Ah, now I get it. Now I understand. Having no original thoughts of her own, feeling intimidated by her own lack of expertise, ambi choose to speak through the words of experts, agreeing with Levits, Edward Lucas, or Jukka (when it’s convenient, of course). She has no fortitude to stand on her own two feet, rendering her use for Latvia she oh-so-dearly love obsolete (unlike Jukka’s, Lucas’ or Levits).

PS Running again, Madame President? Shall we mention Mr. LL’s politics?

Aleksejs,
You need to read more so that you learn how little you know.  I really don’t care what you choose to read but stretch a little and go beyond the Russian propaganda.

Care to answer questions about valsts nacija? I was wondering if you have an opinion of your own on whether the ethnic minorities have to drop their ethnic culture and be forced to like tautasdziesmas? Is that what Levits meant? What do you think, ambersun? Do you also think that Levits would have anything to say about the Russian culture? Or maybe Jewish culture?

I’ll repeat my main question: how does one become a Latvian in the sense of valsts nacija? The Kremlin prop is silent on that issue.

PS I’ll repeat what I said earlier: “when you, ambersun, cannot say anything positive about carriers of the immigrant culture, who found their home in Latvia, you don’t help that integration [of which Levits speaks]. When you mock a notion of several identities, you don’t help that integration.” Your own multi-part diatribes on this forum contradict your quoting of Levits.

Loba dīna!

For a self-proclaimed Ann Arbor liberal pseudo-feminist whatchamacallit, you sure do strike interesting poses with regard to authority, Ambersun! Nope, I’m not nearly as qualified as Levits to define Latvia, obviously, with regard to the law. But you’re not even quoting Levits; you are quoting an editorial by Dina Gailīte and an atreferējums—and as a matter of fact, it is Tālavs Jundzis mounting an Ambersunny type of argument against Levits. Are either as qualified as, say, Valters? Rainis? Menders? Schiemann? Zemgals? Forgive me, but in the course of 2,773 posts, besides indulging in the mud-wrestling matches so popular in this little corner of cyberspace, I have cited, linked to and interpreted a plethora of ideas and views on these questions, both specific to Latvia and in a European context. What Aleks wrote in #29 makes sense to me as a starting point for serious discussion. Stop running away and debate specifics, please. I would ask, for example, what an “immigrant” is—are you saying that my neighboring Old Believers, who have roots here since before the United States (where you live as an “occupant,” by your apparent definition) was even founded, not to mention Latvia, are “immigrants”?

Vysu lobu,
/P

P.S. I won’t dignify Courlander’s perverse Freudian analysis in absentia with much of a response, but my father died when I was eleven years old. I have nothing but respect for him, and read his journals and writings reverently. He was an extremely erudite person for whom Rainis was something of a demigod. He read widely—from Trotsky to Virza, from Freud to Marx, from Goethe to Sartre, from Brecht to Tauns. He had a Ph.D. in philosophy from Bonn. He was no lover of Ulmanis. As to being an “outsider”—sometimes I am, sometimes not. Depends upon which circles I move in, and I love to move in as many as possible—and upon what you mean, not so easy to figure out. I’ve lived here for nearly two decades. I have many friends here, and feel quite at home. I’m not from here, no—but this is hardly a monolithic country. Many are not from here, many who are from here spent years abroad, etc. As to coming here to “show them the way”—no, sorry. My arrival threw me into a mental maelstrom that lasted for years; one of the first concerns I had, and still have, is that Latvians not get buried in Western junk food of the mind. I never assumed a superior attitude at all, and I have learned a lot more in Latvia than Latvians ever learned from me. At the same time, many people have been quite eager to learn from my experience; Latvia has been in the free world for a while, sir.

