ORHAN KEMAL CENGİZ
o.cengiz@todayszaman.com
On Nov. 24, 25 and 26, International Association to Fight Unfounded Armenian Allegations (ASİM-DER) head Göksel Gülbey published the street addresses and contact information of Armenian foundations, schools and churches active in Turkey via his Twitter account.
Try to imagine what it would mean if a neo-Nazi — or any other extreme right-wing organization — in Germany were to do the same with details about the addresses and telephone numbers of Jewish synagogues, foundations, schools and so on.
Actually, no matter where in the world it happens, when racist organizations get hold of contact information belonging to vulnerable minority groups and then purposefully disclose it, it always means the same thing: Go and “beat people up, hit them or at the very least, make them very uncomfortable and worried.”
Prior to the release of this contact information, Göksel Gülbey was involved in a series of incidents targeting Armenians. In fact, in one case, Gülbey made a formal complaint to the Interior Ministry about the number of Armenian foundations active in Turkey (57), asking in his complaint, “Is there really a need for this many Armenian foundations?”
Another incident in the past involves the fake execution by Göksel Gülbey and other ASİM-DER leaders of a plaster model of Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan. When the association’s activities are examined more closely, it in fact appears that their problem lies more in the actual existence of Armenians rather than any “Armenian allegations.”
In democratic societies the world around, there are generally two limitations placed on freedom of expression. One of these has to do with open invitations to violence, and the other with racist rhetoric that spreads hatred and enmity targeting specific groups. Turkey’s history is filled with incidents in which minority groups were targeted for attacks. And while debates may rage about what the limitations to freedom of expression are, and what certain rhetoric means in practical terms, you cannot overlook such a history and its legacy.
You would not have to know much about Turkish history to understand that addresses and telephone numbers belonging to Armenian organizations, when published on the Web by extremist rightist organizations, turn people into targets, and that this was in fact the goal. Our prosecutors should move into immediate action and start investigations into the matter, but I have never witnessed the laws of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) used this way.
As I have written before in this column, the application of former Article 312, the infamous article of the TCK on provoking hatred and enmity, now Article 216, in cases in which people encourage hatred and enmity against minorities and other vulnerable groups has proven an exception rather than a rule. Despite a history marked by frequent painful episodes of this type, prosecutors and judges ignore and overlook just how serious the results of rhetoric, expressions and announcements can be when they target certain groups.
They do not want to understand the potential seriousness of these situations. They do not want to see that words or rhetoric aimed at the majority are in fact much different in a practical sense from words or rhetoric targeting minority groups, and that these things can lead to very different results. At this point, there are some civil society organizations preparing to open legal cases against the above-mentioned use of Twitter. I do hope that the legal system will spring into action here. For as long as we are unable to prevent rhetoric on hatred that targets minorities, we will not be able to prevent hate crimes. And this is the truth, one which we know from a history marked by these episodes.