We need 'tamadas', not historians or lobbyists

Published in Turkish Daily News, 13 December 2007

Re-Published in French by Collectif Van as Nous avons besoin de 'tamadas*', pas d’historiens ni de lobbyistes


You don't need a PhD in rocket science to recognize the complexity of Armenian-Turkish relations and its infinite regress to the samsaric cycles of prejudice, hatred and “you act right first, then I will too” attitudes.

Within this journey to nowhere, there are two dominant voices: Those who think that if they only had more third party countries or groups siding with them, they would “win” the battle of “truth” against the “deniers” and those who think that if only they had more historical research, books and commissions, they would prove the indisputable “truth” to the shame of the revisionists.

Both of these groups presuppose that this bizarre globalized quarrel is exclusively over the “truth” of past. Yet as the dead bodies lie in silence, the ones who are fighting are present tense actors with their present tense narratives, goals, fears or anticipations. In an ironic way, the dead are still victimized by the living, who politicize and utilize their memories just as their biological bodies were politicized and utilized prior to their murders.

So, the main challenge in front of us isn't whose “truth” will get the upper hand in the international circus, but it is how, if ever, we can tease out the present politics (whether that of identity or saving the face) so that we can genuinely mourn for the dead.

No matter what one thinks, “justice” is never really met after mass atrocities, especially historical ones. Notions of retributive justice embodied by tribunals are of no use when perpetrators exist no more. In spite of the aura of “justice” which they spread, the sheer number of victims and perpetrators mean that they have to pursue a symbolic course, often only condemning key actors. Contrary to their own self-perception, they fail hard in breaking cycles of hatred and preventing future atrocities.

Similarly, cultural factors limit the effectiveness of “justice” set in the courts. For example, even though a court in the Middle East may sentence a rapist, there is a high chance that the family of the victim will not find it satisfactory and pursue a sense of a justice by ways of an “honor killing.” For this reason, wise men and women have sought to pursue culturally relevant ways of working toward justice and reconciliation.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who led the famous Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, combined the African concept of ubuntu with Christian notions of confession, forgiveness and reconciliation. Tutu argued that there was no future for South Africa unless blacks and whites lived together in harmony and this could only be achieved through forgiveness.

In Rwanda, the shortcomings of Western perceptions of justice as embodied in the tribunals have been supplemented by the use of Rwandan gacaca trials. In gacaca trials, the perpetrators are reintegrated to their local communities following a traditional ceremony.

What about Armenian-Turkish relations?

There is no court system in the world that can handle this issue. To even suggest a retributive pursuit is laden with serious conceptual faults. No amount of legislation passed in third party countries will move Turks to be open to correct a past wrong doing. No “objective” history book will be able to be the final word, as collective memories, by their very own nature, remain contested and modified along with contemporary demands. So, we are in need of another solution.

Isn't there anything we can find in the Anatolian cultures that can provide us with a much more relevant way? I believe there is, though it would sound naïve to the realist and punitive “adults” reading this article.

In the Armenian culture, there is the tradition of tamadas, who are prominent men managing the procession of toasts made around a table of food and drinks. In both Turkish and Armenian cultures, sitting around a table plays an important role. It symbolizes welcoming, accommodation, fellowship and celebration. Thus, a drinking table is much more suitable for reconciliation between Turks and Armenians than a U.N. committee room.

Drinking and eating draws us together into conviviality and sharing a personal and vulnerable presence, rather than the impersonal battlefield effect of courts, commissions and assemblies. Sitting around a table with a tamada ensures that everybody's voice and wishes are heard and given equal respect.

After the third shot, one recognizes the lovability of the other enough to reach out and kiss away the personal barrier that separates us from the stranger or unwanted. The eventual procession of the toasts to a closure, when the group feels that enough toasts have been made, means that a healthy mourning process reaches freedom from a melancholic sense of loss that poisons the one trapped in the past.

To be sure, this will not satisfy those who want “revenge” or reinstatement of a mythical kingdom or lost glory or maintenance of pure and heroic pasts. Sadly, justice and reconciliation remain patchy, imperfect and limited in our clay earth. What is left to us is our humanity in its raw form.

Whether we can actualize it to the extent that we can lament together and move beyond black and white narratives of victimhood or innocence, depends not on the U.S. House of Representatives or French parliament or a scholar at Cambridge University, but only on us: Turks, Armenians and a bottle of rakı or liqueur with Mount Ararat as the background.

Is Turkey going through the birth-pains of postmodernity?

Published in Turkish Daily News, 15 November 2007

Turkish intellectuals are often bombarded with new dramas unfolding every single day. As they rush to analyze the issue at hand and propose a way forward, what they often fail to process is the broader picture and how (or whether) these events are connected to each other.

Surely, every event is inherently contextual and unique. However, as the world we live in has begun to erase the clear distinction between the local and global, it is not only that most of the local problems have roots in global realities, but also that local problems often have global effects.

There is something uniquely Turkish about the issues we face in Turkey, but at the same time there is something extremely global about them. In this article, I present to the reader a chance to step back and look at contemporary Turkey in relation to a few global trends in order to see the matrix within which the ‘daily news' emerges.

Weakening of nation states:

Though I have never belonged to the tribe of social scientists who have been preaching the end of nation states, it is true that strict and purist nation state vision has lost much of its appeal and hold at home and globally.

As nation states continue to put themselves under international law and governing bodies or banks, their claims for ‘sovereignty' and control over their ‘nation', which was once taken for granted, are no more what they once were. The Human Rights regime under which we live and the presence of international NGOs and global media remove the arbitrary power that states have.

The issue of Kurds and non-Muslims in Turkey emerges not from some international conspiracy but from the increasing difficulty of trying to implement a 19th century vision of a ‘nation' by way of assimilation and social engineering.

Disillusionment with the elites:

One of the reasons that sociologists offer for the resurgence of political Islam in many countries, which were previously thought to be set on the blissful path of secularization is the fact that secularism is interwoven with a ruling elite who often are far away from the ‘people'. The word ‘halk' in Turkish, like the word ‘people' in every language, has an underlying notion of lesser beings or the herd.

When we look at how the AK Party was able to emerge in such a short amount of time and topple down all of the traditional political elites, we see not an ‘Islamization' of Turkey but the failure of the traditional power structures of the Turkish political system. Even though our Armed Forces asked for a ‘social reflex' amidst the well-orchestrated marches ‘to save the Secular Republic', the outcome of the last elections showed how the ‘herd', in line with their kind in other national farms, is tired of being controlled.

Failure of 19th century secularism:

Classical secularism is based on three assumptions; a) the separation of the state and organized religion, b) the limitation of religious belief to the personal sphere, c) the ultimate demise of religion. This 19th century vision, which has been thought to be the direction of the future, has been largely aborted by the academia.

The resurgence of religions in politics and its strong come back in academic circles and greater society since 1960s have proven that the assumptions b) and c) do not automatically follow a), and that religion flourish and continue to play a strong role under perfect a) conditions. As the politics of Latin and North America, Africa and Asia point, religion, one the most powerful social forces today, can never be ‘tamed'.