P.P.S. (Maybe later I can get to P.P.P.P.P.P.S.!) Sorry, but a peace-loving neighbor nation like Russia with its “normal” nationalism and like phrases are… beyond silly, dearheart. They are brain dead, like the false accusations thrown at Aleks. I don’t know Aleks well, but Russian propaganda has never influenced him. In all our convos, it figures as an object of interest, not an influence. I just got through invoking the “let us build a church in Mecca” argument some of those who adore Glenn Beck (who is surely a remarkable person because he promoted The Soviet Story) make; to me, such arguments are dead in the water. Why in the hell would you look to Russia for building a healthy civic nation? How would emulating Russia possibly be a defense against Russian chauvinism or imperialism? Do you usually fight fire with fire, or do you prefer gasoline? Look at what I quoted of Lelis re borrowing neighboring chauvinisms. And you never did respond to what I suggested you think about—what Lelis wrote of the trimda and Russians.

/P

Peteris,
You know we’‘re not talking about any Old Believers who need to get with the Latvian nation program as our biggest concern here!  How can this be a “serious debate” when you pull this stuff.  Just like the “little old Russian ladies” from Soviet-Russian times who can’t learn Latvian isn’t the main problem for the Latvian language in Latvia.  You tell me who Levits’s “immigrants” are.  Why don’t you comment on the specifics of Levits about “immigrants” having “pienākums piemēroties valsts­nācijai un apgūt…” etc?  What does “pienākums piemēroties valsts­nācijai un apgūt…” etc mean to you and your “nationalism?”

Are you saying that my grandmother (born in 1933 near the village of Audriņi in Latgale, where her great-grandfather is buried) and who due to historical reasons does not speak Latvian and is generally apolitical is an immigrant? What year would she put in a graph that says “when did you immigrate to Latvia?” Most of the Daugavpils’ Russians are citizens by descent meaning they trace their lineage to the interwar Republic. Which year should they put in the same graph?

How can this be a “serious debate” when you pull this stuff.

See Aleksejs’ post above. Sorry, but we are indeed talking about human beings. Most ethnic Russians in Daugavpils (not to mention a great many of the other russophones here) are citizens by descent. I think I have said this a few hundred times. What is it that you don’t get, girl?

/P

Why don’t you comment on the specifics of Levits…

Why don’t you comment on the last hundred things others have asked you to comment on? If you want me to comment on Levits, send me Levits. I have translated Levits in the past; I like to see what a person actually says, in the original. Meanwhile, you comment on what Schöpflin György says, please. And answer the countless questions you flee like a little cyber-butterfly on crack.

If you don’t want to do that, answer a simple question—why and how could others possibly integrate or (Bog forbid) assimilate on your terms? I mean, Aleks is clearly not part of your titular nation, yet he speaks Latvian (more often and better than you do), is very interested in Latvian history, participates in Latvian events, lives in Latvia though he could live anywhere else (and mostly more sweetly), respects this country (does not think of it as Lat-Russ like you do), etc. But here you are screeching your absurdist and baseless calumnies anyhow.

/P

Herder wrote:

Interesting, though not surprising: If you go to Usakovs homepage http://www.ushakov.lv/ you end up automatically at the Russian Version.

The content is stunning.

Nils Ušakovs ir vienīgais Latvijas politiķis, kurš ticis uzaicināts uz Vladimira Putina rīkoto pieņemšanu Maskavā, kā arī apmeklējis Vašingtonu, kur ticies ar amerikāņu kongresa locekļiem.

Great.

/P

Peteris,
It’s not that hard for either you or Aleksejs to understand the Latvian word “pienaakums”— or are you just making false claims about knowing the Latvian language, culture, and history so well, especially for your LatRuss compatriot.  Let’s just say that I appreciate your tribute to your father.  It’s obvious he was a Latvian who understood the meaning in Latvian of “pienaakums.”  I am a “native-speaker” of Latvian, unlike you and Aleksejs, and if you want to know what that once meant to a Latvian in Latvia, just ask me. 

