NINEL
ÇAM van CHAPULL
think/write
Freitag,
5.Juli 2013
I
came back to the boarding school after the summer holiday where I had
already been studying two years. An information was waiting there for
me. A girlfriend of mine, whom I knew from the school had a traffic
accident during the summer holiday and had died. This information is
a crazy information. I didn't believe. How to believe? I couldn't
believe because I didn't had felt anything to that time when this
accident had happened. Is it possible that a friend of you, a person
you love, may have enormous pain and die finally after one week and
your body, your soul is not really able to feel this? Maybe there had
been something I can do for her, but I didn't even sense it. Secretly
I would so much like to believe in the telepathic qualities of human
being, even I had never really experienced this. That I couldn't
accept the death of my girlfriend may base on the same reasons. Was
it too loud around me? Had I been too occupied with anything to that
certain time point when this accident had happened, so that I
couldn't gat aware of what was happening with her? Maybe I had heard
it, a cry with a very high frequency maybe, or very low, maybe I knew
it at that moment, like something one can know without knowing how
to, and maybe I just didn't interpret the meaning what I had
perceived. Like being not able to read a certain language. I informed
myself about the date and the just hour when the accident happened, I
tried to remember what I was doing at that certain moment, during
this week, where I was, with what I was occupied. I was trying to
find a sign which should show me that I could sense the pain of my
friend if I would knew how to interpret, no way: medium was needed.
Anyway,
I never saw her afterwards and believe even now that she lives as I
am doing, just somewhere else, at an other geography, in relations to
other people, and it is just that we didn't say “goodbye”, and
not “see you again”. For sure here and then when we come together
with friends from the science high school we speak about her and
about her very early death and there is a kind of sadness in the air,
a sadness which I cannot share with them though. I don't speak about
that I can not really be sad and tell them the reason why. Not
really. Coming from a scientific education, being a daughter of
atheist parents don't really allow me having believes in that way.
Believing that this is my way of physiological protection seems to be
more rational. But it is not just this, people die, people live
pains, people are tortured all over the world, abused, people are
asking for help, people cry, people get loud, and many other people
cannot hear it, know about it. This is to accept. If one is not in
the same space with the other, with the others, not in the audial or
visual space, he needs to find the medium if he wants to reach the
others.
31st
of Mai 2013 was the first day the police attacked demonstrators who
were occupying the Gezi Parkı,
one of the rare green areas in Taksim Place – Istanbul. One more
shopping mall was planed to build there, one more money making
building, and couple young people wanted to act against this, wanted
to stop the plan. They were using the park around the clock. They
were there with their tents, books, music instruments, they were
there with friends, acquaintances and were open to everyone who wants
to join them. The police though attacked them on 31 st of Mai, early
in the morning, aggressively. The prime minister Erdoğan was calling
them çapulcu -looter, swag man- who deserves to see their day.
The
most important think which I got aware of, before all during the
first couple days of the violent attacks of the police against the
demonstrators in Gezi was, and it is for sure not just me who got
aware of it, is that the TV channels brought nothing on the screen.
That what was happening there, was very important for the country, as
you may had followed the next days showed this very clearly, but the
TV channels which are based just in the neighbourhood didn't even
brought couple images or sentences during the news. In contrary,
facebook and twitter were flooded with news, photos and videos, which
were quite violent. Why was this happening in such a discrepancy?
Were the people who are working for the channels not aware of all
that what was happening in their own city, in their own country? Not
to have telepathic qualities with persons whom I love, getting aware
of this fault-belief I was secretly believing, was a pain to me as a
young teenager; as an adult it is a pain to get aware of that the
media of a country doesn't bring the news to screen. So no one could
have been informed via TV about what was happening there, as long as
they had not been in the spaces of Gezi. As long as they don't have
kids, friends, neighbours who were at Gezi, and who informs them. As
long as … social media … (to that theme far later)
That
the visual and print media was under the control of certain people
and that their sympathies were defining strongly what we were able to
hear and see from the country, from the world was somehow clear to
us. But that the journalism had already turned to such a poor
situation, so far away from its original call and the motivation of
this profession, so far away from the ethics, this was not what we
could imagine. Even though so many journalists are for years in jail,
we couldn't really believe, probably with the same reason why I can't
believe that my friend has died, so we didn't act. Or maybe because
we couldn't act, we could not believe that the media is such corrupt.
Since as soon as we are convinced we should go in for changing this
situation. Hard job for one. And maybe... we were living good lives,
or the life was too dure, or we were just tided in our
responsibilities, careers, hopes...
Anyway,
the day came, and we recognized how dramatic the situation of the
journalism was. Apropos I am not sure if the case that the situation
of journalism is 'half-corrupt' or 'quarter-corrupt' is better than
'total-corrupt'? At least by the last you know that you cannot trust,
since developing a feeling for believing partially is quite hard job.
(also to that theme far later)
One
of the best impacts which this awareness caused is that so many
people, who call themselves Turks excused from their Kurdish fellow
citizens. They were writing that they now can understand how false
they were informed, how impossible it was that they can be aware of
what was happening in far east. They were asking for excuse, because
they had read this newspapers and had watched these TV channels all
through the years, which were under 'total or partial control' of the
government. The government, as a 'whole of institutions', which is
not in the service of the folk they are elected by, but … (What do
they do as politicians, if not being in charge of the people? To this
theme far later.)
