Turkish Armed Forces and Postmodern War-Management

Published in Turkish Daily News, 17 January 2008

The Turkish and international media gave wide coverage to recent Turkish excursions into and bombings of outlawed PKK targets in northern Iraq.

Most of the commentaries focused on the pros and cons of military campaigns on the fragile state of Iraq, the never-ending ‘final moves' to end PKK terror in Turkey and the rekindling of Turkish-American relations. These are in fact legitimate questions, but there is more that needs to be analyzed.

A key area that has escaped from the critical (and often clichéd) eyes of mainstream commentators in Turkey is why these campaigns have been communicated to Turkish society in the way that they have been. In this article, I want to draw attention not to the military attacks and their results or implications, but to how the Turkish Armed forces have employed and orchestrated cutting-edge public relations tactics.

Old school war-management:

In the good old days, managing societies that were engaged in wars was a lot easier. Since the primary information source was the armed forces themselves, the governments easily constructed stories of heroism, success and sacrifices performed for ‘higher ideals.' The pointless destruction, war crimes and failures could easily be left out in the dark. Society was just a spectator enjoying the unified narrative presented in movie-like news from the front lines. What mattered was that ‘we' were winning and ‘we' were ‘heroes' fighting for a ‘just' cause.

The only alternative source of information was the veterans, who had to choose to play either the ‘hero' with the hope that their sacrifices were in fact worth something, or the reclusive survivor who never spoke about war. And when those returnees refused to choose between these two sanctioned roles and dared to speak against their government's policies and the horrors of war, they were declared mentally or morally impaired and pushed out to the margins.

Thus, it was quite easy to manage one's society in the old days. All you needed to do was report as many successes and heroic stories as possible. However, with the development of independent media and easy access to the production and dissemination of photographs and videos from the front lines, the job of the governments and top generals became more difficult.

The Vietnam War was not more destructive or ‘evil' than any other war. In fact, the 20th century had seen bigger and more fatal wars. Yet, for the first time we were able to see the reality of war right in our living rooms, often contradicting the official euphemisms and stories presented to us. This meant that it was becoming a lot more difficult to lead us into collective hypnosis.

A single image of a young girl, Kim Phuc, screaming with pain from her burns and running away naked from a napalm bombing with a bunch of kids, became a turning point for war opposition. It muted all stories of military success and the idea that the war was being fought for noble causes. Though this signaled the end of traditional war-management, it only resulted in more sophisticated strategies. The new strategy, which was first applied during the Desert Storm campaign, uses the same tool that ended the old strategies.

New generation war-management:

If independent media taught us to mistrust the official narratives and cheap heroisms, it also led us to a fixation on the image and visual stimulation. If the previous problem was lack of information and its boring officialdom, our new problem is information overload and its erotic powers.

In order to compete with other producers for our decreasing attention spans, TV reporting has reduced the content of the information to minimal while maximizing its visual and musical effects. As the minimum amount of information is added on to amazing views of fighter jets, attractive uniforms and ‘cool' war toys, the war becomes a ‘thrill.' The shock-and-awe tactics create a sense of ‘awe' of human technology and its precision. The individual becomes fixed on sexy images at the expense of reality.

The news of bombing is presented with black and white videos supplied by the Air Force, which shows war more like an unreal video game. The more the dose of visual stimulation is increased, the more societies fall into rapture and intellectual numbness. Since we are more focused on the airplane, we have no perception of where the bombs fall, or moreover, of the deaths of the human beings underneath them. The U.S. has employed this style of perception management in its controversial campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan with great success.

It appears that the Turkish Armed Forces have learned more from the U.S. than intelligence and F-16 production. All throughout the north Iraq campaigns, top generals and government officials spoke endlessly about our newly acquired spy, night flight and bombing technologies. Newspapers presented the most attractive military pictures along with details of each bomb dropped and how our pilots are trained. TV channels showed videos of the bombings and real-life satellite images of the camps.

It has indeed been a successful example of war-management. Turkish society has faced minimum ethical dilemmas and found much pride and stimulation in our brand new military toys.

The AK Party, the failure of Islamism and traditional Turkish politics

Published on Nthposition, 8 January 2008

The Armed forces and the hopeful parties who sought to capitalize on their chance for power portrayed the last elections in Turkey as a choice between a secular state and a theocracy. The Western media picked up this rhetoric, and the elections were turned into an archetypal struggle between Islamism and democracy as the Turkish nation was said to be deciding on her 'soul'.

There were signals all along that the things were not what they seem to be. A significant portion of liberals, non-Muslims and ethnic minorities in Turkey voted for the AK Party, which was presented as a taqiya movement with mischievous plans to implement an Islamic state. These groups would face the harshest treatment if Turkey turned out to be ruled under Shari'a law; yet, they chose to take the 'risk' because the AK Party has been one of the governments most committed to addressing issues of human rights and religious freedom in the country.

Many observers abroad feared that with the reselection of the AK Party, Turkey would severe her ties with the West and turn Eastward, which would have significant implications on international security and economic relations. Yet foreign investors and most of the Europeans who hope for Turkish integration into the EU openly supported the AK Party because it has been the most proactive and serious government Turkey has ever had on EU negotiations as well as legislative changes, which led to an increase in foreign investment.

Learned commentators who sought to trace an agenda from the AK Party's long-abandoned roots in the Islamist Refah Party (Welfare Party) read the AK Party's increasing appeal in Turkey as a return or strengthening of the Islamist goals, which were brought to a halt by a soft intervention of the Armed forces on 28 February 1997. Yet Refah Party's successor, the Saadet Party (Felicity Party), and the nationalist-cum-Islamist BB Party (Great Union Party) openly condemned the AK Party as an un-Islamic party which had sold out to the West. Meanwhile, books claiming that Abdullah Gul and Tayyip Erdogan were Jews and Zionists topped the bestseller list.

Similarly, as doomsday scenarios of incompatibility of Islam and Secular Democracy found flesh in mass demonstrations, most of the interested onlookers missed the covered women amidst the 'secular' crowds. A couple of Turkish journalists picked on a middle-aged woman in a headscarf, who had 'naively' responded to the question of whether Turkey would become an Islamic state by saying: "Turkey will remain secular, Inshallah."

Ironically, it was the naivety of the journalists who did not realize that a clash between Islam and a secular state existed only as a prescriptive discourse, rather than as a descriptive reality. Turkish Islam has evolved to such a level that a Muslim could seek the help of Allah to sustain a secular state.

Now, the elections are over: we have a reaffirmed government and a promising new president. Turkey is on the same path as she was a year ago. However, the question of what was really happening in Turkey still needs to be asked. Once again, the developments in Turkey signal new formations of Islam and its relationship to politics.

