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There goes another April 24th...
Ok, Everyone has to be a critic now and then right? Heres my rant.
I direct this first question at the Armenian Organizations throughout the US:
What the ____ were you thinking? Almost every one of you went in a separate direction. The "major" event was planned to be several thousands of people in New York City! Are you kidding me? What the ____ has a few thousand people ever gotten accomplished in US policy? Ok, looks like we have to take all you .orgs back to Mr. Hovik's kindergarten - here we go:
Q: Ok .orgs, legislative decisions are made in what city?
A: No, not NYC, not Chicago, not LA, not Detroit, yes you in the back, the one with the fez: "Washington D.C."
Q: Hey, you in the back with the fez who answered the first question. I haven't seen you in this class before, who are you and how did you know the answer to that question?
A: "Well I’m a Turk, and I knew the answer because my people knew enough about the world to know if we want to stop an Armenian movement for Genocide Recognition in the US congress we should go to D.C. and protest - and that is exactly what we did. Unfortunately there wasn't much to protest, we could hardly find any Armenians".
___________
I ask the .orgs again, what the ____ were you thinking? There was not a single headline in any major newspaper that I could find relating to the Armenian Genocide. Why? Because we spread our voices so thin that nobody heard us - again.
Before long it'll be hundreds of bus loads of organized Turks rolling into D.C. to advocate for a law banning talk of such a thing as an Armenian Genocide - a cute little oppressive law they already have in Turkey. Then Armenians will wonder how they ever came up with such a phenomenal idea!
Have you ever opened an invitation from one of those Armenian orgs in D.C. and were amazed at how nice it was. When I get them I feel like some dignitary being invited to a presidential palace. They are all done in full color on super gloss heavy weight stock with all kinds of amazing designs not to mention they are they can be 1/4"-1/2" thick. They are beautiful, but they are also unnecessary. Realistically speaking these .orgs could spend anywhere between $40-$60 on each. (prices vary somewhat). Multiply that number alone by how many thousands of those are sent out for their conferences and parties and ask yourself how much money it ends up being. I threw mine away... as did most of the recipients. I thought "couldn't they have made a nice tri-fold brochure, even in color it could have saved them 70%". But why not waste the money? Its all donated and tax free anyway, right! What else they could have done with it?
They could have used the saved money to help subsidize 100's of tour buses from Armenian populated cities in the US, brought people to D.C. for a weekend rally and march on the Hill. You get a few hundred thousand people and believe me you might get some media attention, you might even get some government attention – and just maybe the amount of attention that would say “Alright these Armenians are getting serious, maybe we should stand by that whole 'moral' thing we keep B.S.-ing about. After all, we will still get our BTC oil supply without any objections from Ankara, we can already see the $ signs glistning in their eyes".
Well we won't know for sure what it would have or could have done because we didn't try it. One thing we did try was Webfaxes, and as we have seen, they are minimally effective at best.
I will say that a record number of members of congress signed letters to Pres. bush asking that he recognized the Genocide, this being the result of efforts by the very .orgs I am speaking of. They also may have had their little ceremonies on the Capital Rotunda or in the basement of one of the House office buildings where nobody even noticed them. I give them credit for doing something... but that something is not enough, and as we can now say in hindsight was not effective - again.
Anyway, credit is to be given to the young people in Yerevan who came out with torches and marched through the streets as ONE singing traditional songs and commemorating all night long at Tsitsernakabert.
I also give credit to the Turkish organizations for being so... well as the name suggests - organized. You used your relationship with Israel to put extra pressure on the immoral and easily blackmailed Bush Administration and they bowed down to you again. You got your people in buses and cars and got them into our nations capital and made your presence felt.
To my common Armenians, I put little blame on you. It is the responsibility of our representing organizations to be innovative leaders to our community, a responsibility they are not living up to. It is however as common Armenians our responsibility to say something when we feel that our orgs are failing us.
I am not saying my above suggestion is the only way, or that it would even work. What I am saying is we sure as ___ aren't trying anything new or different, and its making me sick. I'm ready to start planning something big for next year, or the 95th or the 100th anniversary, I hope I am not alone!