As long as the human race exits, our longing for ‘something more' will continue to make the religious a core part of our experience and what we believe will always influence every aspect of our lives. Thus, as we have arrived at the end of ‘Enlightenment' experiment, we are in need of a completely new paradigm for how religion's power can be channeled into a better future for all of us. Interestingly, AK Party seems to be the most advanced accommodation of Islam in the contemporary world.

Loss of neat and tidy identities:

The haunting recognition that the world is not as ‘solid' as we imagined it to be inevitably leads itself to anomy, a state of no longer having a firm know-how to run a country or even be a ‘patriot'. The Turkish society is struggling to make sense of and live in a ‘liquid' world, to use Zygmunt Bauman's vocabulary. This shows itself under every rock; from the contemporary memory boom to new and dangerous civil groups trying to do something for ‘our nation'; from increasing ethnic and religious violence to the synthetic tension between the ‘secular' and the ‘religious'; and from the wide appeal of conspiracy theories to anti-US and EU feelings.

What lies behind the calls to ‘close the door to globalization' is an instinctive reaction to the possibility that we may end up as the losers at the end of this slippery century. Behind every angry outburst lies a deep fear. Yet, none of this is limited just to Turkey. We see similar tensions in most of the countries in the world.

The list of global trends affecting Turkey can be extended further. Suffice it to say, the tensions we face in Turkey are not just Turkish. Our problem is that we are trying to be ‘modern' when the global experience has shown the shortcomings and failures of the modern vision. Whether postmodernism is or can ever be a paradigm internalized by the Turkish society is open to challenge, but it is increasingly becoming clear that Turkey is trying to find local answers to global problems in an outdated early 20th century toolbox.

Rehumanizing Armenians and Turks

Published in Turkish Daily News, 12 November 2007

You are not alone if you have not heard the word ''rehumanization'' before. Unlike its twin sister ''dehumanization,'' rehumanization is not a popular tool in politics and identity construction. We would rather build identities or pursue political power by stripping the other from their humanity in order to legitimize our superiority over them. We are more inclined to demonize, discredit, and humiliate the other in order to win an argument or establish our ''rights'' over theirs. Rehumanization is restoring the other's dignity and humanity and attributing the other the same rights ''we'' have or demand. Without rehumanization, there can never be reconciliation simply because without accepting each other as human beings and acknowledging the other's voice, we can never expect that the other will hear our pain and concerns and be moved by it to act unselfishly. Dehumanization is plentiful in Armenian-Turkish relations as each side still wages war for the exclusive rights to be heard. That is why debating sides tend to channel their energy only to disprove the other's historical account in order to prove the world how ''immoral'' or ''deceptive'' the other is.

'Subversive Armenians' :

I was never interested in Armenians or what may have happened during the fall of Ottoman Empire. What I knew was what I read on the papers (just like most people in Turkey); Armenians seek to represent the issue internationally with the obvious desire to achieve acknowledgement of Armenian deaths as genocide, in order to receive financial reparations from Turkey and ultimately to claim and have some parts of eastern Turkey incorporated into modern day Armenia. To be fair, some extreme –but thankfully few– individuals or groups in diaspora have made comments which seem to prove this interpretation of why Armenians are so aggressive about the issue. When this perception was combined with our firm belief in official histories and commitment to the welfare of our nation, there was no room left to hear what Armenians were trying to communicate. Then one day, I found myself on a trip to Armenia and Karabakh. Thousands of scenarios went through my mind and none of them was about receiving hospitality. After two weeks, I found myself crying in a church in Karabakh and embracing a new Armenian friend. The same night, I remember crying more around a dinner table dominated by vodka shots and toasts for a better future. I was finally able to see who lives on the other side of Mount Ararat; not a group of conspirators with a mischievous plan, but a group of broken and hopeful people. Since then, ''Armenians'' isn't an abstract category for me. The tension between us have been rehumanized and made flesh and blood.

'Evil Turks' :

Sadly, I was also about to crush into misconceptions and blatant fantasies of some Armenians about Turks. For example, there is something profoundly disturbing about Vahakn Dadrian, a prominent Armenian scholar. He continues to hold essentialist views, which argue that there is something inherent about being a Turk and a Muslim, which makes Turks the most suitable people to commit genocide, even though social sciences have concluded unanimously that there is no ''race'' as such and that ethnic violence occurs regardless of ''race,'' religion, class, gender and education. Less sophisticated versions of such a faulty framework can be heard regularly in layman's terms. If my memory does not fail me, I do not remember seeing a section in the memorial in Yerevan like the one in Yad Vashem– the Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, dedicated to ''righteous among the nations.'' The phrase refers to non-Jews who risked their lives for protecting Jews. It is a simple yet profound way of rehumanizing a past conflict by showing the humanity found in both ends of the story. Aren't there Turks who have risked their lives protecting their neighbours and friends? An Armenian friend once replied to me by saying “only a handful, most of them did so for their own benefits.” In a single stroke, whatever they have done was relativized and stripped off its humanity. Thus, we are back to the black and white narrative of ''Evil Turks.'' A narrative not limited to then but also to now; Turks as an a-historical, unchanging, monolithic entity, burning with eternal hatred of Armenians. Ironically, the same people who ascribe a deterministic and decadent ontology to Turks also demand from them an unselfish moral act to own a crime that was committed by distant actors in their history and has dire social and economic implications.

The sad fact is though each side pays lips service to acknowledging that ''some Armenians'' may have been killed or Armenians ''may have killed'' some in rebellions, retaliations and pointless and immoral ASALA terror, very few people genuinely mourn the pain we have caused on each other, not just the pain ''we'' suffered. Even though bookshelves and columns are full of words about the other, in actuality we have very little knowledge of what the other thinks or feels. A significant portion of diaspora Armenians and intellectuals have a minimum if no real contact with Turkey or any Turks. Their prescriptive comments often signal the failure of self-referential deductions they make, which do not really correspond to the complicated reality of modern Turkey. Ultra-nationalistic and at times racist comments only serve to deafen Turkish ears, and fuel nationalistic sentiments that disregard Armenians all together. After all, only a small portion of Turks has any real contact with Armenians and the complexities of different Armenian voices and how much the past continues to hurt them.

Anti-Conversion Legislations and Religious Freedom

A talk delivered by Ziya Meral at a Religious Freedom Consultancy, House of Lords, 20 March 2007. The text may not be published or re-posted without the permission of the author.

The exercise of our potential to form beliefs and live them accordingly is one of the key factors in making who we are as individuals. Beliefs go deeper than political affiliations or adherences or philosophical formulations. They affect what we eat, drink, how we dress, where we live, what jobs we do or don’t, whom we marry, how we see the world, what we value in life and what we live and die for. Thus choosing to believe or not to believe, to adopt or not to adopt a religion is a life-defining act thus a fundamental issue.

As Declaration on the Elimination of All forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion and Belief notes “religion or belief, for anyone who professes either, is one of the fundamental elements in his conception of life and that freedom of religion or belief should be fully respected and guaranteed”.

In fact this was what was argued for in the Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which notes that “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion, or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (referred to as ICCPR from now on) has sought to protect this “right”. Article 18 of the ICCPR states:

“Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching.”

