I remeber building a crystal radio with my dad when I was a kid. About the only station I could hear with it was the local station. I rember listening to Paul Harvey with it.
The difference between then and now is, Paul was actually inventing an Urban Legend in his “newscast” when you heard him then. Now he and his son just repeat themselves. Reruns! Feh.
Thank you for your responses, one and all. I don’t have much time to spend on the computer; this is why I haven’t been back.
Overall, the responses demonstrate exactly the point of my post. Many people just don’t care to think. If there are superior forces with the power to present their view, and to squash other views, the human tendency is to believe the nearly unilateral perspective. Add to that, in the case of the Armenians’ genocide, a prevailing prejudice against the opposite side. Once the belief becomes ingrained, real facts and logic don’t count for much.
There was only one Turk who joined in, Uralz, and his imperfect English and not-always-sophisticated manner is what got highlighted, rather than the points he raised. He served as a microcosm of the tremendous imbalance in this debate. The Turks don’t regard this issue as a burning passion, and few care to get involved. The Armenians, and their brainwashed supporters, have an irrational, emotional stake in the issue, and show up in numbers. In our case, there were a number of these; thankfully, these were balanced by more neutral observers, many of whom still can’t help thinking that the Armenians’ genocide must be true, because this is the view they have primarily been exposed to.
Notice the facts of my presentation were completely ignored, for the most part. The way the detractors shot back were in ways that are inconsequential for those of us interested in getting at pure truth. These included labelings (“Holocaust denier”), interest in my background, and a few attempts at offering “facts,” with no desire to examine the validity of the sources behind these"facts."
Let’s get down to business and take a look at your responses.
CalMeacham wrote that his Armenian roommate would have reacted to denial of his genocide in the same manner that Miami Cubans wouldn’t tolerate a positive outlook on Castro. The reason for this is that many Armenians in the diaspora are raised, through their parents and churches, to give the genocide matter a kind of religious significance. Try speaking to a religious believer in the form of genuine facts; you’ll get nowhere. This is why those who wish to get at the heart of the matter need to scrutinize the historic claims being made, and whether the sources have a conflict-of-interest or not. As I wrote in my post, it doesn’t matter what “Turks” or “Armenians” say. All that matters is the validity of the sources. In order to find that validity, one must dig deep. For example, a genocide supporter is one of our (that is, for those of us in the USA) most glamorous and greatest presidents, Theodore Roosevelt. But what were the sources Roosevelt used, to arrive at his conclusions? Moreover, did Roosevelt have any prejudices? If you read his speeches, he was well into the “white supremacy” mode prevalent in his time. In short, he had a peeve against Turks, at one point declaring theirs was one of the two countries he would most like to smash.
Zakalwe was kind enough to provide links to previous Armenian genocide discussions on the Straight Dope. From a quick look, it was depressing. Just as here, most people has already made up their minds, brainwashed with overwhelming propaganda as they have been, and facts – regardless of how irrefutable – will simply not be considered.
BrainGlutton asked if I have ever posted or e-mailed under the name of Serdar Argic, revealing that BrainGlutton is somewhat versed in Armenian genocide studies. The answer is no. I have heard of this name; apparently “Serdar Argic” was a Turk who spammed many genocide discussion forums during the 1990s. He was reacting against Turkish apathy, and got himself into the ring as a virtual one-man army, posting non-specific articles to counter the omnipresent Armenian propaganda. He got lambasted, of course, because he was one, and the rest were countless. Those who lambasted him, not different than many of the people here, had no interest in the real historic facts. The easy way they tried to silence this lone voice was to ignore the claims he presented, and to attack him personally.
