251) It Was Not "Genocide"; It was - and still is - "Ethocide"

 

 The following letter was written to Marjorie Pritchard, the Op-Ed Editor of the Armenian mouthpiece newspaper of The Boston Globe on July 23, 2003, by Ergun Kirlikovali
  
It Was Not "Genocide"; It was - and still is - "Ethocide"  

 

"Ethocide" is a new word, coined by this writer, at exactly 8:58 am, on Wednesday, May 7, 2003, after being frustrated by the incredibly biased coverage of the Turkish-Armenian issue in the American press. Ethocide, my humble gift to the English language, is coined from the words "ethics" and "cide". The definition of ethics (singular in number), by Webster's II, New Riverside Dictionary, is: "The branch of philosophy dealing with the rules of right conduct". Ethocide is related and includes all the meanings and interpretations of the word "ethic" (without "s" in the end), which according to the same dictionary, has the following two meanings: 1. A principle of right or good conduct. 2. A system of moral values. "Cide" is Latin word for killing and is already widely used in modern English language in coined forms: insecticide (kills insects); biocide (kills biological growth), suicide (kills self), genocide (kills a group of people with shared traits), etc. Ethocide is, therefore, "deliberate and systematic killing or destroying of ethics" one way or another, in one area or another (in our case, the media).

 

When it came to my attention that The Boston Globe has reversed its prudent policy of using the term 'Armenian Genocide' only with qualifiers like "alleged" preceding it, and thus practically gave into the irritating pressure by the Armenian lobby, I thought: "Here is my chance to introduce the term 'Ethocide' for the first time in American media." If the report in the Armenian press is to be believed, Michael Larkin of the Boston Globe informed the Armenian National Committee (ANC) of Eastern Massachusetts, in a letter dated July 8, that the paper will now treat the alleged Armenian Genocide as the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The trouble is, Armenian claims have nothing to do with the truth.

 

Armenian allegations of genocide are based on an ever-evolving and curious combination of exaggerations, deliberate misrepresentations, half-truths, fakeries, fabrications, and sometimes, outright lies, topped with "victim number-de-jour". The Armenian account of history is the only one where "the dead actually multiply" over the years, from as low as 300,000 claimed in the 1920s to 1 million claimed in 1970s, leveling off in 1.5 million nowadays. And none of this mentions a single word about the Turkish victims, which outnumber the Armenian victims 4 to 1. You could call this religious bias and/or ethnic discrimination against Muslim Turks, but I will call it ethocide, a "deliberate and systematic annihilation of ethics" in American media.

 

It is further alleged that Larkin thanked the Armenian lobbyists for their "... thoughtful efforts to enlighten" Larkin and the Globe and for their "... sincere request" that the Globe reconsider the policy. "You have helped make us a better newspaper." wrote Larkin. When I read this, I was immediately reminded of chapter 13, "Paid Armenian Agents Mold Public Opinion In The United States", of a new book by Samuel A. Weems, a Christian scholar and researcher in Arkansas: "Armenia: Secrets of A 'Christian' Terrorist State", www.stjohnpress.com.

 

It was a wartime tragedy, not genocide, played out against the backdrop of a series of brutal foreign invasions by European powers and Armenian betrayal at the home front. The simple fact that most Armenian last names are Turkish, even to this day, is an indisputable testimony to the much larger truth and the bigger picture that Turks and Armenians lived in peaceful coexistence for a millennium. This harmony was destroyed only in the last 100 years, by Armenian nationalist greed, terror, and treason, and foreign manipulations, resulting in victimization millions of Turks during WWI. The Armenians did, of course, get a lot of help from the European powers, like imperial Britain, colonialist France, and Czarist Russia, who were themselves locked in a three-way contest to carve out the greatest chunk from the multi-continent, multi-ethnic, and multi-religious, 600-year-old Ottoman Empire. These European powers trained, armed, and supported the clandestine Armenian nationalist and terrorist groups among Turks. Who can deny these rock solid facts?

 

Armenian allegations of genocide can not be substantiated by historical evidence. Around 70 prominent historians in the United States of America signed a statement on May 19, 1985, urging the U.S. Congress NOT to legislate history. They said "...historical evidence unearthed so far showed, that it was a civil war, mainly fought by Christian and Muslim irregular forces..." Recognizing only Armenian suffering, and ignoring Turkish suffering would, therefore, be untrue, unscholarly, unfair, and un-American. Such "selective morality" would be unethical, discriminatory, and outright racist.

 

It was a civil war within a world war, provoked by Armenian bloody uprisings, designed to establish a Greater Armenia on Turkish soil, where the Armenians were not even a majority. Here is the rub: If the Armenians had succeeded, it would have been the first "apartheid" of the 20th Century, where an Armenian minority would be ruling over a Turkish majority.

 

In a press release dated July 23, 2001 by the British Ambassador to Ankara, the British government agreed with the above characterizations, saying that these events, while tragic and costly to both sides, could not be considered genocide.

 

The Israeli Government also agrees with the above. In an interview dated April 9, 2001, Shimon Peres, Foreign minister of Israel, told the press that "Armenian allegations are meaningless". He said what happened to Armenians cannot be compared to the Jewish Holocaust. (After all, did Jews establish armies, 150,000 men strong, behind German lines to backstab Germans in order to establish a Jewish state violently carved out of German soil? Of course, not! But the Armenians did all that and more in the Ottoman Empire.)

 

Turkish Academicians are, likewise, in agreement with the above assessments. More than 300 of them signed a public statement on April 23, 2001, saying that the Ottoman government records clearly show that the intention was to remove, not eradicate, Armenians, as alleged. And not all Armenians were deported, as alleged. And not all those deportees perished, as alleged. Due to limited resources and supplies available at a terrible wartime, disease and famine took more lives than bullets and battles. These events cost both Turks and Armenians and others in the area great suffering. In the end, for every Armenian casualty, there were 4 Turkish casualties. Same area, same time period, same wartime conditions. And yet, what one heard mostly in the West for a long time, was Armenian suffering. Turkish suffering, much greater in scope and intensity, was simply ignored as if Turks were not humans.

 

Without acknowledging the supreme treason committed by the murderous Armenian nationalists wearing the uniforms of invading armies of Russia in the East, France in the South, and no uniform at all elsewhere, and without studying the motives and modes of operation of the Armenian terror groups (like Dashnaks, Hunchaks, Ramgavars, and others), one can never do justice to history.

 

Armenian allegations since 1948, when the term genocide was first coined, and the taking of those allegations at face value by third parties, with total disregard for the truth, therefore, clearly constitute a case of ethocide, deliberate and systematic killing of ethics, in this case, in the media.

 

Peace,

 

Ergun Kirlikovali

 

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