After Cracking Down On Tens Of Thousands Of Enemies, Erdogan Says He's Dropping His 2000 Lawsuits Over Insults

from the say-what-now? dept

Fri, Jul 29th 2016 7:39pm — Mike Masnick

For the last few months we've poked fun at Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has ridiculously thin skin. As we noted, he had filed upwards of 100 lawsuits per month against people for "insulting" him -- and this included things as ridiculous as posting a meme on social media that compared Erdogan to Gollum.

Of course, more recently (as you've heard) there was a coup attempt in Turkey, which failed, and Erdogan has spent the last few weeks basically using the coup as an excuse to crush all his enemies.

In the first 48 hours, around 7,000 people were detained, arrested, or dismissed from their jobs. That number has been rising constantly, reaching around 66,000 people from all layers of society, but consisting mostly of government employees.

Add to that the family members of those arrested and dismissed and you will reach a number of 250,000-300,000 potential new opponents, most of whom were not involved with the "other" side or had no direct links with it. The memory of the killings, the hatred, and violence, the split in the army and government agencies about who was on which side -- all of this is truly traumatic for the Turkish nation.

And now, having done that -- including having shut down much of the media in the country and arresting a ton of journalists, Erdogan is apparently in a good mood. He has announced that in a "show of good will," he's going to drop those thousands of cases against people for insulting him.

Uh... thanks?

Of course, he notes that this is a "one-off," meaning he can start bringing more cases pretty soon. Besides, it hardly seems like a gesture of goodwill when it follows destroying the lives of 100s of thousands of people to further entrench your own political power and interests. Of course, he also has a message to anyone with an opinion on all of this:

"Some people give us advice. They say they are worried. Mind your own business! Look at your own deeds."

Yeah. Perhaps Erdogan should look at his own deeds as well.

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Filed Under: coup, goodwill, insults, recep tayyip erdogan, turkey

30 Comments

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That One Guy (profile), 29 Jul 2016 @ 6:09pm

Tattered silk glove over iron fist
I'm guessing this is a (laughably obvious) attempt to demonstrate that he can show 'mercy' to those that oppose him as well as brutality, an attempt to disguise his tyrannical, thuggish nature. That it comes at the same time as he's busy purging 'his' country of those that might have stood up to him makes it a pathetic attempt, but I suppose he figures no-one will be willing to stand up and call him on it at this point.
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Steve Zissou (profile), 29 Jul 2016 @ 7:52pm

'a one off gesture of goodwill' sounds like something an angry dictator would say
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jul 2016 @ 8:07pm

Re: Tattered silk glove over iron fist
I don't think he can grasp the concept of mercy. His previous lawsuits were a dragnet to scoop up all his detractors. Hoping to get serious enemies some unwitting protestors got caught up. He just didn't realize the more he sued over trivial insults made him the target of more such insults making him sue more people to root out more enemies.
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jul 2016 @ 8:15pm

No need to keep suing the people if you've used the coupe attempt to thrown most of the people in jail and scare them into not speaking out again. Helps when the media is all Erdogans people now as well so they won't report anything other than what he wants them to say.
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Padpaw (profile), 29 Jul 2016 @ 8:40pm

Re:
until the next coupe attempt anyway. There will always be those willing to risk their lives to bring down a tyrant.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 29 Jul 2016 @ 9:28pm

After the July 20 Plot...
...Hitler used the plot as an excuse to prune the ranks of about seven thousand individuals, few of which actually had to do with the attack. Likewise, the Gestapo and the SS took advantage of the incident to accuse their enemies, many of whom were not merely executed, but killed brutally to make an example of them. Hanging from piano wire was popular. It was a good time to be in the piano wire market.

Great moments in history!
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Anonymous Coward, 29 Jul 2016 @ 10:39pm

Re: After the July 20 Plot...
Hitler was all too familiar with plots, he tried to overthrow the government himself.
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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 12:12am

Why waste the courts time after you've had the persons who insulted you rounded up, tortured, & worse?

