Turkish Daily News
Let’s not fool ourselves: Ethnic nationalism is alive
January 30, 2007
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In the past there were two concepts in these lands called ‘sin’ and
‘shame.’ It was even a tradition to not to speak of massacres and
pains, not out of forgetting them, but out of shame and respect. But
today cursing a man who lost his life makes only a few of us
embarrassed

CENGÄ°Z AKTAR

Since the murder of Hrant Dink, anger has been expressed in various
ways. The silent march of Jan. 23, which people from all walks of
life joined, was a genuine demonstration. Citizens expressed their
sincere feelings. However this was no turning point. This was not a
reaction which was shared by the whole country, from east to west. I
wish it had been.
This was rather a consolidation of those who shared the humanistic,
democratic, open-minded and self-confident worldview that was
represented by Hrant Dink, but who are also on the way to
extinction. It was the instinctive gathering of a herd which lost a
member to hunting hyenas. Just as is the case in game parks…
Let’s not confuse these lands, whose inhabitants go between servitude
and fatalism, with the France of ’68. The nascent civil society of
Turkey can only advance if it finds the strong and dedicated support
of the state and politics behind it. Just the way it happened during
the European Union reforms from 2002 to 2004. Other than this basic
fact what has been done in order to
transform the healthy reaction into politics?
Nationalism came back rapidly:
First the state and politicians fled the funeral in haste. Let’s
consider the insincere approach of the politicians as a calculation
for the coming elections. What shall we say about the president, who
only sent a dreary wreath to the funeral despite the fact that he will
probably leave the Turkish political scene for good in a few months?
After that, the turning `Armenian’ of a very limited part of society
for a single day was abhorred in the name of national sensitivity. At
the time the murder outraged the whole world, theprime minister, at
the Kızılcahamam camp of the Justice and Development Party (AKP),
flatly rejected the warning of Ayse Böhürler, a member of the
AKP’s executive committee, on the nationalist wave. He instead noted
how the rhetoric of transforming the PKK into a political party has
destroyed the True Path Party (DYP) and reaffirmed the route of his
party accordingly.
The government continued to postpone the abolition of Article 301, as
it has been doing for months. It did not even talk about our history
books that are based on exclusion and the general attitude vis-Ã -vis
non-Muslim minorities.
With the customary reasoning, `You can’t make me say that nationalists
are killing people,’ the government welcomed nationalist votes on the
eve of elections. Because it knew that, to be elected, it had to
embrace the phenomenon called `nationalist sensitivity,’ which is so
widespread and dominant in society due to its molding with nationalist
ideology following the military coup of 1980. Therefore although this
murder is of a political nature and is relevant not only to the past
but also to the future of this country, it won’t be approached by the
government as something more than a law enforcement case.
Moreover, the country soon will face the `anti-Turkey’ dimension of
the matter with the `genocide’ bills in France and the United
States. The dominant rhetoric will use these developments – I can see
statements like,`if Hrant were alive, he would get angry,’ from now –
to turn the reaction, anger and sadness of today in the opposite
direction. This would sweep aside the anger felt towards the Dink
murder and consolidate the process of Turkey’s closing itself to the
world.
The deep state at work:
Actually the atmosphere is already changing. I have been following the
flow of events since Hrant’s killing. I listen on the bus, the
dolmus. I note the nationalist zeal that went to ground for just a
few days but came back without delay. The supporting chants of last
Wednesday while the killers were taken into the Besiktas
Criminal Court; the chic photo of the killer taken in front of the
slogan, `the homeland is sacred, it can’t be left to its fate’; the
threats that came to AGOS and the churches in Kadıköy and Samsun;
the victory cries in Internet sites; and the mumblings of the timid
supportersof the crime with words like, `They also wronged us during
the Ottoman times, they killed our diplomats more recently…’
In the past there were two concepts in these lands called `sin’
and `shame.’ It was even a tradition to not to speak of massacres
and pains, not out of forgetting them, but out of shame and
respect. But today cursing a man who lost his life makes only a few
of us embarrassed.
Let us not forget that we are living in an environment similar to the
Germany of the 1930’s…