Conclusion consequently persecuted and massacred (especially in the sixteenth cen-
tury) and were the targets of Sunni Hanefi conversion efforts (especially
in the nineteenth century) on grounds of their heretical beliefs, includ-
ing allegedly engaging in ritualistic orgies. Like the conversos, who pro-
moted secularism since it seemed to fulfill their highest hopes, a society
free of the religious persecution of ecclesiastical society,^34 because of four
centuries of documented persecution, the Alevi supported the creation of
the new, secular Turkish Republic. They believed it would relieve them
of Sunni Hanefi oppression and allow them the freedom to practice their
own religion in private. Alevi deemed only a secular state that established
no religion, but protected the freedom of all, could relieve them of op-
pression and allow them to maintain their unique religious identity. For
this reason, they wholeheartedly joined the Kemalist revolution, many
seeing it as a chance to no longer be a central concern of an oppressive
state. And in the new republic, they were considered Turks by race, if
formerly schismatic Muslims, and an important ethnic building block of
the new nation.^35 Many of those who publicly abandoned an Alevi iden-
tity and embraced secular nationalism were able to integrate into Turkish
society, although the state has not recognized, or allowed them to main-
tain their religious institutions and practices and continues to Islamize
them through compulsory religious education and mosque building in
Alevi villages.^36
Unlike the Alevi, the urban Dönme were tolerated, their beliefs not
being an issue, and they supported Ottomanism in which all the elements
of society belonged to an overarching identity. The Dönme, who had
thus thrived in the empire, were opposed to its dissolution and the con-
struction of nation-states in its place. In the Turkish Republic, they were
targeted due to their beliefs, including allegedly engaging in ritualized
orgies, and were not accepted as true Muslims. They were discriminated
against as Jews and foreigners. Dönme were not in practice accepted as
Turks and were distrusted on account of their international commercial
connections, which were severed or confiscated.
Because of their very different experiences at the hands of the Turkish Re-
public, the Alevi underwent a renaissance and today they thrive, while the
Dönme have dissolved as an organized community. The Dönme and Alevi,
therefore, faced historically opposite pressures, since the latter were perse-
cuted by the imperial state for their religious beliefs, but were not a primary
concern of the secular state, which approved of their racial identity.