notes / comments

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Thursday, December 20, 2007
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NOTES / COMMENTS

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Just when I think I am done with Armenians and their problems, a new one comes up or an old one that demands a novel approach. Who gives a damn about Armenians and their problems, anyway? Not even Armenians, it seems. I dream of the day when I will exhaust the subject and start writing love stories, adventure yarns, and murder mysteries. I love murder mysteries. I have read hundreds of Simenons… We all have our cross to bear. The smaller the nation, the heavier the cross.
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If you want to convince a civilized man to behave like a barbarian, you tell him barbarians are at the gate even if there is no one there, and if there is one, he is either the gatekeeper or a harmless pilgrim.
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Whenever I feel depressed, I console myself by saying that even those who hate me read me. Writers have this is common with women: they want to be irresistible.
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Since there are no final answers, not even in science, every assertion is open to debate, provided of course the rules imposed on us by reason, common sense, common decency, and grammar are followed. And no one will ever succeed in convincing me that reason, common sense and decency, and grammar are anti-Armenian.
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When I wrote flattering commentaries, I was published. When I wrote critical commentaries, I was published too. But when I started getting at the truth, I was silenced. Truth was my undoing.
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I write for readers with an open mind. Not even the Good Lord can reach brainless idiots or, for that matter, brainy bastards. Consider the influence of the New Testament on the likes of Stalin (a seminarian) and his countless dupes, among them some very smart Armenians, like Anastas (ditto).
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[Armenian]

Re: notes / comments

Virgil, dude, you're on a roll

Where do you get all this energy from? Damn, I thought I was bad...

But please lighten up, the powers that be here might not like the tone of your language. You can say all the things you said without the vulgarity. I would hate for you to get banned from here. Although I like you, do you know the real reason why I don't want to see you banned? You are the only one here that makes me look like a moderate

[Virgil]

Re: notes / comments

If we are unique, that’s because every individual, tribe, nation, or for that matter, snowflake and grain of sand is unique.

Whether this uniqueness is an asset or a liability I will let you decide,

So, let me get this straight, you are comparing the "uniqueness" of a people to a snowflake and grain of sand (i.e. "every tribe is unique, so is the color blue"), which equates to saying, "so what if we are 'unique', snow flakes and a grain of sand are 'unique' too", but then are claiming that you "want [me] to decide" if it is a asset or liabilty when your initial statements has already made it a point to the reader that being unique should hold no importance to your life, thus, implying that it is not a asset? By your reasoning, being unique is either "useless" or a "liability, so, please, stop with the "holier than thou" presentation of your argument of attemping to give the reader a "choice".

You are a walking contradiction and a idiot. First of all, you yourself, as a "Canadian" are "unique", if anyone needs to listen to the "words of the ol'might Ara Baliozian", it is Ara Baliozian himself because he holds a Canadian citizenship, i.e. he is "unique".

Second of all, the idea of being "unique" is not a "mutually exclusive" trait that one can get shake off. Essentially, being unique is a quality every individual possesses. On a micro you speak a "unique" language, you partake in a "unique" culture, you have "unique" beleifs, and you most likly deficate in a "unique" manner when you go to the john to release yourself. Likewise, on the macro level, you have a "unque" citizenship, you pay taxes towards a "unque" government, you reside in a "unique" state, and essentially, your loyalties are to a "unique" entitty. Therefore, this idea that you can somehow distance yourself from being "unique" is a flawed concept. Being "unique" is not a button you can take on and off, it is who you are, for better of for worse, you are, who you are.

The reality is this, you are sitting in the comforts of your home, under the protection of a state, that most likely on the daily basis is engraining into to your psychology the idea of being "connected" to the state (i.e. you are a Canadian). And since you are not a Inuit, you must adhere to being Canadian. So, how is wanting to be Canadian any different then, let us I don't know say, being Armenian? Well, it is different in that the previous is a national identity, while the latter is, first, a ethnic identity, and second a new national identity, however, they are similar in that both are a "unique" identity.

Now, your claim that "uniqueness" is a liability will disarm the Armenian individual in the Diaspora because at the heart, if they take your advice and stop being Armenian for the sake of becoming a "world citizen" it only means then that they will rely on the national identity (i.e. being American, Canadian, and etc ... ) to dictate their "uniqueness", thus, your argument only bolsters assimilation, marginalization, and, again, it is a "idea" that destroy the power with a Armenian to create his or her own destiny.

