Armenian journalist refuses to use the word genocide
13 November 2009
Los Angeles
In the month of September the Armenian public learned of a blatant case of denial of the Armenian Genocide within Armenia. A court case was initiated by the “ARARAT” Center for Strategic Research against the Yerevan-based Caucasus Institute and its director Alexander Iskandaryan for publishing and disseminating denialist literature. Unfortunately, as the initiators of this court case noted during the press-conference, this was not the only such instance of Armenian Genocide denial within Armenia. Another case of such denial transpired recently. A journalist named Emil Danielyan, a citizen and resident of Armenia, in his article about Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s speech before the Armenian National Congress leadership, intentionally refused to use the word genocide when referring to the Armenian Genocide (http://www.azatutyun.am/content/article/1875375.html). His expression of choice was the “1915 mass killings and deportations” so ubiquitous in English-language publications supportive of the Turkish denialist position. Furthermore, a news service operating in Armenia and staffed by Armenians, the Azatutyun radio station, published this article without any editing or disclaimers, assuming the responsibility of the content.
The skeptic in all of us would compel us to give the author the benefit of doubt. Perhaps the use of the term was unintentional and an honest mistake or the content of the article was revised without the author’s knowledge. Unfortunately, this is not the first time this author has denied the reality of the Armenian Genocide. Earlier in 2009 he had written another article in which he used the term “mass killings of Armenians.” A criticism that appeared on “ARARAT” Center’s Foreign Press Review provided an Armenian translation of that article and called upon the author to publicly reject the use of “mass killings”, giving him that very benefit of doubt (http://artmamul.ararat-center.org/?p=161). Yet the call rang hollow and no explanations followed. Thus, the following two assumptions can reasonably be made: either Emil Danielyan consciously thinks that the Armenian Genocide was only a mass killing of Armenians, not genocide, or he does not hold that view, but is willing to ascribe to it and even propagandize it in his own articles, if the publisher pays the right price. In either case, his use of the expression “mass killings” is a deliberate choice.
Impunity breeds insolence. Some suggest that openly trying people for denial of the Armenian Genocide in Armenia would offer fodder to Turkey to cast further doubt on the Genocide. They argue that if deniers exist even among Armenians and they are tried in Armenia, then there must really be questions about the veracity of the Armenian Genocide. Nothing could be further from the truth. We can only fool ourselves by not wanting to see that denial exists in Armenia. In fact, it is the continuous proliferation of Turkish denialist propaganda by unprincipled Armenians that will give Turkey more fodder for speculation. If some Armenians impudently doubt or even deny the Armenian Genocide, then foreign denialists will have a more potent argument in their countries. Turkey’s foreign sympathizers will argue that if Armenians question and doubt the Genocide and their government does nothing, then all historical questions must not yet be settled. Severe punishment of all such attempts will only prove to the rest of the world, including the Turks, that the Armenians and their government are unanimous in their position and there can be no ambiguity on this issue. Thus, those Armenians who falsely cast doubt on the Armenian Genocide should be prosecuted and punished as criminals, because genocide denial is a criminal offense. Denial is the final phase of genocide.
Had Emil Danielyan been called to account for his first article, he would have thought twice about insulting the Armenian nation the second time.
Stepan Sargsyan
Contributing Correspondent (Los Angeles)
ARARAT Center for Strategic Research
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An excellent article yet again, from Stepan Sargsyan, sharp crisp and meticulous, but I have a question that bugs me every time I read about an Armenian denying or avoiding use of the word Genocide to describe Armenian Genocide. And I want to put it to all who read this excelent blog.
Does any one of you know of an Armenian who has not heard, thousands of times, accounts of the various episodes of the Armenian Genocide by survivors or children of survivors?
If any Armenian is ready to deny the Armenian Genocide, and the Armenian government has not made provisions to deal with them legally, then energy should be concentrated on persuading the government to help those guy change their mind in the very hospitable Armenian prisons, there they will soon learn all there is to know about brutality men are capable of, especially if it be known what they got sent in for!
We all know oddballs like Stepan Gregoryan or Aleksandr Iskandaryan and we can very well guess the source of finance for their organisations. But why is it that our security services are not interested in them? Instead they focus on partisan activities which with the wildest imagination you can not link to National security!
Should we not spotlight activities of some party leaders who on the surface are opposing the government on Armenian-Turkish protocols ratification, but in reality have been buying lands along the border and roadsides leading to Turkish border for months and they continue to do so! Anyone disbelieving, should only have to talk to one or two residents of the village Marqara on Turkish border!
And maybe Armenian Diaspora should also learn from all these events, i.e. if they did not concentrate all the energy on Genocide recognition and also spent time energy and resources on what is going on in the country then we may just have got to recognition much earlier and the Armenia would not be in the hands of irrelevant illiterate nobodies, spending time and resources on awarding each other with medals, while running Armenia like they remember their grand dad used to run the village corner shop. Then have the impudence to look strait in the eyes of the camera and lie to the nation.
Vigen Nazaryan.
# 1. The Genocide Test
The Duck Test is based on (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_test) a familiar expression: “If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.” Let’s apply this to Genocide.
1. If it starts with a premeditated act to destroy a nations voice.
2. That is then followed by Mass Killings and Deportation.
3. And continues with Generations of survivors and their children passing the stories of loss and grief to such a degree that it robs the joy of life by instilling a visceral fatalist view on life.
Then it’s probably a Genocide.