The AK Party is a newcomer to the Turkish political arena. It won a majority vote in its first ever election on November 2002. Its conservative stand, which reflected traditional Turkey, and its commitment to pursuing full EU membership and economic reform struck a chord with a significant portion of the country. The brand-new face of its leaders presented a way out of the never-ending cycles of Turkish political tail chasings between the 'left' and the 'right'. Its young leadership presented a worldview driven by realpolitik in line with the demands of a global world and the need for modernization, unlike the traditional Islamist appeals for a return to a Golden Age and the establishment of the global rule of Islam in solidarity with the Muslim world.

Many people gave the AK Party the benefit of the doubt for want of any other viable option and as a reaction to the then ruling elite. The exception to the disappearances of the older folk is Deniz Baykal, who remains the ineffective and not-so-loved leader of the opposition party that no longer has a clear political stand. After five years in office, however, the AK Party's performance has matched initial expectations, and it achieved one of the highest elections results ever in the Turkish history.

There are no legitimate signs that Turkey has turned out to be more Islamic under this administration. The legendary misuse of Article 301 - with its courtroom dramas and its fatal attacks on liberal intellectuals and non-Muslims - has been undertaken by the followers of an increasingly dangerous Turkish rightwing nationalism... which is also anti-AK Party.

This may come as a surprise to those who have been shown a Turkey - either by certain groups in Turkey or by clumsy Western journalists - that is deciding between the East and West; Islam and democracy; international openness and national isolation. None of these frameworks are helpful in trying to understand contemporary Turkey. The AK Party represents a new paradigm both in Turkey and for the rest of the world. It can be understood only on its own terms as a unique product of the failure of Islamism, which chased after the utopias of caliphate and umma, and the traditional political structures of Turkey that existed in a bittersweet love triangle of left, right and the Armed Forces.

How I became a 'so-called' Turk?

Published in Turkish Daily News, 3 January 2008
Re-Published in French by Yevrobatsi as Comment je suis devenu un «soi-disant» Turc

Re-Published in Greek by Phileleftheros as Πως μετεξελίχθηκα σε "λεγόμενο" Τούρκο


In his challenging book “Identity and Violence” Nobel laureate Amartya Sen argues that our identities are constructed not only through our own efforts but also by the enforcement of our setting. For example, an Irish man may consider himself ‘white' and can have strong feelings against people with darker skin colors. However, it is only recently that the English have considered the Irish ‘white.' The Irish have been seen in lesser terms than the ‘actual whites.'

The exclusion of the Irish from the noble ‘white' community obviously has nothing to do with color, as one doesn't really get whiter than an Irishman. Whiteness is a social construct and the ‘real whites' are considered so because of their privileged place within the community of ‘whites'.

Recently, I have learned the hard way that ‘Turkishness' too has its own share of social enforcement and exclusion. I have always seen myself as a Turk. Turkish is my mother tongue. I was born and have spent most of my life in Turkey. I am a Turkish citizen. I genuinely love my country and I am committed to its future. All the members of my family are ethnic Turks, with the exception of one grandma who is Kurdish and my great grandmother who was a Greek convert to Islam. All these years I assumed that these were what made one ‘Turkish.'

Yet, my ‘Turkishness' has been challenged. This first happened when I turned 18 and, out of my disillusionment with Islam, I decided to follow the Christian faith. Though none of my family members are devout Muslims, I spent the following 11 years trying to explain that I love my country, do not work for the CIA and have no part in plans to reinstate the Byzantine Empire. My apologetics have not been too successful as since then I regularly hear the rhetorical question; “What kind of a Turk are you?”

As my ‘Turkishness' began to be questioned by my community, I too started losing my attachment to it. I studied in East Asia for three years and then continued my studies in the UK for three more years. Having studied five different languages (and messing them all up) and traveled to more than 20 countries for research or school reasons, I must admit that I love Japanese food and Shusaku Endo more than I love lahmacun (Turkish pizza) and Murathan Mungan.

When fate and academic interest in collective memory, ethnic conflict and transitional justice put me right in the middle of Turkish-Armenian relations, my Turkishness entered a new stage.

A clumsy newspaper called Avrupa Gazetesi – Turkish but printed and distributed in Europe – published a puzzling piece about a conference in which Dr Fatma Gocek and yours truly were going to speak to lobby for the Armenian cause. I only smiled, since I not only did not know Dr Gocek, nor have ever been invited to such an event, I was not even in the UK during that time.

The correction, which Avrupa Gazetesi published, was too late to stop the ripples. Soon, a host of nationalistic websites and e-groups elaborated further with titles such as “A new addition to the list of Traitors” and I was declared to be a ‘missionary', ‘Armenian lobbyist', but most significantly a “so-called Turk”. Thanks to these nationalist groups, I learned that there are two kinds of Turks: Turks-in-essence (özde Türkler) and so-called-Turks (sözde Türkler).

Some advice!

There is a moral to my identity career. First one is practical: if you don't want to lose your ‘Turkishness' please don't follow my footsteps, it would only lead you to anomie and significant loss of social capital.

The second one is theoretical. It appears that ‘Turkishness' is defined by religious affiliation plus historical and political opinion. Though most of these nationalist groups will give wild reactions when being a Turk is reduced to being a Muslim and Islam is seen as what makes us Turks, nevertheless adherence to the official and dominant views seem to be the criteria for judging to what degree someone is a Turk.

Apparently, citizenship, place of birth, mother tongue and personal feelings of the individual towards his or her country means nothing. One's ‘Turkishness' is validated and enforced by a quasi-official criterion and its willing executors, who have the market monopoly.

If this is so, then ‘Turkishness' is an ideology which one assumes through alignment of personal opinion. As ideologies inescapably shift and modify themselves, those who are privileged to be Turks-in-essence have to continually keep up with subtle changes so as not to be kicked off the list. Thus, it is quite tiring to remain a Turk and to maintain the boundaries of ‘Turkishness'. You never know when the next de-selection will be and who will be joined to the ranks of the outcasts.

A Theology of Guantanamo Bay

Philosopher Giorgio Agamben reminds us of the Roman figure homo sacer--the Sacred Man-- who, according to the Roman law, can be killed with impunity but cannot be sacrificed to gods. His biological life is divorced from political life putting him outside of the boundaries of what constitutes a human and what the rights of that human are. He not only does not belong to the realm of the ‘human’, but neither to the reality of the gods. What is not human and what does not have a ‘value’ can not be sacrificed to gods since its sacrifice would defile the sanctity of gods. Thus, homo sacer exists only as a biological body, not as a human. A theology which ascribes such a status inevitably shapes political forms.