Genocide believer Xtisme goes for the ridicule angle. He complains my post was “long winded.” It’s a serious subject, and the intial essay being replied to (of Cecil’s) covered many points; this one will also cover many of the new points made and is similarly long-winded. (You don’t need to read further unless you are seriously interested.) Perhaps he has comprehension problems, as he writes, “he SEEMS to be saying in the first half that the Ottoman’s were justified in wacking the Armenians because they were refusing to serve in the military (i.e. they were committing treason against the Ottoman empire).” The point is, there is no evidence that the Ottomans – i.e., the Ottoman government – intentionally “whacked” the Armenians. The “evidence” we have of Armenians getting slaughtered comes basically from the hearsay of missionaries, Armenians and Christian sympathizers who were nowhere near the scene, as even the Turks’ allies, the Germans, and the findings of puppet courts from 1919-20 that even the British rejected for their own trial process. If you want to prove a crime, you need real evidence. If you don’t have the evidence, then it is immoral to accuse someone of a crime, particularly a horrible crime such as genocide. And, yes, the Armenians performed high treason. This is easy to see even from Armenian Oral History, which can never substitute for real history. Examples abound of how Armenians went over to the other side, joined the fedayees, and cuddled up to the Russians, British and French.
Xtisme then ridicules the numbers (2.1 million vs. 1.5 million pre-war Armenians, and a mortality of 500k vs 1.5 million ). “Why this seems to facinate the Genocide denial folks is beyond me.” It seems this is not the only matter that is beyond Xtisme, but these numbers are very important. The greater the numbers, the more monstrous the crime; at least that is the impression upon the unwary onlooker. This is why Armenians have inflated their numbers at every turn, as they have always gone for the maximum sympathy value. When they get caught with the real facts disputing their inflated figures, they say, Hey. These numbers aren’t important.
The pre-war number is very important as well, to counter this kind of comment of Xtiste’s: “Even if there WERE only 1.2 million Armenian’s in Turkey at the beginning of the Genocide, its not inconsistent that 1.5 million total were killed OVER AN 8 YEAR PERIOD. Populations after all aren’t static.” He is neglecting the fact that the hard-liners in his corner, such as Peter Balakian, have accepted there were 1 million survivors. (The Patriarch calculated 1,260,000 survivors.) The subtraction must be performed (1.5 million minus one million) to get at the total mortality. This is how we can see that the propagandistic figure of 1.5 million killed would be impossible. And he is right; populations aren’t static… during normal times. During this tragic period, there was negative population growth, with disrupted lives (“all” the men were away) and everyone dying of large numbers, from famine and disease, and other factors.
Xtisme finally comes up with a valid point, as he asks whether the numbers “make a huge difference somehow in whether its a ‘genocide’?” Article 3 of the 1948 Genocide Convention tells us there must be intent to eliminate a group, in whole or in part. So even if there is a partial elimination it would count as a genocide. Keeping in mind the very important criteria, however, that “intent” must be proven. That is what the Armenian genocide thesis sorely lacks, when we examine the genuine evidence. We know large numbers of Armenians died. Yet how did they die? Were they all “murdered” or otherwise violently and intentionally killed, as Rummel and Cecil have told us? Or did the great majority die in exactly the same manner that the bulk of the 2.5 million other Ottomans died, of famine, disease, exposure, combat?
Saoirse: “I would add that the OP’s estimates are 1/3 of the Armenian population. Compare that to the casualties in WWII, where you’ll note that even Poland lost less than one fifth its population. Even granting the OP’s terms, it’s still genocide.”
What determines a genocide is not the numbers nor the severity of the persecutions. I suppose Saoirse didn’t read my essay well. A great thanks to Askance for reminding Xtisme and Saoirse of this wholly important “intent” criteria.
BrainGlutton came back with, “Well, there was no intent on the part of the Serbians to systematically exterminate the Croatians, Bosnian Muslims, or Kosovar Armenians; they would have been satisfied if the target populations had simply left the territory at issue, alive. But ‘ethnic cleansing’ is better than genocide only in the sense that date-rape is better than gang-rape.” (He had better be careful; Samantha Power, who will be coming up, refers to Bosnia as a “genocide” as well.) What BrainGlutton fails to observe is whether the “ethnic cleansing,” if we can now call the Armenian episode as such, occurred at the hands of the Ottoman authorities, or locals who took matters into their own hands. For example, a renegade American force “ethnically cleansed” hundreds of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai. Does that prove the American government “intended” to get rid of most Vietnamese?
