Little more than a year after the unfortunate declaration of the US President on April 24th, 2021, it is tempting to blame the Turks with any cooked-up genocide accusation.
Isn’t that what the fanatic, racist “hate lobbies” love to do in their Wikipedia pages, with their unfounded Armenian Genocide, Greek Genocide, Assyrian Genocide etc. allegations? Reading through these, one wonders, “what other genocide is left out there that has not yet been attributed to Turks”, right? For example, can we also blame Turks for the Holocaust? It is no secret that certain so-called “genocide scholars” have even suggested that Ataturk, Founder of Turkey, being one of the most respected leaders of all times was somehow Hitler’s influencer on Holocaust! Although Turkey took no part in WWII and had absolutely nothing to do with Holocaust, these junk scholars shamelessly attempt to shift the blame on Turkey and its founders.
Of course, in their “research”, these so-called “genocide scholars” often forget to mention the fact that Turks actually saved Jews from the Holocaust. Same authors also seem to omit ethnic cleansing and massacres against Turkish and Ottoman Muslim population by Armenians and Triple Entente Armies during WWI.
Hence, the “let us all blame Turks for everything” campaign we see here in the United States! “Especially blame those Turks, who have established businesses and have common economic and social interests within the established Western nations. Somehow, it’s Turks’ fault – for being too Turkish, middle-class, respectable, too beholden to the ideals of the Modern World, like the Turkish Republic and its founding fathers, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his comrades. Somehow, it’s Turks’ fault that they are the descendants of a great nation, which fought and won a War of Independence against the mighty armies of the West.” This is the line of thinking of the staunchly anti-Turkish, racist hate lobbies based in the US.
By inculcating the notion of “the terrible, genocidal Turk” into the minds of unsuspecting Americans, these hate lobbies marginalize and normalize any harassment and assault directed against us, Turks. Therefore, masses are directed to think that no one should see any problem when a Turkish person is stabbed in the heart in the middle of Manhattan because of a hate crime, or a Turkish restaurant is vandalized in Los Angeles by racist Armenian fanatics, or the hate-speech and racist rhetoric is made part of the educational curriculums in several states in the United States, and part of the local education systems!
Is this what American Freedom all about? Keeping the doors wide-open to the belligerence of racist hate-monger lobbies while muzzling Turkish folks who wish to speak out against the indignity and defamation that is being inculcated against them in the form of “history education” cannot and should not be what America understands from “Freedom of Speech”.
Making large donations to US politicians’ campaigns under the disguise of political lobbying allows racist, hate-mongering diaspora organizations to ostracize and stigmatize defenseless Turks with unfounded genocide claims while any dissenting opinions from Turks are silenced as “denialism”. In return, what is actually denied to us, Turks, is our right of exercising free speech.
The truth is, the more we shy away from defending ourselves against these unfounded genocide allegations, the more we will have to live isolated, ostracized lives without being able to say: “How happy is the one who says I am a Turk”, like Ataturk once did.
Let us make no mistake: Nobody will help us, Turks, unless we help ourselves by getting the established US laws and precedents on our side.
Mr. Biden passed a judgment on a historically contentious issue without fact-checking. In doing so, he has enabled belligerent racist, anti-Turkish diaspora organizations to take further root within the United States and other European satellite nations. These organizations will continue to ruthlessly engineer their current agenda to perfection. Using school curriculums will enable them to brainwash young minds perpetually, with anti-Turkish sentiment unless we work collectively to put a stop to it. This is no longer a crisis of racism against Turks or Muslims in the USA but a crisis of democracy that severely violates of our constitutional rights and places the Turkish American youth -our children- directly in harm’s way.
Those politicians who back this racist agenda, care nothing about what truly happened in history. They do not care about the fact that they wrongfully accuse and vilify Turkish-Americans simply because of their Turkish heritage! They do not care about the fact that they side with organizations, which dare to even exert political pressure on US ambassadors who do not act in unison with their political goals. Nor, apparently, do they seriously consider the many terrible consequences of forcing a racist curriculum on so many American youth! Those American youth who are ‘educated’ with anti-Turkish hate rhetoric and genocide propaganda under the disguise of “genocide awareness” will without a doubt act with violence, hate, and racism towards their Turkish American peers.
