as i see it - Pt. I

[ara baliozian]

BIN THERE

LADEN THAT

*******************

Ara Yeretzian, a doctor from Chicago, has been publishing a series of

critical articles in THE ARMENIAN REPORTER of New York. Judging by reader

reaction √ from "This doctor needs medical help," to "Let the dog bark!"

√ the good doctor appears to have hit paydirt.

Armenian insults might as well be the best form of advertisement.

If you are bad, they ignore you, as they should. But if you have

something to say and that something does not jibe with their own favorite

brand of recycled crap, be prepared to be verbally stoned and spat upon.

An Armenian will never say "I am against dialogue," because that would be

undemocratic and uncivilized. What he will do instead is insult you thus

making sure you reciprocate his sentiments. Because the unspoken message

in all insults is: "Why would anyone want to engage in an argument with a

lowlife like me?"

By silencing dissent, sultans and commissars asserted their

infallibility. By insulting we achieve the same result even if in the

process we make ourselves contemptible in the eyes of the world.

You may take an Armenian out of the Ottoman Empire but you can't take the

Ottoman Empire out of an Armenian.

[ara baliozian]

Friday, December 14, 2001

********************************

1. It has been said that the world is divided into those who cast pearls and

the┘others. I am not sure about that. There are times when the world

looks to me more like a place where swine dish out regurgitated crap to

other swine. Think of Germans under Hitler, Russians under Stalin, Iraqis

under Saddam, Arabs under their assorted emirs, princes and mullahs┘and

so on.

It goes without saying that Armenians form an exception to this general

rule.

It could even be said that every Armenian is a pearl in search of swine.

2. "I paint with my prick," Renoir is quoted as having said.

Some of my readers think with theirs.

3. Always be civil to a writer, especially if he happens to be an Armenian.

You never know when he may choose to get even. I for one never read an

Armenian I have insulted. An insulted Armenian is like a sword of

Damocles and I already have a forest of yataghans hanging over me.

[ara baliozian]

Saturday, December 15, 2001

***********************************

1. Marx said other philosophers only tried to interpret the world;

he was going to change it; but he was wise enough not to say "for the

better"; he was even wiser when he said, "I am not a Marxist!"

2. The Armenian character or our collective unconscious has been shaped more

by sultans than by Armenian literature; that's because, in Machiavelli's

words, "fear never relaxes," whereas love of literature may well be an

absent factor. In the ghetto I grew up I don't remember anyone quoting a

single line by an Armenian poet.

3. Taking yourself seriously in an Armenian environment amounts to committing slow suicide. If you want to survive, learn to laugh, beginning at yourself.

4. We are not normal. It's impossible to be normal in an abnormal world especially if you happen to have an abnormal past.

5. I know many Armenian writers, but I know many more commissars of culture.

You may now draw your own conclusions - please note that I said "conclusions" and not "confusions!"

6. Some of my readers are smart enough to tell the difference between a good

writer and a bad one but not smart enough to ignore the bad - judging by

the number of times I have been told I am bad.

[ara baliozian]

Monday, December 17, 2001

*******************************

1. When confronted with a difficult problem, ostriches bury their heads in the sand, we are told. Men are smarter: they don't bury their heads, they bury the problem even if it means burying themselves in the process.

2. Semantics rule the world.

We say "genocide," they say "dispersion."

I say "the enemy is us," they say the enemy is you."

3. 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.

4. I shall attain wisdom on the day I give up writing. But as long as I think by writing I can change things or anyone's mind I am condemned to remain an obstinate fool.

5. "You are a fool to write for Armenians," I am told once in a while by

friends. I don't write for Armenians. I settle scores with those who brainwashed me and I expose those who are now busy brainwashing you, your children and your grandchildren - regardless of nationality. What could be more universal?

[ara baliozian]

LATER / 17 December, 2001

************************************

1. They will misunderstand you if understanding you means relinquishing their infallibility.

2. I remember to have read somewhere that

to say you were wrong means saying

you are wiser today than you were yesterday.

Likewise, to refuse admitting infallibility is to say you were an arrogant fool yesterday, you are an arrogant fool today,

and you intend to remain a damn fool all your life. And why? Because you value your ignorance more than someone else's knowledge.

3. Since our national mortality rate has been higher than most, we cover up that fact by bragging about our genius for survival.

I call that ostrich patriotism.

