Its funny how all "expatriate" turks hate Erodgan while he wins over-whelming vote in mainland Turkey Mashallah! There is a reason that Europe is going down while Turkey is rising...
I don't understand..Why do some expatriate Turks dislike Erodgan so much? Even though he is taking Turkey in the right direction? Probably they are just brainwashed by West and its terminologies ...hah.
While I can't speak for all members here, I will explain to you why I dislike him. If you wish to discuss the matter maturely, without referring to my country as a "**** hole", or "suckular", we can debate the matter.
While I dislike him, I will agree with you that he has done well for the country. GDP per capita, quality of life, infrastructure and business are all improving based on some of Erdogans policies and work. On this front, not much can be said about him. This goes without saying, however, that perhaps it was “just Turkeys time to boom”. I have an undergraduate degree in economics, and even anyone who remotely follows the news can tell you – economies are cyclical. There is no boom or recession that lasts forever. Thus in the case of the west, their own poor policies, pro-union, socialist behaviour resulted in dragging their economies down. As budgets tighten, businesses and investment move out of their home country and into another- relative political stability, abundant technology/capital, and low operating costs. So right about with the collapse of EU/US economies (starting with them particularly slowing down at the turn of the century), we saw not just Turkey, but a number of developing nations begin to boom. Once more, Erdogan did have a role in its improvement, but I don’t believe his policies, if we applied them in the good times of mid to late 90’s, would result in such massive growth and economic success.
On a more political front, he is volatile and incredibly thin skinned. This makes me worry about if or when he will get ticked off on a personal level with another important country (ie the US…Yeah, I don’t care what anyone says about how strong our army or economy is – we need them…for now), or a rival country (Greece). Take for example the Syrian crisis. When it all began Erdogans attitude to the world was “Don’t worry! We’re tight, I’ll talk to him! Hes a good guy!”. As soon as Erdogan didn’t get his way, he became the biggest voice of criticism against Bashar Al-Assad, despite nothing really changing in Syria before and after the meeting. Same goes for Israel – when he couldn’t broker a peace process, he felt insulted by Israel and look where that got us. The man runs Turkish policy on his personal tiffs, and that can be dangerous.
Then there is the entire coupe plotter issue. He is expending tremendous efforts to arrest coupe plotters from decades ago, and manipulating/controlling the media to make a massive fuss about how untouchable and just his government policy is. Going back to the entire economy topic – Turkey had its boom, where was the boom in Pakistan? Iran? Afghanistan? Syria? Right, it never happened. Why? Political instability – who in their right mind would bring their business to countries that are wrought with intolerance, violence, and bigotry? (Please, don’t think I am trying to insult you or the people of Pakistan with that last adjective, but you cannot deny the fact that there is a large number of seriously fanatical Muslims there – far more than Turkey). Nobody would, and that’s why while these other countries are either falling apart, having serious friction with neighbouring countries, or dealing with internal issues (Alawites vs Sunnis anyone? Oh look, religious violence again!), Turkey and other less hardline developing nations had their boom. Had it not been for keeping religion out through these coupes, it is likely Turkey would be dealing with some sort of internal strife like the other nations I listed. Rather than saying “We are Turks, we are united and able to play on the global political stage as ONE COUNTRY”, they would be busy dealing with nonsense of Shia vs Sunni, Jihad on Israel and US, religious enforcement/oppression. Before Erdogan takes full credit for improving the economy, he needs to check his pro-Islam stance and stop taking the country down that direction because I assure you secularism set the stage for the boom – not Islam.
Finally, as you can probably tell, I dislike having Islam (Or any religion) implemented in government, or encouraged by the government. Why is it necessary to have Islam courses in the military? Erdogans excuse was to be a truly democratic country we need to offer the option. Well, the military is large enough – why not implement some courses in Christianity? I know Turkey is a predominantly Muslim nation, but when you’re talking about true democracy, you give ALL religions and choices an option.
Why all of a sudden did we build such warm relationships with Muslim nations, and coincidently our relations with all other nations soured? Turk/US relations went south, Turk/EU relations went south, Turk/Israel relations went south. Turk/Islam relations went up – big time. This is NOT a proper way to attain prosperity for your people. Furthermore, more and more mosques are being built all throughout the country, heck we are even paying to have mosques built in other countries now to help promote Islam. Even recently, we have announced “Ayran” as our national beverage. AtaTurk was the founder of Turkey, it’s his country, his drink – Raki. Turkish Airlines is now beginning a partial ban on alcohol on certain flights – is that really a sound business decision? You have a business not selling something that has a huge profit margin, because? There is a huge thread about a Pianist being thrown in jail because he rubbed Islamic hardliners in government the wrong way. Hundreds of journalists are in jail because they spoke low of Erdogans government, or Islam. There is an obvious pattern and trend here, that regardless of where you sit on the political fence (Kemalist vs Islamist), that you just simply cannot argue against if you apply sound and reasonable logic.
For Erdogans time, he took the country in the right direction. However, as he further dismantles any form of opposition, or parties that keep his actions in check, you can clearly see he is taking bigger and bolder steps towards Islam, and further away from Secularism. You need only look at the Ottoman empire, or current heavy Islamic countries and the state they were in or how they end up. Erdogan is playing my country and my people right into those same doomed steps. That’s why I dislike him.
I made a post some time ago about how mean education levels/poverty will affect peoples decisions to follow a more religious path as a means of salvation. All Erdogan did was play the right card at the right time (and good on him for it), and with that he won the trust of the people. Unfortunately Turkey hasn’t reached that highly educated state to know better (imo), and thus will follow Erdogan blindly, or buy into the religion scheme willingly simply because they don’t know better just yet.
There is your answer. I’ll say it again – if you come out with “lolz” or other insults, I will not engage with you any further. Discuss if you wish.