During the 19th and 20th centuries a similar systematisation of which biological bodies would be ascribed the status of a ‘human’ was accomplished with the marriage of theological assumptions and the ‘findings’ of science that cemented the difference between biological life and political life. Theologically, there was developed the order of creation, levels of perfection and purity, and at which of these levels the Image of God is expressed in its perfect condition. Out of this cosmic ordering, there emerged the political theology that identified the nation, its security, significance and rights with this stage of advanced human lives, whose superiority has been proved by the shape of their skulls in line with the predetermined intellectual and athletic potential of ‘races’. Thus, Jews, Gypsies, mentally and physically handicapped were nothing but mere bodies that could and should be done away with so that they won’t ‘contaminate’ us.

Now racism—that is, the exclusion of a group on perceived grounds of difference and reasons—shows itself in properties of belonging, not in scientific criteria. You are either with ‘us’ or with ‘them’. But who are ‘we’? The bearers of civilization, justice, advancement, everything that is pure, good, noble, above all ‘we’ are the bearers of the Imago Dei, the Image of God! Who are ‘they’? Political representations of ‘them’, as seen visually in media representations, are whatever ‘we’ are not: evil, destructive, barbarian, uncivilized, backward. “They” are the bearers of the Image of the Devil! Therefore let us unite around a ‘crusade’ against the devil! The reproduction of ‘we’ and ‘them’ in this most common way is a theological one.

‘We’ act politically on such a theology in the never-ending war on terror, an infinite war with no visible enemies but only a theological embodiment of who ‘they’ are. This informs our ‘right’ for pre-emptive strike to secure ‘our way of life’, and in this process we theologically allocate the death tolls as well for which lives we can mourn. Some lives are more worthy to protect, mourn and cover in the media; say one life of ‘ours’ versus 3,000 of ‘them’ that die within a month, as Judith Butler powerfully argues in her book "The Precarious Life". In this disproportionality, what we mourn is the ‘collateral damage’. The ‘sin’ is that we could not live up to the militaristic precision and skill that ‘we’ possess, not the sin that ‘we’ have reduced ‘them’ to biological lives we can kill with impunity.

If one can be killed, since one is really not a human but only that of a biological being that embodies evil, then we can easily place such a being in an ‘indefinite detention’. We don’t even have to call them Prisoners of War, or have evidences of their crimes, or deal with them in the ‘justice’ which we embody. ‘We’ can keep them outside of the political sphere of international treaties, human rights conventions and not grant them even the right of a fair trial. These are all for ‘human beings’ who carry the Image of God, not for those biological bodies that still insist on living and breathing like a ‘human’ while all along who they really are is just the Devil. And the Devil is bad!

Even if now 'we' cannot show anything they have done thus far, since evil is so integral to their ontology they will surely one day do something wrong. Keeping 'them' outside of human community is a price ‘we’ have to pay. ‘We’ do not want to do these dirty and brutal things. President Bush 'wishes' to close down Guantanamo Bay. However, sacrifices have to be made for this ‘just’ war.

Theology enters into the stage at this point and helps us to assume that we live in a 'just' world, in which people get what they deserve and if the natural events do not provide that, those who believe in 'justice' should fight to settle the accounts. Yet, this blurs the deep-seated suspicion that we do not live in a just world, but rather a fallen one, and 'justice' is never met in such a context but remains to be the exclusive property of the powerful, of 'us'. Thus this war is ‘just’ in the sense that it is just for ‘us’ the human beings. This imagined ‘we’ has to be protected at the exclusion of the ‘other’, by the grace and help of God, ‘our’ God. And surely, God is on the side of non-evil and the righteous, isn’t he?

When we turn our eyes to our God, we see his Son who stands in front of the angry crowd, declaring that he came to set the captives free, to restore the sick, poor and sinful, meaning the outcasts, back to human community. We are told he is the one that leaves all of the flock behind to go after the lost sheep and that rejoices when one of the coins which were lost is found and is returned. At the very core of his gospel lies inclusion, restoration and integration of those who have been dehumanized by the religious saints, pure ones, the civilized, ‘we’. Much of his teachings criticise the hypocrisy of those who claim to know and love God when all the while their self-righteousness blinds them from the very core of knowing and loving God.

The core which produces the Good Samaritan. The core which eats and drinks with the 'unclean', sinful, weak and sick. The core which turns the other cheek. The core which chooses to forgive, show mercy and love, rather than wage a campaign of retribution and vengeance. In fact it is this core which Nietzsche despised the most about Christian faith. He saw this Christian reaction towards revenge and retribution to be decadence. That is why he didn't find the Christian notion of God 'noble'. He saw such a God who chooses mercy, forgiveness and inclusion, as unworthy of worship.

Jesus not only declares a completely opposite theology of relating to the 'other' who may have offended us, or may have even harmed us or may do so in the future, but also demands the same attitude from his followers. His imperative brings with it an automatic judgement, one will either hear his voice and follow his call or one will continue to develop a pure and godly 'we'. One will either seek his face in the zone in which dehumanization takes place or amongst 'us' , which is in its worst form when we presume to see his face when we look into the water.

We seek him in vain in our modern-day cathedrals of glory and power and higher values. He is in the prison, with those who are hungry, naked and vulnerable. He warns us that he will hold us accountable, not because we have failed to meet him among 'us', but because we have not run to his image, the image of God, which is in prison, naked and hungry.

Jesus identifies himself not with the powerful--who presume to decide which biological lives will be given the status of a human and thus granted political rights, and which ones will be reduced to mere physical existence—but rather with the despised, with the Homo Sacer. If Jesus were caught living the vicious subversive Gospel today, he would not be on a wooden cross, since the wooden cross no longer symbolizes what it did then: the dishonouring and dehumanization of the individual in the presence of the entire city as a punishment. He would be wearing an orange jumper, living in a cage, dishonoured and dehumanized, in the presence of the entire world who behold all this on the TV screen.

It is no surprise Dietrich Bonhoeffer declared that those who do not speak for Jews have no right to sing Gregorian chants, because failing to do so – failing to stop the dehumanization and death of millions of people in impunity--contradicts the very thing, the Gospel, that the church and Christianity is based upon. When the Church forgets the core which gives birth to her with an eternal imperative to follow, all of her functions, activities and sacraments become a self-judgement and a joke like that of the king who still believes in his majesty while all along the world recognizes that he is just naked.

