Your Country is Unwhole, Not Women

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The President [Recep Tayyip Erdoğan] graduating from economics branch has again been a matter of debate recently yet there is a field we know he has the skills on a “honorary PhD”- basis: touching the nerves of groups he has laid eyes on and polarizing those with different attachments through arguments he has developed which are not that original.  But you have to give him the credit; he knows very well, which tones he will receive hitting which wires.  

Yesterday, he has provoked women again by his words “How a woman who abstains from motherness through saying ‘I’m working’, is actually denying her womanliness. A woman who denies motherness and avoids managing her home, is an unwhole, half woman regardless how much success she has in her business life.  Refusing motherness is giving up on humanity” and the reaction was not late to come.  

Women who have made an issue of bringing themselves into existence is a group often targeted by him.

He says; “Can man and woman be equals at all?” and “Every abortion is a murder”. He says “You have to give birth to at least three children and do that in a natural way”. He says; “Be a good mother and partner”. He says and says and says…He continuously instrumentalizes the woman who tries to be the subject of her own life. He tries to make her an object of AKP (Justice and Development Party) policies, put her on the shelf next to the incubator, food processor, iron and vacuum cleaner, dust her off and polish her.

 In my opinion, some reason why Erdoğan has continually kept harping on woman is the feminist struggle practices of women for years, and the fact that women are the fastest group to show reaction, get organized and raise voice.

Hence, demonstrations will be held this evening saying “A woman is a woman, what is half, is your brain”.

When we scream in whatever tone, whenever he wishes us to scream, can our voice shout down other voices? Of course we are not going to remain quiet, yet should our scream this evening for instance be only that?

Is the voice of women being heard who for instance were left half in Nusaybin, Sur and Cizre, lost their houses, children and have never had the chance to think on “being whole”?

 Are we up for a test of Turkishness through a blood test?

Do we feel safe with a Prime Minister who has called what has been done to the the Armenians in 1915’s “ordinary”? Have we turned our heads and looked at which situation our Armenian neighbour is in after this statement?

Two days ago, Saturday Mothers searching for 585 weeks for their relatives disappeared in custody, were asking about Hurşit Külter unaccounted for 12 days.

In the last three years, 275 persons have lost their lives in 10 bomb attacks.

While the country you have been ruling becomes more and more “half” everyday, how dare you round on woman like that? (BK/HK)