ISTANBUL: Armenian journalist: I am sick of being a good-bad Armenia

Today’s Zaman, Turkey
April 5 2015

Armenian journalist: I am sick of being a good-bad Armenian

Jan DevletoÄ?lu, who has been practicing journalism for a long time
now, has attracted attention with his recent memoirs, `Ä°yi Kötü
Ermeni’ (good-bad Armenian).

Our first question was about the title of the book. He noted that the
title can be traced back to his childhood, when he was working in a
small store: `My boss Jule sent me to a state office so that I would
give bribe money to a manager there. The director took the envelope
and told me that Jule is a good Armenian. This influenced me greatly
and made me think. I concluded that Armenians are generally bad but
that Jule was not one of those bad Armenians. He was a good-bad
Armenian.’

The many incidents of discrimination he faced form the main theme and
subject of the book. He does not, however, define the book as merely a
personal biography, saying: `The name of the book will not change if
you narrate the stories of any people who have been discriminated
against, regardless of their identities. As I noted in the preface of
the book, I am sick of being a good-bad Armenian in my own country.’

We kept talking about discrimination; at some point, we started
chatting about his son, Rafi, a name that has its own story.
DevletoÄ?lu picked this name to protect his son against discrimination
in case he ever chose to live and study in Turkey, because Rafi is a
popular name in Islam as well as in other religions. He says: `Given
that the state does not consider stopping its discriminatory practices
or taking the religion section off ID cards, I needed to take a
measure of protection and make sure that the religion of my son would
be recorded as Islam. I needed to protect a young individual against
biases, stereotypes, discrimination and religious pressure. For me,
religion is a personal thing, a decision that should be made by the
individual. I believe that what I did was right. I made efforts to do
this in the consulate. You cannot have your rights without a fight.’

`My religion was recorded as Islam on my ID; I was as happy as if I
had won the lottery’

DevletoÄ?lu’s religion was mistakenly changed to Islam on his ID when
he went to get a new one. He felt as if he had won the lottery,
because on his previous ID card the religion section read `Armenian’
and `Catholic.’ For a brief period of time, Islam superficially
eliminated the sense of being part of a lower class or of a minority.
According to DevletoÄ?lu, the state had profiled him on the ID card,
and for this reason, he was humiliated all the time: `This mistake
saved me from discrimination for a while. Now I can take a copy of my
ID card and use it in official places and hotels instead of my
passport which I preferred, as a more secular ID, in the past.’

`You cannot publish a report abroad without verifying it through at
least two sources’

Of course, I wanted to take the opportunity to ask this veteran
journalist about the current state of affairs of Turkish media. He
said: `In order to attain the truth in Turkish media, I have to read
at least three papers, and throw at least 50 percent of what I read
away. So you do the math.’

DevletoÄ?lu maintained that it is quite different to be a journalist
abroad, explaining: `You cannot publish a report without verifying it
through at least two reliable sources. If you do, and it turns out
that the report is falsified, you can no longer do that job. A
journalist has to comply with the principles of the profession. When
you do not, you become an outcast. The best-selling paper in the UK
had to shut down because it violated journalistic principles.’