In a milieu such as this, the church can assume its most usual role. The church can raise funds, do advocacy and organize protests for the release of the inmates, when she recognizes that the answer to our prayers for peace on earth is actualized when she assumes her calling. Yet, this reactive role is only a temporary band-aid to deep wounds.

There is one more thing the church can do that (if she does it) has the potential to literally change the world we live in. Surprisingly, this ‘thing’ is what we speak about the most: to live the Gospel of Jesus. Perhaps it is so familiar that we are now completely blind to its implications to the post-9/11 world we live in.

What is this Gospel? It speaks of love of the neighbour, which requires trust in God and taking the risk to care for the wounded Samaritan. It promotes inclusion of the ‘other’ and the restoration of their dignity rather than exclusion and dehumanization, which Jesus sharply and repeatedly condemned. This Gospel cherishes meekness and vulnerability, of loving and caring and humbling ourselves, rather than Nietzschean visions of great politicians who embody “strength” and “determination” to establish “our security” by moving beyond good and evil. It deconstructs the metaphysical “we” and “them” and unites us in the knowledge of our interdependence, createdness, vulnerability and need of forgiveness in the presence of a Holy God.

The Gospel gives no room for concepts such as “collateral damage” or Machiavellian means. For this Gospel, every human being is precious and every human life is worth living, saving and mourning for. After all, this is exactly why Christ died on the cross. Finally, this Gospel is about forgiveness and reconciliation, rather than seeking revenge and brutal retribution.

Several years have passed since 9/11, and none of us can really say that we now live in a better and safer world. At that junction in time, the Western church had a brilliant opportunity to actualize the Gospel and change the course of history. There is a growing consensus that masculine politics which followed 9/11 are not the solution, and now talks of inclusion, forgiveness, reconciliation and meekness dominate the secular circles. And I wonder why those who have a reason for their hope still keep quiet or are unable to see the profound implications of their faith to such debates…

We need 'tamadas', not historians or lobbyists

Published in Turkish Daily News, 13 December 2007

Re-Published in French by Collectif Van as Nous avons besoin de 'tamadas*', pas d’historiens ni de lobbyistes


You don't need a PhD in rocket science to recognize the complexity of Armenian-Turkish relations and its infinite regress to the samsaric cycles of prejudice, hatred and “you act right first, then I will too” attitudes.

Within this journey to nowhere, there are two dominant voices: Those who think that if they only had more third party countries or groups siding with them, they would “win” the battle of “truth” against the “deniers” and those who think that if only they had more historical research, books and commissions, they would prove the indisputable “truth” to the shame of the revisionists.

Both of these groups presuppose that this bizarre globalized quarrel is exclusively over the “truth” of past. Yet as the dead bodies lie in silence, the ones who are fighting are present tense actors with their present tense narratives, goals, fears or anticipations. In an ironic way, the dead are still victimized by the living, who politicize and utilize their memories just as their biological bodies were politicized and utilized prior to their murders.

So, the main challenge in front of us isn't whose “truth” will get the upper hand in the international circus, but it is how, if ever, we can tease out the present politics (whether that of identity or saving the face) so that we can genuinely mourn for the dead.

No matter what one thinks, “justice” is never really met after mass atrocities, especially historical ones. Notions of retributive justice embodied by tribunals are of no use when perpetrators exist no more. In spite of the aura of “justice” which they spread, the sheer number of victims and perpetrators mean that they have to pursue a symbolic course, often only condemning key actors. Contrary to their own self-perception, they fail hard in breaking cycles of hatred and preventing future atrocities.

Similarly, cultural factors limit the effectiveness of “justice” set in the courts. For example, even though a court in the Middle East may sentence a rapist, there is a high chance that the family of the victim will not find it satisfactory and pursue a sense of a justice by ways of an “honor killing.” For this reason, wise men and women have sought to pursue culturally relevant ways of working toward justice and reconciliation.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who led the famous Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, combined the African concept of ubuntu with Christian notions of confession, forgiveness and reconciliation. Tutu argued that there was no future for South Africa unless blacks and whites lived together in harmony and this could only be achieved through forgiveness.

In Rwanda, the shortcomings of Western perceptions of justice as embodied in the tribunals have been supplemented by the use of Rwandan gacaca trials. In gacaca trials, the perpetrators are reintegrated to their local communities following a traditional ceremony.

What about Armenian-Turkish relations?

There is no court system in the world that can handle this issue. To even suggest a retributive pursuit is laden with serious conceptual faults. No amount of legislation passed in third party countries will move Turks to be open to correct a past wrong doing. No “objective” history book will be able to be the final word, as collective memories, by their very own nature, remain contested and modified along with contemporary demands. So, we are in need of another solution.

Isn't there anything we can find in the Anatolian cultures that can provide us with a much more relevant way? I believe there is, though it would sound naïve to the realist and punitive “adults” reading this article.

In the Armenian culture, there is the tradition of tamadas, who are prominent men managing the procession of toasts made around a table of food and drinks. In both Turkish and Armenian cultures, sitting around a table plays an important role. It symbolizes welcoming, accommodation, fellowship and celebration. Thus, a drinking table is much more suitable for reconciliation between Turks and Armenians than a U.N. committee room.

Drinking and eating draws us together into conviviality and sharing a personal and vulnerable presence, rather than the impersonal battlefield effect of courts, commissions and assemblies. Sitting around a table with a tamada ensures that everybody's voice and wishes are heard and given equal respect.

After the third shot, one recognizes the lovability of the other enough to reach out and kiss away the personal barrier that separates us from the stranger or unwanted. The eventual procession of the toasts to a closure, when the group feels that enough toasts have been made, means that a healthy mourning process reaches freedom from a melancholic sense of loss that poisons the one trapped in the past.

To be sure, this will not satisfy those who want “revenge” or reinstatement of a mythical kingdom or lost glory or maintenance of pure and heroic pasts. Sadly, justice and reconciliation remain patchy, imperfect and limited in our clay earth. What is left to us is our humanity in its raw form.

Whether we can actualize it to the extent that we can lament together and move beyond black and white narratives of victimhood or innocence, depends not on the U.S. House of Representatives or French parliament or a scholar at Cambridge University, but only on us: Turks, Armenians and a bottle of rakı or liqueur with Mount Ararat as the background.

Is Turkey going through the birth-pains of postmodernity?

Published in Turkish Daily News, 15 November 2007

Turkish intellectuals are often bombarded with new dramas unfolding every single day. As they rush to analyze the issue at hand and propose a way forward, what they often fail to process is the broader picture and how (or whether) these events are connected to each other.

