Turkey gets a naval base in Albania

[ovarel]

Our nation will understand that it is possible to both respect Ataturk and his achievements as well as support the AKP (or whatever government in the future that gets voted in after AKP lose favor) in their efforts and be a Muslim at the same time.

i believe the day you mentioned will come..but i dont believe the day that people of Turkey will understand that noone has to respect M.Kemal will come..its hopeless

i dont respect m.kemal,i dont believe the history he wrote..i love my country,i love my people and i love my flag but i dont like him and i dont have to...

you people think kemal is a hero who owned the west..
you are terribly wrong,the west owned us with him.

 

[Mehmet]

i believe the day you mentioned will come..but i dont believe the day that people of Turkey will understand that noone has to respect M.Kemal will come..its hopeless

i dont respect m.kemal,i dont believe the history he wrote..i love my country,i love my people and i love my flag but i dont like him and i dont have to...

you people think kemal is a hero who owned the west..
you are terribly wrong,the west owned us with him.

I am not going to argue with you regarding this, my point is clear, that as a nation we must not fall into the trap of cherry picking our history or getting far too emotional over it. I as a Turk respect Ataturk as a leader, I dont worship him nor do I worship the AKP, Ataturk gets my respect as being our leader during our darkest time, I also respect ALL our Ottoman leaders. Am I making my position clear?

When you state "You People" I am afraid you are getting too worked up over a historical figure brother. You should not do this as it will only lead to divisions in our society that our enemies may take advantage of. I hope one day the factions which people identify themselves with understand how foolish they have been.

 

[ovarel]

I am not going to argue with you regarding this, my point is clear, that as a nation we must not fall into the trap of cherry picking our history or getting far too emotional over it. I as a Turk respect Ataturk as a leader, I dont worship him nor do I worship the AKP, Ataturk gets my respect as being our leader during our darkest time, I also respect ALL our Ottoman leaders. Am I making my position clear?

When you state "You People" I am afraid you are getting too worked up over a historical figure brother. You should not do this as it will only lead to divisions in our society that our enemies may take advantage of. I hope one day the factions which people identify themselves with understand how foolish they have been.

im not the one getting emotional,on the contrary,i strongly support the rational approach to our history..

i dont respect all ottoman leaders.if you are doing so you are the one getting emotional and cancelling the rational thinking process..there is no need to be like "ömer baba"..saying that they were all good etc etc this is meaningless..we should settle accounts with our history,if we dont want the westerners to exploit our differences..

and if you accuse me of getting too worked up over a historical figure,then i have to ask you that how long have you been away from Turkey?since when m.kemal is regarded as a historical figure?

the head of the army says who doesnt follow ataturk is our enemy and im the one being accused of getting too worked up..c'mon man..

who controls the past controls the future..when kemalist indoctrination leave the past alone,i will not say anything against their god and his teachings..

no need to mention that you free not to argue.

 

[Mehmet]

im not the one getting emotional,on the contrary,i strongly support the rational approach to our history..

i dont respect all ottoman leaders.if you are doing so you are the one getting emotional and cancelling the rational thinking process..there is no need to be like "ömer baba"..saying that they were all good etc etc this is meaningless..we should settle accounts with our history,if we dont want the westerners to exploit our differences..

and if you accuse me of getting too worked up over a historical figure,then i have to ask you that how long have you been away from Turkey?since when m.kemal is regarded as a historical figure?

the head of the army says who doesnt follow ataturk is our enemy and im the one being accused of getting too worked up..c'mon man..

who controls the past controls the future..when kemalist indoctrination leave the past alone,i will not say anything against their god and his teachings..

no need to mention that you free not to argue.

Apologies then, when you referred to me as "you people" I took that you were implying that I am a hardcore kemalist, my point brother is that I respect Ataturk and our Ottoman leaders because they were simply our leaders with many of them during their reign having to commit to difficult decisions, nothing more. They are all historical figures as well as our previous leaders before the AKP government.

