Opinion: Issues and Concerns in the Community

Tamar Karkazian
Editor

With November fast approaching, and elections just around the corner, it seems fitting to discuss elections and issues and concerns of the people, not to mention rivalries. Yes, all these obviously relate to the presidential election, but these concepts and concerns can also be related to the dynamics within the Fresno Armenian community.

Let us start at the core: the issues and concerns of the individuals in the communities. For the presidential campaign, the concerns we have as citizens, tend to revolve around the economy and jobs, just to name a few. For the Armenian community, concerns revolve around participation, involvement, and keeping the culture alive.

Often, in both politics and in the Armenian community we get so wrapped up in the differences that we forget we have something greater in common: the desire for our communities to succeed. Most individuals in America, Republicans and Democrats alike, want the unemployment rate to decrease and our economy to improve. The same goes for Armenians; we all want to get individuals involved and to keep the Armenian culture vibrant.

In both contexts, we want the same end result, for our communities to succeed, but we repeatedly get so caught up in the “how” that we forget our goals. There is more than one way to solve a problem, to decrease the deficit, to get individuals involved, or to keep the Armenian culture alive. For some organizations, keeping the culture alive means teaching the language, yet for others it means bringing Armenians together. Neither is right or wrong; both address the issue. What might work for some individuals may not work for others. It is important to remember that there is more than one way to achieve our goals and the better we work together the better off everyone will be.

So I encourage you to remember that we are not as different as we sometimes feel. Although we have our differences, we are all striving to reach the same goal success. We should strive to find common ground and work together to reach our goals.