Surely, every event is inherently contextual and unique. However, as the world we live in has begun to erase the clear distinction between the local and global, it is not only that most of the local problems have roots in global realities, but also that local problems often have global effects.

There is something uniquely Turkish about the issues we face in Turkey, but at the same time there is something extremely global about them. In this article, I present to the reader a chance to step back and look at contemporary Turkey in relation to a few global trends in order to see the matrix within which the ‘daily news' emerges.

Weakening of nation states:

Though I have never belonged to the tribe of social scientists who have been preaching the end of nation states, it is true that strict and purist nation state vision has lost much of its appeal and hold at home and globally.

As nation states continue to put themselves under international law and governing bodies or banks, their claims for ‘sovereignty' and control over their ‘nation', which was once taken for granted, are no more what they once were. The Human Rights regime under which we live and the presence of international NGOs and global media remove the arbitrary power that states have.

The issue of Kurds and non-Muslims in Turkey emerges not from some international conspiracy but from the increasing difficulty of trying to implement a 19th century vision of a ‘nation' by way of assimilation and social engineering.

Disillusionment with the elites:

One of the reasons that sociologists offer for the resurgence of political Islam in many countries, which were previously thought to be set on the blissful path of secularization is the fact that secularism is interwoven with a ruling elite who often are far away from the ‘people'. The word ‘halk' in Turkish, like the word ‘people' in every language, has an underlying notion of lesser beings or the herd.

When we look at how the AK Party was able to emerge in such a short amount of time and topple down all of the traditional political elites, we see not an ‘Islamization' of Turkey but the failure of the traditional power structures of the Turkish political system. Even though our Armed Forces asked for a ‘social reflex' amidst the well-orchestrated marches ‘to save the Secular Republic', the outcome of the last elections showed how the ‘herd', in line with their kind in other national farms, is tired of being controlled.

Failure of 19th century secularism:

Classical secularism is based on three assumptions; a) the separation of the state and organized religion, b) the limitation of religious belief to the personal sphere, c) the ultimate demise of religion. This 19th century vision, which has been thought to be the direction of the future, has been largely aborted by the academia.

The resurgence of religions in politics and its strong come back in academic circles and greater society since 1960s have proven that the assumptions b) and c) do not automatically follow a), and that religion flourish and continue to play a strong role under perfect a) conditions. As the politics of Latin and North America, Africa and Asia point, religion, one the most powerful social forces today, can never be ‘tamed'.

As long as the human race exits, our longing for ‘something more' will continue to make the religious a core part of our experience and what we believe will always influence every aspect of our lives. Thus, as we have arrived at the end of ‘Enlightenment' experiment, we are in need of a completely new paradigm for how religion's power can be channeled into a better future for all of us. Interestingly, AK Party seems to be the most advanced accommodation of Islam in the contemporary world.

Loss of neat and tidy identities:

The haunting recognition that the world is not as ‘solid' as we imagined it to be inevitably leads itself to anomy, a state of no longer having a firm know-how to run a country or even be a ‘patriot'. The Turkish society is struggling to make sense of and live in a ‘liquid' world, to use Zygmunt Bauman's vocabulary. This shows itself under every rock; from the contemporary memory boom to new and dangerous civil groups trying to do something for ‘our nation'; from increasing ethnic and religious violence to the synthetic tension between the ‘secular' and the ‘religious'; and from the wide appeal of conspiracy theories to anti-US and EU feelings.

What lies behind the calls to ‘close the door to globalization' is an instinctive reaction to the possibility that we may end up as the losers at the end of this slippery century. Behind every angry outburst lies a deep fear. Yet, none of this is limited just to Turkey. We see similar tensions in most of the countries in the world.

The list of global trends affecting Turkey can be extended further. Suffice it to say, the tensions we face in Turkey are not just Turkish. Our problem is that we are trying to be ‘modern' when the global experience has shown the shortcomings and failures of the modern vision. Whether postmodernism is or can ever be a paradigm internalized by the Turkish society is open to challenge, but it is increasingly becoming clear that Turkey is trying to find local answers to global problems in an outdated early 20th century toolbox.

Rehumanizing Armenians and Turks

Published in Turkish Daily News, 12 November 2007

You are not alone if you have not heard the word ''rehumanization'' before. Unlike its twin sister ''dehumanization,'' rehumanization is not a popular tool in politics and identity construction. We would rather build identities or pursue political power by stripping the other from their humanity in order to legitimize our superiority over them. We are more inclined to demonize, discredit, and humiliate the other in order to win an argument or establish our ''rights'' over theirs. Rehumanization is restoring the other's dignity and humanity and attributing the other the same rights ''we'' have or demand. Without rehumanization, there can never be reconciliation simply because without accepting each other as human beings and acknowledging the other's voice, we can never expect that the other will hear our pain and concerns and be moved by it to act unselfishly. Dehumanization is plentiful in Armenian-Turkish relations as each side still wages war for the exclusive rights to be heard. That is why debating sides tend to channel their energy only to disprove the other's historical account in order to prove the world how ''immoral'' or ''deceptive'' the other is.

'Subversive Armenians' :

I was never interested in Armenians or what may have happened during the fall of Ottoman Empire. What I knew was what I read on the papers (just like most people in Turkey); Armenians seek to represent the issue internationally with the obvious desire to achieve acknowledgement of Armenian deaths as genocide, in order to receive financial reparations from Turkey and ultimately to claim and have some parts of eastern Turkey incorporated into modern day Armenia. To be fair, some extreme –but thankfully few– individuals or groups in diaspora have made comments which seem to prove this interpretation of why Armenians are so aggressive about the issue. When this perception was combined with our firm belief in official histories and commitment to the welfare of our nation, there was no room left to hear what Armenians were trying to communicate. Then one day, I found myself on a trip to Armenia and Karabakh. Thousands of scenarios went through my mind and none of them was about receiving hospitality. After two weeks, I found myself crying in a church in Karabakh and embracing a new Armenian friend. The same night, I remember crying more around a dinner table dominated by vodka shots and toasts for a better future. I was finally able to see who lives on the other side of Mount Ararat; not a group of conspirators with a mischievous plan, but a group of broken and hopeful people. Since then, ''Armenians'' isn't an abstract category for me. The tension between us have been rehumanized and made flesh and blood.

