Freedom of expression where are you?

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I'm not so fond of Turkey, i think the meat is kinda dry, and i prefer juicy. That's why i stick with chicken.

 

Head of the army... Hmm, theoretically it is the president, in the unlikely and unfortunate case we actually get in a war. However, in Bulgaria there is a chief of the General Staff as well, who acts (iirc) as the day-to-day head honcho in our beloved armed forces... but I don't remember who that is at present. I'm in the Netherlands so I don't get much Bulgarian news here - and a general, per se, is not a political figure, chief of staff or no. Still, his appointment does make the news, so more politically active - and aware - people have heard of him.

Reserve generals sometimes opt for politics, but active-duty ones tend to stay out of it. Which is just the way it should be, if you ask me. I don't remember any officer, in this capacity, offering his opinion on politics. I think s/he would very soon join the reserve, or at least forget about promotions in the near future. Besides, with the current state of the army, they have a lot more to think and speak about, and anyway they're not typically public figures.

High-ranking police commissioners have (or used to have, I'm not sure) officer titles up to general, and these do sometimes make a comment or two about politics, but that's very rare. The current mayor of Sofia is an exception... but then again, his promotion to generaldom was so blurringly fast it's hard to take seriously (from major to Lieutenant General - or whatever title is equal to the second lowest general after the "vanilla" general - in 4 years) except as priming him as a political figure. He has somewhat of a "strongman" reputation and a lot of people would support him for a political career, but so far he sounds as if he doesn't want to challenge the democratic system.

 

The kind of response I expect from Pac Man. I'm not surprised.

 

Wow,you guys had some very serious conversations about Turkey and politics without actually listening to each other and intention to really "understand"..

As for pacman i don't know why you don't like Türkiye(Turkey)...But come and visit maybe you would change your opinion...

As for others,the topic got sidetracked,i think...Correct me if i'm wrong but weren't you supposed to be talking about laws in France and Türkiye? I mean the heated discussion about Greeks and Turks won't ever come to a conclusion without some open-minded people(Which I'm not about some topics)...

[/looks under the name, notes a lack of the word "moderator", suggests that you leave the moderating to the moderators, thanks - dmc]

Sorry if you feel like i'm trying to do your job...But i was only pointing out that they were talking about topics which were full of dead-ends... And the topic was about freedom of speech not Lausanne...

[ October 26, 2006, 08:12: Message edited by: Kara Ay ]

 

Errr....guys, surely you know the difference between a joke and a jab below the belt ? Just to clarify...i was talking about the bird which goes by the name of turkey, not the country. There's hardly anything wrong with the country as far as i'm concerned, and especially not with the people from it, i happen to know quite a few Turks in my area, so i know what i'm talking about. Matter of fact, my fellow countrymen could learn a lesson from them when it comes to friendlyness and good manners.

Catch me now ?

 

Thanks The argument had been getting a little heated,when you told that joke,i thought it was a jab...

 

@ The Shaman: What you say is what it should be in a modern country. Unfortunately we aren't living in such a modern country. Unless relationship of army and politics in our country doesn't change we will not be able to solve many of our problems including this problem with Armenians.

Most discussions don't come to a conclusion but at least I've learned what Greeks think about these matters. I feel that I became more "open-minded" after this discussion here and reading a few posts in some other forums on the net where Armenians and Turks discuss.

You're somewhat right but what should we do? Should we open a new topic for every problem of our country? In one topic we discussed more than 3 problems about Turkey. Since sources of most of our problems are same I don't think we're too off-topic.

 

I think we should teach RTE English and then make him read these opinions on this board

 

Well my RL has taken a lot of my time of these days so it's i gwet to answer only now.

The problem is that i do read your posts, and from what it looks like in them you don't seem to say anything for your country. So please spare me the drama. When you come here and open the topic (and in consequent posts too) by stating both errors, then i will retract my characterization for you. I hope i made myself clear despite the lack of capitals.

Furthermore whether is for good or bad, you (as me in my country) don't get to take the decisions that affect the foreign (or internal for that matter) policy of the countries. What me and you can do is choose the people that take these decisions. Also in case that doesn't works, there are also other ways to show our dismay. In case you don't know that.

So without taking it off topic i would like to know, how your people reacted to the fact that Turkey minister of Education decided to remove the painting of Delacrua(sp?) "Liberty leads the people" form the school books in response to the voting of that -admittetly- stupid law?