If you one more time give me that crap about Aleksejs knowing Latvian so well and whatever other clever phrasing you contrive that hides how Aleksejs doesn’t like “ugly” Latvian history, doesn’t like “Latvian ‘tautasdziesmas’ culture,” threatens to vote for SC with every snit-fit over perceived deprivation of his “Russian” rights or those of his Old Believer Imperialist-Russian gran, and clearly doesn’t understand “pienaakums” like most Russians in Latvia also don’t - and that would make your father give all the rights-not-pienaakums Russian whiners a piece of his brill “PHD” mind, I may give both of you a piece of my modern US-liberated, un-shy mind and gladly take my LOL time-out.

It appears that neither you nor Aleksejs understand - or want to understand - this from the “brill PHD” Levits, who I imagine also read broadly and extensively: “Imigrantiem nacionālā valstī ir pienākums piemēroties valsts­nācijai un apgūt dubultidentitāt.” 

You explain to Aleksejs that no one in Europe speaks “European” and it’s not one of the choices of “dubultidentitāt” for Russians, including his Old Believers of the Republic of Latvia, the one they used to live in and the one they live in now. 

Maybe I’ll take my own time out.

Peteris writes one time too many: 
“Most ethnic Russians in Daugavpils (not to mention a great many of the other russophones here) are citizens by descent. I think I have said this a few hundred times. What is it that you don’t get, girl?”

They are “citizens by descent” and if they were decent citizens of The Republic of Latvia, they would fulfill the decent citizens “pienaakums.”  I guess as “russophones” they don’t understand the language and the “pienaakums” of their decent Latvian citizenship.

Oh, ambi, how silly you get! No one questions the word pienākums. I question the word “imigrants.” Who are those immigrants? Are they people who were born in the interwar Republic of Latvia? If so, when did they immigrate? I will again ask you: what year should my grandmother put in the graph that says: what year did you immigrate to Latvia?

I’ve read the Saeima transcripts of the interwar Republic before your favorite dictator brutally murdered the democracy in 1934. It is quite clear that each ethnic minority spoke its own language - not just at home, but in the holy of holies - inside the Latvia’s parliament. Were they not decent citizens? Was Schumann, who fought for the rights of minorities, not a decent MP?

Decency is not a legal requirement, Madame President. There are many people who speak Latvian fluently who are not decent citizens. Some of them even have been selling Latvia off to Russia, one little fence at a time. There are those, of course, who don’t speak the language and are not part of the nation of Hard-Working Latvians, Without Whom Latvia Wouldn’t Exist(tm). But they could be decent citizens, even though they are not citizens in the legal sense.

Incidentally, what was Latvia when the first Old Believers crossed the border and did the act of immigrating? A speck in the milkman’s eye?

And I’m sorry, but I don’t like Russian folk songs either. I don’t trod around in a sports track suit and drink vodka. Better yet, I hardly ever use Russian as my public language. What would that make me? A grandson of an immigrant who was born in the country to which she immigrated? 

I went to Cēsis over the weekend. While I was outside a store, a homeless man addressed me:

“Jūs esat no Tallinas?” he asked.
“No Rīgas,” I answered.
“Ka jūms patīk Cēsis?”
“Pils man ļoti patika.”
“Would you have a santim,” he said in Russian, adding “Es ta sapratu jūms būtu labāk ja mēs runātu krieviski.”

Now I did my citizenry duty - I spoke the state language. Detecting an accent, he choose to switch. I was offended. So how can you complain that no one speaks Latvian, if no one insists that ethnic minorities speak Latvian? And these people would be decent citizens, per your definition, ambi.

And if the language is the only true requirement for being a decent citizen, why can you not accept that it is possible to speak the language and vote for SC? Or does a decent citizen not vote a certain way? So, obviously, speaking the language is not enough, is it?

To be a Latvian citizen, i.e. to belong to the political entity that is Latvia, one practically has to be a latvietis, per your definition. One even has to have the same political views as you and never ever vote for SC. Soon, you will be preparing those trains to deport those of us who are not native-speakers of Latvian and who happen to be Russian. Or maybe we’ll just wear a hammer and a sickle on our shirts at all times.