The end game is this, because you can never wash away your Armenian "uniqueness" you will eventually finally realize who you are and try to back assimilate bringing all the foreign residue into the Armenian communities. And it is at this moment that extrapollated will destroy the inherit "uniqness" of the Armenian people. What you champion will only provide mass marketers and corporations more fresh meat to pawn their make shift identities to, you are indirectly supporting corporations. So you are at the heart taking the Armenian out of a "lions den" and putting him or her directly in the lions mouth.

provided you don’ adopt one of our ubiquitous dealers of chauvinist crapola as your guide.

Ha, "Chauvinist crapola" no, realist that has real ideas, ideas that for the most part that are not so much different to the ideas that have contributed to the development of the Canadian state, a state which you reside in, pay taxes to, and eventually will be buried in. I don't ask to be "anyone's guide", I only defend my interests and values, something alien to a walking vaginal like yourself that for all of his life has contributed to 0% of the development of the Armenian state and people, but instead has indirectly undermined the self determination of the Armenian people with ridiculous idealistic ideas in a age that is devoid of any idealism.

Speaking for myself, I will say that our uniqueness is not what concerns me. What concerns me is our problems and there is nothing – repeat, nothing -- unique about them.

The only problems Armenians face today are demotivation and incidently, demotivation that has its roots in views and opinions you preach. The idea that Armenians should just bend over and screw them. Instead of empowering your people, you are just taking away their political handgun by leading them into isolation with your talks of "identity" being somehow "not important".

The reality is this, you are a chicken xxxx individual that hides behind quotes and ideas of true intellectual giants. All you have done is just hide behind meaningless and empty ideas that have no actual value to anyone but you and your ego. You are not even the dirt underneath the nail of a Monte, Andranik, and Nejda. Your not even a Newton who acknowledges that his greatness can be attributed to giants (i.e. "I can only see so far, because I stand on the shoulders of giant") and furthermore, you are not even the entity that Plato refers to who will free his or her fellow man that is stuck in the cave watching shadows (i.e. Allegory of the Cave) because you are not brave enough to take risks nor are you brave enough to confront people for their wrong doings, all you do is analyze the shortcomings of other men for trying to change the world.

All you, the "Ara type" end up doing is contributing to the stagnation of the Armenian people and to the larger extent to the human race. The reality is that we are all different whether we choose to accept or not and the moment the world government realizes this and the moment you realize this, is the moment mankind can better themselves by seeking out a solution that will address this fundimental trait of the human condition.

Understand, Armenians failed to listen to your advice not so much so because they or some shadow entity wants to silence you, rather, they fail to listen to you because your ideas are a bit "behind on the times". The reality is that the "one world" ideology in which you preach died the moment the Soviet Union disintegrated, this is a fact most politicians in the western world adhere to. If man is man and their exists no difference then why did your fellow "human" Turks and Azeris try to annex land that for the most part, was no theirs and certainly, was already occupied by Armenians.

And I am a staunch socialist, however, the reality is this, the reality is that in the world where capitalism rule, where everyone is competeting with one another, you would be a fool to convince your people to be more "worldly" when in fact the world revolves around markets, competition, and is based on the "idea of scales", when one man eats, another man starves. Let us at least, at minimum, be the man that does not starve.

Corruption, incompetence, divisiveness, authoritarianism, prejudice, and intolerance are as old as mankind.

Yes and why do you think so? Because people have different opinions, feelings, and interests. Furthermore, the idea that "corruption" and "authoritarianism" is evil and wrong when in fact our civilization has stemmed from the barbarism of men that have been corrupt and authoritarians is just horse xxxx. Man will always be intolerant to one another because men are born different and develop differently as a they age. This is the price you pay for being different, however, it is a well payed investment. Difference is a normal part of nature, the abnormal is when individuals are the same, when two people, on opposite cornor of the world, are exact duplicates of each other. That is when the world stops being "amazing" and starts being mundane. I would rather have intolerance but a fresh sense of "difference" that has not been corrupted by mass marketing, cultural polution stemming from mass marketers, inter racial sludge, inter ethnic sludge, and etc. opposed to everyone coming off the corporate assembly line.

So is unawareness of them or self-deception. We either confront our shortcomings and make an honest effort to overcome them or we pretend there is nothing we can do because they are an integral part of the human condition.

First, there exists no shortcomings that is mutuall exclusive to the Armenian people that is not inherit in other people and certainly, not inherit in other states. The moment I will give up being "who I am" and, as you say, "overcome" the "shortcomings", is the day eastern and western states like China and United States stop forcing their people to adopt one race, one ethnicity, and one culture. You should ask the Tibeten people how they feel about the "overcoming" of the "shortcomings" imposed by the Chinese government onto to them via or the Armenians in Georgia that are not given eqaul treatment as Georgian citizens. The sad difference here is that while you have a oppurtunity to be who you are, the Armenians in Georgia do not, and essentially, you are pissing away this privalage because you have your head too far up your ass to see the picture clearly.

