Thanks for a great debate!

Thank you to student leaders who planned the well-attended debate on the Ward Connerly Initiative that was held yesterday. The debate was well organized, balanced, informative and engaging. The speakers offered diverse perspectives and the audience questions were insightful. Congratulations to all the organizers on an excellent event, and thanks to everyone who attended to learn more about this important issue.

Cathy Busha
director, Office of LGBTQ Affairs

Ninety-three years and counting

April 24, 1915 marks the culmination of the Ottoman Empire’s Committee of Union and Progress plan to completely exterminate the Armenian race. During the beginning of the 20th century, the Ottoman Empire had already significantly declined in land and power, and as a result, crisis, revolution and political groups arose. The Turks grew tense when the Armenians attempted to be politically involved. They questioned Armenia’s intent and felt threatened by any foreign participation in their government. Armenians were suddenly second-class citizens, with limited rights and security.

In 1915, all Armenians within the empire and neighboring countries were ordered to leave their homes. The top Armenian intellectuals and community leaders were executed. Armenian women, children, men and elderly were forced to march into the deserts of eastern Turkey without any supplies or food. Though death from starvation was expected, the Turkish government also organized massacres along the way. Turkish officials slaughtered, raped, burned and tortured many. By the end of this tragic event, 1.5 out of 2 million Armenians were killed.

Today, 22 countries have officially recognized the events in 1915 as “”genocide,”” however, the Turkish government has yet to admit that the violent acts constitute as such. Photographs, written documents and survivors from the genocide have made Turkey’s denial even more irrational. Former UA professor Elif Shafak, of Turkish studies and Women’s studies, was arrested by the Turkish government for acknowledging the Armenian genocide in her recent book, “”The Bastard of Istanbul.”” The longer the Turkish government is left unanswerable to their atrocious deeds against the Armenians, the harder it becomes for both the Armenians and Turks to repair relations among one another.

The implications of this denial are vital – Hitler himself mentioned the extermination of the Armenians prior to his genocide of the Jews: “”Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”” With on-going genocides such as Darfur, leaving genocide unrecognized and unaccounted for makes itoniy more probable that genocide will continue to occur without consequence.

Ninety-three years have passed and Armenians from all over the world still commemorate the Armenian Genocide. Since Turkey failed to erase the entire population of Armenia, Armenians have the opportunity to educate others in hopes that the world will recognize the Genocide and Turkey’s actions will never be forgotten.

Sevan Abnous
Armenian Students Association

‘All living creatures are sacred’

World Week for Animals in Laboratories takes place this week through Saturday. Every year, 100 million animals are experimented on. Most of these die as a result. Here’s my input to the ongoing vivisection debate in the Daily Wildcat. I do this with the realization there may be impassioned arguments from the medical researchers and graduate assistants who will fear losing future salary and grant opportunities because of what I say.

The National Institutes of Health is the largest funding source for experiments involving animals. Entering the words “”brain injury”” into the NIH CRISP database turns up 26 results for 2007. The majority of these are grants for experiments involving piglets. To study a brain injury on a newborn swine, you must inflict a brain injury on it. Since Dartmouth and the University of Pennsylvania received NIH grants, they both obviously have a means to do so. Morally, I believe all living creatures are sacred. But not everybody believes the way I do nor has strong morals. I choose not to profit from intentionally inflicting harm on innocent species. I’m not going to belabor the point. I’ll close by saying my hat is off to Wayne State University for choosing to use cadavers in its TBI experiments.

Curt Fluegel
UA alumnus