The Endlessness of Crime and Apology
by Talin Suciyan
Translated by Vartan Matiossian
December 9, 2011
Last week, Turkey’s Prime Minister Erdogan’s statement about Dersim
was immediately well received in the mainstream press, and we had to
wait until the weekend to read more critical articles about it. Two
articles by AyÅ?e Hür and Prof. Taner Akçam were like an `introduction
to the literature of apology,’ especially for the Prime Minister
himself.[1] There may be aspects in both articles that are worth
discussing, but what I want to deal with now is something quite
different.
First and foremost, by apologizing you cannot undo things that have
already happened. In other words, no one can be cleared of a crime, or
have himself/herself absolved of it, just because he/she apologized
and expressed repentance, especially if it is a genocide ` a crime
that has achieved the purpose of annihilating a certain group of
people in line with a carefully planned and organized manner. Apology
is about repentance for a situation which is irreversible and the
responsibility borne in connection with it. Be it an apology given to
the people of Dersim, or Armenians, or Assyrians, or Pontic and Asia
Minor Greeks, or the victims of systematic torture, or Alevis, or
Kurds, an apology duly given is not an end in itself, but the
beginning of an endless journey against regeneration of denial by the
state and amongst the general public. This is because Turkey will
never be the society that it was before 1915, just like Germany will
never be the Germany where the Holocaust did not happen. This is
because every inch of Germany and of those places beyond Germany’s
boundaries where Jews were killed bears the traces of Jews’ toiling
and living, as is the case with Turkey where every inch bears the
traces of Armenians’ and Assyrians’ toiling and living. Apology means
to be conscious that the endlessness of the catastrophe is
irreversible. A few words articulated incidentally while bashing the
opposition party can never be an apology; if anything, it will be only
a disgrace, quoting Taner Akçam.
Given the mechanism of denial in Turkey which goes live whenever there
is any mention of such crimes, a couple of words by Erdogan are
praised as `an important step’, `a milestone’, `an unprecedented
move’. Those who think and speak that way miss the fact that this kind
of self-praising is the proof of how deeply denial is
institutionalized and banalized in the country. Yıldırım Türker’s
article, `Those faces are still smiling,’ is a reminder of this
persecution, because denial is persecution.[2] The denial of
responsibility means that victims bear up with the consequences of
their victimization forever. It is for this reason that KılıçdaroÄ?lu
recalled the Armenian Diaspora, for there is a crime of denial carved
over the `mental map’ of both KılıçdaroÄ?lu and Erdogan; a denial that
is common history for both. For this reason, when KılıçdaroÄ?lu said,
with regard to the words of the Prime Minister over Dersim, that `the
mental map of the prime minister of this country is identical to the
mental map of the Armenian Diaspora,’ he touched the most sensitive
nerve. The response of the Prime Minister to this sensitivity was: `I
would measure the forehead of whoever compares me to the Armenian
Diaspora.’
Even the hidden or secret existence of Armenians in Anatolia today
offers a historical fact. After the Genocide (if the Genocide is
something to be placed between two dates, as they often do), what was
left of the Armenians tried to remain in their places somehow. For
example, according to the census of 1965, the number of those who
spoke Armenian as their mother tongue was 849 in Kastamonu, 488 in
Bolu, 376 in Hatay, 228 in Sinop, 217 in Sivas, 216 in Amasya, 148 in
Malatya, 132 in Diyarbakır, 118 in Yozgat [3]. And today there are
almost no Armenians in those locations. Neither the Prime Minister,
nor KılıçdaroÄ?lu feel the urge to ask why Armenians were compelled to
leave those cities and come to Istanbul¦ Because for them there was
nothing more natural than the Republic breathing down the neck of a
few Armenians who continued their existence in Anatolia. People who
tried to maintain their lives on the land where their dead had fallen,
despite all sorts of pressure, menace, and settlement policies, were
turned into wanderers. As a result, the Armenian community existing
today in Istanbul is a diaspora, a diaspora created by the policy of
denial of the Republic.[4]
Aside from all this, it remains upon the shoulders of Armenians, in
the whole country, to stand up for the `Armenian Diaspora’, a term
used as an insult, a blasphemy. The reason is that the Armenian
Diaspora is not only marked with red in the mental map of ErdoÄ?an and
KılıçdaroÄ?lu, but also for an entire society and its intellectuals.
The Armenians in search of justice `are criminals, nationalists, full
of hate and disgust.’ KılıçdaroÄ?lu and ErdoÄ?an also represent broad
segments of society. The intellectuals of this country can only teach
the meaning of apology to their leaders when they stand up for the
Armenian Diaspora and their claims for justice. Because we cannot
forget that denial is not only state-owned, but also, since almost a
century, it belongs to broad segments of the society and the
intelligentsia. The matter of concern is not the feelings of those who
claim their rights, but the legitimacy of the rights claimed. Time has
not changed anything. For, as we may see, after 73 and 96 years of the
events, the past has never ceased to be part of the present.
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[1] For ErdoÄ?an’s statement see Turkish newspapers of November 23,
2011. ErdoÄ?an had said: `. . . if there is such a literature, I
apologize.’
[2] For Türker’s article see Radikal, November 27, 2011
[3] Peter Alford Andrews and Rüdiger Benninghaus, Ethnic Groups in the
Republic of Turkey, Wiesbaden, 1989.
[4] To those who may object this, to be a diaspora does not mean to be
outside the borders of the state where an individual lives, but to be
uprooted. Whoever is forced to live in a place different of the place
accepted as homeland lives in diaspora. In his book `Memories of
Istanbul,’ translated into Turkish by Silva Kuyumciyan, Hagop Mndzuri
writes about being `hostage in Istanbul,’ which reflects the exact
situation. On the other side, state boundaries cannot be the only
criteria to characterize the diaspora, because state boundaries are
always in flux. The example of Hatay probably suffices to explain this
phenomenon.
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