Kifeas wrote:CopperLine wrote:Are Turkish Cypriots indigenous to Cyprus ? Does it matter, or when and how does it matter ? If the prefix Turkish before Cypriot refers to language and the prefix Greek before Cypriot refers to Hellenic Cyprus then consider this :
If the minimal definition of Hellenic culture is language and religion - Greek and Orthodox - and the numerical majority of Cypriots are part and parcel of hellenic culture, and then one says to that 'you don't have to leave Cyprus if you're Turkish Cypriot, just assimilate as a Cypriot', what real choices do I have if the language of my house is Turkish, and the religion of my home is Muslim ? I can lose Cyprus and being a Cypriot by going, say, to Turkey; or I can lose my language and religion by remaining in Cyprus. Either way I've lost something extremely precious. Remember the humanitarian disaster that was the 1922-23 'population exchange' between Greece and Turkey all in the (confused and contradictory) name of language and religion. All peoples lost.
If on the other hand the speaking and teaching of Turkish was supported across the island (similarly that the teaching and speaking of Greek), if mosque and church were actually open to all (personally I'm an atheist so am not too keen on promoting religious mumbo-jumbo, but I love religious architecture) then the inherent dangers of assimilation could give way to a richer multiculturalism.
Have a listen to Nina Simone's brilliant civil rights song, "Missisippi goddam',
[find a version here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LOkNUaLjT4 and a longer one here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ckarOiWLLtY ] [/size] it is telling how the Cyprus problem is strikingly reminiscent of the 1860-1960s US civil rights struggle -
"you don't have to live next to me
just give me my equality
CopperLine, the argument here so far wasn’t whether the TCs are indigenous to Cyprus, but, believe it or not, whether the Greek Cypriots are! If you were to ask me, yes, the TCs are also indigenous to Cyprus! However, the argument here derives from the efforts of some Turks (they do not deserve the title of TCs) to convince us that we GCs are not indigenous to Cyprus!
This effort of theirs has a reason and a purpose! It is based on the historical by now propaganda claim of the official Turkish side that there are no Cypriot people and no Cypriot nation, but only two different and separate nations in Cyprus, the Turks and the Greeks, who both (peoples or nations) have an equal separate right to Cyprus, as two separate peoples. This invention of theirs is made so that they can justify the notion that (a.) as a TC community they do not constitute a minority but a separate people and therefore they are entitled to a separate self-determination right, and (b.) so that based on a., they can more easily promote their irredentist pro-partition thesis, by convincing the international community that they are entitled to such a separate self-determination right.
Even when they now talk about a solution of the Cyprus issue on the basis of a bi-zonal and a bi-communal federation, under the umbrella of the UN; in reality what they are aiming is for a virgin birth instant recognition of their status as a separate nation with its own “inherited” (read usurped) territory in the north of Cyprus (read vindication of the 1974 invasion and ethnic cleansing of the GCs from there,) and through this virgin birth instant recognition to enter into a confederation type of agreement with the “counterpart GC nation-state in the south.”
I hope you now understand where it all stems from!
PS: Be careful when you use notions such as “equality” in Cyprus. No one single GC denies one single human, political, cultural, religious, linguistic and democratic right of any one single TC! We believe that every TC should enjoy every one of the all the above rights, just like every single GC will do! However, you have to know that when the Turks use the concept of equality in Cyprus, what they basically mean is that we should more or less accept the grouping of the 82% of Cypriots into one set, and the groping of the remaining 18% of Cypriots into another set, and then “level-out” and “equate” the larger group with the smaller, in a "procrustean bed's" fashion!
.But you can't go wrong with "Mycenaeans"