Sadly over the last 4 years we have seen an increasing amount of violations of these rights and these violations have often continued without international community’s attention or at times wilful overlooking.

In 2006 the case of Abdul Rahman in Afghanistan, who converted to Christianity from Islam 15 years ago and who was facing death penalty was widely covered in the world wide media. He was eventually released due to International pressure but had to flee to Italy as the high level exposure of his case to media brought with it his possible murder by extremist groups.

However, Abdul Rahman’s story is neither unique nor a one off event. Converts, people who change their religion have been continually facing the risk of death and gross human rights abuses including denial of access to education, housing, employment, business, movement, worship.

Allow me to point out to three different cases. In India, often referred as the largest democracy in the world, 7 states- Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Arunachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and recently Himachal Pradesh, have enacted so called “Freedom of Religious Acts”. A similar law in Tamil Nadu was repealed in 2004. The chief objective of these laws is the prevention of conversion from Hinduism to any other religion carried out by ‘forcible’ or ‘fraudulent’ means of by ‘allurement’ or ‘inducement’. Article 3 of the Orissa Freedom of Religion Act, which serves as a basis to subsequent laws in other states, stipulated that “no person shall convert or attempt to convert, either directly or otherwise, any person from one religious faith to another by the use of force or by inducement or by any fraudulent means nor shall any person abet such conversion.”

Critics within and outside of India have drawn attention to vague formulation of phrases such as ‘allurement’ or ‘inducement’ and the possible doors this open to persecution of Non-Hindu groups in India. It has also been widely noted that the subtext behind these laws is the mass conversion to Christianity and Islam among Dalits- the so called untouchables and the Tribesman. Conversion provides them a way out of the caste system and socio-economic opportunities. With increasing Hindu nationalism, during 2006 BJP and various Hindu nationalist organisations have asked similar laws to be introduced nationwide. Not so surprisingly, 2006 saw widespread violence against Christians in many states across the country.

These laws, not only contradict the Indian Constitution, such as Article 25, which guarantees the right to believe, choose and propagate beliefs but also International treaties India is a signatory party to. As the well known patterns of Human Rights abuses show, when such laws go unchallenged they often serve as an encouragement to other countries.

In fact, when the Sri Lankan Minister of Hindu Cultural Affairs visited Tamil Nadu, India in 2002, when the Religious Freedom Act was still in use, he brought back to Sri Lanka the proposal for a legislation to prohibit ‘forced’ or ‘unethical’ conversions. This was later developed into a “Freedom of Religion Bill”, which was approved by the Cabinet in 2004, but has not been introduced to the Parliament, thus has not came into force yet.

The final draft of the bill states in Section 2 that “no person shall, either directly or otherwise, convert or attempt to convert any person professing one religion to another religion by the use of force, allurement or by fraudulent means.” Though, everyone would agree that using force or unethical means that exploits socio-economic vulnerabilities to ‘convert’ somebody is wrong, when the increasing violence towards the religious minorities in Sri Lanka particularly towards Christians since 2003 is taken into account, it appears that these vague formulations are regularly used by various Buddhist groups to deny the exercise of any other religion all together. As religious boundaries are closely linked to ethnic boundaries (i.e. to be a Sinhalese is to be Buddhist, to be a Tamil is to be a Hindu), conversion to another religion is seen as a threat, betrayal or treason. During 2006, attacks on churches, clergy and their families, hindrance of religious ceremonies have continued.

This of course not only contradicts, the article 10 of Sri Lanka’s Constitution which protects freedom of conscience and religion, ‘including the freedom to have or adopt a religion or belief’, but also the International responsibilities Sri Lanka has.

Algerian Parliament passed a new legislation, titled “the conditions and rules for the exercise of religious worship other than Islam” on February 2006, which came into force in September 2006. The legislation hinders the right of assembly and even collecting tidings during worship services. It stipulates a prison term ranging from two to five years and a fine of between $7000- 14000 for anyone who “incites, constrains or uses any seductive means aimed at converting a Muslim to another religion, or uses to this end establishments for teaching, education, health; organisations of a social or cultural nature; training institutions, or any other establishment, or any financial means”, and who “makes, stores, or distributes printed documents or audiovisual productions or who makes use of any other support or means that aims to shake the faith of a Muslim.” Elusive terms such as ‘seductive means’ or ‘aims to shake the faith of a Muslim’ are of great concern and many fear that this vagueness will facilitate malicious prosecution against religious minorities. In fact, the new legislation even criminalizes objections or protests against itself.

At the surface level, these legislations seem to be against unethical propagation of other religions and wider concerns of security. These possible misuses of religion and propagation are in fact mentioned in the Article 18 of ICCPR:

18.2. No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice.
18.3. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.

These anti-conversion legislations cunningly come very close to assert themselves as the limitations, which ICCPR brings to religious freedom. Thus, they can, rather ironically, be named as Religious “Freedom” Acts, that actually seek to protect freedom of religion. In actuality, when this discourse is placed within its context and its day to day implications, these legislations are clearly an annex, a bold legal actualization of ever present tensions and attitudes within societies towards those of other religious creeds and specifically towards converts who are seen as betraying their people. Iran has continually argued that Bahá’ís in Iran were a political group that actively sought to overthrow the regime, thus Iran had the right to deny the use of free exercise of their religion.

In Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Yemen, Sudan, Iran and Mauritania apostasy is punishable by death as these countries constitutionally acknowledge Shari’a as the primary ‘source for legislation’. The traditional Shi’a Jafari school of Shari’a Law, as well as all four Sunni schools, teach death penalty for anyone leaving Islam. It is worth to note that these laws are not forced regularly or consistently and there is a growing number of modern Islamic scholars who condemn death penalty.

In Iran, there has not been an official execution lately. On the other hand during 2006 and 2007, Muslim background Christians in various parts of Iran have been detained, abused, then released on hefty bails including turning over their properties and further threats that they will be charged with treason if they continue to propagate their faith, partake in a local church and more significantly if they report these abuses to the International community. Iran’s track record of abuses includes de facto denial of the right of education, assembly, employment to hundreds of thousands of Bahá’ís living in Iran. Just because they are Bahá’ís.

Egypt is another important country, which has persecuted religious minorities, denied ID cards, employment, fair access to courts and still requires a never ending process for even repairing a non-Muslim religious centre, let alone build new ones. In Egypt, converts from Islam to other religions regularly face incommunicado detention by State Intelligence Service, loss of their marital status or right over their children, property and family heritage. A 57 years old man, Bahaa Al Aqqad, has been kept in an underground desert cell without an official charge during 2006 and well into 2007. Though the court has ordered his release following the end of the 6 months right of detention given to security forces, solely because he has converted from Islam two years ago and chose to speak about it his new faith.

Even in Turkey, a secular democratic republic, converts regularly face not only persecution from their communities but suffer structural hindrances that prohibit their socio-economic opportunities as their security files mark them as a national threat. During the last year, a Turkish church formed by converts in Odemis were attacked by Molotov Cocktails and another one in Samsun stoned. The local police and governor has ordered the Odemis church to shut down their church. The legal process now is not the arrests of the attackers but whether or not this church will remain open.

