Talk:Xenophobia and discrimination in Turkey

Possible issues with this article.
Is this an article whose tone is encylopedic or polemical in character, in whole or in part?

One clearly non-Wikipedia-compliant problem is that some references from previous years are written unedited as if still in the present. Also those sentences or assertions made in a permanent uncited present tense ("currently").

Lewvalton (talk) 16:22, 3 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Definitely agreed. "In Turkey racism and ethnic discrimination are prevalent in its society and throughout its history, and this racism and ethnic discrimination is also institutional against the non-Muslim and non-Sunni minorities.[1][2][3][4] " For example, what kind of sentence is that? It is not only extremely subjective and emotional, but also wrongfully agitated and basically incorrect, taking both the 'statement' itself and the references utilized to back such a 'declaration' up in consideration - that simply have nothing to do with the content of this sentence. Institution of Turkey doesn't compromise a single statement regarding one's racial or cultural ethnicity, along with the fact that is one of the only constitutions based on solid secular ideals in the Middle East. Batuhan Erdoğan (talk) 13:47, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

I think the section regarding sunnis and non-muslims should go to freedom of religion in Turkey — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.165.246.181 (talk) 02:27, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

Requested move

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the proposal was move per request.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 14:14, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Racism and discrimination in Turkey → Racism in Turkey – Discrimination is a very broad subject. It would include things like sexism, heterosexism, discrimination based on age, etc. This article is almost exclusively about race and ethnicity issues, except the part about Alevis. And changing the title would make this article more in line with the Racism in Europe template, which links to this article, and where all the other countries' pages seem to be named "Racism in X". Kevin (talk) 00:29, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. Meets the consistency criterion of WP:CRITERIA. --BDD (talk) 16:56, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support I don't mind. Proudbolsahye (talk) 18:39, 10 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support for consistency reasons. Dimadick (talk) 07:50, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support The current title is just ugly, and ironically enough implies an anti-Turkish POV. Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 13:22, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support per Cavann. -- Ե րևանցի talk  14:15, 11 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Support. The proposed new title is more concise, but basically conveys all of the information needed to describe the content of the article.   - WPGA2345 -     ☛   04:29, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

two points
My edits have been reverted, because I should give reasons on TP. The reverter said "crucial things", which I found is funny, obviously that junk is crucial. But I dont think there was bad intention in the reversion, i think it needed more explanation. I am not active on english wikipedia, but I stumbled across this.

1) The military action in the Zilan-Valley The user Takabeg has uploaded a piece of Newspaper, with the title "The ones from Zilan-Valley have been erased". In Turkish, the suffix "-kiler" means "the ones" from Zilan Valley, its a neutral reference to a group. In this military action against a kurdish rebellion there was some degree of high civilian casualities, which I will not discuss here. The point is: The newspaper article is cut - as you can see. The reason for is obvious: If you read the part that was cut out, you get clear that the title "the ones in the Zilan-Valley have been erased" does not refere to any civilian or ethnicity, as the text and the context here try to suggest. Its a ugly manipulation of a kurdish nationalist. The notion "deredekiler" (the ones from the valley) does only refer to "bandits", as the rebells are called. Here you can read the whole article:. Crushing a rebellion and killing "bandits" is not racism. Especially there is no indication of racism if you say, the "bandits have been erased".

2) The use of language in a parliament is not a issue of racism or not, its an issue of the concept of unity&centralism, the concept of "rules and etiquette" and the concept of "official language". Determining an official language in a determined political sphere is not a form of racism. If "Pussy Riot"-friendly members of parliament have a speech with naked breasts - is it sexism if the cameras turn away? Ridiculous statements and one outright forgery. --Zoylab (talk) 21:57, 3 November 2014 (UTC)


 * 1) What happened in Zilan is clear. It was an indiscriminate bombing campaign that killed Kurds. The Turkish army used two corps (VII Corps and IX Corps) and 80 aircraft for the cleansing operation from July 8, 1930. The massacre took place was on July 13, 1930, but Yusuf Mazhar, who was the special correspondent of the daily Cumhuriyet (Turkey's most widely read daily paper in 1930-1940s), reported the cleaning in districts of Erciş, Mount Süphan and Zeylân was completely finished by telephone on July 12, 1930. This is the exact date of the newspaper. We have every right to believe that those dead refer to those thousands of Kurdish residents in the Zilan Valley of Turkey. This is obserervance of Turkish, Kurdish, and third-party At any rate, "Temizlik basladi" doesn't sound like the Turkish government accidentally killed these innocent people. Calling them "bandits" does not help your argument either.