'Evil Turks' :

Sadly, I was also about to crush into misconceptions and blatant fantasies of some Armenians about Turks. For example, there is something profoundly disturbing about Vahakn Dadrian, a prominent Armenian scholar. He continues to hold essentialist views, which argue that there is something inherent about being a Turk and a Muslim, which makes Turks the most suitable people to commit genocide, even though social sciences have concluded unanimously that there is no ''race'' as such and that ethnic violence occurs regardless of ''race,'' religion, class, gender and education. Less sophisticated versions of such a faulty framework can be heard regularly in layman's terms. If my memory does not fail me, I do not remember seeing a section in the memorial in Yerevan like the one in Yad Vashem– the Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, dedicated to ''righteous among the nations.'' The phrase refers to non-Jews who risked their lives for protecting Jews. It is a simple yet profound way of rehumanizing a past conflict by showing the humanity found in both ends of the story. Aren't there Turks who have risked their lives protecting their neighbours and friends? An Armenian friend once replied to me by saying “only a handful, most of them did so for their own benefits.” In a single stroke, whatever they have done was relativized and stripped off its humanity. Thus, we are back to the black and white narrative of ''Evil Turks.'' A narrative not limited to then but also to now; Turks as an a-historical, unchanging, monolithic entity, burning with eternal hatred of Armenians. Ironically, the same people who ascribe a deterministic and decadent ontology to Turks also demand from them an unselfish moral act to own a crime that was committed by distant actors in their history and has dire social and economic implications.

The sad fact is though each side pays lips service to acknowledging that ''some Armenians'' may have been killed or Armenians ''may have killed'' some in rebellions, retaliations and pointless and immoral ASALA terror, very few people genuinely mourn the pain we have caused on each other, not just the pain ''we'' suffered. Even though bookshelves and columns are full of words about the other, in actuality we have very little knowledge of what the other thinks or feels. A significant portion of diaspora Armenians and intellectuals have a minimum if no real contact with Turkey or any Turks. Their prescriptive comments often signal the failure of self-referential deductions they make, which do not really correspond to the complicated reality of modern Turkey. Ultra-nationalistic and at times racist comments only serve to deafen Turkish ears, and fuel nationalistic sentiments that disregard Armenians all together. After all, only a small portion of Turks has any real contact with Armenians and the complexities of different Armenian voices and how much the past continues to hurt them.

Anti-Conversion Legislations and Religious Freedom

A talk delivered by Ziya Meral at a Religious Freedom Consultancy, House of Lords, 20 March 2007. The text may not be published or re-posted without the permission of the author.

The exercise of our potential to form beliefs and live them accordingly is one of the key factors in making who we are as individuals. Beliefs go deeper than political affiliations or adherences or philosophical formulations. They affect what we eat, drink, how we dress, where we live, what jobs we do or don’t, whom we marry, how we see the world, what we value in life and what we live and die for. Thus choosing to believe or not to believe, to adopt or not to adopt a religion is a life-defining act thus a fundamental issue.

As Declaration on the Elimination of All forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion and Belief notes “religion or belief, for anyone who professes either, is one of the fundamental elements in his conception of life and that freedom of religion or belief should be fully respected and guaranteed”.

In fact this was what was argued for in the Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which notes that “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion, or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (referred to as ICCPR from now on) has sought to protect this “right”. Article 18 of the ICCPR states:

“Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching.”

Sadly over the last 4 years we have seen an increasing amount of violations of these rights and these violations have often continued without international community’s attention or at times wilful overlooking.

In 2006 the case of Abdul Rahman in Afghanistan, who converted to Christianity from Islam 15 years ago and who was facing death penalty was widely covered in the world wide media. He was eventually released due to International pressure but had to flee to Italy as the high level exposure of his case to media brought with it his possible murder by extremist groups.

However, Abdul Rahman’s story is neither unique nor a one off event. Converts, people who change their religion have been continually facing the risk of death and gross human rights abuses including denial of access to education, housing, employment, business, movement, worship.

Allow me to point out to three different cases. In India, often referred as the largest democracy in the world, 7 states- Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Arunachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and recently Himachal Pradesh, have enacted so called “Freedom of Religious Acts”. A similar law in Tamil Nadu was repealed in 2004. The chief objective of these laws is the prevention of conversion from Hinduism to any other religion carried out by ‘forcible’ or ‘fraudulent’ means of by ‘allurement’ or ‘inducement’. Article 3 of the Orissa Freedom of Religion Act, which serves as a basis to subsequent laws in other states, stipulated that “no person shall convert or attempt to convert, either directly or otherwise, any person from one religious faith to another by the use of force or by inducement or by any fraudulent means nor shall any person abet such conversion.”

Critics within and outside of India have drawn attention to vague formulation of phrases such as ‘allurement’ or ‘inducement’ and the possible doors this open to persecution of Non-Hindu groups in India. It has also been widely noted that the subtext behind these laws is the mass conversion to Christianity and Islam among Dalits- the so called untouchables and the Tribesman. Conversion provides them a way out of the caste system and socio-economic opportunities. With increasing Hindu nationalism, during 2006 BJP and various Hindu nationalist organisations have asked similar laws to be introduced nationwide. Not so surprisingly, 2006 saw widespread violence against Christians in many states across the country.

These laws, not only contradict the Indian Constitution, such as Article 25, which guarantees the right to believe, choose and propagate beliefs but also International treaties India is a signatory party to. As the well known patterns of Human Rights abuses show, when such laws go unchallenged they often serve as an encouragement to other countries.

In fact, when the Sri Lankan Minister of Hindu Cultural Affairs visited Tamil Nadu, India in 2002, when the Religious Freedom Act was still in use, he brought back to Sri Lanka the proposal for a legislation to prohibit ‘forced’ or ‘unethical’ conversions. This was later developed into a “Freedom of Religion Bill”, which was approved by the Cabinet in 2004, but has not been introduced to the Parliament, thus has not came into force yet.

The final draft of the bill states in Section 2 that “no person shall, either directly or otherwise, convert or attempt to convert any person professing one religion to another religion by the use of force, allurement or by fraudulent means.” Though, everyone would agree that using force or unethical means that exploits socio-economic vulnerabilities to ‘convert’ somebody is wrong, when the increasing violence towards the religious minorities in Sri Lanka particularly towards Christians since 2003 is taken into account, it appears that these vague formulations are regularly used by various Buddhist groups to deny the exercise of any other religion all together. As religious boundaries are closely linked to ethnic boundaries (i.e. to be a Sinhalese is to be Buddhist, to be a Tamil is to be a Hindu), conversion to another religion is seen as a threat, betrayal or treason. During 2006, attacks on churches, clergy and their families, hindrance of religious ceremonies have continued.

This of course not only contradicts, the article 10 of Sri Lanka’s Constitution which protects freedom of conscience and religion, ‘including the freedom to have or adopt a religion or belief’, but also the International responsibilities Sri Lanka has.

