welcome as the agreement of an honest man; but in practice, any insult hurts regardless of its source for the same reason that the bite of a mad dog hurts. Some of my readers issue orders as if they were general and I a foot soldier: which reminds me of the German diplomat who, while in Yerevan, is said to have remarked: "Every morning three and a half million Napoleons wake up in Armenia." Take any two Armenian brothers and one of them is sure to think of himself as Abel and to behave as Cain. I dream of the day when I will be able to write: Since no one insulted me yesterday, I have nothing to say today. That’s because I believe good conduct should be rewarded. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 16, 2001 06:54 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OBSERVATIONS **************************** My critics may be divided into two sets: those who tell me I repeat myself and those accuse me of negativism. Perhaps henceforth I should have the following warning preceding each essay: "Since what follows is neither new nor positive, it may be a waste of your valuable time to read it." One of the most widespread misconceptions of our time: If you know how to use your computer, you also know how to use your brain. Prejudice is like a knife that maims and castrates our thinking organ. In odar environments nice guys may finish last, but in ours they are not even allowed to finish: somewhere along the line they are set upon, mugged, beaten to a pulp, kicked in the groin, shot, stoned to death, hanged, buried, and forgotten. I have been exposed to too many patriotic speeches by bloodsuckers, fascists, and charlatans to have any respect for verbal professions of patriotism. If you ever come across a fellow Armenian who agrees with you all the time and on all issues, you can be sure of one thing: you are in a dream. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 30, 2001 07:22 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ROUTINE *********************** After two decades of hostile co-existence, my critics and I have developed a routine that goes something like this: MYSELF: We have many problems. MY CRITICS: Mention a single nation without problems. -Other nations are functional, we are dysfunctional. -You say that because you are anti-Armenian. -And you say that because you expect even critics to recycle chauvinist crap. -Do you have to stress the negative all the time? Why don’t you say something positive once in a while? -To be truly negative means to give up and to assimilate, which is exactly what the majority has been doing. -Whose fault is it if Armenians assimilate? People like you who stress the negative! -Assimilation has been with us long before I was born: it is a result of a divided, corrupt, and incompetent leadership. -We did not invent these things; you will find divisions, corruption and incompetence in the most progressive nations. -Progressive nations go forward; we have been going in the opposite directions. -Give us a chance. We are a new nation: we just gained our independence. -We are the cradle of civilization, according to our propagandists. -That’s right! And the first nation to accept Christianity. -Correction: the first nation to give up Christianity as an impractical religion. -You speak like a fool and an ignoramus. -You call that Christian? -I call it being honest. -An honest man does not call a fellow human being a fool and an ignoramus. -I can’t think of you as a fellow human being because you are anti-Armenian. -I am anti-Armenian because I refuse to recycle chauvinist crap? -No, because you are anti-Armenian, period!… …and so on There you have it: two monologues that never cross! -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 08, 2001 11:03 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- READERS AND CRITICS ******************************** Some of my critics think they are making a positive contribution to our cause when they accuse me of negativism, thus implying, when I am negative I am negative, but when they are negative they are positive. When a reader insults, curses, swears and foams at the mouth, I feel like James Thurber’s duelist, who, after decapitating his opponent, says "Touché!" If you adopt a critical stance – which, in our environment, might as well mean: if you use your common sense and view things as they are – you will be accused of being a bad Armenian as if being a good Armenian meant being deaf, dumb and blind. In his latest posthumously published book, TOWARDS ARARAT (Yerevan, 2001), Gostan Zarian writes that, when an Armenian establishes himself in a foreign country, he acquires something of the ape and the parrot. "You lack originality," I was informed recently by one of these ape/parrots. To how many of my critics I could say: I am flattered that someone of your intellectual caliber reads my nonsense and takes the trouble to comment on it. In your place I would occupy myself with worthier enterprises. If an Armenian writer criticizes Armenians and no one reads him, is he still wrong? -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted July 04, 2001 11:10 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE VIEW FROM MT. ARARAT ************************************* There is a type of Armenian who defends his innocence by taking care to remain ignorant. If he is a partisan he will assume the partisan version of our recent past is the only valid one and when confronted with another version (which may well be as valid) he will not even consider its merits. If he is a chauvinist he will equate criticism and dissent with treason and betrayal. Such an Armenian will perch on a dunghill in his backyard and when asked what he is doing there, he will reply, "I am on top of Mt. Ararat and I am enjoying the panorama." There is an old Armenian saying: "There are 42 kinds of insanity." Make it 43. AN ARMENIAN PARADOX EXPLAINED ********************************************** An Armenian who insults you, will not forgive you; and the more unjustified his insult is, the longer-lasting his resentment against you will be. Until very recently I couldn’t explain that, but I think I can now, or at least I can give it a try. By making him insult you, you reveal the fact that he is an ordinary human being like yourself, and this is an offense he cannot forgive. He has been brought up to believe he knows better because he is better. There is more wisdom in his ignorance than in your knowledge. Even when he voices a prejudice he is more tolerant than you. That’s because he is not an ordinary joe to whom ordinary criteria apply. He is a member of a fraternity or elite from which the unwashed are excluded. Of course he himself knows all that not to be true, but he doesn’t want anyone else to know. -------------------- ara baliozian

ara baliozian Member Member # 271 posted August 09, 2001 11:07 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MEMOS ************************ TO READERS WHO ARE PROGRAMMED TO CONTRADICT EVERYTHING I SAY: Obviously, I am the wrong man for the job – the job being convincing you that like all human beings you too may well be fallible. However, if you are certain you are always right and I am always wrong, why waste your time reading me? -- especially in view of the fact that we have so many partisan publications recycling chauvinist crap…. TO THOSE WHO INSULT ME ANONYMOUSLY: There should be a silent rule for all e-mail communications that says, if you insult someone, have the decency to do so under your real name, otherwise your target may be justified in dismissing your words as those of a cowardly liar: because anyone who lies about his identity will lie about anything. TO THOSE WHO ARE NOT OPEN TO SUGGESTIONS: Sometimes I make suggestions (like the above) not with the expectation that they will be accepted but with the hope that they will enhance the awareness of my critics. But that too may well be a vain hope. One cannot make suggestions to someone who has assessed himself as la crème de la crème but who is in fact la crème de la scum. Such a one is not, as a rule, open to suggestion even when the suggestion is to his advantage. -------------------- ara baliozian