I went to the Burbank Human Relations Council’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day
celebration. This year, the focus was on assisting those suffering from the ravages of the two
most destructive urban fires. As usual, it was an uplifting event, and reconfirmed my inclination
to present an Armenian-adapted version of MLK’s famous “I Have A Dream” speech. I request
advance forgiveness for the liberties I have taken with this well-intentioned bit of plagiarism. If
you’d like to read the original version, I retrieved it from this website.
Here goes:
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest national
struggle for freedom in the history of our world.
Five score a d six years ago, a great Armenian, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, saved
the last pockets of Armenian self-governance. This momentous accomplishment came as a great
beacon light of hope to hundreds of thousands of Armenians who had been seared in the flames
of withering genocidal injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their
persecution.
But a century later, the Armenian still is not free. A century later, the life of the Armenian is still
sadly crippled by the manacles of depopulation and the chains of territorial disenfranchisement.
A century later, the Armenian lives on a lonely island of insecurity in the midst of a vast ocean of
expansionist barbarism. A century later, the Armenian is still languishing in the corners of the
world’s society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we struggle today to dramatize a
shameful condition.
In a sense we have come to say to the world we have come to cash a check. When the architects
of our world’s order created this system, they were signing a promissory note to which everyone
was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, Armenians as well all others, would
be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
It is obvious today that world has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as Armenians are
concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, the world has given the Armenian people a
bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.” But we refuse to believe
that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the
great vaults of opportunity of this world. So we have come to cash this check – a check that will
give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also struggled to
remind the world of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling
off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of depopulation to the sunlit path of territorial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of territorial injustice to the solid rock of a free, independent, united, and socialist Armenia. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.
It would be fatal for the world to overlook the urgency of the moment. This frigid winter of the
Armenian’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating spring of liberation
and restoration. Twenty twenty-five is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the
Armenian needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the
world continues with business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in the world
until the Armenian is granted his human rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake
the foundations of our world until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which
leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty
of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of
bitterness and hatred.
We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not
allow our creative protest to degenerate into passivity and appeasement. Again and again we
must rise to the majestic heights of meeting external machinations with soul force. A marvelous
new militancy shall engulf the Armenian community, but must not lead us to a distrust of all
other people, for many of them, as evidenced by some of their pronouncements, have come to
realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. They have come to realize that their freedom
is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
As we struggle, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn
back. There are those who are asking the devotees of human rights, “When will you be
satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Armenian is the victim of the unspeakable
horrors of Turkish and Azeri brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy
with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels and hotels of our occupied cities. We
cannot be satisfied as long as the Armenian’s basic mobility is from an ever-smaller Armenia to
an assimilating Diaspora. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their
selfhood and robbed of their dignity by denialist policies. We cannot be satisfied as long as a
Armenian in Sassoun cannot freely and safely say “I am Armenian” and an Armenian in Bolis
believes he can only cringingly accept Turkish overlordship. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we
will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have experienced great trials and tribulations. Some of you
have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of Azeri brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.
Go back to Artzakh, go back to Van, go back to G/Kareen, go back to Gars, go back to Cilicia,
go back to the ruins of our deserted cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be
changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I
still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the highest human ideals.
I have a dream that one day this world will rise up and live out the true meaning the creed: “We
hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day on the grand mountains of the Armenian Highlands the sons of
Genocide survivors and the sons of Genocide perpetrators will be able to sit down together at the
table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even Cilicia, a province whose people are sweltering with the heat of
striving to prove they are Turks (since they are not), sweltering with the heat of the oppression
forced Turkification, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that our children will one day live in a world where they will not be judged as
less because they are Armenian but by as co-equals with all others.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, over in Azerbaijan and Turkey, with their vicious racists, with their
weapons dripping with Armenian blood; one day right there in occupied Armenian lands,
Armenian boys and girls will be able to join hands with little Turkish and Azeri boys and girls as
sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made
low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the
glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the struggle with. With this faith we will be
able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our world into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together,to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, “My
world, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”
And if the world is to be great, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious
hilltops of Kharpert. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of Sassoun. Let freedom ring
from the heightening Taurus Mountains of Cilicia!
Let freedom ring from snowcapped Arakadz!
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of Dikranagerd!
But not only that; let freedom ring from Teezapayd of Hadroot!
Let freedom ring from Khoosdoop!
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of the Araradian plain. From every Ararat, let
freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village
and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all
of God’s children, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual,
“Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”
Garen Yegparian (20250122)