Two wrongs don't make a right heh? Well three maybe have a chance?

Childish and immature responses by the goverment of Turkey this seems to me. And what the rest of the world sees is not your opinions or of a group with no political entity in reality (leftish parties and some logical people), but rather the actions of your goverment and sometimes the radical actions of some extreme nationalists (Grey Wolves anyone?)

As for your wish i tell you that in case it's granted i can tell you that Turkey won't like it at all. I belong to the group of people that believe that it is stupid to have a continuous strife with each other. So less of us more the chances for something stupid to happen.

All i have to say to you (and as a general statement) is that looking within our closet for skeletons, and cleaning them or tiding them, before we start shouting about other peoples (or nations) closets is something that i would really like to see happening in this world.

Yeah for his time and facing the problems that Turkay faced at that time, his ideas were revolutionary (for the Turkish way of thinking untill then) and indeed helped the nation to stay alive, to say the least.

But things have changed a lot and some people don't seem to understand this. As i have said earlier, i think it's time for the people of Turkey to wake up? Start showing their dismay? Try to change the way things are now?

I don't know, it seems to me that people of Turkey don't really want to change this politic to be honest. Or they really don't know how, which in effect is equal to the previous statement.

 

Because most people here say something for my country, so somebody should look from the other side.

He is one of the biggest idiots in the world, but most people said nothing.

They should wake up, but there is something wrong about them. They somehow seem to be inclined to stay sleeping. Or their chances of waking up is prevented by some people (like the present government of Turkey), I'm not sure. And they won't change the ways I think. Most of the electors of the present government are not happy with them, but some of them will vote for them again in the next selections. Aziz Nesin, a Turkish writer, once said 80%( or something like that, I can't recall the exact number now) of Turkey is stupid; I often think he is right.

I think Atatürk's ideas are still valuable, maybe not as much as 1930s, but they are valuable.

They are real idiots. And I see myself from that group(leftish parties and some logical people).

But, I still claim Turkey or Ottoman empire don't have the blood of innocent Armenians on their hands.

 

Which seems to be the root of this dispute (not that it's a recent one, mind you)
I've spoken to many Armenians over the years, and at one point or another this topic always pops up. Almost every one of these Armenians is descendant from someone who fled the genocide a century ago, and all of them said that their ancestor was an innocent Armenian who fled while other innocent Armenians were being slaughtered. Now I'm not saying they're right and you're wrong, but I'm not sure I agree with the statement that "innocent" Armenians weren't killed. And as far as I'm concerned it doesn't matter whether the Ottoman government meant to slaughter them or not - as far as I can tell it did. The Ottomans might have perceived the intellectuals as a threat, but that doesn't mean they were "not innocent".

The reason I tend to side with the Armenian story is because the Ottomans weren't exactly known for being nice to those they invaded, and especially not if these people happened to disagree with them. What they did in the Balkans, and in what later became Syria and Lebanon, wasn't very pretty, and only got worse during the First World War.

 

Turkey certainly doesn't have. But Ottomans are responsible for whatever happened. Even if all these people died because of sickness, starvation, cold etc.. it was Ottomans' responsibility. At least leaders of Committee of Union and Progress have Armenian blood on their hands. But Turkish Republic has no relationship with these.

I read a speech of Ataturk in Turkish Grand National Assembly in a newspaper recently. He said something like "I don't wan't to speak about what happened in WW1, some immoral things have been done in history, but currently noone can say Armenians are being killed here." (It seems he said these after some accusations) Not a perfect translation but something like that. Though an idiot nationalist journalist interprets it differently (he says Ataturk completely denies everything) it seems that Ataturk doesn't deny what happened in the past too.

Anyway what Ottomans did to Armenians is not very different from what France did in Algeria or what happened to natives when America was found. If Turks did it then it's a genocide, if some western country did the same thing it means "they brought civilization".

 

Depends on the country. France are actually a strange case, in that they've managed to recreate rather good (or at least acceptable) diplomatic relations with many countries which they'd previously invaded and did nasty things in.

 

Hardly, Germanie and austria accepts and aknowledge what they did under world war 2, and its a general accepted fact that what european countries and later US soldiers did to the indianes was not nice, to say at least. None of the countries denies that and in most cases has appolegiest for it.

