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Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

economist.com

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Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#61

Post by dang »

gefh wrote: post #4

Sliding? More like rushing full throttle. Ataturk would be disgusted.

Please don't post unsubstantive-indignant comments to HN regardless of how right you are. Such comments are reliably destructive of the quality of conversation we're hoping for. This is clearly seen below, where the thread devolves into a flamewar about genocide, but it happens pretty much every time, so we all need to learn not to post like this.

If you have a substantive point to make, please make it thoughtfully; otherwise please don't post until you do.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#62

Post by Vorch »

shepardrtc wrote: post #49
Vorch wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read more on what lead to banishment of Armenians. If you attack unprotected Turkish villages with the help of foreign powers and betray your neighbours, you face the consequences, this is war. Also there was no such thing as hating Armenians til aforementioned betrayal. At the time there were even couple of high ranking statesman like Gabriel Noradunkyan from Armenians.

Banishment? You mean genocide, right?

Turkey lost thousands of innocent and defenseless men from Armenian attacks which makes the situation a bilateral clash. So no, I mean banishment.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#63

Post by hackuser »

enraged_camel wrote: post #52
bpodgursky wrote: post #6

I've read the Economist for a long time, and they should be ashamed of themselves for not calling out how wrong they were when Erdogan was first elected. Their line was that the AK's "moderate Islamism" would be good for democracy long-term, and anyone who was afraid of political Islam was regressive. Yeah, sometimes editors and opinion pieces are wrong. But admit it when you are -- I haven't seen the Economist staff…

Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. Over time though he slid into authoritarianism, and started jailing or exiling people who disagreed with him. Some people believe this was him showing his true colors, while others think it's a combination of his narcissism and severe par…

> Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. / Over time though he slid into authoritarianism

That is the standard practice of authoritarians. Rarely do they announce before being elected, 'if you elect me, I'm going to do away with democracy and become a dictator'. First they get elected, then consolidate power (including by governing in a way that builds political support), and then they seize power.

The fact that he behaved in the way the parent describes doesn't mean he didn't plan to seize power as an authoritarian dictator (and it doesn't mean that he did). If the future authoritarians were easily identified ahead of time, they wouldn't have much chance of advancing their plans.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#64

Post by enraged_camel »

shepardrtc wrote: post #49
Vorch wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read more on what lead to banishment of Armenians. If you attack unprotected Turkish villages with the help of foreign powers and betray your neighbours, you face the consequences, this is war. Also there was no such thing as hating Armenians til aforementioned betrayal. At the time there were even couple of high ranking statesman like Gabriel Noradunkyan from Armenians.

Banishment? You mean genocide, right?

It started out as exile. The Ottomans basically rounded up large numbers of Armenian civilians and forcefully marched them from Eastern Anatolia to today's Syria, in the hopes that separating them from their Turkish neighbors (with whom they were fighting violently) would put an end to what was seen as a civil distraction during war. Countless Armenians perished along the way as a result of gross incompetence and negligence on the part of the soldiers in charge.

If genocide is defined as "systematic and deliberate extermination of a group of people" then it wasn't genocide, because the intention was not to exterminate, but to relocate. Turkey absolutely needs to own up to what happened and pay reparations (even though it is a different country than the Ottoman Empire under which the events occurred), but in my opinion calling it genocide is inaccurate.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#65

Post by upquark »

Vorch wrote: post #62
shepardrtc wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Banishment? You mean genocide, right?

Turkey lost thousands of innocent and defenseless men from Armenian attacks which makes the situation a bilateral clash. So no, I mean banishment.

> bilateral clash

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Ghetto_Uprising

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#66

Post by hackuser »

int_19h wrote: post #38
untog wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A timely warning to the US, too - as more and more Senate votes are being decided by 50% majority rather than their traditional 2/3 (EDIT: sorry, 3/5). That both parties indulge in it should be worrying to everyone.

With Senate, the simple 50% majority is by design. That's consistent with most other bicameral parliaments out there, which also vote on a simple majority basis. Since the issues they can vote on are restricted by the Constitution, it's not really a big deal. The big deal is amending the Constitution itself, which is extremely difficult (if anything, probably more difficult than it should be).

> Since the issues they can vote on are restricted by the Constitution, it's not really a big deal.

I don't agree. The U.S. Senate is very powerful; those restrictions aren't very broad.

> the simple 50% majority is by design

It depends what you mean. The filibuster, which requires 60% majority, has been part of the Senate since around the 1840s; clearly many generations of Senators thought it was important and intended that it continue.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#68

Post by hackuser »

slurry wrote: post #42
untog wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A timely warning to the US, too - as more and more Senate votes are being decided by 50% majority rather than their traditional 2/3 (EDIT: sorry, 3/5). That both parties indulge in it should be worrying to everyone.

It was 3/5, not 2/3, to break a filibuster, and the use of filibusters had been getting to unprecedented levels. The argument above was that constitutional change should be hard I.e. require a supermajority. The Senate rules as followed recently have been requiring a supermajority for ANY change. That is unhealthy.

> It was 3/5, not 2/3, to break a filibuster

It still is. Filibusters have been banned only for confirmations of appointments by the President.

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#69

Post by shitgoose »

kolbe wrote: post #60
sdiq wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Erdogan, the dictator, and 'moderate Islamism' as you quote, are two different things and we shouldn't conflate the two. If anything, his arch-nemesis, the US based Fethullah Gulen, is also an Islamist though of a different shade. Now, if this Gulen (if it is true he was behind the recently failed coup, or, otherwise) did manage to lead Turkey and ended up being different from Erdogan, when it comes to the di…

Is it? I don't have any real data on it, but anecdotally, it seems like Islamic rule correlates very strongly with dictatorships.

Saddam, Qaddafi, Assad, Mubarak? Islamic rule?

Re: Turkey is sliding into dictatorship

#70

Post by gkya »

So saddening the amount of ignorance and hate I see here in HN regarding my country. I wish nothing about Turkey gets submitted again here so that I can continue to visit HN as a hackers' and tech entrepreneurs' forum.

You clearly don't know anything about our history. You don't even know who we are. You insult us with your superficial readings of superficial wikipedia articles. We don't need this at all.

We're having hard times, but I still have hope. After all, civilisation was invented here. I wish we were able to export the better parts too.

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