Again, speaking for myself, I am all for calling a spade a spade, a charlatan a phony and a wheeler-dealer not a man of vision or a noble specimen of humanity but a low-life and a bottom feeder.
#

And again, speaking for myself, I am calling you a phony, a coward, a failed writer, and, in total, your life's work is crap. It is useless to any Armenian, in any form, whether on the internet or in a book. There is no "phony wheeler-dealer" but yourself, Ara, this is reality. You live in the margins of your egos instead of the real world. I have tried to reason with you on many occasions, but on every level you are just useless. The ideas you promote will end up destroying the hard of work of other men that put themselves on the line versus you, that just sits there and writes, who for the most part, has spent 72 years of his life just talking out of his ass.

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Wednesday, December 19, 2007
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EITHER / OR
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If we are unique, that’s because every individual, tribe, nation, or for that matter, snowflake and grain of sand is unique. Whether this uniqueness is an asset or a liability I will let you decide, provided you don’t adopt one of our ubiquitous dealers of chauvinist crapola as your guide. Speaking for myself, I will say that our uniqueness is not what concerns me. What concerns me is our problems and there is nothing – repeat, nothing -- unique about them. Corruption, incompetence, divisiveness, authoritarianism, prejudice, and intolerance are as old as mankind. So is unawareness of them or self-deception. We either confront our shortcomings and make an honest effort to overcome them or we pretend there is nothing we can do because they are an integral part of the human condition. Again, speaking for myself, I am all for calling a spade a spade, a charlatan a phony and a wheeler-dealer not a man of vision or a noble specimen of humanity but a low-life and a bottom feeder.
#

[Virgil]

Re: notes / comments

This thread is essentially a depository of Ara's self-hate, egomania, delusion, hysteria and disgruntlement. As any self-respecting Armenian can see from his written crap, the depth of Ara's self-hate, delusion and ignorance is bottomless. I read Ara's rants just to observe first hand the kind of psychological damage diasporan Armenian suffer from. In short: the "notes and comments" found here are nothing but 'brain-farts' of a self-hating egomaniac. There are Armenians who assimilate and disappear without a trace. And then there are assimilated ones like Ara... The problem with his kind, however, is that once they 'assimilate' they continue sticking around to give us 'advise.'

Ditto, I don't know why even reply to this wall, it only fuels his fire. My only fear is that some Armenian youth comes and reads his "infinite wisdom" and adopts his self hating views or looks to him as a "credible" source when in fact the man's life work is worthless to the Armenian people.

You know what is funny in all of this? The Armenian intellectuals that were breed under the Armenian state are not "intellectuals" but the many half witt Turkish Armenians, in Ara's opinion, are the "true intellectuals", talk about being a "Turkamole".

[Virgil]

Re: notes / comments

“Nothing you say makes sense!” a reader writes; and another: “Tell us something we don’t know.” These two contradictory comments suggest that I may well be on the right track. But perhaps I am deluding myself.

Armenian is right, you have a inflated ego. No, you are not "deluding" yourself, you are just promoting a destructive ideology that is not condusive to state building or maintaing a identity. And yes, nobody exactly understands your point of view, you quote Toynbee but yet at the same time knock down nationalists and state builders. Your a walking contradiction and maybe, I should not be responding to you because it only fuels the fire, but more than half the time you contradict yourself and recycle the same garbage ideas. There is no ounce of original ideas or opinions, just a take recorder tryign to prove a...exactly what is it you are trying to prove? That Armenians should do what exactly? Please, have the courage to lay out a opinion and have the courage to defend it or else everything else is useless window dressing.

Ara, understand, I have read better "pseudo-intellectuals", your opinions are just a recycling of many great thinkers, but instead of posting them in the context presented, you employ "relativism" and this, parapharses their ideas out of the context they were presented.

I understand illusions. I have quite a few of them myself, as a matter of fact. I believe reason matters. I believe common sense is transferable. I believe explanations work. I think I may be able to make a difference. I like to hope where far better men than myself failed, I may succeed. Call it optimism run riot. Call it hubris. Whatever it is, it allows me to go on.

Hmm....common sense? You talking about common sense? What exactly are you talking about? Lets hear it Ara, put your money where your mouth is and reveal to us your "grandiose" ideas? Stop hiding behing your image of being "above it", of being this great "intellectual", you far from both. You are so full of yourself that instead of addressing anyone directly with healthy debate, you resort to creating incoherant scribbles that lead to nothing but stagnation, your point being that "I am so great that you need to dechipire my reply to you", your full it.