 

And the problem is that. If Turks accept what they did, they will be known as the second genociders (I don't know if there is a word like this) after Germans. Other countries (US and France) don't deny what happened but they also don't accept this as a genocide. The word "genocide" is very heavy.

I like something about western countries. They go to some lands, slaughter innocent people (natives, innocent civilians in Iraq, Vietnam, Algeria ...), commit war crimes... But some other people from same country can make movies etc. criticizing their own country. If someone makes a movie here about what happened during WW1 to Armenians in Ottoman Empire his life wouldn't be very long. Grey wolves didn't let a movie named "Ararat" (made by an Armenian) to be shown here. There is a documentary that nationalists use in their TV programs here frequently that shows what French did in Algeria. Interesting, because AFAIK this documentary was created by some French and it was awarded at Cannes.

 

The French attitude to Algeria the Algerian massacre is peculiar and they seem to be mostly avoiding the issue, not actually giving any public apology but neither are they exactly denying the events. Their attitude is that history should be left to historians and that the political leadership has no responsibility for it. Which in light of laws such as the one in question sounds incredibly hypocritical. The thing is though that Turkey is with straight face denying the genocide in Armenia which vast majority of historians agree to have happened.

 

To be honest i can't really comment on the usefullness of Ataturks ideas and politics. Because i don't know them to full extend.

But i can comment (and i will) on the Keepers of these ideas, which at the moment the Turkish Army is proclaiming to be.

They are doing a very lousy job to help this country go forth. And in fact they hinder the progress of your country big time. Their continuous warmongering and perceiving any neighbour as a threat goes to prove that. If nothing else they will manage to keep Turkey out of EU, and by doing so they will manage Turkey to earn the dismay of their only ally USA.

Like it or not untill the very recent years Turkey was a very strong strategic ally of USA. Located at the borders of USSR (Caucasus) and in control of the only gateway to Meditteranean for the Black sea. Also a neighbour to Iraq (5th biggest oil producing country), and Middle east in general. Not to mention that it was the only country with Islam as main religion, but mainly more open minded than the rest of the countries there.

That is why the attacks on Kurds and the total abuse of their rights was unnoticed so many years.

Right now your role has changed, and that was done by the denial of letting the attack against Iraq take place from Turkey (the northern front that is). The US Army was forced to look elsewhere and they found their ally in the face of your biggest threat (Kurds).

The push of US to get Turkey within EU is for two purposes.

First they can clearly use one more nation that has such a defined role towards them (that of a minor officer towards a general) in their big threat in economical affairs.

Secondly the economy of US is not that powerfull as it used to be (i may be wrong, but in general economies are having trouble). The continuous funding of Turkey is a burden they don't want anymore. Far more easy to have the EU fund the problematic Turkish economy (sorry but it's true).

The keepers of Ataturks dogma have managed to mess it up though. In the report that is coming on November 8th (iirc) the Turkey will get very low grades, and rumour has it that your case will be put on hold untill you manage to meet the obligations which your goverment accepted by signing that protocol.

So since the ideals of Ataturk are represented by the Army, it looks to me that they do you no good. And that is because actions (or lack of them) speak louder than words.

Again i am not commenting on the ideas themselves, rather the upholders of that ideas (your Army claims to be the upholder). If the ideas are different then i guess Turkey has a big problem.

Truth is that in order to enter EU many sacrifices must be made. And i don't think that Turkish people are quite willing to do it. I have read a poll that was published in Milliet (sp?) recently. It showed among other things, that the majority no longer wishes to become member of the EU.

Something that won't happen if things continue as they are now.

But on the other hand if Turkey does not enter EU, i think that in the long run things will get very hard not to say nasty.
Of course this is my personal estimation and nothing more

 

Well,Mithrandir i don't know if your government asked your people whether they wanted to become a member of EU.. But in "Türkiye"/Turkey this certainly didn't happen...

Some smartass politician started to tell everbody that Turkey should be a member of EU without giving reasons... And the press supported him profoundly so my people thought that they should be a member of Eu... But recently,problems with South Cyprus gov. and that nonsense about freedom of speech(France contradicting herself)...