I am not a part of the Turkish war machine therefore I am not the one telling you to worship Ataturk I am simply stating the fact that he his a historical figure even if it does not appear like that at the moment, my hope is our nation will wake up one day and harmonize itself, accepting our complete history for what it is (that it is just history), with people free to respect who or if they wish idolize whoever they want.

I also understand how you feel, I also grew up with nothing but Ataturk's victories and achievements being drilled into me everyday but as you have guessed I have not been in Turkey for some time since my job requires me to travel frequently however this has given me the ability to look outside and to be frank smell and sort out the dung from the truth.

 

[ovarel]

i got your point..i also oppose the factioning in our society..we should create a tolerant society..in order to achieve this,the state institutions must not favor one idea or POV..for example:when the army favor kemalism,anti-kemalists is becoming more radical.the state can solve this problem.

 

[Saithan]

M.Kemal was a visionary, he did great many things for our country, and he should be remembered for that.

 

[rickshaw driver]

how far is Bosnia from albania?i heard turkey has got very brotherly ties with BiH and it not land-locked i think

 

[A1Kaid]

Kardes, I have encountered some Kemalist before, and the Kemalist many of them are hardcore secularist to the point it seems they are anti-Islam. It seems like some do worship M.Kemal. I once questioned and presented an alternative view of Mustafa Kemal, I received many insults and very disgusting language (on website not personally, I doubt they would say such things in person)...I know the nature of some of these Kemalist type people and their words and actions reflect poorly on them.

So I understand where Ovarel is coming from, as I have been exposed to some of the Kemalist followers.

 

[A1Kaid]

how far is Bosnia from albania?i heard turkey has got very brotherly ties with BiH and it not land-locked i think

According to this distance from Tirana to Sarajevo is

Miles: 188.83
Kilometers: 303.88

Distance between Tirana albania and Sarajevo bosnia and herzegovina

 

[rickshaw driver]

According to this distance from Tirana to Sarajevo is

Miles: 188.83
Kilometers: 303.88

Distance between Tirana albania and Sarajevo bosnia and herzegovina

serbia is yoguslavia?i mean smaller one after the breakup

 

[Mehmet]

Kardes, I have encountered some Kemalist before, and the Kemalist many of them are hardcore secularist to the point it seems they are anti-Islam. It seems like some do worship M.Kemal. I once questioned and presented an alternative view of Mustafa Kemal, I received many insults and very disgusting language (on website not personally, I doubt they would say such things in person)...I know the nature of some of these Kemalist type people and their words and actions reflect poorly on them.

So I understand where Ovarel is coming from, as I have been exposed to some of the Kemalist followers.

You will find many Turks to have great respect and admiration of Ataturk and as percentage wise small numbers being openly religious, for Turks religion is much more a private, personal thing (the "my choice of religion, my struggle to live by it's ideals is a personal matter for me only mentality of thinking)

The actions of some Turks who defend Ataturk is frankly at current times necessary (to a point) since even our current Western friends who supposedly respect Turkey and Ataturk also buy into the propaganda that is the so called genocide (which paints Ataturk as a mass murderer in the East of Turkey when historical documents clearly place him the West of Turkey at Gallipoli during the events described). The Turks who appear to be radicalized have been by far and large a result of the Western Turko bashing mentality, the demonizing of the Turk (a remnant propaganda from WW1 still utilized today to make the secular Turks evil (secular Muslims being the ultimate paradox to many Western "scholars" (sic). ie: propaganda mouthpieces).

This policy is well documented in academia and it is known as Orientalism which is basically the Western view of the cultural other (Middle East, Islam, far East) and the results of such thinking is often portrayed in film such as 99 percent of the time when Arabs in American movies wearing face cover and brandishing a weapon.

So when Turks who defend Ataturk to the extreme it is important to understand that they are the result of the Western world that deliberately attempts to obfuscate the facts and diminish the proven victories & achievements the man has been credited for.