 * 2) European Commission Against Racism and Intolerance reported that "The public use by officials of the Kurdish language lays them open to prosecution, and public defence by individuals of Kurdish or minority interests also frequently leads to prosecutions under the Criminal Code". In fact, the public use of Kurdish lays Kurds open not only to prosecution, but also to death: Emrah Gezer, a 29-year-old Kurdish man, was killed by 15 gunshots on 27 December 2009 in Ankara after he sang a Kurdish song at a club to celebrate his friend's birthday. So there's no doubt in my mind that banning a language comes from the same essential rationale. It is discriminatory to ban a certain language from being broadcasted. In America, they'll just add sub-titles in English or something. Banning the Kurdish language is considered racist by hundreds of third-party sources. This news-broadcast is just one example and therefore it shall remain. Also, the very fact that you're dividing me and Takabeg between ethnic lines and is treating Wikipedia like it's a WP:BATTLEFIELD proves my point. Étienne Dolet (talk) 22:30, 3 November 2014 (UTC)


 * 2) I did not discuss the use of language generally and racism in Turkey. Read again. I said having fixed rules of which language to speak in a parliament does not mean that this regulation is racist.


 * 1) I did not discuss the events in Zilan, so you are talking in vain. I am talking about that newspaper article. "Temizlik basladi" is only refering to bandits. So you have not answered my post. The newspaper article makes clear that the title is about "cleaning bandits". That is really clear if you read the article. So do you speak Turkish? If yes, why are you still advocating the manipulation? If no, how come you are you discussing with me?


 * So talking to other users: Imagine the US-army makes a military operation and posts a newspaper article saying "The Falluja valley has been cleaned", then, in the next sentences, it talks about how rebells have been killed. Lets say in that campaign there was heavy civilian casualties. Now, the guilt-mongerers and manipulators cut out the main article, and try to build a suggestion that the title of that newspaper article refers to the killing of the civilians by US-soldiers, which the newspaper article doesnt talk about. That shameful thing is what they do!


 * Coming back to the turkish example: There is also no proof that the civilians have been called "bandits", and the all the newspaper pictures only show male rebell fighters running away. That's why I am so relaxed to say, let some third party check it. Because then the manipulations that you try to defend here will crumble apart, two big elements of this junk-article will get deleted, the manipulations of the user Takabeg will get revealed. And if this manipulations will not be adressed and taken off, or if I get banned: I will show every liberal-minded person in Turkey how you guys are actually openly manipulating data and the worse- how you try to defend it afterwards. Because the only thing you need to reveal this is the full article (that I have) and some degree of basic Turkish. So actually i am really relaxed to say your behaviour here proves actually the opposite: you are on WP:BATTLEFIELD, because you defend manipulation. And again: Let the people check it! Zoylab (talk) 10:12, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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Broken link
'"Samast'a jandarma karakolunda kahraman muamelesi". Radikal (in Turkish). 2 February 2007.' Is broken and it isn't police it is gendermerie. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.253.111.124 (talk) 14:27, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

How can you know their race?
"More than 4,000 Kurds were arrested in 2011" not all Diyarbakır people is Kurd. If we must speak for Diyarbakır's race distribution according to local people roughly %60 Diyarbakır people is Kurd. I can't say how much of them real Kurd because in Turkey we don't investigate people's races. I don't think a The Guardian reporter know anything about that, too. They are not arrested them for being Kurd or any other race only because investigation about terrorism. Wikipedia has so many wrong or biased pages about Turkey which i don't know why. Too many for me to correct, i hope people can be more sensitive about Turkey.

Also, according to Turkish nationality law: Everyone bound to the Turkish state through the bond of citizenship is a Turk. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.253.111.124 (talk) 14:57, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Recentism and BLP problems
As with a lot of articles on Turkey, this article suffers a great deal from recentism as well. Racism in Turkey is a phenomenon that has been there (in its modern sense) for over a century and has substantial historical roots. Whilst this article does a good job of explaining some historical aspects, a lot of crucial aspects of racism in Turkey are just missing e.g. a lot of the ideological dimension, Nihal Atsız and his followers, who do not even mind being called "racist". On the other hand, whilst the current situation should definitely be covered in detail, the article devotes paragraphs upon paragraphs to narrating specific incidents that took place in the 2000s and 2010s. Encyclopaedic writing in such an article should give an overview and mention salient cases, but not every instance of racism, and should not list these in a newscast-like tone. Currently much of the article just consists of lists of events (especially in the "Against Armenians" section). I won't be removing anything (except for a statement made in Sweden!) but I will be tagging the article for attention. , I think you may be interested in fixing this.