My people have realised finally that entering Eu isn't in their best interests... And if we can't be a member of Eu hen we should be no longer a member of other organizations linked to Eu.. I think that would make the Eu leaders wake up and realise what losing Turkey means.... And about unstable Turkey economy,you are right but the funny thing is Turkey came where he is now by following the instructions of IMF

 

I also don't like the army but they have some little use against the radical Muslims. On the US issue, I don't want to be an ally of the US. It is strange but the people of Turkey have one of the highest rates of US dislike, but governments are always one of the biggest lackeys of them.

And their funding is harmful because as a payoff, they want Turkey not to produce the agricultural crops which are produced in US and the things like that. It interferes to the domestic internal issues of Turkey.

I also don't want to enter EU because at these stage, it has no benefits as Turkey is not an equivalent of them and won't have any word in anything. People here think that they all will go to Europe and start working there when Turkey enters EU. Ignorance

 

First of all welcome to the forums
Secondly plz call me Mithrantir not with a d but rather with a t.

And to be more serious and address your post.

When we entered EU (1976 or around there) the people of my country were not asked but not opposed either. It was a decision, with an outcome that was not easily foreseenable. People were ok because it looked a good decision. If you ask them know the conversion to Euros from Drachmas was painfull but they realize that it was not a bad move still.

That smartass politician is Erdogan i guess. He, despite being an Islamist he was the first to proclaim that Turkeys entrance to EU will be good.

If you care to hear my opinion, he is right to be honest. It will do good to Turkey (as for EU that is a different subject).

And sorry to break your bubble. But if Turkey decides to leave every organization that has affiliations to the EU, Turkey must leave every organization (including NATO) except the Arabic counsil (if it's called that way) or any strictly Islamic organization for that matter.

Will that hurt EU or the rest of the world? Sorry but no. In fact the only one to be severely affected will be Turkey. Because as you accepted the Turkish economy right now is problematic to put it mildy and this is a problem, especially in a world where economies get more and more stretched.

As for freedom of speech in France please don't start flaming. Your country has big issues with that particular subject and speaking for other countries in that tone, is not a good move. Especially countries that had taken actions towards that goal too (no i am not talking about the particular law).

I would like to comment the attitude you expressed by saying this

It seems that many people have this attitude in Turkey. This attitude and thoughts have been expressed by Erdogan too.

I can't understand the reasoning of this to be honest. Is Turkey in EU right now? No
Is EU suffering from the lack of Turkey within EU? Sorry but NO.
Do you think that everyone (goverments and people) is skeptical about the entrance of Turkey in EU without a reason?

Is Turkey going to be benefited big time should it enters EU? I think yes.

So i think that the whole line is more of an empty claim and more directed towards you (you as the citizens of Turkey) to make you feel somehow more reassured of your importance maybe?

I also think that you should drop that line, because it causes rather unpleasant sentiments towards your country.

Sorry if i sound harsh, but you must understand that the world does not spins around Turkey or any other nation for that matter.

To tell you the truth i find it strange that the excuse of radical Muslims comes forth everytime the questioning of Armys presence in politics starts. But well i guess that is a totally internal issue. And yes that totally internal issue is going to affect your international relationships, in the not so distant future. I have a feeling that the elections that are coming in your country, are going to be a starting point of that. Especially if Erdogan wins again.

As for US all i can say is that in the rest of the world is propably one of the most hated nations worldwide. If not nr1 then surely in top 5 everywhere. But still is a very big and strong nation, which is best kept as a friend and not as an enemy. That is what the goverments think. And sadly yes US has a long history of intefering with the internal affairs of many countries, and usually with disastrous results, but that won't prevent them from doing it again.

I guess then you expect to get right in and be a full member from day 1?
That can't happen, and if a nation wants to become part of the EU must fulfill certain criteria. These criteria Turkey at the moment does not fulfill not even by a long shot. Countries which were in a much better situation, had to wait many years and go under many checks and changes, for their membership to be approved.

I can't understand why Turkey should be an exception.

As for the immigration part, i think that the people are only dreaming what they would like to happen. If that is related to reality or not, is to early to say.

Namely Bulgary and Poland that just entered EU, were dismayed by the laws of GB and New Zealand (recently put in effect) that put limitations to the extend of that kind of immigration can take.

Don't be suprised in case this happen for Turkey again. Countries in EU allready have concerns of the Turkish immigrants that live and work (or not work) in their territory. But that is not something you have to worry now.