Algerian Parliament passed a new legislation, titled “the conditions and rules for the exercise of religious worship other than Islam” on February 2006, which came into force in September 2006. The legislation hinders the right of assembly and even collecting tidings during worship services. It stipulates a prison term ranging from two to five years and a fine of between $7000- 14000 for anyone who “incites, constrains or uses any seductive means aimed at converting a Muslim to another religion, or uses to this end establishments for teaching, education, health; organisations of a social or cultural nature; training institutions, or any other establishment, or any financial means”, and who “makes, stores, or distributes printed documents or audiovisual productions or who makes use of any other support or means that aims to shake the faith of a Muslim.” Elusive terms such as ‘seductive means’ or ‘aims to shake the faith of a Muslim’ are of great concern and many fear that this vagueness will facilitate malicious prosecution against religious minorities. In fact, the new legislation even criminalizes objections or protests against itself.

At the surface level, these legislations seem to be against unethical propagation of other religions and wider concerns of security. These possible misuses of religion and propagation are in fact mentioned in the Article 18 of ICCPR:

18.2. No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice.
18.3. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.

These anti-conversion legislations cunningly come very close to assert themselves as the limitations, which ICCPR brings to religious freedom. Thus, they can, rather ironically, be named as Religious “Freedom” Acts, that actually seek to protect freedom of religion. In actuality, when this discourse is placed within its context and its day to day implications, these legislations are clearly an annex, a bold legal actualization of ever present tensions and attitudes within societies towards those of other religious creeds and specifically towards converts who are seen as betraying their people. Iran has continually argued that Bahá’ís in Iran were a political group that actively sought to overthrow the regime, thus Iran had the right to deny the use of free exercise of their religion.

In Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Yemen, Sudan, Iran and Mauritania apostasy is punishable by death as these countries constitutionally acknowledge Shari’a as the primary ‘source for legislation’. The traditional Shi’a Jafari school of Shari’a Law, as well as all four Sunni schools, teach death penalty for anyone leaving Islam. It is worth to note that these laws are not forced regularly or consistently and there is a growing number of modern Islamic scholars who condemn death penalty.

In Iran, there has not been an official execution lately. On the other hand during 2006 and 2007, Muslim background Christians in various parts of Iran have been detained, abused, then released on hefty bails including turning over their properties and further threats that they will be charged with treason if they continue to propagate their faith, partake in a local church and more significantly if they report these abuses to the International community. Iran’s track record of abuses includes de facto denial of the right of education, assembly, employment to hundreds of thousands of Bahá’ís living in Iran. Just because they are Bahá’ís.

Egypt is another important country, which has persecuted religious minorities, denied ID cards, employment, fair access to courts and still requires a never ending process for even repairing a non-Muslim religious centre, let alone build new ones. In Egypt, converts from Islam to other religions regularly face incommunicado detention by State Intelligence Service, loss of their marital status or right over their children, property and family heritage. A 57 years old man, Bahaa Al Aqqad, has been kept in an underground desert cell without an official charge during 2006 and well into 2007. Though the court has ordered his release following the end of the 6 months right of detention given to security forces, solely because he has converted from Islam two years ago and chose to speak about it his new faith.

Even in Turkey, a secular democratic republic, converts regularly face not only persecution from their communities but suffer structural hindrances that prohibit their socio-economic opportunities as their security files mark them as a national threat. During the last year, a Turkish church formed by converts in Odemis were attacked by Molotov Cocktails and another one in Samsun stoned. The local police and governor has ordered the Odemis church to shut down their church. The legal process now is not the arrests of the attackers but whether or not this church will remain open.

Currently two Muslim background Christians, Hakan Tastan and Turan Topal await a court decision on the charges of the renowned “insulting Turkishness” and the accusation of offering money, sexual opportunities and threats with the use of guns to convert Muslims. Over the last two years, Turkish media, intellectuals and sadly politicians continued their assertions that conversion of Turks to other religions was an internationally organized campaign to destroy Turkey. Such sentiments have shown themselves in the killing of the Roman Catholic priest, Andrea Santoro by a 16 years old young man in Trabzon. Father Santoro was blamed to be seducing and alluring Muslim Turks to change their religion.

For the Western mind this can be a puzzling problem. In the Western world religion is seen primarily as a personalized belief. The notion of secularization, in its ideal forms, brings with itself the non-state involvement in individual beliefs, and of course non-religious involvement in the public sphere. Whereas the greatest portion of the world has never set foot on such a journey.

20th century Euro centric sociology has proudly forecasted that by the end of the 20th century there would hardly be any religion found in the public space. The inevitable secularization process would cause the decline of religion and make the rest of the world like secular Western Europe. Now it appears that Europe is the anomaly as religion in the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, meaning the greatest portion of the world, still continues to be a key defining factor and social force.

Today’s global world is often a polarized world, rather worlds living in close proximity. In this picture, boundaries are increasingly drawn along religious and ethnic lines. In all of the cases I quoted here, India, Sri Lanka, Algeria, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, we see emerging patterns of increasing ethno-nationalisms that has strong religious tones. These are in fact ontologies in the making, and a person, who chooses to change his religion is located involuntarily into a new category. They no more fit the nationalist or ethnic constructions and are seen as one of the enemies. They are not only doomed to anomy and a sense of loss and not belonging anywhere, but also left without a shelter or protection.

Human Rights tools have been targets of sharp criticisms. “They are Western, individualized, Judeo-Christian. We should not impose our values to the rest of the world as if they are universal.” All of these are true to a certain extent. Human Rights laws are all human products, with the underlying good intention to protect fellow human beings. They are open to maturation. In women’s rights, children’s rights and various other issues we do see great improvements, attention and emerging policies. We should by all means continue to advance them. Because they are the only things we got in our hands.

But sadly, the right to believe or the fate of millions of people who suffer persecution for no other reason than holding different religious beliefs are overlooked, left undone and somehow are not worth our attention and energy. This is not only seen in the governmental levels but also among NGOs. Often religious persecution isn’t included in country profiles or reported in worldwide media. It seems that the effects of the19th and 20th centuries’ outdated attitudes towards religion still linger, amidst 21st century realities and the faces of people who suffer.

Ahmadinejad owes a great debt to Bush

Published in Turkish Daily News, 3 October 2007

If you ever find yourself walking around in Tehran, you will recognize right away that the mood in the streets is melancholy, not a mad commitment to destroy Israel, if not the entire world. Romantic memories of the ‘free and prosperous' days of the Shah still linger in a country, which continues to mourn the loss of a ‘once great place' in the eyes of the world.