The concept of Orientalism can be applied to the Palestinian (evil Muslims who in Western eyes are wrong by default) - Israeli (civilized Westerners who can do no wrong by default) conflict.

1974 Cyprus conflict, ie: the painting of the Muslim Turks as evil vs the "innocent" EOKA & Junta controlled Greek Christian Cypriots.

PKK Conflict: Evil Muslim (the cultural other) giant Turkey vs the European backed "innocent" PKK "freedom" fighters.

There are many more examples of this but the end results are always the same, the ignorance of the West in their understanding and views of religions (especially Islam (focus since 19th century awareness of the Ottoman Empire) and cultures (central focus is on the ME) they do not understand create the very people they fear, the ignorance creating enmity and bitterness for Western countries and cultures.

 

[ovarel]

i dont want to offend ataturks followers and i respect mehmet but since he is trying to find excuses for kemalist bigotry..then here is my excuses for my stance..

westerners does not demonize m.kemal..on the contrary,they love to abuse the ataturk fetishism..backward societies worship political leaders and westerners take advantage of it..ataturk was a radical westernizer,why should the westerners demonize him?most of his policies was very helpful to UK..all westerners adore him except greeks and armenians..if you dont believe me,go argue with a westerner,you will see that they are more kemalist than you..and israelis,they are also quite pro-ataturk..

and mehmet is talking about secular Turks..no need to blame western orientalists because sadly we are also falling in that trap..there is no secularists vs islamists in Turkey..one does not have to be a pro-theocracy in order to reject ataturks legacy..i also want secularism(which we dont have ) in Turkey but i dont want anybody to use secularism as an oppressive tool and to retain his power..turks are the most orientalist people in the world,we are orientalizing ourselves,this is crazy..remember what Hadise wore in the Eurovision song contest;a bellydancer clothe..we wanted to seem cute to the white man by playing to his harem fantasies..i felt myself like $hit... before blaming westerners,we should check ourselves..

as me and mehmet agreed earlier,people may have different opinions about m.kemal..but if we always find excuses for their intolerance,then we are not going to have the society we want..unless we want to go back to 40's.

 

[damm1t]

stop fighting guys..
not to respect opposite views is the source of any kind of conflicts between us..
i tell you what i think; i believe the akp government is one of the most succesful ones, i respect Ataturk and take him as a immortal leader for all of us..
i am not afraid of opposite views, i embrace them if they dont intend to divide my people and country like bdp kurds do.
logic is really simple, how less we fight that much we develop..

 

[Saithan]

At the end of the day I keep feeling that both Mehmet and Ovarel are talking about the same thing.

"Aferim delisi olmayin, istikrarli ve kudretli olun".

Let the artists promote Turkey as they want. Playing to peoples fantasy and expectations are normal. Remember that everyone has "an idea" of how a country is. e.g. Japan = samurai.

Please remember the artists are one of the best way of promoting our country. the drama series, the movies, painters, singers etc. can reach far away places.

 

[ovarel]

At the end of the day I keep feeling that both Mehmet and Ovarel are talking about the same thing.

"Aferim delisi olmayin, istikrarli ve kudretli olun".

Let the artists promote Turkey as they want. Playing to peoples fantasy and expectations are normal. Remember that everyone has "an idea" of how a country is. e.g. Japan = samurai.

Please remember the artists are one of the best way of promoting our country. the drama series, the movies, painters, singers etc. can reach far away places.

to be honest,i couldnt understand how this debate is related with artists promoting Turkey..also this was not a fight between mehmet and me,it was just a debate..despite i appreciate your mediator role between the opposite views i cant accept the opinion that "dont discuss and we will develop"..i think the opposite is true,if we are loyal to debate ethics..

yes mehmet and me agreed on many things but i simply didnt like his apologetic behaviour for kemalist attacks..if we want to reunite the factionings then we have to accept the incorrectness of their behaviours.

we didnt have a fight or whatsoever,dont panic.