Being a professor not enough to be a human

It has to be asked of Professor Celal Şengör, who ruined an exceptionally sunny Sunday for many of us with his poisonous ideas in an interview with Radikal’s Armağan Çağlayan, while he praised late military leader Kenan Evren and the Sept. 12 military coup, together with his hate for democracy and his ambition for oligarchy, what he was trying to prove by gorillas at a zoo that making people eat feces in prison was not torture…  

I wonder if, according to him, puncturing people’s soles and palms by hitting with sticks, batons, chains and irons was torture. 

Was it torture, I wonder, to strip people naked and advance dogs on them? 

Was it torture to expose people to electricity? 

I wonder if it was torture to hang people upside down, tied with a chain on one leg and keep them there until they passed out. 

Was it torture to lay 50 people on top of each other and make then chant the national anthem? 

Was it torture to make people smoke five cigarettes simultaneously and make them eat the filters when they were finished? 

Was it torture to line people up and make the one behind climb on the back of the person in front and make them walk until they collapsed? 

Was it torture to force people to go under a bunker and because they cannot fit, hit arms and legs that remain outside with clubs? 

Was it torture to push people into a sewage pool? 

Was it torture to force people to memorize 40 marches and make them chant them until their vocal cords gave in? 

Was it torture to ban people from sitting down for 14 hours? 

Or was it torture to barge in dormitories while people were sleeping and beat them with batons and clubs? 

We do not know yet whether Şengör has a scientific explanation about why these are not tortures but we do know that he has not been able to save himself from the “ignorance” of the people he constantly complains about in the 35 years he has avoided them. 

Really, it is the educated ignorant who causes the biggest damage to societies because it is not only education that eliminates ignorance; one also needs a strong character.

Education is not enough to be a human being nor can it be ascertained from a person’s CV if he is humanitarian. 

Don’t ever judge people by the title of the schools they have graduated from. 

As a matter of fact, freedom of expression is partly needed for this. Let everybody talk so that we can refute the poisonous ideas of some.