“You repeat yourself,” I am reminded once in a while. So do our Turcocentric pundits. So do our sermonizers who quote the Scriptures from hundreds of pulpits every Sunday. Has anyone ever dared to stand up and accuse them of repeating themselves? Once when I said as much in a commentary, the secretary of an archbishop wrote an angry letter to the editor in which she said: “How dare you, sir, comparing the trash you dish out [I am now abridging and paraphrasing] with the Holy Scriptures which happen to be the word of God?” My answer: Almost everything I write may be considered a paraphrase or variations on the Biblical dictum “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”

"A house divided against itself cannot stand"? We are already divided you jackass, we are in four corners of the planet, the reality is this idea of "unifying" is a failed ideology that has caused our people to be "divided", Monte Melkonyan, the most left leaning Armenian patriot (Actually, he was truly a human citizen), refers to this problem in Rights to Struggle, this very same idea of "unifying" for the sake of "unifying" is only rehetric used by cowards because they are not brave enough to accept the mantle of leadership. Essentially, what you are saying that everyone's opinions are the same, that one idea is the equal to the next, that ideas on different political and socio-economic don't matter because "we are all Armenian". The reality is this, you have a opinion, I have a opinion, only one will be adopted by the Armenian people and which every direction they choose, right or wrong, will determine our future. I can not unite with you nor anyone else that has a "different" view point because fundimentally, their view is wrong. I will have to fight them to earn the people's hearts and mind because people, historically, only follow individuals that are willing to put themselves in the fire for their beliefs.

You on the other hand, just want every "Jack Nahapetian" to just give in to assimilation and adopt your views that only promote stagnation. I will not allow it because at the root, your ideas are the same ones that lead the Armenian people to such a lowly state.

And stop claiming anyone is "Turkocentric", the reality is that Turks want to annex Armenia. They are infact more racist and prejudice, if you need to preach to anyone it is to them or else your "psuedo-intellectual" bukaka has already been adopted by Armenians in the west.

Are you honestly promoting the idea that Armenians don't have the right to question Turks after all we have been through and after all that has happend with regards to Azerbaijan and Turkey? What the xxxx is wrong with you? You are disarming your people, it is like when Israelis and xxxs call everyone else "Anti-Semites" to silence them, but the only difference is, the latter works for the xxxish cause, while your attempt to label us as "Turkocentric" only gives more weight to Turkey and Azerbaijan on the geopolitical level. Now, apprently, we are "Turkocentric", now our attempt to point the radical mistreatment of minorties in Turkey and the Ottoman Empire can be silenced by calling us "Turkocentric". Your a idiot, I am not suprised to find out why the nationalists failed because back then people like you existed as the majority, truly, truly, history repeats itself.

Scratch a defender of the status quo and expose a hireling for whom the establishment is manna.

Defender of what "status quo"? Are you dillusional? The reality is that you are the one defending the "status quo", I am changing the world. You are sitting there, behind your little computer, in the safety of your home, in a foreign country, quoting shakesphere, when in fact there is a Armenia state today, in this state Armenians are suffering, futhermore, you are disarming Armenians by taking away their political handgun when you refer to them as "Turkocentric".

There are no new ideas, only subtle adjustments of old ones.

More like plagiarism, you just steal other ideas and try to coin them as your own. There is no ounce of origanality in what you say and I could understand the point better by reading it from the source.

I should like to meet an Armenian whose first impulse is to understand rather than to dismiss as absurd that which he makes no effort to understand.
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Really, you provide nothing to understand, you just want Armenians to worship you and adopt your self-hating ideology and most have, believe me, most have, that is exactly the problem. You don't need to convince anyone of being "Turkocentric" and accepting a "world citizenship", Armenian women are already have Turkish babies yev lav en Turk khunoom and we are already adapting.

