The politics of saying 'genocide'

[chcarnage]

Originally posted by: Aimster
(Reuters article)

Dogu Perincek came to Switzerland, repeatedly and publicly denied the Armenian genocide knowing that he'd be dragged to court for this and that he's likely to lose the case. Basically he came here to get the doubtful honor of being the first person on this planet that got convicted for denying the Armenian genocide. I'm sure this supposed martyr has earned quite some respect among his fellow Turk nationalists for his low-risk trip to Switzerland.

Also, he was not sentenced to a suspended jail term, this is a mistranslation. He was sentenced to a suspended fine of an additional 9000 Swiss Francs (about $7480). This additional fine was calculated by multiplying his financial situation with the gravity of the crime (90 "day rates" * 100 Francs). To my knowledge, nobody ever got a jail term for breaking the anti racism paragraph in Switzerland.

 

[TheChort]

Originally posted by: Aimster
I just copied the entire article.

I found the part in bold interesting and that is mainly why I posted it. I found it interesting because Turkey is at least admitting people died. I was under the impression Turkey ignored it and never made a comment.

Upon random google searches I came upon another article from an Armenian site that says that Turkey has in fact asked that Armenia and them come together to finally put this issue to rest. Both sides will send their historians to a summit and they will sit there and discuss their data. However, Armenia said this is just a plot by Turkey to try to rid the incident as a genocide so they declined.

Turkey has always admitted to killings on both sides of the camp. They claim that during WWI, people on all sides paid the price.

But more importantly, that committee you mentioned is the Turkish-Armenian Reconciliation Committee (TARC).
The reason most diasporan Armenians were against it is because it seemed that one of the side plots of this committee would be to never bring up the Genocide, which is something that is not acceptable to most Armenians.
Info on TARC (Just to be fair, I'm gonna let you know that I got that from an Armenian source.)

My personal opinion on the matter is once Turkey recognizes the Genocide took place, we should be able to start opening up the doors once again. But until then, I feel that any communication would definitely involved the pink elephant in the room.

 

[Arglebargle]

Weren't there major Armenian groups allied with European powers that were trying to occupy and annex parts of Turkey in this time period? I have no doubts about the scope of death, and the Turkish responsibility for it (and their twitchy inability to 'fess up to it). It's not like the Armenian political movements were all just sitting there at a garden party. You really don't want to piss off the Turks; they can be good friends and formidable enemies. Don't poke the bear in the nose unless you want to see his teeth....

 

[TheChort]

Originally posted by: Arglebargle
Weren't there major Armenian groups allied with European powers that were trying to occupy and annex parts of Turkey in this time period? I have no doubts about the scope of death, and the Turkish responsibility for it (and their twitchy inability to 'fess up to it). It's not like the Armenian political movements were all just sitting there at a garden party. You really don't want to piss off the Turks; they can be good friends and formidable enemies. Don't poke the bear in the nose unless you want to see his teeth....

Sure there were. There's no denying that Armenians had political aspirations at the time too. Some of them were even for independance/separation. Many hoped that with the political pressures of WWI and The Ottomans losing the war, they might be able to break away.

But the fact of the matter is that the Ottoman state initiated a tactical extermination of all the Armenians in the nation. It was organized and it was planned. It doesn't matter if all the Armenians collectively pissed on every single mosque in the country, the actions of the Ottoman State could NEVER be justified.

Here is a map showing the sizes and locations of Armenians deported and killed across Turkey.