TARAF WRITER THREATENED OVER ADAPTATION OF ATATURK ADDRESS
Today’s Zaman
Nov 12 2009
Turkey
Taraf daily’s columnist Sevan NiÅ~_anyan, who wrote a humanistic
adaptation of Ataturk’s "Address to Turkish Youth," a patriotic
speech calling on young people to protect their country at all costs,
published e-mails received from irate nationalists and filled with
threats and vulgar language in his column yesterday.
In his adaptation, NiÅ~_anyan replaced the first sentence of the
address, "Your first duty is to preserve and to defend Turkish
Independence and the Turkish Republic forever," with "Your first duty
is to be a human being." The sentences: "This is the very foundation
of your existence and your future. This foundation is your most
precious treasure. In the future, too, there may be malevolent people
at home and abroad, who will wish to deprive you of this treasure"
in the original were changed to: "The very foundation of being human
is love toward other human beings. All through your life, you shall
consider it a duty for yourself to teach beauty, reason and justice
to people. If you have knowledge, you will share it without expecting
anything in return." The rest of NiÅ~_anyan’s adaptation was a treatise
on the equality of all human beings.
However, the backlash from some among the Turkish youth was
spine-chilling. "We will make you write the correct version of the
‘Address to Youth’ with your own blood. … I’ll kill you like that
Hrant Dink dog," said one of the messages, most of whose text was
not suitable for replication here.
Another one said: "I have been praying for years to be able to kill
one of your kind when I’m on my army duty. I would do this in cold
blood and killing your ilk would not hurt my conscience at all but
would give me honor. … You should know that we are waiting for
the tiniest spark." Another message was the sender’s own adaptation,
"Turkish Youth! Your primary duty is to adopt as a principle to wipe
from the earth for the sake of Turkishness and humanity the Armenians
and Kurds, that champion enmity against Turks and which are the most
debased nations on earth."
Yet another version started: "Oh You! The despicable creature who
thinks himself a man because you know how to write. You and your ilk
will see the power of the Turkish Nation very soon. Armenians and
others, those who continue their corrupted intrigues to separate the
country despite all the tolerance we have shown will pay the price they
deserve to pay in the near future. Now is your day to speak, but don’t
you worry; that will change in a year or two. The day we’ll settle
accounts with you is near! We’ll see if you can show the same courage
then!! Find a hole to hide in, you separatist PKK-supporting traitors."
"Yours is a cowardly nation. You can write all you want about Ataturk;
you’ll never have the strength to destroy his republic. But you
and your owners who hold your leash should remember that the thing
that can cross your immunity and protection is a 9mm bullet." Other
messages accused him of being a lapdog of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan and Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen.