Never say "I don't like Ataturk" ... or else you'll be imprisoned for four and a half years !

Submitted by Ianus (Poland), Jan 28, 2010 at 13:55

Turk referring to wrote :

We know what sort of disease Kemal the Holy died of and what causes it, don't we ? So we agree on his notorious alcoholism.

>And your point is ? Drinking is a hazard for human health ? Alcoholism is bad ? What kind of lesson we have to get out of it ?<

Several important points and lessons could be learned from it. But let's concentrate just upon one point bearing directly on Article 301 and Law No. 5816 which stipulates

" Anyone who publicly insults or curses the memory of Atatürk shall be imprisoned with a sentence of between one and three years. … If the crimes outlined in the first article are committed by a group of two or more individuals, publicly, in public districts or by means of the press, the penalty imposed will be increased by a proportion of one-half."

Imagine I make in public the following syllogism : "Ataturk was the founder of the Turkish Republic. Ataturk was a notorious drunkard. A notorious drunkard was the founder of the Turkish Republic".

It would be interesting to see how the sublime Turkish prosecutors will react?

a/Will they benignly admit that the syllogism is logically correct and falls into the narrow category covered by Article 301 "Expressions of thought intended to criticize does shall not constitute a crime." ?

b/ Will they point mildly to a logical and/or factual error I am unaware of ?

c/ Will they decide the above syllogism constitutes clearly an "insult" and/or "curse" to the memory of Ataturk and thus is punishable with imprisonment between two and six years?

d/Will they send to the suburbs of Lodz a hired thug to do with the author of the syllogism what they would love to do themselves without any syllogisms?

Now, on a surrealistic note, in Turkey people get prosecuted and hunted for such diverse "crimes" as (an official ) chewing gum during a ceremony near Kemal's statue, ( a girl) attaching a clown's hat on Kemal's statue, (students) sticking flyers advertising the play, "The Vagina Monologues", over a poster of Ataturk at a university campus. Even asking abstract scholarly questions like ""In the future we will be asked the question 'Why are this man's [Atatürk's] statues and photographs all over the place?' You cannot bury this issue. This will certainly be debated." can end with a trial for insulting Ataturk's memory.

But what do I say ? Simply saying "I don't like Ataturk" may call in a prying Turkish inquisitioner, let alone thoughts like the following "In a reference to Ataturk's expulsion of the British from Istanbul, Bezirgan bluntly declared that she would probably have enjoyed greater freedom of expression if the British had stayed" , let alone this "Unfortunately, Turkey has always been the arena for dirty wars throughout history. Starting with Mustafa Kemal's [Atatürk] massacre order in Dersim [today's Tunceli], …" and "If today's Kurdish movement is called terrorist, that means that the movement which Mustafa Kemal started was no different. The only difference is that Mustafa Kemal was not arrested." for which the author faces seven and half year in jail.

They say alcoholism destroys families, erodes social relations,causes psychiatric and somatic disorders and dysfunctions, leads to alcoholic dementia, domestic violence, anti-social behaviour. Now if an alcoholic all exposed to these inevitable effects of misuse of alcohol founds a state exactly in his own imagine, then how much of his disorders, psychoses and dysfunctions are conveyed and embodied into his creation, I wonder ? Banning thinking about this curious issue in Turkey by a medieval law is very symptomatic and humorous. Many heavy alcoholics get angry and deny blatantly any allegations of alcoholism.

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