Xtisme helpfully pointed to Wikipedia’s Armenian Genocide page, to support his claims. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia where everyone from the public is free to participate. With an emotionally controversial topic as the “Armenian Genocide,” currently a pro-Armenian “mafia” is in control. Because the anti-genocide crowd is few and unmotivated, these fanatical forces prevent changes of any significance made to their genocide claims. The conflicted sources offered, along with the unverified photographs, tell us this page is filled mainly with propaganda.
Measure for Measure provides evidence for “intent,” for good measure, by quoting from Samantha Power. Who is Samantha Power? She is a former law student, possible lawyer and journalist who enjoys presenting herself as an advocate for “human rights” while decreeing some humans to be worthier than others. (In her dogmatic world, there are black hats and white hats; no grays.) The world of genocide is largely based on politics, not history. (And it has become so powerful, Power actually won a Pulitzer Prize for this flawed book; probably no one on that Pulitzer committee cared to go through Power’s claims or sources with a questioning mind.) In order to profit from this world, one must bend to what the genocide advocates are saying. Power is a bender. She is not a scholar.
A whole industry was made of putting quotes in Talat Pasha’s mouth. That is what Aram Andonian did (the fellow Peter Balakian turned to among others to prove genocide, as Cecil relied upon. Power also has pointed to Andonian in her book, while giving credence to the trial outcome of Talat’s Armenian assassin), but Andonian was not the only one. Power’s source for the quote Measure for Measure presented was “Ambassador Morgenthau’s Story.” Ambassador Morgenthau is another example, like President Roosevelt, who seems beyond reproach on the surface, but in reality was a dishonorable man, with reasons to get the USA into war. His book is notorious for fabrications, as one can learn from Heath Lowry’s “The Story Behind Ambassador Morgenthau.” (Lowry researched the private papers of Morgenthau… that is, Morgenthau’s own words… to expose what a dishonest man Morgenthau was.)
It is a sure bet Samantha Power was aware of this infallible research discrediting Morgenthau and his propagandistic book. It must be asked why she relied overwhelmingly on Morgenthau for her Armenian chapter. The answer will have nothing to do with valuing the truth.
M for M also adds Power’s following claim as a fact: “The Turkish sultan Abdul Hamid had killed some 200,000 Armenians in 1895-1896.” While Xtiste will no doubt object, those are highly inflated figures. Please refer to near the end of my first post, when this matter was addressed. Attention needs to be paid as to why the Armenians who got killed got killed. Some were certainly innocent, paying for the wild ways of their greedy revolutionary leaders. (These leaders were not above wanting their people to get killed by Muslims they had incited, so that Europeans may intervene.) Yet a good percentage of the dead were not innocents, but Armenians who were rebelling. For example: a diary entry of one of these leaders, Aghasi (1895, Zeitun), tells us only 125 Armenians were killed vs. 20,000 Turks. (No one cares about the Turks killed during this period, naturally.)
Alex_Dubinsky offers, “the OP keeps saying that historically the Turks didn’t dislike the Armenians. However, that is not a relevant argument if it were true.” Yes, it was true; the Armenians were known as the “Loyal Nation,” and were allowed to become extremely prosperous. As Sir Charles Eliot correctly pointed out in a book he wrote in 1900, there was a brotherly feeling between the two peoples, lasting many centuries. And this is very relevant, given that deceptive genocide arguments range from hatred of Christians to cleaning out all non-Turks. If Armenians remained loyal, nothing would have happened to them. The first prime minister of Armenia admitted no less, in his 1923 manifesto.
“But even if it was a disorganized, collective result of unspoken hatred, I don’t quite agree that it changes the assessment,” Alex continues. By this time, no doubt there were Turks who committed crimes against Armenians because they were seen as disloyal. Unfortunately, such is a common reaction in all nations. If a minority in the USA were to rise against the USA during a desperate war, I don’t know how many would disagree that there would not be much mercy shown to the minority, and members of the group would suffer from a broad, heavy-handed stroke. But that is a far cry from Alex’s summation, that “there oughtn’t be less blame on the Turkish people.” The ones who massacred were usually not the common Turkish people, despite what Armenian propaganda often tells us. Crimes were mostly committed by lawless bands (mainly Kurds), preying on the caravans, a number out for revenge for what Armenians had done to their families. An important point to bear in mind is that the Ottomans took over 1,600 such cases to court, and a good number of Turks paid for their crimes via execution. Obviously, it would make no sense to try and punish those killing (or otherwise committing crimes against) Armenians if the idea was to persecute or exterminate the Armenians.
