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 Turkey has been getting really aggressive about the above photo, attacking websites that fail to pull it down, including banning Youtube, Twitter, and Facebook for a few days. Eventually, the ban was lifted when the sites complied with a Turkish court order to censor the photo but this is not the first time this is happened. In essence, those sites are censoring free speech from outside of Turkey. quote:Google Dodges a Ban in Turkey Over Hostage Photo quote:Turkey Lists Social Media as Top Threat in Leaked Document Also happened last year quote:http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/18/opinion/turkeys-battle-with-twitter.html Pretty messed up in my opinion. Though, I will say, to be fair. While it seems unfair for the rest of the internet to be beholden to the laws of Turkey and hurt feelings, its worth pointing out these sites comply with US law with little fuss, to the point where they collaborated with the unconstitutional PRISM program of mass surveillance. In effect, the rest of the world is beholden to the culture, laws, and liberalism of the United States, including mass surveillance and censorship. The truth is, virtually every country in the world believes in some form of internet censorship. Most of us I would hope would agree that child pornography should be illegal. Other countries have that attitude towards hate speech and harassment. Who should decide? 
Mandy Thompson fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Apr 8, 2015 |
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Apr 8, 2015 04:59
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Haven't they banned and unbanned youtube and twitter like 5000 times at this point? It's really lost its impact at this point.
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Apr 8, 2015 05:03
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Nintendo Kid posted:Haven't they banned and unbanned youtube and twitter like 5000 times at this point? It's really lost its impact at this point. Yeah but occasionally those sites comply with Turkey's stupid demands to not hurt Erdogan's fe-fes
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Apr 8, 2015 05:37
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This guy, Erdowan, imprisons journalists for either posting "insults" or even just liking them on Facebook. He wants so badly to be a cult of personalty in the vein of Putin, but he has none of the competence, and he is routinely scandalised because his family does dumb, corrupt stuff and without fail, someone is there with a camera or a voice recorder to catch them out. What a petty poo poo. I'm sure Turkey will be admitted into the EU they throw him into the Aegean, because he just jumps from one abuse of power to another. His entourage are a bunch of lovely gentlemen as well. http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/.premium-1.591647
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Apr 8, 2015 14:26
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Turkey is the only country with a ban on burning their flag. Plus they can jail you for talking poo poo about their retarded founder Aatrek I mean Ataturk. EDIT: In a free country I can say stuff like my founding fathers thought black people were inferior and not worthy of citizenship, and not get in trouble.
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Apr 8, 2015 21:49
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From the impression I get from Turkish people talking about him, he was a net good; he ended the royal and religious stranglehold over the justice system, instituted quality (women make up a majority of professional academics to this day) but things like secularising society and reforming the language system were such a radical cultural change, there's sort of an elastic snapback from it to this day, with the emergence of non-secular parties, etc. It wasn't a system that supported people equally in terms of class. People needed to relearn how to read and write since the alphabet was changed from Arabic script to Latin, and back then schools and such were only in major cities, and Turkey is one of those countries that has a deep city/country divide to this day. In fact Erdowan bases his power from provincial seats. He is not popular in any major city that I know of. European-connected city dwellers recognise him for what he is, but he still garners support in Turkey because he's developing provincial areas, and redeveloping unsympathetic urban pockets in a neo-liberal way. In fact, I remember seeing a documentary about this communist group a couple of years before the kidnapping, and the gist was that the historical neighbourhood was set to be demolished and gentrified to scatter the communists into the wind.
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Apr 9, 2015 06:10
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Ataturk is about as good as a capitalist can be. One of history's great revolutionary heroes. I mean, at one point he invited 60% of the parliament he created to be "his" party thereby creating an opposition party. He was pretty badass. The current government? Well, let's just say Ataturk built in a solution to governments like this one.
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Apr 12, 2015 16:19
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Shbobdb posted:The current government? Well, let's just say Ataturk built in a solution to governments like this one. The military might not putsch this time you know~
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Apr 12, 2015 16:26
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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The time for a putsch has passed it isn't happening this time.