Here’s an example of Aleksejs’s serious attempt to understand The Independent Republic of Latvia “pienaakums” and to forge a double-identity with the russophone “S(inverted roof above! )-A-S(roof again)-L-I-K”  - as in SHASHLIK- “culture.”

“I was [sincerely and innocently] wondering ... whether the ethnic minorities have to drop their ethnic culture [SHASHLIK, MATZOH, CEPULIENE?] and be forced to like tautasdziesmas? Is that what Levits meant? ... Do you also think that Levits would have anything to say about the Russian culture? [SHASHLIK, SOVIET?] Or maybe Jewish culture [MATZOH. CEPULIENE, SHASHLIK, TAUTASDZIESMAS, SOVIET?]?  I’ll repeat my main question: how does one become a Latvian in the sense of valsts nacija”?

Aleksejs,
I surmise you did not attend the last Dziesmas Svetki - bestowed the title of “Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity” by UNESCO - along with the other Latvian citizens like Loskutovs and me and the “other minorites” in Latvia other than Russians like Jews and Lithuanians, who assume the “double-culture” when citizens of Latvia and willingly participate in the national celebration of Latvian cultural events.  I guess you at least read the propaganda - whoops - the EXTENSIVE NEWS - in the Russian press in Latvia about how “THEY CAME, THEY SANG.”  Peteris (and Anita) seem to like that “simplicity” of expression.

As to your last question “how does one become a Latvian etc.,” you could read Bilmanis on Latvian history, Rislakki on how to defend against Russian propaganda, attend the next Dziesmas Svetki with Loskutovs, see how “other minorities” do it, start eating “piragi” with the shashlik, interview Egils Levits for an article for the Russian NEWS in Latvia.

Shashlik is the embodiment of a Russian culture?! Now I’ve heard everything. You are indeed beyond help. Or should that be HELP?

For the record: Meksikāņu virtuves nebūs

I quote:

Patlaban gandrīz visas ēdināšanas uzņēmumiem rezervētās vietas ir iznomātas, palikušas dažas vakantas vietas amatnieku rosībai. Tas, pēc Kiklin pārstāvju domām, norāda, ka arī uzņēmums bez pieredzes masu pasākumu rīkošanā spēj noorganizēt tirdzniecības procesu arī tādā pasākumā kā Dziesmu svētki.
“Latvijas uzņēmumi, kas piedāvā Latvijā ražotu produkciju, jo tie ir latviešu svētki,” galveno tirgotāju atlases kritēriju Dienai atklāj Kiklin vadītājs Oskars Polmanis, piebilstot, ka tādēļ ir nācies atteikt, piemēram, ēdinātājam, kas svētkos vēlējies piedāvāt meksikāņu virtuvi.

Svētku norises vietās būs nopērkami šašliki, ceptas desiņas un “citi latviešiem raksturīgi ēdieni”, sola O.Polmanis. Dienas uzrunātie tautiskuma eksperti gan ir citās domās par kaukāziešu tautu ēdiena — šašlika — iederēšanos svētku cienastu sarakstā. “Negribētos, lai svētki pārvēršas par to ņegu ņigu, kāds ir Aglonā, kur svētceļniekus sagaida šašliki un vesels balagāns, no kura nevar tikt vaļā — pilnīgi zūd vēlme iet bazilikā. Tas ir piemērs, kā nevajadzētu rīkot tautas svētkus,” pirms gaidāmajiem Dziesmu svētkiem uzsver rakstniece Nora Ikstena.

PS If I wanted to know what Bilmanis thought about becoming a Latvian, I’d read Bilmanis. I am asking you, ambersun.

PPS I don’t write in Russian, ambi, for my job.

PPPS - I’m turning into Mikus now - have you decided what is meant by “imigrants”? What should I tell my grandmother? Is she an immigrant to the country where she was born?