WASHINGTON, DC – Grammy Award-winning band System of a Down has reached out to hundreds of thousands of its fans by posting on its website an Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) action alert calling on the Public Broadcasting Service to back away from plans to broadcast a panel discussion this April featuring known deniers of the Armenian Genocide.
The band, known for its worldwide genocide prevention efforts, has been at the forefront of the effort to end U.S. complicity in the Turkish government’s campaign to deny the Armenian Genocide. System has pressed aggressively for the adoption of Armenian Genocide resolutions before the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, including through a personal visit last September to the Batavia, Illinois district office of Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert. To view the System link, visit:
www.systemofadown.com and click on “News.”
The action alert comes in response to the recent PBS announcement that it plans to broadcast a panel discussion, including known Armenian Genocide deniers Justin McCarthy and Omer Turan, following the airing this April of the documentary “The Armenian Genocide,” produced by Andrew Goldberg. The ANCA has formally protested PBS’s decision, and established an online WebFax program through which thousands of individuals have already registered their protests. Additionally, over 12,000 protests have been sent to PBS through an online petition set up by Armenian Tidorts:
http://www.petitiononline.com/pbspanel/petition.html
The lead authors of the Armenian Genocide Resolution before the U.S. House of Representatives, Adam Schiff (D-CA) and George Radanovich (R-CA), and Armenian Caucus Co-Chairmen Joe Knollenberg (R-MI) and Frank Pallone (D-NJ), have urged their colleagues to join with them in signing a Congressional letter expressing opposition to PBS’s plans to provide a platform to deniers of the Armenian Genocide. The growing controversy over PBS’s actions has been covered by the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times.
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