Perhaps what I have been trying to do is let our ostriches know that they are making asses of themselves with their posterior stuck out and their vision as well as thinking organ buried in the sand.

4. Prejudices are like prisons, and bigots who hate to give up their prejudices remind me of prisoners who prefer to live behind bars.

5. To how many of my critics (make it, hostile readers) I could say: "My

brain against your intestines? I don't stand a chance."

[ara baliozian]

Tuesday, December 18, 2001

**********************************

The enemy is us.

An often repeated clichИ that no longer even registers on our consciousness.

Perhaps the function of a writer is to rephrase clichИs or to find in them new and unexpected meanings. And this is exactly what Russell does in the following quotation: "The beliefs that are held most firmly and most passionately are very often those for which there is least evidence.

When one large body of men believes A, and another large body of men believes B, there is a tendency of each body to hate the other for believing anything so obviously absurd." (PORTRAITS FROM MEMORY & OTHER ESSAYS, page 167.) Which reminds me of another quotation I remember to have read somewhere:

"Among fanatics, impartiality is seen as bias and moderation as betrayal."

[ara baliozian]

18 December, 2001 /LATER

*********************************

With us the ego comes first.

The boss says I am the boss!

The bishop says I represent God on earth, and

the benefactor says I represent Das Kapital!

As for writers and their ideas:

the consensus is

(and this is the only time we can speak of consensus in our context):

The worst writer who is for us

is infinitely superior

to the best writers that is against us.

To put it differently:

Better a jackass who kisses ass

than Plato or Socrates

who refuses to kiss ass.

[ara baliozian]

Wednesday, December 19, 2001

**********************************

Why is it that it is so difficult for some Armenians

to disagree without being insolent?

-- or, as we say in Armenian:

a gosht, borodakhos, yev anpardavan sriga?

And if you were to say,

"Because you yourself are a rude sriga";

the obvious questions to be asked are:

"Why can't you find yourself a better role model to emulate?

Why choose me?

Surely there must be far better men than myself out there --

beginning with your parents and schoolteachers?

And if, none of them is worthy of emulation,

why don't you take it upon yourself to introduce civility

in our uncivilized environment?

Why make things worse by contributing to our Ottomanism?"

[ara baliozian]

Thursday, December 20, 2001

*********************************

What's happening today in Argentina

happens with us every day with one difference however.

Instead of rioting we either emigrate or join the ranks of the alienated majority.

If you were to ask the rioters in Buenos Aires why they are rioting, they will reply: "The economy, stupid!"

If you were to ask the Armenians who emigrate

why they are emigrating, they will give you the same answer. But if you were to ask the alienated Armenians, you will probably get no answer.

That's the way it is with the alienated:

they are too alienated to explain the obvious.

And on those very rare occasions when they take it upon themselves to explain (as I have been doing during the last two decades)

they are verbally abused in several languages

- Armenian, English, Turkish, and sometimes even in Arabic.

[ara baliozian]

LATER / 20 December, 2001

********************************

It's not easy being an Armenian.

If you are honest, the dishonest will develop a consensus against you.

If you understand or know something they don't know, you will be verbally abused by the ignorant.

If you are a moderate, don't be surprised if you don't make too many friends among the fanatics.

If you make fun of partisans, members of both parties will hate your guts.

The only way to be popular among fools and charlatans is to be one of them.

It's not easy being an Armenian.

Thank God I am only a minor scribbler.

I hate to thin what would have happened to me

had I been a major or even a middling one.

[ara baliozian]

THE JACKASS AND THE RAT

************************************

Once upon a time,

or as we say in Armenian,

there was once and there was not (gar ou chigar)a jackass and a rat.

Gentle reader, if at this point you identified yourself with either the jackass or the rat, you do not qualify as a gentle reader but as a prejudiced one, that is to say, you are a hostile reader and an enemy.

This parable is not for you.

Nothing I say or write is for you.

Please do not read me any more.

I don't need enemies.

As an Armenian I have enough of them already -- more than my share, as a matter of fact. I need friendly readers. I need friends.

But perhaps I will have better luck

looking for them in the animal kingdom, including jackasses and rats.

[ara baliozian]

QUATRAIN

*****************

Of certain men

One could truly say:

"He is worse than a Turk.

He is an Armenian!"

 

Saturday, December 22, 2001

**************************************

MENDOZA: I am a brigand: I live by robbing the rich.