The so-called “Armenian Genocide” claims must first be taken to a competent international tribunal. While there is an enormous number of publications claiming that the events that transpired during World War-I involving Armenians amount to a genocide, publications claiming just the opposite are equally voluminous.
The important thing to point out here, is that those who accuse Ottoman Turks of perpetrating a genocide (against Armenians, Greeks, and other ethnicities) do so even though there is not a single court judgment finding Ottoman Empire or its successor state, Turkey, guilty of genocide. These folks also offer no account or counterevidence that accurately repudiates these claims. In fact, Malta Tribunals exonerated the two States from charges of massacring Ottoman Christian minorities due to complete lack of evidence. However, today, a naïve person who is conducting a simple Internet search using the words ‘Armenian’ and ‘Genocide’ will find an enormous amount of material, literally blaming Turks for a genocide that did not occur. On the other hand, there is absolutely no account of any other opposing views in these Wikipedia pages. All these claims are being made by the accusers, leaving zero ground to the accused for defense. Leaving no opportunity to the accused to defend themselves is a practice enjoyed by tyrannical regimes and their kangaroo courts.
Therefore, political characters who are administrators of school districts (like Los Angeles Unified School District or LAUSD) who pursue and support this racist agenda must be ashamed of themselves. They ignore the fact that school districts cannot adopt racism. They ignore the fact that education must include science and objective facts, not propaganda rhetoric only validated by the extent of political campaign contributions. They ignore the fact that the educational curriculums must include programs that aim to ‘educate’ young minds, not indoctrinate them.
Besides, any objective historian who looks objectively into the rebellions started by minorities during the Late Ottoman Period and WWI would see that the Ottoman Empire’s suppression of these armed rebellions cannot be considered as a genocide. No scholar can ignore the fact that the insurrections committed by the Armenians, Pontic Greeks and other minority terrorist organizations were treasonous acts of terrorism and they were suppressed by the Ottoman authorities by force, as any other government at the time would do. Likewise, those scholars who look at history ethically and objectively would realize that these secessionist terrorist organizations massacred hundreds of thousands of defenseless Turkish people in cooperation with the invading Triple Entente Armies during WWI, leaving behind completely decimated Turkish villages.
Hence, our organization TADA’s response to Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) officials has been that:
- The so-called “Armenian Genocide” is based upon an unproven propaganda narrative of the US based Armenian Diaspora and teaching it as an “absolute historical truth” despite the existence of voluminous research from eminent scholars pointing the contrary is scholastically objectionable at best.
- Teaching these unproven genocide claims would poison young minds and incite hate and racism against Turks.
- Teaching these cooked-up genocide claims to young minds with objectionable, one-sided resources provided by an organization who had direct proven ties to terrorism is an abject travesty.
In the face of this disaster, Turkish Community could be easily tempted to rant and rave. Certain members of the Turkish Community have been trying to find a solution to this outright racist attack from this so-called “educational institution” as well as the President of the US. It certainly looks like the entire world is united to vilify the Turk! Some of this rant is online and some is in print, and none of it is acceptable.
Turks need passion, articulate and splendid passion, to spur them to the work ahead because the opposing hate lobby commands hundreds of millions of dollars. Bu, now, we need to leave the rag and fire to the side and instead, think out loud about the work ahead.
First, we need to bolster the constitutional rights of Turks and provide information to those, who are under direct threat, whenever possible. That means working together towards the main goal of defending ourselves against racist attacks whenever and however possible. The ‘how’ could be achieved by enlightening and sharing knowledge with Our People on their constitutional rights. TADA already has undertaken this mission. Turks must be able to exercise their freedoms, free from any form of discrimination against them due to their Turkish Heritage in daily life, in their workplaces, at schools, or in any other public environments such as hotels, restaurants, shops, trade centers, malls, and court rooms and other public places. Rights are taken with struggle; not handed freely.
Without a doubt, Turks and their rights are under protection if they rise and defend them. These so-called rights will not magically appear on their side out of the oblivion though. Laws cannot defend a victim if the entire society targets that victim.
Remember what happened to the African Americans who were massacred, lynched, and terrorized within the most despicable and racist periods of our history, until such time African Americans had to stand up for their rights and defend their freedoms.