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Tuesday, December 18, 2007
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TYRANNY VERSUS DEMOCRACY
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A community or a nation is not a congregation that will sing the same tune in unison. There will always be discordant voices. Get used to them. Our degree of tolerance and civilization depends on the manner in which we handle dissent.
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I have been rereading Herodotus. What a great storyteller he was! Speaking of a certain Greek city-state, he writes that its citizens preferred tyranny to freedom. Impossible, I thought. Who in his right mind would choose tyranny when he can live in freedom? And then I thought of my fellow countrymen and remembered the words of our progressive and enlightened citizens (self-assessed of course) who tell us we are not yet ready for democracy. If by “we” they mean our leaders, they may be right. If they mean a fraction of the people that have been brainwashed, ditto. But I have no doubt whatever in my mind that, given a choice, the overwhelming majority will choose to live in a democracy. You want proof? Consider Armenians in the United States and Canada who did not immigrate en masse to Armenia under Stalin.
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After centuries of oppression we have accumulated vast stores of resentment, anger, and bitterness. Our leaders are aware of this. That is why they channel this suppressed fury in the direction of the Turks. What motivates them to do that is self-preservation.
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The chances of the unthinkable happening will be diminished if we think about it. If the unthinkable did happen it is because those who thought about it were ignored. “Zohrab effendi is exaggerating,” they said…
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There is a type of critic (make it, kibitzer) who is so blinded by his own brilliance that he does not mind making an ass of himself. But he is smart enough to do so anonymously and dumb enough to add cowardice to narcissism.
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[Armenian]

Re: notes / comments

This thread is essentially a depository of Ara's self-hate, egomania, delusion, hysteria and disgruntlement. As any self-respecting Armenian can see from his written crap, the depth of Ara's self-hate, delusion and ignorance is bottomless. I read Ara's rants just to observe first hand the kind of psychological damage diasporan Armenian suffer from. In short: the "notes and comments" found here are nothing but 'brain-farts' of a self-hating egomaniac. There are Armenians who assimilate and disappear without a trace. And then there are assimilated ones like Ara... The problem with his kind, however, is that once they 'assimilate' they continue sticking around to give us 'advise.'

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Monday, December 17, 2007
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ILLUSIONS
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“Nothing you say makes sense!” a reader writes; and another: “Tell us something we don’t know.” These two contradictory comments suggest that I may well be on the right track. But perhaps I am deluding myself.
*
I understand illusions. I have quite a few of them myself, as a matter of fact. I believe reason matters. I believe common sense is transferable. I believe explanations work. I think I may be able to make a difference. I like to hope where far better men than myself failed, I may succeed. Call it optimism run riot. Call it hubris. Whatever it is, it allows me to go on.
*
“You repeat yourself,” I am reminded once in a while. So do our Turcocentric pundits. So do our sermonizers who quote the Scriptures from hundreds of pulpits every Sunday. Has anyone ever dared to stand up and accuse them of repeating themselves? Once when I said as much in a commentary, the secretary of an archbishop wrote an angry letter to the editor in which she said: “How dare you, sir, comparing the trash you dish out [I am now abridging and paraphrasing] with the Holy Scriptures which happen to be the word of God?” My answer: Almost everything I write may be considered a paraphrase or variations on the Biblical dictum “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
*
Scratch a defender of the status quo and expose a hireling for whom the establishment is manna.
*
There are no new ideas, only subtle adjustments of old ones.
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I should like to meet an Armenian whose first impulse is to understand rather than to dismiss as absurd that which he makes no effort to understand.
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[Armenian]

Re: notes / comments

Apres Virgil,

Some of my earlier posts in this thread: http://forum.armenianclub.com/showpo...&postcount=246

http://forum.armenianclub.com/showpost.php?p=175565&postcount=756

http://forum.armenianclub.com/showpost.php?p=167868&postcount=478

This thread is essentially a depository of Ara's self-hate, ego, delusion, hysteria and disgruntlement. More you push him the worst he will get with his hypocrisy, hate towards Armenians and contradictions. Word of caution. In his mind Ara is trying to engage us in a 'debate.' Ara is bored, he is alone, his literary works are collecting dust. So Ara simply wants company to talk to, and he has found a 'captive' audience here. As a result, he is trying to be controversial, he is trying to be a humanitarian, he is trying to be sage like, he is trying to be eccentric, aloof, etc. Most probably, his 'internet' experience has been the most excitement he has had in decades.

I have observed Ara's written garbage for the past fifteen-twenty years. I can confidently say he has been repulsive throughout his life. As anyone can see from his written crap, the depth of his self-hate, delusion and ignorance is bottomless. I come into this thread and read Ara's rants just to observe first hand the kind of psychological damage diasporan Armenian suffer from. I suggest individuals here to make periodic posts to show the unsuspecting reader, be it Armenian, Jew or Turk, that this person in question speaks only for himself and no one else.

In short: the "notes and comments" found here are nothing but 'brain-farts' of a self-hating egomaniac. There are Armenians who assimilate and disappear without a trace. And then there are assimilated ones like Ara... The problem with his kind, however, is that once they 'assimilate' they continue sticking around to give us 'advise.'