I don't really want to write about this, but it's been stressing me out all week and interfering with my creativity, so I think I will address it and get it off my chest so I can work on other things. As you may or may not have heard
(depending on who’s reading this, although somewhat surprisingly it does seem
that the US media finally has picked up this story), Azerbaijan’s president-for-life Ilham Aliyev, who’s totally not a fascist dictator or anything, needed to distract
his populace from the country’s corona-induced economic slump, so they attacked
Armenia’s northeast border in the Tavush province, shelling civilian targets in villages, and blamed Armenia for
starting it. Now Azeris apparently are taught from pre-school up that
Armenians are evil, so they took the bait and actually believe Armenia started the attack, and started a huge pro-war protest
in their capital of Baku demanding a renewed war and “death to Armenians” (and
from videos I saw, most of them weren’t wearing masks, so that’s a special
little bonus). Don’t these people ever get tired of losing? There’s never been
such a hateful and racist protest in Armenia, mind you. “Death to Azeris” has
never been a mainstream opinion in Armenia. After this, Azerbaijan’s foreign
minister threatened that they have the capability to launch missiles at Armenia’s
Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant. Of course, this would render not only Armenia,
but Azerbaijan itself, Georgia, half of Turkey, northern Iran
and southern Russia uninhabitable for centuries. So, either he was completely
talking out his ass, or he’s a complete moron. This has served to make
Azerbaijan look even more like an aggressor on the international arena, and it
seems that most Western countries are taking Armenia’s side on the issue from
the looks of things. It’s common knowledge
that they could target these areas, but you don’t say that publicly. And I doubt that the Armenian military is leaving such a target wide open in the first place. In
any case Azerbaijan has taken on far more casualties thus far, losing soldiers,
tanks and drones. As usual when they do this sort of thing.
Anyway, that’s my summary of what’s
been going on. I of course have my biases, as evidenced by my summary above. I refuse to trust Azeri news sources for the simple fact that they come from a totalitarian fascist government that makes hatred and scapegoating part of its domestic policy. That's not to say Armenian news is perfect, who knows if we're really getting the whole story from either side, but objectively speaking if I had to choose between the two narratives I'll go with the Armenian one. But if you’ve been reading my blogs as of late, my recent existential awakening
has made me view this all differently than I would have a few years ago. I now
recognize nationalism as nothing but a made-up human construct used as
population control, and
this is especially true of totalitarian dictatorships such as Azerbaijan. It really has no more meaning than being loyal to a football team. If you really contemplate the universe and existence itself, you'll see that. I feel that Armenian
nationalism has to exist as a self-defense against the Pan-Turkish genocidal aspirations
of its neighbors to the east and west, but I also see it for the abstraction
that it is. Maybe I haven't completely let go of it either, and maybe I don't need to. I don't see Armenians as either superior or inferior to other nationality or ethnicity. But as a group, they are ancient and have endured a lot. The Turkic people, much like the Europeans in the Americas, arrived later as colonizers. This doesn't necessarily make those alive today inherently bad or good, it simply is. Although some historic injustices as a result of that history of colonization and genocide deserve to be made right. As for the common people of Azerbaijan, it’s not their fault they’ve
been brainwashed since childhood. Societal brainwashing is a powerful thing, and you definitely see it in the United States too. They don’t realize that they’re merely
being controlled and used by their government, who is their real enemy. I
really don’t bear them ill-will per se, it’s their nationalist ideology and
their government I despise. Nationalism itself is a disease that infects the
Caucasus region, and there’s never going to be peace until that nationalism is
done away with. I don’t know what that’s going to take. Hopefully it won’t take
the entire region being reduced to a radioactive crater.
At any rate, I’ll leave you with a video that explains the situation quite well, with added humor. Humor definitely helps. This may not be an unbiased news report, but unbiased news reports don't actually exist if you think about it.
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