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Guest Contributor

Guest Contributor

Guest contributions to the Armenian Weekly are informative articles or press releases written and submitted by members of the community.

9 Comments

  1. Pastor Ara doesn’t speak for the Fresno Armenian Community.LGBT don’t live on margins of society they have laws protecting them, allow legal marriage and were recognized with the white House lighting up the gay flag whilest our country never acknowledges recognition of the Armenian genocide. Rev. Ara is not from mainstream traditional Armenian churches we don’t get involved with blurring the lines between church and state. Mr. Ashjian as part of FUSD expressed an opinion, that while the schools would be forced to comply teaching LGBT as part of normal accepted behavior he was concerned with public schools teaching this and taking the place of parental or moral/Spiritual audiences. Why is an opinion or free speech attacked if you don’t follow the extreme liberal left’s view of what is fascist or how they want to write history …immediately censorship destruction of your culture and historical statues. Next they will want to take down our Davit of Sassoun statue as being too Christian or violent. Rev. Are will probably agree with them. Oh and those Syrian refugees in Fresno are anti Syrian government sided with wahabbi jihadists and helped to destroy the lives of 25,000 Syrian Armenians that fled to Armenia. Well we all know America doesn’t want to take in Christians. Please you shouldn’t encourage the attacking of an Armenian by others who have a different agenda. Ashjian has every right as a member of the school board to express his concerns.

  2. It isn’t possible for me to praise Rev. Ara Guekguezian too much for his brave, forthright and honest stand against Mr. Tashjian’s outrageous cheapening of the Armenian Genocide with twisted Trumpoid logic and bigotry. His far-fetched attacks on political opponents as being the equivalent of Ottoman Turks is simply a disgrace and makes me wonder how a person of such limited intellectual horizons could become an important functionary in Fresno with power over the education of youth.

    My respect for Rev. Guekguezian is only deepened when I see he seems to be fighting a lonely battle in this matter, at least in terms of the Fresno Armenian community. What position do responsible Armenian associations and organizations in Fresno take on this issue? I have only seen silence. So much the worse for the Armenian Genocide issue.

    Thanks again and more power to you, Rev. Guekguezian. You reassure me that not all of us have lost our conscience or our ability to reason.

    • Diran, the LGBT movement has gone beyond all bounds of decency and respect with their shrill, threatening demands.

      That in essence is what Superintendent Ashjian was saying, even if the Genocide analogy was not quite correct.

      Look for: “drag queen story hour [dot] org”

      That is just one example: Drag queens dressed up and teaching little kids in schools in cities such as New York.

      This is what LGBT demand and get. Are there no limits?

      Diran, maybe Armenian American day schools should have readings by drag queens?

      How about our Sunday schools?

  3. Is Ara the new leftist representing our community in Fresno? how about he learns the first amendment right of freedom of speech, the left can keep their crap away from us and especially our children. Their “norm” is not a social norm ANYWHERE, other than maybe San Fransisco which apparently has 67 genders listed. California is imploding on itself, and the LGBT agenda is becoming obviously closer to fascism. Thank you Mr. Ashjian for standing up to truth.

  4. Where in Brooke Ashjian’s statement does he mention the Armenian Genocide? He is comparing pre-genocide Ottoman attitudes towards the Ottoman Armenian community with LGBT activists’ attitudes towards the community he represents and claims he can speak for.

    Ottoman Armenians were largely self-oppressing: they knew what sort of behavior would be acceptable and what would not, and they self-restrained themselves with the knowledge that horrible things could result from straying into behavior Muslims could deem unacceptable for Christians. To a limited extent this does appear to parallel the situation Ashjian complains of: a situation where certain viewpoints and behavior cannot be given regard to because activists have deemed them to be invalid viewpoints and unacceptable behavior. And, if those viewpoints are ever expressed or acted upon, the offending individuals risk loss of position, employment, marginalization, disenfranchisement, or worse, as a response, leading to everyone existing in a climate of fear. Of course “offenders” are not massacred. Yet the threat of protest demonstrations, with the risk of a riot of mobs of the self-righteous outraged is not that dissimilar to the ever-present Ottoman-era threat of a riot of outraged Muslims descending onto Armenian districts. That said, I doubt Ashjian is really against Thought Police, he just represents a different, older, branch of it.

    • Thank you, Steve, for articulating what Brooke was getting at and what I understood him to mean.

  5. “Community Reacts”

    Which community? The LGBT one and a SINGLE lefty Armenian Rev.?

    “LGBT community, which is on the margins of society, should not be compared to Turkish officials who carried out the Armenian Genocide.”

    Perhaps they are a lot worse? And no they are not “on the margins” – they are shoved down the throats of anyone with an opinion that does not conform to theirs.

    I have never seen anything quite like what is going on today with this sudden onslaught of leftist insanity, using the same methods they charge others with: fascism.

    Notice how this article starts: “Armenian pastor is among many now calling for the resignation”. Really? How amazingly SENSITIVE and TOLERANT of you for someone who has a traditional opinion. Not to mention freedom loving and first amendment loving ‘Americans’. Except: “when someone does not meet with the standards of our narrative and indoctrination, let’s attack him, make him suffer and destroy his livelihood, because we are all tolerant leftists who care for our fellow human”. Right.

    As one American politician stated decades ago: “When Fascism comes to America it will be called anti-Fascism”. We are seeing this unfold in all spheres of life, and it isn’t necessarily political, but social.

  6. Only the true enemies of Jesus support homosexual behavior. As a Christian I am against teaching our school children that it is ok to be homosexual. The fires of Hell are waiting for those who lead little children to satan. Why would anyone who has morals listen to a pastor who is working against the bible like Ara is doing? Wake up America before these wicked evil morals are ingrained in the next generation.

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