Currently two Muslim background Christians, Hakan Tastan and Turan Topal await a court decision on the charges of the renowned “insulting Turkishness” and the accusation of offering money, sexual opportunities and threats with the use of guns to convert Muslims. Over the last two years, Turkish media, intellectuals and sadly politicians continued their assertions that conversion of Turks to other religions was an internationally organized campaign to destroy Turkey. Such sentiments have shown themselves in the killing of the Roman Catholic priest, Andrea Santoro by a 16 years old young man in Trabzon. Father Santoro was blamed to be seducing and alluring Muslim Turks to change their religion.

For the Western mind this can be a puzzling problem. In the Western world religion is seen primarily as a personalized belief. The notion of secularization, in its ideal forms, brings with itself the non-state involvement in individual beliefs, and of course non-religious involvement in the public sphere. Whereas the greatest portion of the world has never set foot on such a journey.

20th century Euro centric sociology has proudly forecasted that by the end of the 20th century there would hardly be any religion found in the public space. The inevitable secularization process would cause the decline of religion and make the rest of the world like secular Western Europe. Now it appears that Europe is the anomaly as religion in the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, meaning the greatest portion of the world, still continues to be a key defining factor and social force.

Today’s global world is often a polarized world, rather worlds living in close proximity. In this picture, boundaries are increasingly drawn along religious and ethnic lines. In all of the cases I quoted here, India, Sri Lanka, Algeria, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, we see emerging patterns of increasing ethno-nationalisms that has strong religious tones. These are in fact ontologies in the making, and a person, who chooses to change his religion is located involuntarily into a new category. They no more fit the nationalist or ethnic constructions and are seen as one of the enemies. They are not only doomed to anomy and a sense of loss and not belonging anywhere, but also left without a shelter or protection.

Human Rights tools have been targets of sharp criticisms. “They are Western, individualized, Judeo-Christian. We should not impose our values to the rest of the world as if they are universal.” All of these are true to a certain extent. Human Rights laws are all human products, with the underlying good intention to protect fellow human beings. They are open to maturation. In women’s rights, children’s rights and various other issues we do see great improvements, attention and emerging policies. We should by all means continue to advance them. Because they are the only things we got in our hands.

But sadly, the right to believe or the fate of millions of people who suffer persecution for no other reason than holding different religious beliefs are overlooked, left undone and somehow are not worth our attention and energy. This is not only seen in the governmental levels but also among NGOs. Often religious persecution isn’t included in country profiles or reported in worldwide media. It seems that the effects of the19th and 20th centuries’ outdated attitudes towards religion still linger, amidst 21st century realities and the faces of people who suffer.

Ahmadinejad owes a great debt to Bush

Published in Turkish Daily News, 3 October 2007

If you ever find yourself walking around in Tehran, you will recognize right away that the mood in the streets is melancholy, not a mad commitment to destroy Israel, if not the entire world. Romantic memories of the ‘free and prosperous' days of the Shah still linger in a country, which continues to mourn the loss of a ‘once great place' in the eyes of the world.

As the middle classes and the educated circles increasingly react against the flamboyant rhetoric of their President and want him to address the economic problems and closed doors that limit the development of Iran, the last thing on their minds is an apocalyptic struggle paving the way of the Mahdi.

Iran has gained significantly from U.S. policies:

In many ways, there is nothing new about Iran's ambitions on acquiring nuclear energy (well, let's be honest, nuclear weapons). It has long been in the cards since the days of Rafsanjani, with a slight detour under Khatami, the reformer.

Even though the popular reading of Iran and its state may present a rather unstable and irrational country, this is far from the truth. The Iranian state and people care about their international standing as much as any other country, and their foreign policy follows a rationale based on their regional interests and domestic tensions, just like any other country.

One may fail to recognize how much Iran has gained in the last two years.

Though the U.S. had certain desired outcomes in mind when invading Afghanistan and Iraq, the last thing the administration foresaw or wanted was to create a stronger Iran. In fact, the effect of the Afghan and Iraqi affairs resulted in Iran gaining a much stronger political and popular presence in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf.

However, it is not only Iran's diplomacy that gained new grounds through the unexpected opening. The increasing diplomatic tensions that brought the focus back on Iran have done wonders in refreshing the weakening hold of revolutionary attitudes and Ahmadinejad's appeal to Iranians.

“I hate Ahmadinejad, but I admire him!”:

A rather well-off shop owner in Tehran tells me his memories of the Shah and the freedom they enjoyed. A taxi driver keeps me hostage for 20 minutes after I arrive at my destination with his passionate confessions about his day-to-day life and its limitations.

A university student notes the displeasure among her peers about how Iran is perceived globally and how their President is no reflection of their country. A lay intellectual who claims to be a devoted Communist bashes his anger against the elitism of the ruling class and the serious problems in the country.

An internet café owner tells me his plans to flee to the U.S., just as many other young professionals of his generation, who are more busy trying to get a high score in English tests, than to plan a suicidal mission to Israel.

One thing unites these people. They have all stated in their own words the same generic message: “I hate Ahmadinejad, but I admire him!”

Ironically, they all see Israel and the U.S. seeking to destroy Iran in an ‘irrational and mad' way, just as we hear regularly that this is what Iran is trying to do. Though none of them want anything to do with nuclear weapons, they all support Iran's bid for nuclear energy and feel that their President is courageously defending their rights against a colonial West that seeks to hinder their development.

Though the President's domestic performance and populist rhetoric is speedily decreasing his appeal within Iran, his seemingly tough stand against the West is gaining him more brownie points.

In fact, this has been the ultimate lesson we have learned, although apparently not all of us, since the Islamic Revolution. Iranians are patriotic people who will unite strongly in the face of an outside enemy. One of the key factors of how Khomeini was able to appeal to a wide range of people from atheists, leftists to Islamic seminary students was the authenticity and commitment to Iran he represented in the presence of a Shah who seemed to be losing his Iranian-ness and ‘selling his nation' to outside powers.

So it seems that President Ahmadinejad owes at least a short ‘thank you' email sent to the gov.us domain. And President Bush may be moved to accept such courtesy and grant an equally genuine response. After all, President Bush himself owes a lot to Ahmadinejad's populism in his efforts to emerge as a strong and fearless defender of the ‘free world' after the not-so-desirable public relations outcome of the Iraq war.

What makes headscarves political: wearing or banning them?

Published as "Covering up the truth" in the Parliament Magazine,
1 October 2007

I remember standing in front of a university campus in Izmir, Turkey, and watching a young girl wearing a headscarf approaching the gate. She reached for her headscarf and swiftly removed it. The details of her face have eroded over the years, yet the expression on her face – tinged with humiliation, resentfulness and anger – still lingers. It was only at that moment I realised what millions of women like her might feel everyday. Since then, I have asked myself again and again, what would I do or feel if I were in their shoes?

I am not a Muslim and have strong problems with Muslims who seek to force women to wear headscarves. On a recent trip to Iran, I witnessed the arrests of two young women whose headscarves and sandals violated the orders of the new police chief of Tehran, who had been disturbed by the increasing hair and skin showed on the streets under the burning Persian sun. I could not sleep that night for the same reason I struggled with watching a woman forced to remove her headscarf: every human being should be free to live according to their conscience.

There are various arguments we hear about banning headscarves, ranging from national security to hospital hygiene and need for full facial pictures on IDs. The most widely heard argument within and outside Turkey is “we have nothing against people having freedom of belief and practice, it is just that they are making wearing the headscarves political”. There are two significant problems with this seemingly convincing argument.

First of all, what does it matter if headscarves have turned into political symbols? Isn’t democracy the creative space in which individuals or groups can express themselves, whether it be through their fashion sense or political aspirations? As we say in Turkish, “Özrü kabahetinden de beter” – the excuse is worse than the actual fault. The public arena is by its very nature political and it is the core of our political system that gives the individual a right for personal political expression. Thus, the reasoning that “they are making it political,” which this argument uses to convince us to accept the banning of headscarves, is no real reason at all. To my mind this automatically makes banning ungrounded.

If outward signs of one’s beliefs and views are not compatible with the Turkish constitution and its unique perception of democracy, then surely we should be stopping people from wearing certain kind of beards and dresses, or growing pointed moustaches and using peculiar hand shakes to represent their political beliefs. Since we are not enforcing the consistent banning of such symbols – not least because to do so would be to undermine our own political system – the rhetoric that states “actually I have nothing against them” is truly a poor one, if not a self contradictory one, and shows that we in fact do have something against “them”.

The second issue is that banning headscarves has become the cause of the problem that it seeks to solve. Wearing headscarves is a religious practice that dates from ancient times, and has been practiced by many religions, including Muslims throughout the history of Islam. If a modern country bans a historical religious practice, doesn’t the act of banning itself make it a political issue as controversial as any other apparent contravention of an individual’s rights by a sovereign power?

Since religious beliefs transcend any current political context by their very nature, banning them tends to have an automatically counter-productive impact, in that it makes people cling to them all the more fiercely – a stubborn resistance prompted by a ‘fear of God’ that is far more consequential than ‘fear of man’. Thus, increasing calls for bans to be lifted, and political pressure to do so, are merely the results of banning headscarves in the first place.

Yes, the women who wear headscarves may be trying to make a political point, but I doubt if the point is to change Turkey into a theocratic nation overnight with the magic of filling our streets with more women who wear headscarves. Political systems do not change when people are allowed to dress as they wish. These women are trying to communicate a genuine point. They are banned from equal opportunities and treated as less than citizens. And yes, they are now shouting louder than ever to make the rest of us hear their voice.

We need to mourn the loss of Ottoman Empire!

Published in Turkish Daily News, 13 August 2007

It may sound funny to suggest that we the Turks have to mourn for a past loss, when there is so much going on that demands our attention in the age of BlackBerrys, on- the-go cappuccinos and frequent flyer programs. Yet, the sages tell us that certain problems, which keep repeating themselves in contemporary events, are often symptoms of things that remain unresolved.

Turkey has mastered being ‘modern' in line with the modes of thinking which were available in the ‘modern' era. However, the complexities of the 21st century demand a completely different set of skills and strategies. It is a given that Turkey needs to upgrade a lot of its modes of thinking on a wide range of issues from minorities to religion and from politics to diplomacy, but before we can even begin to entertain any thoughts of a new direction, we need to process a past trauma that is diluting our perception of ourselves, of the world and of the others, thus inhibiting us from a new future. As the ethnic, political, religious and social turmoil we witnessed during 2006 and 2007 points out, we are at a conjunction stuck between our past and future. The angel of history has travelled a long way with the storms of progress since the days of Benjamin when he had to face a decision between facing the past debris or the future. Now that his wings are strong enough for him to stand still in the midst of storm, he can and has to “awaken the dead and make whole what has been smashed.”

The link between the Ottoman Empire and Turkish Republic:

The modern nation-state with its Western calendar, bureaucracy, legal structures, alphabet and vocabulary is indeed a sharp break from the multi-ethnic Empire in many ways. Yet, as sociologist Paul Connerton reminds, every radical break is linked to the memories of the past in a paradoxical way; the more radical the break the more dependence on the old. We depend on the memory of the Empire more than we like to admit, but our relationship to it remains inconsistent and full of tension. Turkish nationalists regularly utilize the past golden age within their narratives, but where the golden age ceases to be sparkling and recalls rather darker episodes, the memory of the Empire is shelved. The Republic often represents the ‘modern' and the superior, but sometimes the Empire is spoken of as ‘superior' in terms of political power and the myths of respect for minorities, which is represented as an ‘advanced' solution for today's dilemmas.

The fall and its aftermath:

One can argue that since the fall of the Empire, we have not had a chance to lower our guard and process our history. The fall was followed by an immense effort to save our motherland. A certain narrative and language had to be created and maintained with an iron fist in order to form a ‘nation' out of the debris of a multi-ethnic empire. The momentum, the survival instinct, defence mechanism or whatever you name it, which has brought us thus far, no longer serves its purposes. Some 90 years have passed since the actual events, but they still remain afresh in our culture and memories. Once ‘we' ruled and then found ourselves called ‘the sick man of Europe'. The people, who had conquered the known world, were forced to watch as their lands were invaded by their previous subjects. The loss was traumatic; from the people of a mighty empire to a people vulnerable to colonisation, from wide borders ranging from the Balkans to North Africa, to the Near East, to shrinking borders close to the Aegean shores of the motherland.

From a historical trauma to common sense:

Contemporary generations who have no direct experiences of a life under the glorious Empire and its fall are only socialized into this trauma. They are given a specific narrative from youth. The cities in which they live present themselves as palimpsests which give a concrete form to what is being whispered in textbooks and collected (not collective) memories of the past. From commemorations they partake to the names of the streets on which they walk, everyday they confront this narrative as a reality. Thus the text of the trauma evolves into being an internalized truth evoking certain emotional and intellectual responses in the forms of ‘common sense'.

The traces of the trauma can be seen in the contemporary references to the 1929 Treaty of Sevres and the graffiti that graces many bus stops and walls nowadays; “Dünya Türk Olsun!” (Let the World become Turks). Both of these are symptoms of an unhealthy fear and anxiety felt in the face of 21st century realities, which confront everyone in the world, not just the Turks. The memory of Sevres is recollected as a template to make sense of what is happening now. Foreign nations are making plans behind closed doors to divide, invade, loot or colonise our country. This, we have seen before and it just confirms what we have always known; Turks have no friends other than Turks. It's a “fact”. Just like everyone knows that non-Muslim minorities either work with ‘Zionists' for the glory of Israel or with ‘Crusaders' for the colonial West. We are being stripped of our power and glory just like before. It should not be the Turks who bow down as victims in front of globalization, the EU, the US or whoever is trying to tame or manipulate us. It should be us who hold the leash again. Let us rule the world and let them follow our demands or in European terminology; ‘our way of life'.

