One Year After Hrant Dink

Yesterday, the 19th of January, was the first anniversary of Hrant Dink's murder. One year ago, tens of thousands had spontaneously gathered where he was killed and assembled into a peaceful demonstration condemning the murder. "We're all Armenians" was their rallying cry, protesting the government's cumbersome, half-hearted efforts at prosecuting the killer, as well as its repressive attitude towards the remaining minorities in Turkey.

One year later, things were considerably different as the "peaceful" protesters worked themselves into a frenzy, attacking and trashing surrounding buildings, shops and offices and effectively spoiling the nobility of their cause

Curiously, this screw-up led my mind back to a similar, but completely unrelated conflict that took place around Hrant Dink's death, last year in my university. A huge on-line fight had flared up over the issue of gay rights in Turkey. A few days later, someone sprayed these "We're all faggots" stencils all over the campus, hitting two birds with one politically-incorrect stone by ridiculing gay rights and anti-nationalist activists in one go. The graffiti themselves later assumed the nature of the insult ridden school forums, replaying the crass exchange of insults on a simpler chalk-and-pencil medium.

I was convinced around then that Turkish people would take a long time abandon their over-the-top and pumped-up attitudes when defending their ideas, whatever they might be.