(This post needed to be split in two, as there was much ground to cover.)
Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor was interested in my background and asked, “Why are you so passionate about this subject?” Because I see this matter as a terrible falsification, and not many are taking the trouble to studiously speak up. But as Saoirse intelligently replied, none of that should matter. Genocide advocates love to poke into backgrounds to see if those going against their genocide are “agents of the Turkish government.” The idea is, anyone who bothers to argue must be getting paid off. As I see it, the Turkish government is next-to-useless when it comes to defending against these horrible claims, otherwise these horrible claims could not be as widely accepted as they have been. Yet even if this worst case scenario should somehow be a fantastic reality, that an arguer as myself is in it for “profitable gain,” again it wouldn’t matter. All that should matter is the quality of the research, for those of us seeking the real truth.
Askeptic writes, “I for one would like to know why these long Amenian Genocide Denial screeds are usually submitted by “guests” who are never heard from again…all Armenian Genocide Denials must be posted in the Pit. At this point that is really the most appropriate place for them. That way we can engage the OP in a manner he deserves.” In other words, the credence of an essay should be determined by how often a “guest” shows up? Very illogical, and contemptuous to boot. It’s “My way or the highway” for this person (hardly in keeping with being “a skeptic”), and he has adopted this position with no attempt at intellectual rebuttal. (Alex_Dubinsky’s very intelligent reply was much appreciated: “Uhuh, and where’s your long thesis proving point-by-point he is wrong?”)
Cervaise has offered: “In answer to the OP’s title question: Yes.” Thank you for proving it, Cervaise. Evidently, judging from the rest that he offered, he values older threads treading familiar ground. If the couple of pages I read from the links Zakalwe provided are typical, I didn’t notice any significantly revealing insight. Most writers are mindlessly repeating propaganda, or are contemptuous of those not holding their hermetically-sealed views.
Siege: “I’m dating an Armenian-American. Members of his family were killed in the Armenian genocide; the survivors made it here. While those who survived the genocide are dying off, the stories are part of his family history. I’m afraid I put people who deny there was an Armenian genocide in the same category as Holocaust deniers. bostonteaparty, if you sincerely doubt that such a thing happened, may I suggest you ask an Armenian, not a Turk?”
Did you read the essay, Siege? I don’t see where I have asked a “Turk.” Many of the sources are actually Armenian, or pro-Armenian. As I explained, I don’t prefer to ask Armenians or Turks. I prefer sources with no reason to exaggerate. Westerners who grew up in societies with anti-Turkish hostilities, and who offer evidence against this genocide, would have no reason to be untruthful. Internal Ottoman documents would have no reason to be untruthful. If you consider yourself honorable, you should make an effort to see whether this was really a genocide or not, by digging in to the actual history offered by impartial authors. (Hard to find, as polarized as this debate has become. Dr. Guenter Lewy is one.) You are not going to get at the truth by asking your emotional Armenian-American boyfriend. But if you are going to use him as a source, be courageous and ask the hard questions… as, for example, if the Armenians were under the Ottomans’ thumb for years, and the idea was to exterminate them, how could there possibly have been so many survivors? (The Patriarch himself tells us nearly half the pre-war population remained in what was left of the Ottoman Empire, by 1921; hundreds of thousands of the rest had ventured on to other territories, on their own.) As you added, “You might want to duck after you ask, though.” And worse, in your case, you might not get any nookie. (Even if he is a guy. And that’s serious anger.)
