×
Leaving blood on their flags
Paylaş
LinkedinFlipboardLinki KopyalaYazı Tipi
Every primary school in Turkey has been commanded since January to show students a propaganda film vilifying Armenians as murderers of Turks in the early 20th century. The army produced it and sent it to the Ministry of Education, which distributed the six-part "documentary" to schools last June. Last month, the ministry sent the schools letters requiring them to show the film to students "when convenient" and report on student reactions by March 2.
The images are downright gruesome and frightening, showing the bones and sculls of people the film claims were Turks killed by Armenians. For children ages seven to 13 Ğ around 10.5 million of them Ğ this degree of manipulation is particularly cruel. It puts hate and fear in their hearts before they form the next front lines.
Only in the face of recent protests by NGOs and teachers unions, Education Minister Hüseyin Çelik told news crews Wednesday that no such order by the ministry had been issued and that showing the film, "Sarı Gelin: The Inside Story of the Armenian Problem" to students was not their intention. "It was for the teachers, not the kids," he said. This type of lie is common here but it underlines the NGOs’ successful and persistent fight to expose the dark motives of leadership in this country.
The timing of this hate drive, which carries its own momentum despite the "revision", seems connected to recent events. In January, Turkish signatures on an apology to Armenians grew to thousands as the country marked the second anniversary of the nationalist murder of prominent Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink. President Barack Obama was greeted by open letters from the Armenian Diaspora demanding publicly that he pass a bill criminalizing denial of the events of 1915 as "genocide".
The film was meant to make a whole generation of Turkish children believe that the only victims of those events were Turkish. No matter where people stand on the matter, the number of Armenians who died Ğ by low or high estimates Ğ suggests this is simply false.
War kills Turks and kids
When the ministry sent its demand Ğ and schools began showing the film Ğ these kids were watching horrifying images on nightly news of Israel’s massacre of more than 1,000 Gazans, a third of them children. It would be reasonable not only for these children to hate Armenians after seeing Six Parts of this film but also for them to believe that ethnic and nationalistic divides end in wars that kill Turks, Muslims and children just like them. And, of course, thousands of Turkish-Armenian children could be traumatized by this "state" campaign or feel compelled to hide their identity.
Parents can only do so much to change first impressions formed in young minds. My son will be in Turkish primary school in less than five years, and this is the very kind of thing that makes me want to cut and run. I realize that the fight with propaganda belongs more to people born of this land, but the planting of such seeds in innocent hearts troubles me on a visceral, universal level. It makes me cry.
In her book "Deep Mountain" Ece Temelkuran discusses the weight of propaganda on Turks and Armenians. A year ago she wrote in the daily Milliyet about the brainwashing of children who made a Turkish flag from their blood to support the Turkish troops fighting Kurds. "If only this noise, which makes flags out of children and dead children out of flags, would end."
Only in the face of recent protests by NGOs and teachers unions, Education Minister Hüseyin Çelik told news crews Wednesday that no such order by the ministry had been issued and that showing the film, "Sarı Gelin: The Inside Story of the Armenian Problem" to students was not their intention. "It was for the teachers, not the kids," he said. This type of lie is common here but it underlines the NGOs’ successful and persistent fight to expose the dark motives of leadership in this country.
The timing of this hate drive, which carries its own momentum despite the "revision", seems connected to recent events. In January, Turkish signatures on an apology to Armenians grew to thousands as the country marked the second anniversary of the nationalist murder of prominent Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink. President Barack Obama was greeted by open letters from the Armenian Diaspora demanding publicly that he pass a bill criminalizing denial of the events of 1915 as "genocide".
The film was meant to make a whole generation of Turkish children believe that the only victims of those events were Turkish. No matter where people stand on the matter, the number of Armenians who died Ğ by low or high estimates Ğ suggests this is simply false.
War kills Turks and kids
When the ministry sent its demand Ğ and schools began showing the film Ğ these kids were watching horrifying images on nightly news of Israel’s massacre of more than 1,000 Gazans, a third of them children. It would be reasonable not only for these children to hate Armenians after seeing Six Parts of this film but also for them to believe that ethnic and nationalistic divides end in wars that kill Turks, Muslims and children just like them. And, of course, thousands of Turkish-Armenian children could be traumatized by this "state" campaign or feel compelled to hide their identity.
Parents can only do so much to change first impressions formed in young minds. My son will be in Turkish primary school in less than five years, and this is the very kind of thing that makes me want to cut and run. I realize that the fight with propaganda belongs more to people born of this land, but the planting of such seeds in innocent hearts troubles me on a visceral, universal level. It makes me cry.
In her book "Deep Mountain" Ece Temelkuran discusses the weight of propaganda on Turks and Armenians. A year ago she wrote in the daily Milliyet about the brainwashing of children who made a Turkish flag from their blood to support the Turkish troops fighting Kurds. "If only this noise, which makes flags out of children and dead children out of flags, would end."
Paylaş
LinkedinFlipboardLinki KopyalaYazı Tipi
