Thursday, April 20, 2006
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CHOBANIAN
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When Arshak Chobanian, a foremost writer of the last century, visited Beirut, Antranik Zaroukian writes in his memoirs, one of his first questions to friends was: “Where do we stand with our struggle against the Tashnaks?”
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DIVIDE AND RULE
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Zaroukian discusses and dissects many struggles, almost all of them internecine. Another proof of the fact that we have accepted the divide-and-rule tactic of our oppressors as if it were a fait accompli imposed on us by force majeure.
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ANSWERS AND QUESTIONS
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We either agree with someone else’s answers or we ask questions of our own. If we choose someone else’s answers, let us at least make sure that his secret agenda does not conflict with our own.
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FRIENDS AND ENEMIES
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We are better at making enemies than friends. It has happened to me more than once that in my efforts to make a friend, I have succeeded only in making an enemy.
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A BIG LIE
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In a contest between a pleasant lie and an unpleasant truth, the lie will always win. Ideology is theology is one of those pleasant lies that have poisoned and Talibanized our collective existence.
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PHILOSOPHERS AND CAPITALISTS
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He who hires and fires knows better than he who is hired and fired. It follows a benefactor is wiser than a philosopher. All a philosopher does is deal in “philosophical gobbledygook,” whereas a benefactor deals in dollars. Only an idiot would refuse to see the uselessness of the philosopher and the necessity of the benefactor. Conclusion: philosophers are idiots, benefactors lovers of wisdom (which is what “philosopher” means in Greek – a lover of wisdom).
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Friday, April 21, 2006
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CONTRADICTIONS
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During the Soviet era, Armenians of the Diaspora were divided into those who supported the Homeland on the grounds that the regime was only an ephemeral phase, and those who declared it was our inalienable right and patriotic duty to resist tyranny. Two questions that were avoided and continue to be avoided today: Does supporting the Homeland also mean covering up or ignoring its abuses of power and crimes against humanity? Does resisting tyranny justify violating the fundamental human right of free speech of all dissenters?
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UNSPOKEN MOTTOS
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Better a dishonest somebody than an honest nobody.
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Better a fat idiot than a hungry philosopher.
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MORONS AND OXYMORONS
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An honest politician.
A tolerant partisan.
A pious bishop.
A humble benefactor.
A selfless academic.
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QUESTION
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Have I ever said anything you did not already know or suspect?
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MAXIM
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The easiest way to expose one’s ignorance is by pretending to know more than one does.
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MEMO
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In my formative years the man whose judgment I respected the most was a Stalinist. Moral: Trust no one so completely as to paralyze your own judgment.
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Saturday, April 22, 2006
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FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS
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A dupe is one who thinks it is his patriotic duty to believe what his elders tell him. Millions were deceived because they thought Lenin, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao knew better. Many others believed in the slogan “Mussolini ha sempre ragione” (Mussolini is always right). What is even more astonishing is that among these countless faceless and anonymous mobs were also some of the most intelligent men of the last century – H.G. Wells, Shaw, Heidegger, Knut Hamsun, Gide, Koestler, Silone, Sartre… Never say therefore for whom the bell tolls.
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CONFESSION
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I have committed my share of transgression, probably many more than I should have. But I have never felt the need to legitimize my intolerance by joining a political party. If I hate a fellow Armenian to the point of wishing him dead, I do so on purely personal grounds without feeling the need of a boss to convince me that by hating him I am discharging my patriotic duty. If I hate Ottomanized and Sovietized Armenians it’s because I see traces of both in myself.
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MASSACRISM
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A man who is obsessed with the past cannot ask himself, Where am I? Where am I going? Where will I be tomorrow or next year? Remembering our victims, yes; letting them turn us into pillars of salt, no!
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