The Armenian Genocide has lessons for Canadians as they come to terms with trauma inflicted on indigenous people, renowned Canadian-Armenian filmmaker Atom Egoyan told CBC News.
The Canadian Museum for Human Rights is marking the centennial of the Armenian Genocide with a visit from Egoyan and his wife, actress Arsinée Khanjian, who will both speak at the respective event.
“On my father’s side, my grandparents were [Genocide] survivors,” Egoyan said. “My grandmother really was found in a village at the age of about six, so we don’t really know where she’s from.
“When we came to Canada [from Egypt], I was raised in Victoria, B.C., where there wasn’t really an Armenian community to speak of, so it was something that wasn’t really talked about a lot until I went to Toronto, and I realized that there was this whole history.
“It’s a pretty grim history but the amazing part is that Canada had a huge role in actually welcoming Armenian refugees at the time to Canada and has actually acknowledged this officially as genocide.”
Egoyan added that he has come face to face with people who deny the Armenian Genocide.
“It’s not usually someone who says, ‘It didn’t happen,’” he added. “ It’s someone who basically says, ‘Well, there have been exaggerations,’ or ‘I’m sure there are two sides to the story.’ There’s usually some way of equivocating. Of course when you meet someone who’s actually adamant about the denial, it becomes even starker than that. It’s a little surreal to be honest, it’s quite surreal.
“You have to also understand when you meet someone who’s a young person who was raised in Turkey that they weren’t schooled with this.… A lot of them aren’t even aware of the history.”
And to the question on at what point is there no excuse for ignorance, he specifically responded: “Well, in the case of being able to understand someone else’s suffering. That’s what it comes down to; it’s this question of compassion. It’s this understanding that we’re dealing with other human beings.
“This is a responsibility that we have as a society and we have to hold ourselves up to the very high standards of being able to address the wrongs that we have done.”
