One thing can, yes, one has to assume at this point: the President doesn’t like listening to pop music. At least not a Turkish one. The country-typical entertainment music is not even bad, on the contrary. Turkey has world famous stars, Sezen Aksu, Tarkan, Gülşen, Sila, Mabel Matız, the list is long. Whereby Gulsen, revered by the fans as “the Turkish Madonna” because of her provocative outfits, her provocative performances and videos, is currently not singing. She sits.
The 46-year-old musician was arrested in Istanbul for making an admittedly distasteful joke on stage. She slandered one of her show colleagues; His “perversion,” which is well known to all, can be traced back to his time at an Imam Hatip school. the Imam Hatip Schools, these are schools where a lot of space is given to Islam and theological education. The best-known Imam Hatip graduate is President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
So far there is no evidence that the arrest was ordered from above, that the judiciary was politically controlled. But in an authoritarian country, the mechanisms quickly and easily take on a life of their own. Then, without being asked, prosecutors do what they suspect is in the interests of those in power. In this combination, a bad joke can become a political bomb.
A scantily clad pop diva waving the rainbow flag, the good reputation of the religious high schools valued by many Turks and – unspoken, but understandable for every Turk – the prestige of the president. The musician herself must have known that. Your joke was initially well received in a country that is divided into the pious and the secular: the Gülşen audience cheered. At first nothing had happened at all. The singer blasphemed, the audience applauded, the show went on.
Only now, months later, did a video recording of the concert trigger an outcry from Erdoğan’s supporters and in his AKP party. The gossip of a provocative musician becomes a “hate crime” and a “disgrace to humanity”. The thing with the video, Gülşen’s fans suspect, may have been politically staged. Nine months before the upcoming elections there are always forces that want to heat up the mood.
Society should find its way back to its historical roots, and the secular Atatürk state should be re-Islamized
As might be expected, protests are loud following the arrest. The objections voiced on social media would fill entire newspaper pages. The judiciary’s actions against Gülşen are understood as an attack on the secular, fairly Islam-free way of life of many Turks. The Turkish opposition is of course jumping up. The case has even attracted international attention. The US government got involved or interfered – here, in a country like Turkey that tends to be hostile to America, the choice of words becomes a question of attitude. In any case, Washington sees the Gülşen case as a threat to freedom of art and expression. In return, the Turkish Association of Judges and Public Prosecutors commented. The allegation that the judiciary was working on the short leash of the government was objected to.
Not to mention the protests from Erdoğan’s ruling AKP party. Whereby: the reputation of Islamic education must be of particular concern to the president’s supporters at the moment. Cases of sexual abuse have been repeatedly uncovered in the schools of the conservative, politically powerful “Islamic Orders”. These revelations bring to mind the darkest recesses of Catholic educational institutions. Only: This does not apply to the Imam Hatip high schools.
The “Imam Hatip Liseleri” are state vocational high schools, attended by boys and girls whose conservative parents value a religiously tinged education. Those who graduate can study Islamic theology. The male students can become prayer leaders – i.e. imams – at a mosque. The diploma should be helpful for a career with the state religious authority Diyanet. The schools are part of Erdoğan’s political life project. Society should find its way back to its historical roots, and the secular Atatürk state should be re-Islamized. At least that’s what many think: One hundred years after the founding of the Turkish Republic, he wants to become the Muslim father of the nation and the historic anti-Atatürk.
The government pursues its Islamizing cultural policy in changing fields. Hagia Sophia, the 1,500-year-old orthodox church in Istanbul, was turned from a museum back into a mosque under Erdogan. Taxes on alcohol and tobacco are astronomically high, and alcohol sales are prohibited on religious holidays. The head of state lets it be known that the national drink is not the aniseed schnapps rakı drunk on ice, but the yogurt drink ayran.
The Istanbul Rainbow Parade was world famous – until the authorities banned it
In addition, the permanent stimulus topic LGBT+. For a conservative Islamic country like Turkey, the rainbow movement is quite strong and is making itself felt. The Istanbul Rainbow Parade was world famous – until the authorities banned it. Leading government politicians and the head of Diyanet, the top religious authority, warn that LGBT+ is the enemy, corrupts children and dishonors Turkish culture.
Music plays a special role in these re-Islamization tendencies. Orthodox Sunni Islamists not only ban images, but also object to music. A pop icon had recently fallen victim to state hostility: Sezen Aksu, the queen of Turkish pop music, had made a supposedly blasphemous allusion to Adam and Eve, to the story of creation, in one song. The state broadcasting authority ordered that the song, which violated “moral values,” could not be played on TV and radio. After the public space of social media had heated up accordingly, President Erdoğan himself spoke up: “It is our duty to cut out such tongues from the mouth.” At least that is proof that the President is not a fan of light music.