TANNER: I am a gentleman: I live by robbing the poor.

Shaw, MAN AND SUPERMAN (1903)

***

He knows nothing, and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly

to a political career."

Shaw, MAJOR BARBARA (1907)

***

QUESTION: What did you think of after reading this second quotation?

ANSWER: Every other Armenian.

[ara baliozian]

A TIMELY PROPOSAL

*****************************

Anyone who defends the status quo against malcontents like me deserves a medal.

As things stand, we have all kinds of crazy medals with crazier legends, such as PRINCE OF VASPURAGAN, KING OF CILICIA, and

EMPEROR OF TRANSCAUCASIA.

The medal I have in mind should simply read DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, and it should be awarded not only to wealthy merchants

and capitalists with deep pockets

but also to ordinary wage-earners and members of the proletarian class.

One of these days if and when our bosses, bishops and benefactors smarten up

they will see the wisdom in this proposal.

If they haven't so far it’s because of purely financial reasons.

I am told a PRINCE OF VASPURAGAN medal costs the recipient a minimum of $5000; my guess is, a mythical kingdom in Cilicia comes a little higher; and only multimillionaires can afford an imaginary Transcaucasian empire.

 

By contrast a DEFENDER OF THE FAITH medal

could be within the income bracket of any working stiff.

[ara baliozian]

Sunday, December 23, 2001

*****************************

May I confess that I don't always like what I write;

but there are things that must be said

and things that write themselves, so to speak,

without any effort on my part --

as though my hand were driven by reality itself.

What I can't understand are Armenians

who hate me but go on reading everything I write

as if I were rearranging reality for them

and they don't like what they see;

and instead of saying "You don't know what you are talking about!"

they insult me, thus confirming everything I say

about Armenian intolerance, tribalism, and Ottomanism.

Some even go down into the gutter hoping I will join them there,

and when I fail to do so,

they become more irrational.

It is as if they were saying:

"If you think I am as bad as a Turk, then, by jingo!

I will behave like one!"

instead of: "I will prove you are wrong

by behaving like a civilized, tolerant Armenian

and a worthy member of the first nation

that accepted Christianity whose central message is

compassion, forgiveness, and love."

[ara baliozian]

Monday, December 24, 2001

********************************

Some may think what follows is about love;

others may think otherwise.

I will let the reader decide.

Last night while reading the diary of a contemporary writer

I came across the name of Pierre Lot,

a turn-of-the-century French novelist

familiar to Armenians for his love of Turks and hatred of Armenians.

I remember, when I first heard of this as a boy,

I ascribed it to some kind of incomprehensible human perversity.

How can civilized man and a famous author to boot

love Turks after knowing what they had done to us?

And why did he hate Armenians?

What possible harm had we done him?

I am older now and the years have enhanced

my understanding and tolerance of human eccentricities and predilections.

 

With a little effort I think I could understand Pierre Lot.

I could even understand the Armenian-American poet

(who shall remain nameless)

who after a short visit to Turkey

wrote me a letter in which he said

he found Turks much more lovable than Armenians.

I now see nothing incomprehensible in that,

as I see nothing incomprehensible in William Saroyan

saying that we Armenians should feel sorry for Turks.

One reason I am now more favorably disposed

towards those who hate Armenians is that

I have witnessed and even experienced on my own skin

Armenian hatred of Armenian.

If Armenians can hate their fellow Armenians,

why not a French writer?

Who knows, maybe there will come a time

when Armenians will learn to love their fellow Armenians

after they learn to love Turks.

But perhaps not even then┘.

[ara baliozian]

There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.

-- Douglas Adams

[ara baliozian]

Tuesday, December 25, 2001

***********************************

When asked to encourage Catholicism in Russia by way of conciliating the

Pope, Stalin is quoted as having said: "The Pope! How many divisions has

he got?"

On hearing of Stalin’s death in 1953, Pope Pius XII is reported to have

said: "He is now counting my divisions."

I read this in Julien Green’s diary: VERS L’INVISIBLE: JOURNAL 1958-1967

(Paris: Plon, 1967). Green is an American who lives in Paris and writes

in French. He is also a devout Catholic and mentions God on almost every

page of his diary.

He quotes a musicologist friends of his who once said to him: "Mozart is

sometimes absent from his music, but Bach is always present in his."

He quotes a phrase from the German to the effect that man is dust but he

is also light.