The
first reaction of Erdogan, you already know. The second reaction was
that he was saying that the demonstrators had tortured a woman with a
kid who is carrying a scarf. (Far later came out that no one had
tortured this woman, but the woman tried to discuss in a rude way
with the demonstrators, who ignored her. Time after it came out, that
Erdogan is the wedding witness of this woman.) He said in his
speeches that the demonstrators get into the mosque, to the holy
places of the country, with their shoes, that they had been drinking
beer there, and that harlotry had happened in this mosque. This
mosque had been used as first aid infirmary for the people who were
injured by the attacks of the police. As the Gezi was evacuated a
photo came in print media which was showing a bunch of used condoms,
for making Türkiye clear, what the ethical level of the
demonstrators is. I mean I don't really have problem with people who
make love with each other, but the point was that the same photo was
already used before couple months in relation to news which is about
a whorehouse. People had been killed, and the politicians were
saying, that their own friends caused them to die, which was
obviously not true, because so many people had witnessed what had
happened. … Actually I could make a list about the second reaction
of Erdogan: lying
but
I will come back to the theme 'Media' and tell for last about a more
organized lie: One day in the morning, as I do nowadays, I opened
facebook. One of the messages which was coming up, was a entrance
card for a theatre piece, organized by AKP, the ruling political
party. I didn't understand at the first view what AKP was trying to
do. The good thing though is that the young people in Gezi understood
what AKP was trying to do. Early in the morning some civil police
with Che Guevara t-shirts came from the side of the park and attacked
the police. With molotov cocktail. The cameramen of the main leading
TV's were already there, well positioned and making their shootings
for the country, whose target is to show how violent the
demonstrators are. To me, who had read so many posts from
demonstrators in the sense of that they are not and won't get
violent, and that everyone should take care about this attitude,
since it would be in the interest of the government to provoke them
to violence, and that would be beginning of the end of the game where
they loose their rights, yes, to me, it was not difficult to believe
that this theatre is a shooting game for formatting the opinion of
the folk in Türkiye. But what did so many people believe in when
they were watching TV? People who don't have internet, who are not
networked via social media, who don't have the people around them,
who cannot inform them about the real facts of that what is happening
there in Gezi?
Third
reaction of Erdogan: Are you one of us or not? Actually this is an
attitude which the whole government is built on and working with? If
you are one of AKP, you can be sure, your way will be lightened. If
you have problems they will solved. Even the justice will not cause
you a damage. Because of the reason of 'ethic and moral' in metro
stations are announced that the couples shouldn't kiss each other,
but on the other side, if you are one of AKP, you won't really have
problems. For example, even though couple bureaucrats of a city has
abused 16 years old teenager, this can be considered as ok. Or an
handicapped child was abused two years long by a bureaucrat is not a
real problem. The police had killed during the days of demonstration
four people, but the justice is not really reacting, because it is
'his police'. For sure not because Erdogan or any politicians have a
problem with that this certain police will be considered to a
adequate sentence, but it would show that they cannot take care about
their people, their privileged people. Their people should do
everything what they command, but for that they will not get
punished. They had already began with the tactic that the police
began not to use helmets with their personal numbers, so that no
video, no photo of anyone can one day show who was the person who
behave out of his responsibilities. So the police can handle as
brutal as they want.
Fourth
reaction of Erdogan: witch-hunt. If you don't belong to them, you are
considered as a 'witch' which has to be haunted, 'whose day will be
shown'. With Gezi Movement this game turned to a main focus of AKP.
Do you belong to them or not, you showed, so everything necessarily
will be done.
What
the government didn't already had under control, for bringing only
'the information, thinking and world view' of their own under the
folk, was the social media. Not very easy to believe, since the
importance of social media in the 'Arabic Spring' was already known.
But probably it is quite difficult to get this medium under control,
without injuring the democratic rights of a society. Or is it? And
when if, how will we hear their voice?
Politicians
announced that they will get the information from facebook and
twitter, who messaged what, who was in contact with whom, and who was
active 'anarchist', and that 'they will show to the guilty people
their day!' Somehow it was too late, to use the 'fear' of people to
control them for not using the social media. It had already happened.
No idea how, but somehow 'the wall of fear' which had been build up
during the last decades in Türkiye was broken by the mass of
people before all by the young
people.
The
movement began with just couple young activists camping at the park
but turned in a very short time to millions, spread all over
Türkiye. People were getting information in the shortest times per
facebook messages or tweets, they were making photos and videos with
their smart phones and were putting them into web. Accessible for
everyone. Everyone was able to act and react, was journalist and
reader, demonstrator and observer at the same time. Gezi Movement was
happening at an age where the technologies were allowing a
transparency through everyone who were connected by social media,
“the damn media” with the words of the president Erdoğan. Yes,
but will this communication media help people also by the problems
which are waiting for them in the era of witch-hunt? I hope. But it
is for sure that this era has a quality which is silent, subliminal
and insidious. People who showed up by in Gezi got rude reminder and
were even discharged. This mentality will literally ruin many people.
A brand which will not heard easily if one doesn't look at. What are
to do? I mean that this question is one of the most important
questions, which needs their international creative answers. Now we
know that our neighbour is abusing his kid, but he also knows that we
know it. What to do? What are our responsibilities?
Also
about this very important theme I will go on thinking/writing later.
I would like to come back again to the social media, to the meaning
of the social media, which allowed this movement arrive its potency.
What are these medium really, the social media? What are their strong
qualities? Was it really the social media which helped people to
break down the wall of fear which had been build up very
systematically? What is there to learn, to understand? I would so
much like to understand this. And this I will try, while I am writing
this article.