On top of that, I think this article might have a serious BLP problem. For specific incidents to be labelled as instances of racism, we need them to be reported as racism by reliable sources. This should absolutely be the case when living people are involved. I personally do think that all of this rhetoric these people are spewing is racism, just in case if it is unfortunately the case that I need to make that clear. But it is not important that I, as a Wikipedia editor, consider it racism. Per WP:BLP that type of classification should be absolutely sourced to WP:RS and furthermore the source should be attributed in the sentence. The sentence on Aras Özbiliz an excellent example of how that should be done. --GGT (talk) 19:41, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Wrong title?
This topic is titled "Racism in Turkey". But the entire article talks about "Ethnic discrimination in Turkey". MrUnoDosTres (talk) 19:43, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Why? Racism includes many ways of ethnic and racial segregation. Turkey has been historically a country with a substantial problem of racism, and the title has nothing wrong. I don't know what is the difference, ethnic discrimination is part of wider Turkish social racism. ZaDoraemonzu (talk), 12:11, 9 September 2020 (UTC)

The title says its racism but its mostly about excluded people YUMOYOY (talk) 13:16, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

No mention of the Greek Genocide?
The Genocide against Greek and the events before the Lausanne Treaty should be mentioned 62.228.52.76 (talk) 00:53, 20 April 2023 (UTC)


 * I think it would be more accurate to talk about how the Greeks killed the Turks by tearing their flesh in Tripolitsa in 1821. Or how the Greeks brutally tortured and killed Turkish pilot Cengiz Topel in Cyprus. It would be more correct to mention. The hypocrisy of the Greeks is not found in any other nation in the world. You are constantly committing genocide against other nations, especially Turks, and playing the victim. It's really disgusting. 176.220.242.91 (talk) 10:01, 11 August 2023 (UTC)
 * Why would that be mentioned in an article about ethnic discrimination in Turkey? But if you care, the topic is covered under "Civilian Massacre" in the wikipedia article on the Siege of Tripolitsa, contextualizing it with the Turkish-to-Greek massacre that had occured a few months earlier--both considered war crimes from modern perspectives. As for Cengiz Topel, we are speaking of a pilot who dropped bombs on villages during Cypriot intercommunal violence, correct? He also has his own Wikipedia page and would not belong in this particular article on ethnic discrimination in Turkey.
 * The presence of one genocide does not negate the ethnic cleansing of another. You can hold both atrocities as sad realities of history. 192.160.130.39 (talk) 16:39, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Here is the wikipedia page where your complaints would be better suited: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacres_during_the_Greek_War_of_Independence 192.160.130.39 (talk) 16:43, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

What is this article about?
Sorry to say this but over the years this article has evolved into one big unmanageable mess.

It was initially created as a bone fide attempt to summarise animosity in Turkey against the traditionally defined religious minorities (azınlıklar) and Kurds, and was titled "Racism in Turkey". Fair enough, but even then there was a problem with WP:OR/WP:SYNTH as I discussed above many years ago, with incidents not being explicitly described as "racist" being dumped into the article.

Over the years it was renamed "Racism and discrimination in Turkey". Gradually sections were added about newer, immigrant communities and the xenophobia they've experienced (Afghans, Arabs, Syrians). Now there is even a section titled "against Turks"!

This is ridiculous. There is no single source that treats all of these as a single unified phenomenon. The name of the article is awfully non-specific: will this article be expanded to include examples of sexism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, ableism and so forth? Those all fall under the discrimination category, right? I can't see a comparable lack of focus for any other such article for other countries either. This article seems to have become a dumping ground for all sorts of things wrong with Turkey, but lacks encyclopaedic focus. GGT (talk) 20:48, 21 August 2023 (UTC)


 * I agree and the lumping together or "Xenophobia and discrimination" in the title is ridiculous. Xenophobia is specific; discrimination is general - which type of discrimination. If the page is about racism, it should be about that; if it is about all discrimination, it does not need another, more specific form of discrimination mentioned alongside it - though I would hazard that "discrimination" is too broad a topic even as a very broad umbrella topic. The title here definitely needs a rethink. Iskandar323 (talk) 21:33, 28 October 2023 (UTC)


 * Comment: The article needs ce, but the source content supports the relationship between the terms. No objection to changing the title to "Xenophobia and ethnic discrimination in Turkey" or "Racism and ethnic discrimination in Turkey" if a more specific title finds consensus.  // Timothy :: talk  21:43, 28 October 2023 (UTC)