We should be more afraid he is going to decide this is a faster way to handle things & start ordering strikes elsewhere.
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Hugo S Cunningham (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 12:51am

An example others should follow?
This would be an appropriate time to ask Gollum to forgive that guy who compared him to some politician...
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 1:16am

Re: Tattered silk glove over iron fist
With a lot of western critique coming down on him, he has to show capable of acting "democratically" and send at least some of the people he has cleansed to court.

If you fill the courts with useless defamation lawsuits, you will end up stalling that opportunity. To be able to satisfy EU and US demands for some kind of legal action before execution, he has to clear the courts for his theater to begin.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 1:23am

Re: After the July 20 Plot...
Stalin... Trotsky... The great purge...

If you dig in history it is brimming of tyrants solidifying their power by purging percieved plots against them. It actually seems like one of the most telltale signs of a dictators, szars, sultans or kings to purge opposition by force.
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Mark Wing, 30 Jul 2016 @ 3:35am

This reminded me of:

"Conan, what is best in life?"

"Crush your enemies. See them driven before you. Hear the lamentations of their women."
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Norahc, 30 Jul 2016 @ 3:51am

Travel plans
I still wouldn't make any travel plans to Turkey if I was you, Mike.
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Tejat, 30 Jul 2016 @ 4:38am

Re: Travel plans
I still wouldn't make any travel plans to Turkey if I was you, Mike.

Why not? I'm sure it's perfectly safe. Turkey is a "democracy", remember?
/s
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 4:41am

Revenge is a dish best served cold. Mr. Putin knows that too.
Trump 2016 :p
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 6:52am

He is exhibiting all the hallmærks of a dicktator. Yes yes spelling mistake on purpose.
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 8:09am

Obviously having thousands of people executed and recording the results to masturbate over later is more entertaining to Erdogan than lawsuits.
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art guerrilla (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 8:24am

Re: Re: Tattered silk glove over iron fist
yeah, that and, um, he threw the 2000 lawsuit defendants in jail; so, yeah, no need for the lawsuits themselves any longer...
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Jul 2016 @ 10:14am

He's probably already put all of those people in prison by now as "coup participants".
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Uriel-238 (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 12:36pm

Conan the Barbarian (the 1982 movie) wasn't the first.
Allegedly from Genghis Khan (though considered out of character by some historians) The greatest joy for a man is to defeat his enemies, to drive them before him, to take from them all they possess, to see those they love in tears, to ride their horses, and to hold their wives and daughters in his arms.
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Hugo S Cunningham (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 12:56pm

Conan's model
@Mark Wing--
If you want to see where Robert E Howard got that quote, google: "Genghis Khan joy is in victory".
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Mason Wheeler (profile), 30 Jul 2016 @ 3:36pm

Re: Re:
When's the last time you heard of it happening in North Korea?
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Pixelation, 30 Jul 2016 @ 8:34pm

We can do better
Apparently we haven't turned up the taunting enough.

Hey Erdogan, saying you look like Gollum is an insult to Gollum!
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Mark Wing, 30 Jul 2016 @ 10:40pm

Thanks, Hugo!
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Tin-Foil-Hat, 30 Jul 2016 @ 11:11pm

Thanks
Thank you Bush and Obama. Bush's lies and warmongering and Obama's incompetence has really contributed to major instability. It's so nice that the US can stir up shit and then return home with an ocean separating them from the chaos. I hope the next coup is successful.
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Anonymous Coward, 31 Jul 2016 @ 5:28pm

Those poor Lawyers
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Anonymous Coward, 1 Aug 2016 @ 5:12am

Re: Thanks
It's not tinfoil hat territory to say that world leaders are to blame for the "instability".

In fact, the middle east instability started before WWII.
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Ninja (profile), 1 Aug 2016 @ 6:56am

Re: After the July 20 Plot...
Nothing like a failed coup to help a real coup flourish. I wonder if there are any "fake" failed coups orchestrated to support real coups out there.

Of course, nowadays you don't need weapons to instate a coup, just look at Brazil.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 1 Aug 2016 @ 10:32am

Fake coups...
Operation Fall Weiss, 1939?
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Uriel-238 (profile), 1 Aug 2016 @ 10:38am

Re: Fake coups...
I'm sorry. More specifically Operation Himmler.

I could Godwin for dayzzzzzz.
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