#2. Emil Danielyan needs a dictionary
Emil,
Words, Language, Linguistics and Meaning are important concepts that will require too much space and time for this blog post but here are a set of definitions that may help you make sense of the Armenian Genocide. If you plan on being a writer, you may want to look into buying a dictionary.
Definitions
Genocide – Genocide is the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group. (source, Wikipedia: Genocide)
Systematic – Systematic a : methodical in procedure or plan b : marked by thoroughness and regularity (source, Merriam Webster: Systematic)
Strategy: A strategy is a plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. Strategy deals with the how part rather than the what. Strategy is distinct from tactics. (Wikipedia: Strategy)
Tactics: In military terms, tactics is concerned with the conduct of an engagement while strategy is concerned with how different engagements are linked. (Wikipedia: Strategy)
#3. A proposal to insure the continued survival of the Turkish culture, nation and peoples.
The nation of Turkey, with it’s rich history and culture is an achievement that is the byproduct of generations of inspiration and contributions of it’s past and present citizens. It deserves to continue to build and exist as a nation and it would be a totally unacceptable crime if an organized effort were made to systematically set into motion a set of activities designed to neutralize and eliminate the Turkish peoples. I propose the creation of an international law to insure that such an act can never take place. I believe this law should apply to other nations as well. But I want to make sure that the law differentiates between Mass Killings and Deportations and something I will call Genocide – a term I will define as a premeditated and deliberate conspiracy to destroy the ethnic and national group of Turkey. For the sake of the Turkish people and other nations of historical significance, I urge the passage of laws that make it a crime to deny Genocide.
#4. Ideas to promote a Genocide Friendly World – the utility of forgetfulness.
In order to successfully commit Genocide, history has shown that it helps to first neutralize the clergymen, physicians, editors, journalists, lawyers, teachers, politicians – to kill the voices who would alert a nations citizens and the rest of the world . Of course ultimate success of a genocide is not just measured by the elimination of a nations leadership, the destruction of the culture and subsequent Mass Killings and Deportations, it also requires that the parties that commit genocide are not held accountable. Some recent techniques offer future perpertrators of genocide an opportunity to avoid accountability. This new technique involves the necessary step of identifying journalists who lack the critical thinking skills to look at Genocide systematically. These journalists would be the types who would overlook the occurrence of the neutralization of a nations leadership. These journalists have the tendency to look at tactics and fail to see the big picture. These journalist have been known to push the idea of genocide as simply Mass Killings and Deportations.
If we are to continue to have Genocide as an option, we must do what we can to find these journalists and also identify publications with weak editorial competency. Above all we must prevent any laws that would make Genocide denial a crime. Such laws would only squelch the opportunity for future genocides. Now more than ever, we must do what we can to reduce the diligence of world citizens if we hope to have a future that continues to have genocide as an option for dealing with unwanted peoples, cultures and nations. We must also do what we can to minimize those who continue to remind the world of past genocide’s.
Genocide requires strategy and tactics – phase 1 is the set up, phase 2 is the Mass Killings and Deportation.
“Mass Killings and Deportation”(MK&D) is a tactical expression whose danger is that it stops the reader from exploring or thinking strategically. As such, it is the type of manipulation of logic that one needs to successfully deny genocide. While there is some doubt to the linage of the expression — “One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is just a statistic.” (some say Stalin) the idea of depersonalizing a subject such as the use of the term “MK&D” is a clever approach to re-brand the genocide. I don’t think the author is that clever, if he was, he should visit the United States to help reframe other problematic areas like Tobacco smoking – but even the Tobacco industry is not as clever as those who perpetrated the genocide. For this, the tobacco industry would need to do the following:
1. In the dead of night, on a single day, lets say, April 24, they Round up all of the thought leaders, publishers, and policy makers who may publish or organize resistance to combat the spread of tobacco.
2. Destroy all books, artifacts and scientific studies that relate to the negative effects of Tobacco.
3. Take all of those who suffer from cancer and march them into the desert or deport them.
But the tobacco industry didn’t do this – so all they are is simply perpetrators of MK&D.
Genocide has nothing to do with statistics – it is a matter of design.
We cannot call what happened to the Jews MK&D because it was more than that (even first year law students know of the concept of mens rea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea ) – it’s important because a functioning society needs to lay down the law and say: WE WILL PROSECUTE THE HINT OF CONSPIRACY WITH THE FULL FORCE OF THE LAW. Civil Society needs to be very careful
Genocide begins well before MK&D. First we have meetings, then we have organizations, then we design ovens, optimize killing methods, apply science to perhaps move from carbon monoxide to Zyclon B ( From Wikipedia: Zyklon B was used in the concentration camps initially for delousing to control typhus. The chemical used in the gas chambers was deliberately made without the warning odorant.[5])
April 24 was step one in the process and for a small nation like Armenia, to snuff the voice, destroy the churches, and make having a name ending in IAN a death sentence is not mentioned in the authors simple phrase “Mass Killings and Deportations.
So my conclusion to this is simple, if Emil Danielyan were a student in the undergraduate course on journalism, I would say: “Emil, writing and thinking are not your strength and while I appreciate your desire to be a writer, your specious reasoning will simply lead to others having to spend too much time having to clean up after the mess you create.
Poor Emil, eench geness gor?
Here is more examples of genocide denial by Danielyan. You should definitely condemn these articles as well.
http://www.armenialiberty.org/content/article/1576659.html
http://www.armenialiberty.org/content/article/1576660.html