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LABEL GANGS AND HIM
Kerim Balci
Today's Zaman
Jan 29 2008
Turkey
Turkey is failing to create its own brand names, but the labels
this country sticks to itself are quite durable. The justice
minister's recent sarcastic self-critique could not have better
expressed our reality: "If 301 was a brand name, it wouldn't need
any advertisement." Well, congratulations my nation! We now have a
new famous name: Ergenekon.
It would make a great label for torture devices, retired army personnel
equipment, know-how companies targeting Third World countries with
coups, midnight memorandums, ground-setting strategies for military
intervention and psychological warfare. Back to the times when the
most famous Turk in the world was Mehmet Ali Aðca, the unsuccessful
assassin of the pope!
The name Ergenekon is a telling one. Ergene meant "steep" in old
Turkish and Kon meant "gangway, mountain pass." This "steep mountain
pass" refers to an old legend about Turks being stuck in a valley
surrounded with iron mountains and an ironsmith managing to open a
passage through by burning huge numbers of trees. In the case of the
Ergenekon Gang the mountains refer to the Justice and Development
Party (AK Party) and the growing awareness of civil society of its
duties and rights. The ironsmith is the 33 member-gang and "them."
The trees to be burned are the religiously observant, Kurds, Alevis,
Armenians, civilians, democrats... In short, "us!"
I used to be a fan of Cartoon Network's "Powerpuff Girls." In
this cartoon series there are several bad guys. But one is so bad
and so dreadful that it cannot be named. The girls refer to this
soft-speaking evil that plays with good people's dreams as simply
"Him." Him penetrates into people's consciences; Him plays the role
of the best of the good; all other bad guys simply make noise, kick
people, spit at the street, torch cars and houses, burglarize banks...
Their faces speak to the fact that they are bad. But Him! Him makes
strategies. For its evil ends, Him may do good at some stages. Him may
fight against evil together with the Powerpuff Girls and befriend them,
but just to squeeze the power-giving Molecule-X off their bodies in
the end. Him never makes coalitions with other bad guys.
Because Him does not like to share the post of extreme evilness.
Who is Turkey's Him?
Play the game yourself. Just fill in the blanks with names: "...~E. is
the mastermind of the Ergenekon Gang." When does your voice grow
weak? When do you feel afraid to pronounce the name and would rather
say "Him"?
Let me help you more.
One of the evil acts of the Ergenekon Gang -- so we are told -- is
to label university personnel. Why label university professors if you
are just planning to prepare the pretext for a coup? Why not label the
army personnel and decide who will be with you when the time for the
coup comes? Why not label the columnists and journalists and decide
who will applaud your intervention and who won't?
Two things are obvious: The gang people were planning a pre-coup or
post-coup cleansing in the universities; and there is a link between
labeling and coup-preparing. The reverse logic does not need to work
here, but it may well work: "Whoever prepares for a coup labels" is
a true proposition. Is "Whoever labels prepares for a coup" also true?
Ret. Maj. Gen. Veli Kucuk, the alleged leader of the Ergenekon Gang,
is also the alleged founder of an illegal intelligence unit in the
gendarmerie, the existence of which is denied by officials. The
gendarmerie happens to be Turkey's prime-labeler, as recent labeling
scandals disclosed. We may come to a point to claim that labeling
is a virus that leads to the disease of coup-provoking. Shouldn't we
open the old accounts and ask whether our other labelers are involved
with these labelers?
For the university professors who have been labeled by the Ergenekon
Gang, I have bad news: Labels are shared. Somewhere in deep/high your
names are coupled with labels and put in front of Him.
Beware; you may be a good friend of Him!
--Boundary_(ID_3zp4+boDhEnZOpPYHGTT7g)--
Kerim Balci
Today's Zaman
Jan 29 2008
Turkey
Turkey is failing to create its own brand names, but the labels
this country sticks to itself are quite durable. The justice
minister's recent sarcastic self-critique could not have better
expressed our reality: "If 301 was a brand name, it wouldn't need
any advertisement." Well, congratulations my nation! We now have a
new famous name: Ergenekon.
It would make a great label for torture devices, retired army personnel
equipment, know-how companies targeting Third World countries with
coups, midnight memorandums, ground-setting strategies for military
intervention and psychological warfare. Back to the times when the
most famous Turk in the world was Mehmet Ali Aðca, the unsuccessful
assassin of the pope!
The name Ergenekon is a telling one. Ergene meant "steep" in old
Turkish and Kon meant "gangway, mountain pass." This "steep mountain
pass" refers to an old legend about Turks being stuck in a valley
surrounded with iron mountains and an ironsmith managing to open a
passage through by burning huge numbers of trees. In the case of the
Ergenekon Gang the mountains refer to the Justice and Development
Party (AK Party) and the growing awareness of civil society of its
duties and rights. The ironsmith is the 33 member-gang and "them."
The trees to be burned are the religiously observant, Kurds, Alevis,
Armenians, civilians, democrats... In short, "us!"
I used to be a fan of Cartoon Network's "Powerpuff Girls." In
this cartoon series there are several bad guys. But one is so bad
and so dreadful that it cannot be named. The girls refer to this
soft-speaking evil that plays with good people's dreams as simply
"Him." Him penetrates into people's consciences; Him plays the role
of the best of the good; all other bad guys simply make noise, kick
people, spit at the street, torch cars and houses, burglarize banks...
Their faces speak to the fact that they are bad. But Him! Him makes
strategies. For its evil ends, Him may do good at some stages. Him may
fight against evil together with the Powerpuff Girls and befriend them,
but just to squeeze the power-giving Molecule-X off their bodies in
the end. Him never makes coalitions with other bad guys.
Because Him does not like to share the post of extreme evilness.
Who is Turkey's Him?
Play the game yourself. Just fill in the blanks with names: "...~E. is
the mastermind of the Ergenekon Gang." When does your voice grow
weak? When do you feel afraid to pronounce the name and would rather
say "Him"?
Let me help you more.
One of the evil acts of the Ergenekon Gang -- so we are told -- is
to label university personnel. Why label university professors if you
are just planning to prepare the pretext for a coup? Why not label the
army personnel and decide who will be with you when the time for the
coup comes? Why not label the columnists and journalists and decide
who will applaud your intervention and who won't?
Two things are obvious: The gang people were planning a pre-coup or
post-coup cleansing in the universities; and there is a link between
labeling and coup-preparing. The reverse logic does not need to work
here, but it may well work: "Whoever prepares for a coup labels" is
a true proposition. Is "Whoever labels prepares for a coup" also true?
Ret. Maj. Gen. Veli Kucuk, the alleged leader of the Ergenekon Gang,
is also the alleged founder of an illegal intelligence unit in the
gendarmerie, the existence of which is denied by officials. The
gendarmerie happens to be Turkey's prime-labeler, as recent labeling
scandals disclosed. We may come to a point to claim that labeling
is a virus that leads to the disease of coup-provoking. Shouldn't we
open the old accounts and ask whether our other labelers are involved
with these labelers?
For the university professors who have been labeled by the Ergenekon
Gang, I have bad news: Labels are shared. Somewhere in deep/high your
names are coupled with labels and put in front of Him.
Beware; you may be a good friend of Him!
--Boundary_(ID_3zp4+boDhEnZOpPYHGTT7g)--