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Apr 12, 2015 17:44
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I will throw in my two bits and say there is a reason Erdogan is still in power: it is the social divides those coups which divided and embittered half the country to no end, and the silent cultural war that has been happening since the 1920s. In addition, the demographics of the country are more complicated than many assume, many people who live in urban areas also vote AKP and the number is probably still growing. The traditional rural/urban divide has blurred a considerable amount in the last few decades. Obviously around here, Erdogan is a tinpot leader than needs to be overthrown without consequence. I think that impulse I think it really speaks of the near complete ignorance of how fragile the body politic of Turkey is and has been for a while. He is obviously corrupt and promotes are particularly noxious form of politics, but the polls don't lie and there are strong reasons why most Turks don't vote for the CHP. There is no easy exit for Turkey. Ardennes fucked around with this message at 19:17 on Apr 12, 2015 |
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Apr 12, 2015 19:14
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"Erdogan is winning elections from his rural base in the east of the country" is one of those notions that gets thrown around a lot in non-Turkish environments, and it's funny because it's completely false. You can check this easily by noting Turkey is 72% urbanized. Rural voters don't count as much and it's not like they uniformly vote Erdogan anyway. Rural-based ethnic/religious minorities form some of the most consistent front of opposition against the AKP and these are especially concentrated in the east. Rather, you'd want to look at small Anatolian cities, as well as sections of (Sunni Turkish) urban poor in metropolitan areas.
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Apr 13, 2015 01:12
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It's probably shorthand for saying there is a very strong regional divide sorta like the US talks about the north and south, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_presidential_election,_2014 I'm not familiar at all with what districts are what, but it might be the case that the districts that go to the opposition are more urban than the districts that go to Erdogan? I can see that as being translated to his victory being because of a rural base, but of course nowadays you need urban voters to win since Turkey uses popular vote, not an electoral college (right?). With an US style system it would still be possible for some gerrymandering-esque nonsense to happen but if with a popular vote the only reason a candidate would win without urban support is if there was massive vote differentials in urban vs rural communities which is pretty unlikely.
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Apr 13, 2015 04:05
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I like how Erdogan says you can't attack the president in the media in other countries. I'd love to see how he'd react if something like Breitbart popped up in Turkey.
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Apr 13, 2015 04:28
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Hitlers Gay Secret posted:Turkey is the only country with a ban on burning their flag. Plus they can jail you for talking poo poo about their retarded founder Aatrek I mean Ataturk. Ataturk was born in Greece to a part-Albanian family, FYI *is arrested as Turkish police abseil through my window*
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Apr 13, 2015 04:35
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fspades posted:"Erdogan is winning elections from his rural base in the east of the country" is one of those notions that gets thrown around a lot in non-Turkish environments, and it's funny because it's completely false. You can check this easily by noting Turkey is 72% urbanized. Rural voters don't count as much and it's not like they uniformly vote Erdogan anyway. Rural-based ethnic/religious minorities form some of the most consistent front of opposition against the AKP and these are especially concentrated in the east. Rather, you'd want to look at small Anatolian cities, as well as sections of (Sunni Turkish) urban poor in metropolitan areas. Even Istanbul and Ankara have consider numbers of AKP voters, a majority if you count suburbs outside the centers of the cities. It may be true that most of central Istanbul probably hates Erdogan's guts but if you start going to the suburbs (which isn't hard since they are freaking massive) you are going to see very different opinions. Also, as you say, Turkey's rural population isn't homogeneous and the HDP is going to have its Kurdish strongholds and the MHP is still out there. Together, it just isn't enough to really challenge the AKP. At its heart I think it speaks of much of the mis-communication about the rise of religiosity of the middle east, which is both cultural but also class based, and in many ways is a rejection of politics that dominated the country. AKP obviously isn't leftist quite the opposite, but it is an outlet of a lot of pent up resentment that has built up over generations. Even if the Turkish military could hold a coup, they wouldn't be able to control the country afterwards. Ultimately, Ataturk's system of just keeping a lid of both Kurdish nationalism and religiosity through the military force just couldn't be sustained.