As the middle classes and the educated circles increasingly react against the flamboyant rhetoric of their President and want him to address the economic problems and closed doors that limit the development of Iran, the last thing on their minds is an apocalyptic struggle paving the way of the Mahdi.

Iran has gained significantly from U.S. policies:

In many ways, there is nothing new about Iran's ambitions on acquiring nuclear energy (well, let's be honest, nuclear weapons). It has long been in the cards since the days of Rafsanjani, with a slight detour under Khatami, the reformer.

Even though the popular reading of Iran and its state may present a rather unstable and irrational country, this is far from the truth. The Iranian state and people care about their international standing as much as any other country, and their foreign policy follows a rationale based on their regional interests and domestic tensions, just like any other country.

One may fail to recognize how much Iran has gained in the last two years.

Though the U.S. had certain desired outcomes in mind when invading Afghanistan and Iraq, the last thing the administration foresaw or wanted was to create a stronger Iran. In fact, the effect of the Afghan and Iraqi affairs resulted in Iran gaining a much stronger political and popular presence in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf.

However, it is not only Iran's diplomacy that gained new grounds through the unexpected opening. The increasing diplomatic tensions that brought the focus back on Iran have done wonders in refreshing the weakening hold of revolutionary attitudes and Ahmadinejad's appeal to Iranians.

“I hate Ahmadinejad, but I admire him!”:

A rather well-off shop owner in Tehran tells me his memories of the Shah and the freedom they enjoyed. A taxi driver keeps me hostage for 20 minutes after I arrive at my destination with his passionate confessions about his day-to-day life and its limitations.

A university student notes the displeasure among her peers about how Iran is perceived globally and how their President is no reflection of their country. A lay intellectual who claims to be a devoted Communist bashes his anger against the elitism of the ruling class and the serious problems in the country.

An internet café owner tells me his plans to flee to the U.S., just as many other young professionals of his generation, who are more busy trying to get a high score in English tests, than to plan a suicidal mission to Israel.

One thing unites these people. They have all stated in their own words the same generic message: “I hate Ahmadinejad, but I admire him!”

Ironically, they all see Israel and the U.S. seeking to destroy Iran in an ‘irrational and mad' way, just as we hear regularly that this is what Iran is trying to do. Though none of them want anything to do with nuclear weapons, they all support Iran's bid for nuclear energy and feel that their President is courageously defending their rights against a colonial West that seeks to hinder their development.

Though the President's domestic performance and populist rhetoric is speedily decreasing his appeal within Iran, his seemingly tough stand against the West is gaining him more brownie points.

In fact, this has been the ultimate lesson we have learned, although apparently not all of us, since the Islamic Revolution. Iranians are patriotic people who will unite strongly in the face of an outside enemy. One of the key factors of how Khomeini was able to appeal to a wide range of people from atheists, leftists to Islamic seminary students was the authenticity and commitment to Iran he represented in the presence of a Shah who seemed to be losing his Iranian-ness and ‘selling his nation' to outside powers.

So it seems that President Ahmadinejad owes at least a short ‘thank you' email sent to the gov.us domain. And President Bush may be moved to accept such courtesy and grant an equally genuine response. After all, President Bush himself owes a lot to Ahmadinejad's populism in his efforts to emerge as a strong and fearless defender of the ‘free world' after the not-so-desirable public relations outcome of the Iraq war.

What makes headscarves political: wearing or banning them?

Published as "Covering up the truth" in the Parliament Magazine,
1 October 2007

I remember standing in front of a university campus in Izmir, Turkey, and watching a young girl wearing a headscarf approaching the gate. She reached for her headscarf and swiftly removed it. The details of her face have eroded over the years, yet the expression on her face – tinged with humiliation, resentfulness and anger – still lingers. It was only at that moment I realised what millions of women like her might feel everyday. Since then, I have asked myself again and again, what would I do or feel if I were in their shoes?

I am not a Muslim and have strong problems with Muslims who seek to force women to wear headscarves. On a recent trip to Iran, I witnessed the arrests of two young women whose headscarves and sandals violated the orders of the new police chief of Tehran, who had been disturbed by the increasing hair and skin showed on the streets under the burning Persian sun. I could not sleep that night for the same reason I struggled with watching a woman forced to remove her headscarf: every human being should be free to live according to their conscience.

There are various arguments we hear about banning headscarves, ranging from national security to hospital hygiene and need for full facial pictures on IDs. The most widely heard argument within and outside Turkey is “we have nothing against people having freedom of belief and practice, it is just that they are making wearing the headscarves political”. There are two significant problems with this seemingly convincing argument.

First of all, what does it matter if headscarves have turned into political symbols? Isn’t democracy the creative space in which individuals or groups can express themselves, whether it be through their fashion sense or political aspirations? As we say in Turkish, “Özrü kabahetinden de beter” – the excuse is worse than the actual fault. The public arena is by its very nature political and it is the core of our political system that gives the individual a right for personal political expression. Thus, the reasoning that “they are making it political,” which this argument uses to convince us to accept the banning of headscarves, is no real reason at all. To my mind this automatically makes banning ungrounded.

If outward signs of one’s beliefs and views are not compatible with the Turkish constitution and its unique perception of democracy, then surely we should be stopping people from wearing certain kind of beards and dresses, or growing pointed moustaches and using peculiar hand shakes to represent their political beliefs. Since we are not enforcing the consistent banning of such symbols – not least because to do so would be to undermine our own political system – the rhetoric that states “actually I have nothing against them” is truly a poor one, if not a self contradictory one, and shows that we in fact do have something against “them”.

The second issue is that banning headscarves has become the cause of the problem that it seeks to solve. Wearing headscarves is a religious practice that dates from ancient times, and has been practiced by many religions, including Muslims throughout the history of Islam. If a modern country bans a historical religious practice, doesn’t the act of banning itself make it a political issue as controversial as any other apparent contravention of an individual’s rights by a sovereign power?

Since religious beliefs transcend any current political context by their very nature, banning them tends to have an automatically counter-productive impact, in that it makes people cling to them all the more fiercely – a stubborn resistance prompted by a ‘fear of God’ that is far more consequential than ‘fear of man’. Thus, increasing calls for bans to be lifted, and political pressure to do so, are merely the results of banning headscarves in the first place.

Yes, the women who wear headscarves may be trying to make a political point, but I doubt if the point is to change Turkey into a theocratic nation overnight with the magic of filling our streets with more women who wear headscarves. Political systems do not change when people are allowed to dress as they wish. These women are trying to communicate a genuine point. They are banned from equal opportunities and treated as less than citizens. And yes, they are now shouting louder than ever to make the rest of us hear their voice.