VBefore the elections scheduled for June 2023, there are two facts about the voting tendencies for Erdoğan and his party. Fact one, the erosion of votes for the government has removed various circles from Erdogan, the most loyal to him are the Islamist arch-conservative voters. Because of the economic crisis, even they are no longer such fanatical supporters of the government as they used to be. Fact two, a large proportion of young voters have no intention of voting for Erdogan and his AKP, which offer them no future. Erdoğan is aware of these facts, but seems to have already given up on the drifting young people in order to at least keep the conservatives. As the elections approach, he tries to make his Islamist voters happy by tickling young people’s nerves and interfering with modern lifestyles with reactionary measures.
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Summer is festival season in Turkey. This summer nearly twenty youth festivals have been banned for odd reasons. Some were canceled “for security reasons”. Although there were no problems with security. Others reported that alcohol was being consumed or that girls and boys were staying in the same tents. In order not to lose the votes of the conservative electorate locally, something was sacrificed, which is fun for the young people, from whom there are no votes to be won anyway. What we have witnessed over the past few weeks shows that the government will not limit itself to canceling festivals, but will repeatedly play the card of appalling Islamofascism in order to win the elections.
Bulent Mumay
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Image: private
It is now punishable to poke fun at imam preacher schools, the number of which has multiplied since Erdoğan took office. Pop singer Gülsen was jailed for an analogy she joked with friends. For whatever reason, her words from April were only remembered on August 25. Hours after these were launched by the pro-government press, the pop star was arrested for sedition. But there is a completely different reason behind it. Gülsen had stood behind LGBTI+ people and shown the rainbow flag at concerts in recent months. The government dislikes the way she dresses in her clips and concerts, and has penalized TV stations for showing footage of her. With Gülsen’s arrest, the palace government sends a salute to the conservative electorate. The main thing is to silence Gülsen and make it impossible for her to perform. After a week in prison, she protested and her detention was commuted to house arrest. This ensures that Gülsen cannot perform, dress as she pleases in public and no longer supports the LGBTI+ movement.
If you don’t pray, you risk your life
So it’s a criminal offense to make a joke. But calling for murder against a singer who was arrested for joking is, according to Turkish case law, quite normal. A conservative politician had said about Gülsen: “It is imperative to kill this woman.” He continues to walk around freely. Penalties are raining down on broadcasters that bring Gülsen’s clips, but the TV channel, which said: “Music drives people to adultery”, is only “observed” by the state. The palace justice that sentenced Gülsen to house arrest for supporting LGBTI+ people is also letting go of an imam who declared pedophilia normal. “Arms, breasts, legs, everything is bare in the child, but pedophilia is then supposed to be a crime. It’s you who challenges pedophilia, “were his words, the judiciary could not find any criminal offense in it.