Posted by pancho from ? (64.94.93.158) on Monday, June 03, 2002 at 11:51AM :
I think I understand why we divide into factions and tribes and regions...why in one city Assyrians canīt get together on anything and almost delight in tearing themselves into ever smaller and smaller segments of one fabric...if it ever was one piece.
No one should doubt that if there ever came to be an Assyria, it would be a Fascist state of unbelievable proportions. We would have the same groups vying for control of the Police and Judiciary to enforce the views they can only yell about now.
Also this insane insistence that "Christianity saved us", when we look about as UN-saved as any people could...and are doing all we can to destroy whatever remains of us anywhere...in the West through silly nationalism not worth a damn and in the East by getting the West to bomb what remains to shreds and shards.
I think I understand now why we tussle endlessly about things that donīt matter anywhere at all, or have any hope in hell of impacting our Heritage beneficially. It is because we are "out of it", that we quibble and divide so. We have brought ourselves to a Backwater, as far from being able to do anything meaningful for our Heritage as possible, and all that is left for us is to splash around and founder in the brackish water surrounding us where nothing new and clean and fresh ever comes.
We are so far removed from anything having to do with an Assyrian Heritage that we grow goofy and irrelevant from lack of productive or meaningful work. We can afford to deal in light nonsense and awesome triviality because it really doesnīt matter what we decide or "do".
Christianity ensured that we would become so weak and unresponsive that a troop of Boy Scouts could have taken our country away from us. Being as it is the dominant religion of those countries who have sought to dominate that region when they couldnīt rob or control it outright...the religion has naturally become odious in the eyes of those who have suffered from Christian armies bombs and "diplomacy"...as Americans wholy ignorant of Islam have grown to hate the very idea of it because believers in it, as false as they may have been, blew up some buildings and killed some some of their compatriots.
Muslims feel the same way. They donīt much care for the religion of the people who kill Muslim children by starvation or steal their resources...itīs only natural. Our affiliation with Christianity has increasingly led to our being pushed out from our ancestral homes...so that rather than saving us, it has resulted in our being made to leave. Canīt blame them one bit...as it is understandable that Americans would react badly to the idea of Islam...as ignorant as they are, it especially makes sense.
Once out of the region and "safe" in the West, it turns out that there isnīt anything "Assyrian" we can do except become frightfully jealous and protective of our own narrow little corner of "Assyria" and cling to it and fight for it and scream for it and destroy others who would oppose it...and the only people remotely interested in all this tempest in a toilet are OTHER Assyrians. No one else in the West knows of us or gives a good damn...so we attack and yell at each other because we donīt want to "lose" even more of what we lost already and donīt want to admit.
No mater what we come up with...the fact is that we are being assimilated to death in the West, that our children could care less about being Assyrian, especially as we their parents present it in such a negative and ludicrous light...here in a country so damn sophisticated and wealthy and all powerful it hurts. Whay WOULD any kid who can be AMERICAN even want to be assyrian? Just as in the East...why would a kid want to be Assyrian, when he could be IRAQI??? ...or prefer to affiliate himself or herself with the people of their own "prophet"...as in the West all you Assyrians want so much to be in with Christ...a Jew?
Of course there were Assyrians who became Muslims...it defies logic to think otherwise...but when has that stopped us? What remains is that the rest of you Christian Assyrians insist that when an Assyrian becomes Muslim, or Buddhist, or Atheist...he can no longer BE an Assyrian. Yet if he or she turns Christian...he or she is the ONLY and the BEST kind of Assyrian...and why? Because at least we Christians "say" we are...whereas the Muslim doesnīt even mention it...except to point out that Assyria was part of their ancestry as well...but only a part. This indicates how much emphasis we place on "saying"...on words and talking as a way of BEING, why there are no "deeds" to go along with the words because we brag so about "saying" we are Assyrian. Thatīs why itīs so damn difficult to get any ACTION out of us AS Assyrians, because we maintain we are TRUE Assyrians, as opposed to the false Muslim kind, because we SAY we are...so talking Assyria becomes sufficient in and of itself, no need and indeed no chance, to DO anything about it.
It seems to me neither Christians nor Muslims retained much of anything Assyrian as they both abandoned their god...the one whose name begins their own, as in ASHURians. But as the Christians have left or been driven out and see themselves one among a zillion Christians in the West with no distinction at all...theyīve decided to become ultra Assyrian...even though all it means is forming silly clubs and issuing edicts and declarations to the wall.
The ones who turned Muslim still own the land...it isnīt YOUR land any more than the house you own in Chicago belongs to the Illinois Indians it was stolen from. The Assyrian Muslims of Iraq and Syria and Turkey are still on the land...they have modern responsibilities, they have to deal in THIS world...they have a history past the point of their ancient empire. We Christians are like the relatives still glorying in the rich and bright past we no longer have...with only a bit of torn lace or a broken candleholder to remind us...while the other branch of the family is busy working and living and dying in the real world.
Why should Iraqis run around all day saying they are Assyrians? Isnīt it enough that they admit to being descendants of the Assyrians and OTHERS of that region...just as none of us can claim to being pure anything? How many of you, of your children, are PROUD to be American...and after 911 were even afraid NOT to be American...who even changed their names from Firas to "Ross" in order to what??? be MORE Assyrian or less...to be seen as proud Assyrians or proud AMERICANS? Isnīt it enough that they try to preserve against all odds what remains of the artifacts and wealth of that region...to provide schools and medical care and hope and dreams for the children of that region? They have REAL work to do...ours is play compared to what they do. We are Americans here, our children certainly see themselves so...we work at jobs that do nothing for Assyria in any way...yet we insist that in our spare time, after soccer practise and the club scene, we will get together and work for "ASSYRIA". Thatīs why we are prone to being so petty...it is a foolīs definition of Assyria or patriotism or nationalism that we maintain because thatīs all there is for us to do...thousands of miles from that region...indeed we have managed only to send more destruction to that region than anything else through the taxes we pay and the armies we serve here in America...our REAL home in the REAL world.
The Muslims back there have a different reality and reponsibility and canīt afford to spin wooley dreams in a basement clubhouse every Friday night...for theirs is the REAl struggle every day to protect and preserve that region...they canīt "play" at being Assyrian the way we can afford to do...they have to LIVE it every day of their lives and being that deeply involved in it, they see the ENTIRE picture...not some weekend fantasy the rest of you indulge in.
-- pancho
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