Excessive mistrust and melancholy:

In addition to the beautiful architecture, artwork and mementos that shape us spatially and aesthetically, two legacies of the Empire continue to form the mental template, which we use to interpret the world, construct a narrative and respond to domestic or foreign events.

The first one is excessive mistrust. The loss of the Empire left us with a deep scar. We see the world and our country through the lenses of a victim who has been betrayed, hurt and abused. Behind all of our angry outbursts and over confident nationalistic declarations lie a deep fear of an imminent loss of everything we hold dear. Just like anyone who has been hurt, we have developed defence mechanisms to protect our vulnerability. And just like them, we have to decide on whether or not such defence is necessary now and whether it is, in fact, hindering us from healing and forming new and meaningful relationships. Turkey is no longer in the fragile position she was after WWI and does not face the same enemies or dangers. The memory of trauma is not only causing us to interpret the contemporary problems through the wrong lenses but also pushes us to create self-fulfilled prophecies. Our attitudes towards ethnic and religious minorities and towards the EU and the US are all shaped by it.

The second one is melancholy, a sense of loss not tied to a specific object but rather a narcissistic obsession. On one hand we are convinced of our greatness over anyone else in the world, on the other hand we despise the fact that we are not in the place we deserve. On one hand it is the outsiders who are guilty of us not leaping forward, but on the other hand our mouths are full of criticisms of our own governments, state and people, as expressed in the fatalistic sentiments of “bizden adam olmaz” (nothing good will become of us). Yet, our self-degradation is paradoxically linked to a shame and honour based worldview, which makes us hyper sensitive to anyone “insulting Turkishness”. The more fragile and fearful an identity is, the more it will seek to assert itself aggressively and defensively. It seems that we are fixed on the reflection we see on the water to the point of being not able to move.

We need to “work through” our past! :

Our perception of a global conspiracy to destroy Turkey at the first possible opportunity using a wide range of tactics from Human Rights to EU negotiations may make sense in the cyclical referencing of conspiracy theories that dominate the best seller lists, but it suffers from serious exaggeration and non-corresponding truths. This only weakens our nation intellectually and politically and hinders Turkey from maximizing her potential to be a key player in the 21st century. It also puts our people in an extremely vulnerable position to be exploited by anyone who wishes to capitalize our fears into raw power, votes or book sales. We need to process our past for our own sake, not because the international community is increasingly reminding us of various dark episodes of our history.

We can, of course, choose to ignore the past and continue to run along the path we know too well. Sadly, the unresolved past will pop up here and there in the forms of leakage or repetition. May it be in pointless murders of the members of ethnic and religious minorities or steps away from a mature democracy that cherishes freedom of speech, opinion and belief, sooner or later, the effects of an unresolved past will show themselves again.

The Other Side of the Mountain

Published by the Institute for Global Engagement, Washington D.C., 7 October 2005

For me, there were two boundaries; in the West there was the deep blue of the Aegean, and in the East the shy face of Mt. Ararat smiling behind a veil of mist. Beyond these two borders there were "the others," whose names we never knew and from whom we have been separated a long time ago. Few of us really knew why or when they became the "others," even though there were many traces of them in our country, Turkey. We walked by their empty church buildings and forgotten cemeteries. Every now and then we would hear about them and what they wanted us to hear, but life was too busy and their names were so different that it would take only few seconds to forget it all.

So it was the curiosity fueled by years of mystery that pushed me to join Baroness Caroline Cox — a member of U.K. House of Lords and renowned Christian human rights activist — on a recent trip to Armenia and Karabakh. How did the mountain look from the East? Who were my neighbors, these people so close and so far away in the same time? Would I be welcomed if I were to go to their houses?

Indeed, I discovered that the mountain looked as beautiful as she looked from the West. Much to my surprise, I learned that my dignified nose, which I believed marked me as a Turk, is also an easy-to-recognize trademark among my neighbors. Our foods have much the same names and tastes and our songs carry similar tunes. (Thus there is one more competitor — the Armenians — in the never ending fight between Turks and Greeks about the origins of baklava and dolma!)

As they shared their vodka and bread with me, opened their houses for me to stay and hosted me with genuine warmth, and as I learned their names, heard their stories, and saw their pain, isolation and dreams, their voices became real. My assumptions about Armenians as "others" from a near but faraway land melted away and my ears were finally tuned into their long suffering and hopeful whispers.

The issues that surround the mountain are very complicated indeed. First of all there are the never ending arguments about the sad deaths of many innocent people during the chaotic times that followed the First World War and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Should it be called a genocide or massacre or mere collateral damage? From the Turkish point of view acceptance of the word "genocide" or even the number of people killed seems impossible. For the Armenians who still feel its immense pain as a nation, official acceptance of those deaths by Turkey seems to be the only way to forgive the past and find healing. What's more, this historic problem is an ever growing diplomatic tension for Turkey's international status and desire to be a member of the EU.

The problem has been further exacerbated by the closing of the border between Turkey and Armenia, owing to the clash between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno Karabakh. When the USSR collapsed, its policies of interdependence and relocation of various groups collapsed as well. The green and lush lands of Karabakh thereby became vulnerable in the face of newly rising Central Asian nations. The result of this for the people of Karabakh, Azerian and Armenian alike, was the loss of their homes, sons, and neighbors. The ambitious campaigns led to a war and an eventual, if not several thousand deaths late, truce. With Armenia invading a portion of Azerbaijan in order to establish a link with Karabakh, and Nagorno Karabakh establishing its own government (which had not been recognized internationally), the truce remains fragile.

While sipping slowly a hot cup of coffee (which to the west of the mountain was called Turkish and Armenian east of it), the issues seemed to me to be unsolvable. Yet the pain, ignorance, prejudice, and alienation was so imminent and real, like the bitter taste of the strong coffee in my mouth, that it was an imperative to face them. We simply cannot wait till these issues are fully resolved at the political level, since the contemporary political problems find their source in these ongoing social realities, thus creating a vicious cycle.

"Can there ever be a way to break this cycle?" I asked myself in a church that survived the war in Karabakh. The only answer that found me at that moment was the colorless tear that slowly slid down my face and landed on the dust. I wondered how many refugees, widows, and mothers cried in the same church for a miracle. Did I really have the faith to ask this mountain of prejudice, pain and hatred to move away and drown itself in the deepest ocean?

As many other questions joined more tears, I sensed a gentle hand on my shoulder. My new Armenian friend spoke of God's love and concern and power. We sat there in front of the cross holding hands; one Turkish and one Armenian Christian, who both felt uncomfortable at each others company in the beginning. The beautiful Armenian cross poured Water of Life from its center. Life came from the very symbol of human misery, wretchedness, hatred, pain and shame. That life brought reconciliation between God and human. Once the human being was forgiven and her relationship with the source of life was restored, she too was able to offer a caring hand to her neighbor, realizing the same need of forgiveness she shared with him.

During the evening I raised my toast in the proper Armenian way to my gracious and kind hosts. With the same forgiveness I found from that Water, I asked for forgiveness — forgiveness for not knowing, not paying attention, not caring and not running to their pain. What burnt my chest was not the vodka, but the tears of my new Armenian friends which sealed my prayer: no matter what the past was, through forgiveness and love there would be a future for us to be together again.