"When man tries to make a paradise for himself," he observes, "the result

is a dismal failure. He is much better at making a hell for those who

will follow him?

I also learn that Cortot didn't have a good memory. Once in the middle of

a Beethoven recital, he stopped, couldn't go on, turned to the audience

and asked if anyone had the score with him, and on being handed the score

he went back and continued with the recital.

[ara baliozian]

LATER======[25 December, 2001]

****************************************

1.

The only Armenian Julien Green has mentioned so far (page 119) in his

diary is Basil II Bulgaroktonus ("Bulgar-slayer" in Greek), the Byzantine

Emperor who blinded 15,000 Bulgarian prisoners of war. Green does not

identify him as an Armenian however. He also fails to mention the fact

that on seeing his blinded army, the Bulgarian Czar Samuel is said to

have had a stroke and died on the spot (hangarzamah yeghav, in Armenian).

Another curious fact that Green doesn't mention is the fact that Czar

Samuel was himself an Armenian-- his mother’s name was Ripsima or

Hripsime, which happens to be an exclusively Armenian name.

 

2.

In Simone Weil, I read: "I would suggest that barbarism be considered as

a permanent and universal human characteristic which becomes more or less

pronounced according to the play of circumstances."

Chauvinists and racists, please note!

[ara baliozian]

Wednesday, December 26, 2001

***********************************

 

1. Those who see nothing questionable in tribal or authoritarian regimes

should be reminded once in a while that democracy means government by

consent and despotism means government by coercion.

2. An Armenian controversy is massacre without bloodshed.

3. Our history is a tragedy because we are a farce.

4. If my explanation is wrong or not convincing, correct it or improve on

it. If I have taken the wrong turn, treat me as you would treat a

stranger in your hometown in need of directions.

5. In Julien Green's diary I read that bullfights were popular in Spain

because the people identified the bull with the government.

Elsewhere: "The world is an enemy country."

Victor Hugo once compared Notre-Dame de Paris to a donkey's ears.

6. Indifference to wealth is also wealth. Indifference to success is also

success. But indifference to greater knowledge is the source of all

prejudice, evil and misery.

[ara baliozian]

LATER [26 December, 2001]

*********************************

 

1. Despotism destroys itself because it values cowardice, opportunism and

ignorance much more than honesty, courage, and intelligence.

2. We are all in the gutter but some of us feel very much at home there.

3. If the world is your homeland, all men are your brothers. But if you are

a fanatic chauvinist even your brothers will be your enemies.

4. It's simply mind-boggling the labyrinthine complications the

simple-minded invent to justify their simple-mindedness.

5. Forgiving fanatics amounts to encouraging them. Fanatics should not be

forgiven: they should be opposed, exposed, contradicted, ridiculed, and

whenever possible hanged by the neck until they become moderate corpses.

6. The art of reading consists in reading others as opposed to reading

oneself.

7. I read the following amusing anecdote in Julien Green: Alexander Dumas

fils once received an invitation from a friend with an illegible

handwriting. He took the note to the nearest pharmacist and was told to

wait. The pharmacist then disappeared and when he returned he handed

Dumas a phial of medication and said: "6 francs and 75 centimes, please."

[ara baliozian]

Thursday, December 27, 2001

********************************

1.

When a rascal recognizes himself in my writings, he calls me unpatriotic.

Louis XIV said "I am the state." Our rascals never say that but they

assume it as if it were a universally established and accepted fact.

2.

If the kingdom of God is within us, so is the kingdom of hell.

3.

Julien Green: "A house that one is about to leave becomes more beautiful.

I have seen this happen a hundred times."

4.

According to an old Italian folk tale, there was a devil once who became

bored with life in hell and asked permission to go up in the world and

live as a human being. Permission was granted. But after a couple of

weeks of life on earth he said: "I have had it! I am going back to hell!"

 

On reading this tale I remember to have thought: "He must have lived

among Armenians."

5.

To those who think they know better because they are better, I say:

"Please, stop reading me. You are wasting your valuable time. I have

nothing to tell you. But if you insist on reading me, please do not

comment because I don't plan to read you. But if you go on reading me and

commenting, thank you!"