Little Nemo offered perhaps the most offensive post. “The OP seems to be following the standard genocide denial form,” he wisecracked. He listed a whole series of nonsense, supposed to demonstrate that I’m coming from a dishonest platform. Here I thought I was offering ironclad evidence provided by sources precious to genocide adherents, and suddenly I am accused of mannerisms I had no idea I was committing. Just as a taste, his first one is, “1 - Act reasonable. Claim that you are unbiased and have no personal interest in the debate.” Acting reasonable is a fault? And I don’t recall making any such claims. (Did he get these from a book, and just slapped it on, without consideration to my essay?) “2 - Frame the argument as an ‘either or’ debate. Claim that either your side is right or the other side is right. Ignore all the middle ground between your two positions.” That’s because it is such a debate; either it’s a genocide, or it’s not. And no middle ground is being ignored. Armenians suffered and died, some under the hands of criminals. That’s not being hidden, as opposed to Armenian genocide adherents hiding that hundreds of thousands of Turks were killed by Armenians. “3 - Put the burden of proof on your opponent.” If this were a court of law, the burden of proof will always be on the part of the accuser. “4 - Claim that your supporters are neutral and your opponents are all biased.” Yes, my evidence comes from sources that have no reason to lie. Sources such as missionaries, Ambassador Morgenthau and Aram Andonian had reason to lie. “5 - Nitpick over spurious details. Question whether 40000 or 50000 people died on a given date. Question whether people were shot with a rifle or a handgun.” Perhaps Little Nemo should awaken from his Slumberland and provide an example. There is no nitpicking, and he is not doing his case a favor by speaking so generally.
And so on. But maybe the worst in his list is, “9 - Play the sympathy card. Tell people your group also suffered in some other circumstance. Or say that people have always been biased against your group and believe the worst of them.” There is no “sympathy card” being played. The Turks have never advertised their tragedies, in opposition to what Armenians thrive by. The fact is, there is a tremendous prejudice against Turks. Even a dictionary definition tells us Turks are savages. But what’s really bad about the above is the awful racism involved. Indeed, this was a tragic period where all suffered. 2.5 million Turks died. Nobody cares about them. Hundreds of thousands died at the hands of Armenians. (The shocking fact is, more Turks died violently in the hands of Armenians than the other way around. While Armenians were in charge with and without their Russian allies in eastern Anatolia, on and off for four or five years, the Turkish villagers – with most of the able-bodied men gone – were easy pickings, and there was a systematic policy to wipe out anyone not fitting into the Christian-Armenian mold [even Jews, and fellow Armenians who had converted to Islam], so that a racially pure independent state would result.) Samantha Power won’t say a word about the “human rights” of these victims, and evidently, neither will Little Nemo.
Sage Rat summed up the tallarmeniantale site in his second point with “Yes, Armenians were afterwards deported from the country. But at the same time, Muslims were deported from the Russian/Armenian lands.” I have read the same site, and time and again the point is made that Armenians were not deported. Armenians were moved within the country and not outside the country. The relocation law stressed the temporary nature of the move, and as one can learn from Prof. Lewy’s book, the Ottomans were considering repealing the law in 1917. As soon as the war ended, the Armenians were allowed to return, although many had already returned, since the Armenians were not put under lock and key in concentration camps. The Muslims being deported from Russia at the early stage of the war were never allowed to return to their lands, where they had lived for centuries. That is a key difference. (1.4 million Muslims were already expelled by 1900, from lands Russia had conquered, a third being killed. This parallels somewhat the Armenian experience, but those like Little Nemo and Samantha Power apparently don’t even regard these people as human beings who deserve “human rights.”)
A few posts later, Little Nemo says he likes Turkey, “but it’s a historical fact that the Turks did terrible things to the Armenians.” For centuries, the Ottomans-Armenians thrived as no other time before their history, and the Armenians had been ruled by many conquerors before the Turks stepped in. Armenian historians of the Seljuk period were grateful that the Turks rescued the Armenians from the persecution of the Christian Byzantines. The only time trouble brewed between the two peoples is when Armenians from outside the empire came in and stirred the peaceful Ottoman-Armenians, particularly during the latter end of the 19th century. These terrorists oppressed their own people, and as the years passed, relations got poisoned. The Turks did not just get up and say, “Let’s kill Armenians,” as Cecil alluded in the 1909 example he had given in his Straight Dope. The Armenians would rebel, massacre Turks, and when the Ottoman government tried to put down the rebellions, the Armenians would be regarded in the West as helpless and innocent massacre victims. England, France and Russia were salivating to divide the Ottoman lands between themselves, and the Armenians served as a wonderful excuse. Even when the Armenians did terrible things to the Turks, the Turks forgave them until the situation could no longer be ignored. (It took the Ottomans six months to arrive at the relocation decision, for example, after the war had begun, and after Armenians were rebelling across the land.) When terrible things happened to the Armenians, was it the Ottoman government doing these terrible things? Or was it lawless tribes, who were not discriminating when they victimized others (it’s only the Armenians we hear as the victims). Little Nemo would do well if he opened his mind to genuine history, and get away from the easy propaganda found everywhere.