As for the mountain, it still stands as glorious as it has always been since Noah's days, but now I know who lives on the other side. Now, when I think of its snow capped summit, the sky does not end there for me. I know that I share that summit with millions of broken but hopeful people. And now in the sacredness of my room I pray daily; "Father, give me faith, so big that it would blush the face of the proud mustard seed!"

Sometimes, Forgetting is Better than Facing the Past

Published in Turkish Daily News, 29 May 2007


Allow me to defend myself ‘pre-emptively' in line with the contemporary modus operandi, before you are even offended by this article. (And who knows, may be my initial fears too will be proven to be unfounded when you finish reading this article) In actual life, I am a lot less ‘cynical' than I appear here and have rather strong opinions about how societies should deal with past atrocities. However, as the debates between Armenians and Turks still continue to present themselves exclusively in terms of ‘truth' and ‘justice' over the past, what often is muted in the cacophony of who-is-the-real-victim dogfights, is the present tense.

The problem as well as the solution lies in the present!:

As social sciences and philosophy have pointed out again and again, the present does not discover a mere ‘truth' as it is in the past. Since the past is only present to us in narratives selectively constructed by contemporary actors, one cannot separate the present from the past. By whom, why and how a narrative is constructed is equally, if not more, important than what that narrative tells. It is therefore the present that has to be scrutinized first, not the past, if one wishes to proceed beyond the haunting ghosts of the past. In Armenian-Turkish talks (or rather mutual verbal attacks) the present context is often brought onto the table in ad hominem arguments to discredit the other side; “Of course a diaspora Armenian would say this” “So and so is a Turk thus any criticism of his is ungrounded or denialist.” What I call for here is none of this: I believe that the sword that can cut the Gordian knot of a century long pain, prejudice and conflict does not lie in the past but in the present. Thus, we have to critically analyze, deconstruct and challenge the ideas, discourses and goals that dominate the present if we ever want to reach a half-baked closure over the sad episodes of history and a possible future together. So let me lead the way with casting the first stone; there is so much naivety in the public excitement and blind folded support of demands for facing the past.

Problematic promises of “facing the past”:

The arguments we hear can be summarized in two groups; utilitarian and moral. Utilitarian arguments try to convince us that a nation can be healed only when it confronts her past; that peace and reconciliation can only be achieved by official acknowledgement of past injustices; that such an acknowledgement deters repetition of similar crimes. The moral arguments centre on the themes of justice and moral debt owed the dead. They exhort us to give heed to contemporary demands, because it is moral to do so. Both of these arguments share taken for granted assumptions, which are far from unshaken solid grounds to base an argument. In contrary to the popular beliefs based upon self-help sound bites, facing the past can open the way for re-traumatization of the victim rather than healing. Human beings develop certain mechanisms to continue their lives after tragic events. Leaving it aside, not speaking about it or not acknowledging it and living as though it never happened are not uncommon strategies used by the victims. By putting them to cross-examination, pressuring them to retell the event in the courts or on TV can totally take away from them their only means of coping with life. Even Freud has warned that the patient may leave the therapy in a worse condition than before. The same danger is increased in manifold when we move from the individual victim to wider political concerns. In postconflict settings (e.g. after civil wars and ethnic clashes) or in transitional contexts (e.g. when an old dictatorial regime opens the way for democracy), the negative peace (cessation of armed conflict) can often only be achieved by negotiations of amnesty and not speaking of past evils. Demands for facing the past in these contexts can turn out to be the greatest hindrance to stop destruction and proceed to a better future.

Remembering can be dangerous!:

Similarly, remembering past atrocities can be far from deterring new ones. Serbs ‘remembered' the loss of the Battle of Kosovo of 1389 to Ottomans and made it a corner stone in the narrative of a new Serbian identity as well as legitimization for the brutal treatment of Bosnian Muslims. Hutus too had memories of Tutsi animosities towards them. Identities that are developed on being victims always run the risk of committing the worst crimes. Finally, facing the past means a life long tension as different segments of societies will run counter-memories even though a country may officially choose to face the past and move on. In a poll published in 1998, 74 percent of white urban South Africans, and 62 percent of blacks, reckoned that the operations of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had done more to stir up old resentments than lay them rest. Even in the South African experience, the most famous case of ‘facing the past', the reopening of wounds have been extremely painful and incomplete. There are still survivors who are angry about the amnesties granted to perpetrators and perpetrators and beneficiaries of the system who still deny responsibility. Same thing applies to Argentine and Chile, where there are still different memories of military days and occasional tensions.

Countries that chose to forget:

Philosophers all the way back from Plato to Nietzsche have promoted forgetting the past and starting with a blank page. Aristotle tells us that after the civil war of 404 BC in Athens, peace and democracy was established by leaving the past behind. An amnesty law was passed and the remembering of past injustices became a punishable offence. The reconstruction of democracy by ways of forgetting brought a long period of stability to Athens. The wise men of the Antiquity are not alone on their decision. Modern Spain was born out of the attempts for collective amnesia, which is known as Pacto del Olvido, Pact of Forgetfulness. Only through not speaking of the evils of Franco era and granting amnesty, Spain was able to be what it is today. Mozambique was able to end a 16 years long bloody civil war in 1992 which took one million civilians and left behind memories of gruesome tortures and mutilation by deciding to allow the past to be the past. So sometimes, the only way to save people is to let the past go!

The “innocence” of moral discourses:

Much has been written on how the genuine desires of the victims or their descendants have been utilized for vote gathering in Europe and the US, so I'll spare you that. But there is more politics than meet the eye when states decide to ‘face their past'. France has undergone a significant change in her perception of the past. The myth of French resistance against invading Germans and non-cooperation in Vichy era had to be upgraded when it could no longer hold to be true in the face of the facts of the deportation of tens of thousands of Jews to the arms of death. When the past can't be escaped and upright denial can no more convince anyone, the romanticism of facing the past by offering apologies become a quick way of gaining the moral higher ground once again. Switzerland too had to come to terms with the myth of complete neutrality and account/expiate for the blood gold with setting up foundations and working for ‘deterrence'. Not so surprisingly, Truth Commissions- the epitome of facing the past, have always had their share of similar political motives. They have always provided, knowingly and unknowingly, a great political legitimization to new governments and leaders over the previous ones. At times, they even highlighted the wickedness of the past when the present was not much different. Idi Amin of Uganda, known nowadays as the Last King of Scotland, had commissioned one in 1974 to inquire ‘disappearances' since 1971, which didn't stop people from disappearing during and after the commission.

Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind:

So there is more to it than just rhyme in Alexander Pope's poem. We expect too much from the idea of facing the past, which it can never deliver. Facing the past is a tiresome, non-conclusive, possibly dangerous process, flawed with immoral quests for legitimization and political public relations, with no ipso facto guarantees of healing, peace and reconciliation. The outcome, whether it would be destructive or constructive, depends on the actors of the present tense. Thus, we come back to what I stated in the beginning of this article; the only solution to the Turkish-Armenian question lies in the present not the past.

