Disaster Law Project

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to reinstate the death penalty in response to the failed coup on July 15.  It’s been over 30 years since Turkey lawfully executed anyone, and in 2004, pursuant to a constitutional overhaul predicated on Turkey’s hopes of joining the EU, capital punishment was officially taken off the books. 

But the coup attempt emboldened Erdogan and other hardliners in the AKP, Turkey’s ruling political party that has origins in religious fundamentalism, and which at times seems increasingly ambivalent to the EU.  Despite monetary reforms that opened the economy, reduced national debt and increased personal spending, the AKP has dragged its feet on human rights.  It has blocked social media sites, curbed the sale and consumption of alcohol, and flirted with the idea of criminalizing adultery.  It sacked judges and detained journalists.  It tortures prisoners.

The accession process nonetheless plodded along, showing that enough members of the EU, tentatively at least, believed Turkey would eventually come around.  That bet was risky from the start, and the AKP gave Europe few assurances after the coup attempt when it summarily removed or detained more than 80,000 people from government, military and civic institutions – including relatives of individuals the AKP suspected of sympathizing with coup supporters.  That number continues to grow.

Turkey declared a state of emergency on July 20, followed by an announcement that it would suspend both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [ICCPR] and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms [ECHR].  So what does all of this mean for the death penalty?

It’s hard to know whether Erdogan is serious or saber-rattling (though my bet is on the latter).  But even if he is sincere and Turkey lawfully suspended the ECHR and ICCPR, it can’t reinstate the death penalty without violating international law.  Here’s why:

1. Human Rights Commitments. Turkey is a party to both the ICCPR and the ECHR.  The substantive rights protected by these instruments overlap to some extent.  The ECHR defines a narrower set of rights than the ICCPR, however, but is somewhat easier to enforce.  Neither instrument expressly prohibits the death penalty, though both recognize a fundamental “right to life,” and prohibit “inhumane or degrading” punishment.  Continue reading “Turkey and the Death Penalty: Why International Law Prohibits Capital Punishment Even After the Failed Coup” →

1. You are not the only one. There were others. Or there will be. It’s only a matter of time.

2. Find them. It won’t be hard. Three degrees of separation at best.

3. These are your allies. Your new BFFs. They’ll get it even before you finish telling them. Close ranks around each other when you need to.

4. You will lose friends. Sorry. Because someone who says “I really don’t want to choose sides,” just did.

5. Cut ’em loose. I regret not doing this much earlier. Seeing “them” forced me to remember “him” every time, and took me back to the night he raped me at the lake. But I couldn’t keep bringing it up all the time, because they’d say I was crazy or obsessed.  That’s how victim blaming works.  Don’t give anyone that much power over you, or your healing.

6. “I can’t believe I just did that.” That’s what he said when I was still pinned to the floor of the car with him on top of me. Damn, he was heavy. But sure, maybe he felt bad. So what. Didn’t stop him from raping someone else.

7. When your therapist asks at your first meeting, “have you ever thought about forgiving him?” NO. NO motherfucker. The answer is NO. Then immediately run for the door. Because if that’s the first go-to question, your therapist is either a rapist, or a rape apologist. Get out before it does more damage.

PS: see a *she.*  Lesson learned.

8. But don’t give up on therapy. I cycled through 4 therapists before finding my life saver – what up Dr. Fowler! You’ll find yours. Give it time.  Take breaks when you need them.

9. Forgive him if you want, though. And bring it up at therapy if you need to. But do it on your own terms. Personally, I don’t really think about “forgiveness” – it’s just not a thing for me either way. You might be different.

10. Same with naming. Only you will know if and when it’s the right thing, for YOU. If you do it, though, prepare yourself as well as you can for the backlash. You won’t know exactly what form it will take, or what it will cost you. But it will come. It will suck. And you’ll get through it. I promise.

11. Flashbacks. They’ll knock you down. Like, physically, they knock you down. But it’s a flashback, that’s all. OK? Look where you are. Put your hand on the desk. Hard surface, cold to the touch, probably. Look at your shoes. A little scuffed, right? Reach for that book, and leaf through the pages. Hear that soft muffle? Smell your coffee. That’s how you get through a flashback. Which is all it is. And it will pass.

12. They’re like a sucker-punch though, flashbacks – because you don’t always know when they’re going to hit. There was a time as a Law Prof when I was the target of what fancy-thinkers like to call “contra-power harassment” by a group of student I’m pretty sure would have raped me given the chance. They didn’t, but I remember walking into the student lounge one day seeing them circled around the ring leader. One of them spotted me and nodded to the others. One by one they pulled back just enough to let me pass, but close enough to give me goose bumps. A stronger woman might have just rolled her eyes and kept walking, but I went straight to the bathroom and had a full out panic attack on the floor. Like I said, flashbacks knock you down.

13. That scene in the student lounge was the same thing I happened upon 20 years earlier when I walked into the high school cafeteria the morning after he raped me. He was surrounded by teammates, eager and attentively soaking up the lurid detail.  One of them saw me and nodded to the others. One by one they pulled back just enough to let me pass, but close enough to give me goose bumps.  He stepped forward and yelled, “Hey, I had to wash my car. Remember – you got out and puked all over the place. You owe me $2.50.”

14. Those two snapshots in time were close enough to trigger a flashback after 20 years. But they weren’t the same thing. It’s never the same thing. It’s not that place. And it’s not that time. It’s here. It’s now. And it’s different. Remember that. Thank you, Janet Bell, for reminding me.

15. Don’t trouble yourself with thinking you should be where I am now, because it took 25 years for me to get here. Just know that I was once where you are, sometimes angry, sometimes sad, sometimes self-loathing, and sometimes dismissing what happened, all the while shaking my head in disbelief at women I thought had found a way to get over being raped. “What the fuck is wrong with them – why aren’t they still mad?!?”

16. My anger has shifted away from the man who raped me, towards the men who are still raping other people, and the sycophants who keep making excuses for them. And I’ve learned that I was wrong about the women who found peace. They didn’t get over it, but they did move through it. You will too. Eventually.

17. He raped you. And that was about him. What happens now is about you.

18. I believe you.
19. We believe you.
20. We believe in you.