Sage Rat mentions the Wikipedia page tells us “If the Armenians hadn’t been taken to camps and burned by the thousands, killed by specially selected criminals, starved to death, or left to the whim of the populace, and had instead been deported no one would have an issue.” Most of this is pure propaganda written by Armenians who have hijacked Wikipedia, and exactly the reason why people interested in truth should be very careful before turning to Wikipedia as a reliable source, at least for controversial topics.
Brainglutton: “Curious that bostontea not only has not posted in this thread since the OP, but has not made any other SDMB posts anywhere.” I’m not sure what SDMB stands for, but I have made a few other posts elsewhere. Pretty confident of Brainglutton to speak for the entire output of the Internet.
Jackmannii offers, “The OP sounds a lot like the stuff posted on various Armernian Holocaust denial websites, including similar phraseology.” I don’t know about the “phraseology.” I have arrived at certain conclusions based on what I have learned, and I am communicating in the way I know how. If Jackmannii is suggesting I am mindlessly repeating stock “denial” arguments, he is not being fair. And he is not being open-minded, either. If he were into the truth, he would only care about the validity of the sources and the arguments, not the “phraseology.”
He elaborates further: “If over the years Turkey and its apologists had expended a small fraction of the effort that goes into these pathetic attempts at denial on constructive action - namely acknowledging wrongdoing and apologizing for the past - Turkey would probably have been admitted to the EU by now and gained the respect it seems so desperate to achieve by subterfuge.”
This is very unfortunate. Jackmannii is so convinced of the Turks’ guilt, he is not going to spend any effort in trying to objectively separate fact from fiction. All the unprejudiced information offered in my essay has now become a simple “pathetic attempt at denial.” If someone accuses you of doing wrong, and you know you have done no wrong, should you accept the accusation, simply because the accuser has said so (without offering real evidence)? That is what the EU has demanded that Turkey do (for various political reasons), as a condition for joining. If an organization demands that I be dishonest as a condition for joining the club, that is a club I would not want to join.
Dropzone adds that the Turks who “ordered” the genocide are dead now, but so on and so forth. This is exactly what is needed to prove whether the episode was a genocide or not: Proof of Intent. Aside from Aram Andonian’s forgeries, there are no such orders. If there are no orders, how does Dropzone know who did the ordering, or whether there were orders in the first place? Is he forgetting his personal honor, and simply joining the crowd of voices that have arrived at the same mindless conclusion, and Dropzone doesn’t care about insisting on actual evidence?
As for this “Holocaust” tie-in, an excerpt from Bruce Fein, in a fine article entitled, “An Armenian and Muslim Tragedy? Yes! Genocide? No!”
Why would Armenian genocide theorists repeatedly uncurtain
demonstrative falsehoods as evidence if the truth would prove their
case? Does proof of the Holocaust rest on such imaginary
inventiveness? A long array of individuals have been found guilty of
participation in Hitler’s genocide in courts of law hedged by rules
to insure the reliability of verdicts. Adolph Eichmann’s trial and
conviction in an Israeli court and the Nuremburg trials before an
international body of jurists are illustrative. Not a single Ottoman
Turk, in contrast, has every been found guilty of Armenian genocide
or its equivalent in a genuine court of law, although the victorious
powers in World War I enjoyed both the incentive and opportunity to
do so if incriminating evidence existed.