A Declaration of Universal Human Vulnerability

Published in Turkish Daily News, 26 May 2007


There are two Hrant Dinks for the larger sections of Turkish society; Hrant Dink before his murder and Hrant Dink after his murder. Before his murder, except for those who read his writings and knew him personally, representations of Hrant Dink was a courageous man of convictions, which have caused quite a stir among Turks and Armenians alike. He was in fact a danger for anyone who held a black and white view of the past and present. “Hrant Dink” was a name separated from the man, a face without a body.

As his dead body lied on the ground something extremely important happened. Due to demands of political trauma management, there were a lot of high-level public declarations of condemnation, which owned him as a ‘child of our nation'. However, what caused the emergence of the new Hrant Dink was the hole on the sole of his shoes, not the declarations which were a bullet too late and often without a rhyme. A dead body and blood could have still been understood as the ‘rightful end' of a troublemaker. Yet, his warn out shoes pointed to the man behind the name; a man, fragile and human, not a monster or a powerful enemy. It was only this demystification of Hrant Dink as a vulnerable human being that granted him his humanity back and enabled people to hear his voice. Finally, we saw that Dink was not a powerful enemy, but a sensitive soul rushing among us like a pigeon.

Dehumanization:

Dehumanization of human beings is really what makes an ethnic, racial or political murder possible. First, the body is effaced, his/hers uniqueness or truth is distorted, thus making the flesh embodiment of whatever the enemy or evil or dirt or danger is. Then, hatred or commitment to higher aspirations can easily find their ‘rightful' out channelling on a human being. We have seen this paradoxically in the public comments following the murders of three Christians in Malatya- Necati, Uğur and Tillman. In the wise words of Devlet Bahçeli, the head of Turkish Nationalist Party, “we condemn these murders, but missionaries are not innocent!” Exegetically speaking, the dependent clause that follows the ‘humane' reaction is the main point of the declaration, which is the backbone of the dehumanization that lead to their murder. It seems that the only thing we condemn is the brutal method used and its political implications for us.When the Police entered the room where they were tied to chairs and their throats were cut, what they found was not a hidden Crusader ‘cevşen' (Islamic amulets which their murderers wore for protection) under their clothes, but only flesh and blood. It was in fact this fragile body that was kept away from us in the escalation of events that lead to their murders. They were dehumanized first as modern day Crusaders whose goals were something darker than just propagating their beliefs. Local media in Malatya took away their humanity first by placing them in a narrative of historical and national conflict, helping the murderers to legitimize their acts without facing any moral dilemma.

Nunca Mas and the failure of law:

So in a sense, we have not learned anything from the bloody 20th century in which at least 60 million people alone were killed by genocides and ethnic cleansings. What made mass atrocities possible at the first place was the racial constructions and dehumanisations, which made ‘vermin' out of Jews, ‘cockroaches' out of Tutsis, ‘rapists' and ‘baby factories' out of Bosnian Muslims, ‘lesser' human beings out of Gypsies and ‘waste' out of the handicapped. Amidst these representations, the language of ‘inherent dignity' of a human being does not help us at all, as the media and rhetoric capture for us what constitutes a human being and whose life is worth to protect at the expense of the other. Against all of the intentions of post World War II cosmopolitan desires to ensure that such things happen Never Again (Nunca Mas) and attempts to establish “Universal” declarations and covenants, the wheels of dehumanization continue to turn and produce new ways the human being can be done away with easily. As one of the most respected thinkers of our age, Giorgio Agamben points out; we are now living in an era in which the state of exception is the norm. In this legal status that legally decides to suspend the law, the language of ‘universal rights' too looses a corresponding truth out side of its own word plays. Terror laws, Emergency Laws or Patriot Acts are all legal frameworks that take away any legal protection a human being may ever have. Any given moment the sovereign can decide to not grant any rights to his subjects.

Shifting sand:

Unlike the fixed boundaries of previous centuries- caste systems, classes and racial formations based on ‘scientific truths', today the line that separates who is constituted a Human Being or a mere body and can be easily done away with, is quite liquid. As a sweeping sociological answer to the chicken and egg's chronology, racism, which is the exclusion of the other on perceived grounds of difference or danger, comes before the construction of ‘race'. Nowadays, racism shows itself in the properties of belonging, not so much the sizes of the skulls or god-given levels of biological superiorities: You are either with ‘us' or with ‘them'. Since ‘us' can no more be constructed biologically, you are one ‘us' to the extent you are aligned with ‘us' not just with your place of birth, language and ID, but primarily with what we think and how we see the world. The negative reference point that equally makes us into ‘us' is the threat we are all facing from ‘them'. In the age of global panic attacks and worries of security, the definition of who constitutes a danger and is one of ‘them' changes daily. And as the men wearing orange jumpers and catching tan on a tropical island know too well, all you need is to be caught in the wrong place and time, with a wrong physical outlook and a different view of the world. Yet, for those of us who feel safe with which part of the narrative we belong, the bad news is that there is a high chance that tomorrow's newspapers will inform the world that now it is you and me who is out of the game. Then, in vain, we will scream for our ‘rights' and ‘inherent dignity'. When one is dehumanized, he or she is just a body who has no rights or dignity!

Lowest common denominator:

Sadly, the dark side of the 20th century still lingers in its 21st century forms. Since, we the post-everythingists find it very difficult to hold on to universal moral reference points, and our semi-sacred beliefs in universal human rights have been bastardized, there is not much left for us to appeal as a reason on why we should not kill our neighbour, except the final line of defence: human vulnerability. In this extremely interdependent world, we are all truly vulnerable to being hurt by others who may live in far away lands from us. As the failures of neo-con masculine attempts to make the world safer have proven, we become more vulnerable when we try to protect our vulnerability by the use of force, exclusion and homogenization. Only by seeking to protect the vulnerability and fragility of the other, can we protect our own. Unlike the politics of dominance and muscular power, what we need now is a feminine one that sees the relationship not as means but the ultimate end, chooses to listen and above all is moved by the vulnerability of the other to help and care not just one of ‘us' but ‘them' as well.

Imperative of a new way of imagining identity and politics:

For all we know, we can no longer continue this way. The blood of our political imaginations is now causing us to see nightmares like that of Raskolnikov. We don't need new laws or new political systems or awakening of some long dead utopias, but a firm belief in the Universal Human Vulnerability that we share with every single human being on this planet and not allowing the fear of the possibility of being hurt by the other lead us into the temptation of turning into monsters ourselves. Cherishing this vulnerability and using it positively means that we should train our children not convinced of their superiority from the others and of the danger the other present to ‘us', but convinced of the greatness in the other and what we share with them. The main pressure point we need to put our fingers on, if we want to stop this bleeding, is not high level politics but a whole hearted rejection of dehumanization that we read, hear and see in day to day life. Only when the individuals, not states, ratify this Personal Covenant for the Protection of Human Vulnerability, (which by the way does not exist), can we have some sort of hope for future. Only when there is no ‘but' following the sentence ‘we condemn these', can we stop seeing dead bodies lying on the side walk with holes on their shoes.