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Apr 13, 2015 08:47
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I've been hearing some crazy conspiracy theories about the current administration and ISIS. I'm assuming that's just crazy slander. Otherwise, I've just heard the patronage argument which seems debunked  is it more analogous to the rise of the religious right in America, which is a very suburban phenomenon?
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Apr 13, 2015 15:36
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Sounds like Turks need to respect the robot tbh
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Apr 13, 2015 15:47
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Shbobdb posted:I've been hearing some crazy conspiracy theories about the current administration and ISIS. I'm assuming that's just crazy slander. Not really. They just have no sympathies with any players in the conflict. They are perfectly fine with Syria falling apart if it means Assad, Daesh, Kurds, etc. bleed themselves dry. Less manpower for them to pick battles with Turkey. Undemocratic as Turkey is becoming, it's as stable as it's ever been and can play the long game if it wants to now.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:03
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Frogfingers posted:Not really. They just have no sympathies with any players in the conflict. They are perfectly fine with Syria falling apart if it means Assad, Daesh, Kurds, etc. bleed themselves dry. Less manpower for them to pick battles with Turkey. Undemocratic as Turkey is becoming, it's as stable as it's ever been and can play the long game if it wants to now. Also to be honest Turkey probably hasn't ever really a functioning democracy in the first place, the last "soft coup" happened in 1997.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:24
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Shbobdb posted:
Nope. When they first came into power AKP was a phenomenon that was supported both by some sections of the working class and elite interests, whereas in America there is a much sharper distinction in voting patterns when it comes to class. AKP exclusively plays a game of identity politics and unfortunately they are very good at it. One of the telling signs of this is that you can reasonably determine someone's voting preference just by asking if they are doing their daily prayers or not. Those who think of themselves as "proper muslims" are also more likely to vote for the party they see as "proper muslims." Simple as that. But despite this it would be hard to claim that AKP is an Islamist party in the vein of Muslim Brotherhood. There are Islamist elements within it but they got weaker, not stronger. Especially in recent years, Erdogan's cult of personality has grown to utterly ridiculous levels and now even within the AKP what really matters is unquestionably obeying him. In fact, AKP's Islamist old guard is getting increasingly more agitated over this development. Here's an interesting article about it. fspades fucked around with this message at 05:04 on Apr 14, 2015 |
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Apr 14, 2015 04:59
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I'm wondering but if Erdogen health were to fail him in the next few years, what would happen to AKP? Would it split?
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Apr 14, 2015 07:09
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Crowsbeak posted:I'm wondering but if Erdogen health were to fail him in the next few years, what would happen to AKP? Would it split? It's times like this that I wish the CIA had a better track record of arranging for foreign leaders'  health to fail .  In all seriousness though, Erdogen/Erdogan/Evil Forehead Man having a sudden fatal or debilitating stroke would make me seriously consider that maybe, just maybe, there is an Allah~
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Apr 15, 2015 21:48
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Crowsbeak posted:I'm wondering but if Erdogen health were to fail him in the next few years, what would happen to AKP? Would it split? Depends how far into the "next few years" and how telegraphed his demise has been. Problem with cults of personality isn't necessarily that they're bad for the disenfranchised population at the time, is that they eliminate all mechanisms to peacefully transition power through a sustainable and legitimate process. Liberal_L33t posted:It's times like this that I wish the CIA had a better track record of arranging for foreign leaders' Look, our institutions like to work with locals to advance our interests. If someone we trust, in the position of capacity and ability, came to us for procurement of some items to assist, we might be able to avoid asking further questions and fulfill their request for provisions. Erdogan ain't stupid, he knows this as well as we do. Hence why his system is a ticking time-bomb: soon as growth stalls out and maintaining his governing majority faces unanticipated barriers, he'll take the easy option and bury those barriers. My Imaginary GF fucked around with this message at 22:02 on Apr 15, 2015 |
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Apr 15, 2015 21:58
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My Imaginary GF posted:Look, our institutions like to work with locals to advance our interests. If someone we trust, in the position of capacity and ability, came to us for procurement of some items to assist, we might be able to avoid asking further questions and fulfill their request for provisions. 
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Apr 16, 2015 03:04
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