When people put a real genocide on the same plane as a false one, they are doing a terrible disservice to the real genocide. Moreover, the idea of genocide deteriorates, as folks get the idea politics is the driving force in place of truth.
I see Papermache Prince, OneCentStamp (“Hehehe. I’m sure our new Armenian holocaust denying friends are thrilled by that thought.”) and others on the second page have reduced the goings-on to mocking fun and laughter, and have added nothing of substance. They are all so certain of the “fact” of the “Armenian Genocide,” even though they don’t really care to get into any of the real facts. There is no point in persisting with people as these, and there will no doubt be more silly mocking after I’m out of here. People are going to believe what they choose to believe, no matter what.
But I wish some will keep in mind, not just in the matter of this genocide, but with any claim that seems true on the surface: there are always two sides to a story, and unearthing genuine truth entails putting aside our prejudices and digging in deep.
.
Why, thank you. I really put some effort into it and I appreciate the recognition.
Good to see you’ve come back, bostontea. too many posters don’t, especially after a provocative initial post. It’s often daunting to do so, in the facve of the considerable response to such a post, and I can’t blame soneone who simply feels it isn’t worth the effort.
Your response to me was:
I was simply stating my own limited experience in this arena. But I do observe that there is a big difference between religious fanatics and the near descendants of disasters. In the former case they are convinced of the correctness of their position because of their interpretation of a text or religioous tradition. In the latter case the people are the bearers of passed-down recountings of personal tragedy. There’s a world of difference between “I believe that Jesus is of one substance with the Father” and “My five year old cousins were killed during the forced deportation”. And arguments about whether or not this was intentional “genocide” or incredibly inept and callous deportation aren’t going to make any difference to the survivors and their families. Everyone seems to be in agreement that these things happened. arguing about whether they deserve the name “genocide” seems a much lesser point, and not at all a mitigating factor.
What “superior forces”? The Turks have a govenment, the Armenians do not.
The idea that “superior forces” are alledging genocide is nonsense. Willful disinformation.
And now, I’ll be more explicit: bostontea, are you an employee of the Turkish Government, or of any advertising firm under their employ? :dubious:
That’s a very minor point and extraneous to the real issue. The point being that no one cares whether it was a deportation, relocation, or whatever. The issue people have is with the mass murders, and that’s what people mean when they talk about the genocide. Trying to redefine the genocide as equalling the relocation effort is just the same thing as a magician sending out some pretty girls to distract people from the real issue.
If you would rather research the relocation effort than the genocide then that is entirely up to you, but no one means the one when they say the other.
Propoganda for what? What do Armenians gain by doing this? And I don’t mean the government, I mean normal ordinary grandmothers and grandfathers going about recouting this elaborate tale of the Turks specifically gathering people together to murder at government camps.
What good does it do the EU to make up a bunch of stuff about Turkey having commited a genocide? Are you saying you think they didn’t do any research, and are denying entrance to Turkey just because there is some chance the minimal minority of Armenian people living in mainland Europe will complain?
Are you saying that there isn’t a picture of hundreds of starved bodies of Armenians stacked up on the Wikipedia page? A hundred Armenians all just happened to fall down dead at the exact same time, and as is common were stripped naked and piled up for photos?
Regardless of whether there is official Turkish documentation that can be used to prove it, if you’ve got pictures of the dead bodies, eye witnesses of the murders, and the majority of the impartial (i.e. non-Armenian and non-Turkish) historians of the world agreeing that there was a genocide, Okham’s Razor very easily comes down on the side of there having been a genocide. Crying conspiracy is a very poor answer to this, particularly when there is very little to be gained by most of the people perpetuating the story.
Ohferfuxake.
Turkish forces slaughtered Armenian civilians. Period.
If you deny this, you are either living in a fantasy world or you are knowingly participating in the propagation of a lie. Period.
How’s that for offensive?
Well, you heard wrong. I was there, I saw what Serdar did. “Serdar” was a bot. It would search through the Usenet spool looking for keywords, such as “Armenia” or “genocide”, at which point it would (possibly some human input at this point) string together various standard paragraphs, add a few jabs at the writer of the given post, and cast the resulting post out into the net. Where the post would be forwarded onward. And onward. And onward. This would be regardless of the actual topic, perhaps in a cooking newsgroup, or in a science-fiction newsgroup. Replies to that post, perhaps criticizing its appropriateness, or even coming up with a counter-argument would result in more if the same.