Ok, Everyone has to be a critic now and then right? Heres my rant.
I direct this first question at the Armenian Organizations throughout the US:
What the ____ were you thinking? Almost every one of you went in a separate direction. The "major" event was planned to be several thousands of people in New York City! Are you kidding me? What the ____ has a few thousand people ever gotten accomplished in US policy? Ok, looks like we have to take all you .orgs back to Mr. Hovik's kindergarten - here we go:
Q: Ok .orgs, legislative decisions are made in what city?
A: No, not NYC, not Chicago, not LA, not Detroit, yes you in the back, the one with the fez: "Washington D.C."
Q: Hey, you in the back with the fez who answered the first question. I haven't seen you in this class before, who are you and how did you know the answer to that question?
A: "Well I’m a Turk, and I knew the answer because my people knew enough about the world to know if we want to stop an Armenian movement for Genocide Recognition in the US congress we should go to D.C. and protest - and that is exactly what we did. Unfortunately there wasn't much to protest, we could hardly find any Armenians".
___________
I ask the .orgs again, what the ____ were you thinking? There was not a single headline in any major newspaper that I could find relating to the Armenian Genocide. Why? Because we spread our voices so thin that nobody heard us - again.
Before long it'll be hundreds of bus loads of organized Turks rolling into D.C. to advocate for a law banning talk of such a thing as an Armenian Genocide - a cute little oppressive law they already have in Turkey. Then Armenians will wonder how they ever came up with such a phenomenal idea!
Have you ever opened an invitation from one of those Armenian orgs in D.C. and were amazed at how nice it was. When I get them I feel like some dignitary being invited to a presidential palace. They are all done in full color on super gloss heavy weight stock with all kinds of amazing designs not to mention they are they can be 1/4"-1/2" thick. They are beautiful, but they are also unnecessary. Realistically speaking these .orgs could spend anywhere between $40-$60 on each. (prices vary somewhat). Multiply that number alone by how many thousands of those are sent out for their conferences and parties and ask yourself how much money it ends up being. I threw mine away... as did most of the recipients. I thought "couldn't they have made a nice tri-fold brochure, even in color it could have saved them 70%". But why not waste the money? Its all donated and tax free anyway, right! What else they could have done with it?
They could have used the saved money to help subsidize 100's of tour buses from Armenian populated cities in the US, brought people to D.C. for a weekend rally and march on the Hill. You get a few hundred thousand people and believe me you might get some media attention, you might even get some government attention – and just maybe the amount of attention that would say “Alright these Armenians are getting serious, maybe we should stand by that whole 'moral' thing we keep B.S.-ing about. After all, we will still get our BTC oil supply without any objections from Ankara, we can already see the $ signs glistning in their eyes".
Well we won't know for sure what it would have or could have done because we didn't try it. One thing we did try was Webfaxes, and as we have seen, they are minimally effective at best.
I will say that a record number of members of congress signed letters to Pres. bush asking that he recognized the Genocide, this being the result of efforts by the very .orgs I am speaking of. They also may have had their little ceremonies on the Capital Rotunda or in the basement of one of the House office buildings where nobody even noticed them. I give them credit for doing something... but that something is not enough, and as we can now say in hindsight was not effective - again.
Anyway, credit is to be given to the young people in Yerevan who came out with torches and marched through the streets as ONE singing traditional songs and commemorating all night long at Tsitsernakabert.
I also give credit to the Turkish organizations for being so... well as the name suggests - organized. You used your relationship with Israel to put extra pressure on the immoral and easily blackmailed Bush Administration and they bowed down to you again. You got your people in buses and cars and got them into our nations capital and made your presence felt.
To my common Armenians, I put little blame on you. It is the responsibility of our representing organizations to be innovative leaders to our community, a responsibility they are not living up to. It is however as common Armenians our responsibility to say something when we feel that our orgs are failing us.
I am not saying my above suggestion is the only way, or that it would even work. What I am saying is we sure as ___ aren't trying anything new or different, and its making me sick. I'm ready to start planning something big for next year, or the 95th or the 100th anniversary, I hope I am not alone!
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