[ara baliozian]

LATER [27 December, 2001]

********************************

Progressive nations are progressive not because they are gifted or their

average IQ is higher, but because they are tolerant. They are tolerant to

the point of welcoming and supporting foreign talent. Writers like

Nabokov (a Russian) and Saul Bellow (a Canadian), among many others,

found a second homeland in America. In France we have the examples of

Zola (an Italian), Moreas (a Greek born in Athens), Beckett (an Irishman)

Ionesco (a Rumanian) and Adamov (an Armenian), all of whom made valuable

contributions to French literature.

Money goes to money, they say, and talent goes where there is freedom.

What's happening to us? Compared to our literature of Istanbul at the

turn of the century under the Bloody Sultan, our literature of today

might as well be dead and buried with no prospect of resurrection on the

third day or year or decade.

Once in a while I get letters from friends urging me to back to

translating into English works of Armenian literature. They are surprised

when I tell them there are probably hundreds of unpublished translations

out there in search of publishers who hesitate to publish them because

"there isn't enough interest in ethic literature" √ and they could add:

"especially among ethnics!"

[ara baliozian]

Friday, December 28, 2001

**********************************

There are good Armenians and bad Armenians, or so we are told.

Every good Armenian has his own definition

as to who qualifies as a good Armenian;

and it goes without saying, in his own eyes,

every good Armenian thinks of himself as a good Armenian who is fully qualified to define who is a bad one.

A member of the AAA, for instance, will view a member of the XYZ as a bad Armenian or let's say as a less than a good Armenian or a lesser Armenian and vice versa.

So that in the eyes of some good Armenian

every Armenian is a bad Armenian.

It is safe to assume that every Armenian organization (from AAA to ZZZ) views every other organization as less than good and sometimes even bad, and every bad Armenian views the good ones as bad.

And if you think I am complicating things,

let me complicate matters even more.

the majority of Armenians (the alienated and assimilated) do not care to be defined as good or bad Armenians; as a matter of fact, they don't even care to be identified as Armenians.

And why?

The answer must be simple by now:

Because there are too many self-assessed good Armenians running around (with the blessings of a bishop or boss) and classifying their fellow Armenians as second-class citizens. And since all our alphabet-soup organizations

are in the business of promoting good Armenianism and opposing what they consider as bad Armenianism, it follows that what may save us is not "good" Armenianism but tolerance √ namely,

Armenians who will not impose their narrow criteria on others.

And if you were to ask what is my definition of a good Armenian, I will say I have none.

As far as I am concerned, there are no good or bad Armenians, only good and bad human beings: only Armenians willing to respect

the fundamental human rights of their fellow men regardless of nationality.

The rest is chauvinist mumbo jumbo,

racist nonsense, and fascist crapola.

[ara baliozian]

LATER THE SAME DAY [December 28, 2001]

*********************************************

1.

Since I have always expressed contempt for fascist hoodlums, chauvinist

scumbags, and racist dealers in crapola, why should I be surprised if

some of my readers go on reading everything I write for the sole purpose

of crapping on me? -- after they identify themselves as patriotic

Armenians and me as an unpatriotic one, of course, thus ascribing their

crap to patriotism.

2.

I have experienced many trials, difficulties, and misfortunes in my life

and most of them were of my own making. I suspect I would be a happier

man were I to stop writing for Armenians. One reason I go on is that I

hate the idea of my enemies going around and bragging about the fact they

were successful in alienating and shutting me up. It’s a pleasure to let

them know that the days of commissars of culture are over and they missed

their careers as executioners by several decades.

3.

No writer has ever been persecuted because he didn't love his country but

because he refused to kiss ass.

4.

No matter how absurd a chauvinist, he will always find other chauvinists

to agree with him. And no matter how moderate and objective a critic, he

will always be verbally abused by fanatics.

[ara baliozian]

Saturday, December 29, 2001

*********************************

1.

Instead of saying "Do not lead us into temptation," we should say: "Give

us the strength to resist all temptation." No, I am not trying to improve

on our Lord, only the hearsay evidence.

2.

Ignorance is more popular than knowledge because learning how to live

also means learning how to die.

3.

Whenever I read an insult, I say: "Another enemy, another faithful

reader!" Because I have observed that when a reader insults me he

condemns himself to read everything I write thereafter in order to

justify to himself his self-righteous outrage and he does that even if it

means reversing the meaning of what he reads.

4.

Chauvinism is not a crime in itself but it becomes one when it is used as

a license to behave like a hoodlum. But perhaps I am reversing the

chronology of events here. It would be more accurate to say that a

hoodlum adopts chauvinism in order to mask his status as a skinhead.