Requests to the email address in his posts asking him to post to more appropriate newsgroups were met with silence. Attempts to contact the system administrator produced no results. Serdar Argic was at best an annoyance, and at worst was a thief of all the network bandwidth and disk space that his ill-conceived, inappropriate postings drained away. He was the worst thing that could ever have happened to any counter-argument against the Armenian genocide. Attempting to paint him in any kind of positive light is a disservice to you, and a disservice to your argument.
Your jealousy is transparent, Cervaise. Bostontea picked my post as the most offensive and you’re just going to have to accept that.
Plus, as an indirect result of this thread, I got my first pit thread, in which I was called a “pathetic piece of slime”.
I beg your pardon! I’ll have you know, and the crowd of voices here will support me, that I have no personal honor!
Yeah, even when assertions of bias transition into conspiracy theory.
bostontea is certainly motivated. In the part directed to me he essentially says that Samantha Powers and Ambassador Morgenthau are unreliable sources, mostly on the basis of thinly substantiated smears and allegations of anti-Turkish bias.
Let’s see, where to start? “Power is a bender. She is not a scholar.”
From the jacket of my book: “Samantha Power is the executive director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. A former Balkan War correspondent and a graduate of Harvard Law School…” The jacket includes praises from Professors Stanley Hoffman and Paul M. Kennedy (of The Rise and Fall of Great Powers.)
Her 600 page book contains a single 16 page chapter on the Armenian genocide: hilariously, that is sufficient to run circles around these genocide deniers. But the brevity of her account suggests that, like most of us, she isn’t particularly fixated on Turkish misdeeds.
“Genocide advocates”? Now there’s a catchy phrase. Much shorter and simpler than “People who advocate the recognition of historical fact and oppose the compounding of historic injustice by denying that the victims’ sufferings even took place”.
Thankfully, a host of good and unbiased historians have done this for us. And the Armenian genocide is long-established fact.
I believe you’ve got this backasswards.
Now where have I heard this sort of line before? Oh yes, from another group in denial - those southern whites who used to tell us how happy blacks were under Jim Crow and how there wouldn’t be any trouble if it weren’t for those “outside agitators”. :rolleyes:
Good luck with your crusade, bostontea. You might want to ask the Flat Earth Society for p.r. advice.
Again I ask: bostontea, are you an employee of the Turkish Government, or of any advertising firm under their employ?
I encountered that one as recently as the mid-80’s, from a cafeteria cashier in Spartanburg reacting to nothing more than my non-Southern accent (I should add that I’m white)…
There are multiple reasons for believing in this sort of thing.[ul]
[li]pro-Turkish sympathy[/li][li]encountering the pro-Turkish version first, combined with a disability to stop believing something once believed,[/li][li]anti-Armenian bias (found in some parts of the US with large Armenian communities)[/li][li]the thrill of believing one knows more than them thar pointy-headed intellekchuls,[/li][li]the thrill of believing one knows more than them thar pointy-headed libbruls,[/li][/ul]
Just to set the record straight, I first read about the Armenian Genocide in a book about the causes of World War I. While I don’t remember the author or title, I’ll be happy to swing by the local library and dig them up. The book wasn’t new. I’d say it was written in the 1950’s or 1960’s.
The Armenian genocide isn’t something which was made up recently to keep the Turks out of the European Union. It’s been witnessed, documented, historical fact since it happened. To say it didn’t happen would be like saying America didn’t imprison Japanese-Americans during World War II, the Japanese didn’t commit atrocities in China and Korea before and during World War II or England didn’t kill Catholics in the 17th century. Just because a historical fact is unpleasant and not in keeping with what one wishes a country or people would be doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
Too bad this isn’t an option in Turkey. Authors there who write books mentioning the Armenian genocide are liable to be put on trial for “insulting Turkishness”.
This woman is scheduled to be in court tomorrow (9/20).