What is going on in METU, Ankara?

The METU Forest

The Middle East Technical University (METU) was founded in 1956 in an area of 4500 hectares. This huge region was said to consist of swamps and have a soil like white powder. The forestations were launched on 1961, when students, academics, Ankara citizens as well as some politicians participated in the festivals. More than 31 million trees were planted, creating a vast green area in the steppes of Ankara. These trees were considered as an heritage of METU laborers and academics. The METU forest contains 10 million coniferous and 23 million broad-leaved drought-tolerant trees, including black pine, yellow pine, taurus cedar, oak, poplar and almond trees. The forest encompasses a region of 3100 hectares and was declared a Natural and Archaeological Conservation Site in 1995 by the Ministry of Culture. According to the website of METU Forestation and Environment Directory, the forest accommodates 100 species under the threat of extinction in the Middle Anatolian flora and fauna. This natural ecosystem is home to many wild animals (including wolves, foxes, partridges, rabbits, snakes and turtles), some 140 bird species as well as various fish and other marine species living in the lakes and lagoons. The presence of the forest created a micro-climate effect in the region, made the urban climate milder and put a barrier to unplanned urbanization in the south of Ankara city. The METU Forestation Project won the International Aga Khan Architecture Award (1995) and the TEMA Foundation award (2003).[1]

METU Before and After Forestation 

METU, Politics and the METU Policies

On the other hand, METU always had a strong left-wing tradition, witnessing the most impressive protests of the 60s and led many leftist movements. This tradition is still present as METU students take it as one the essential heritages of previous generations. Just to name one, Hüseyin İnan, executed in 1972 with Deniz Gezmiş and Yusuf Aslan for political reasons, was one of the students who burnt the car of the US ambassador Komer, also known as the Vietnam Butcher, on January 6th, 1969, in METU campus.[2]

Komer's Car Burnt 

Because of its revolutionary stance, METU was always in the target of right-wing governments. Issues such as the construction of highways through the campus and taking over METU's land were used as political propaganda that has symbolic importance in the oppression of opposition movements.[3]

The Highway Project

The highway construction in METU entered the nation's agenda in 1992. This road was supposed to connect the Anadolu Boulevard to Konya Road. The project was approved in 1994 and was of course responded by massive student demonstrations. In addition, METU was declared a protected area in 1995.

In 2008, the Metropolitan Municipality of Melih Gökçek (in power for 19 years, he is well-known for jumping to and fro right-wing parties that take part in the government in the given period) introduced a second road construction. This project initiated strong debate between the Municipality and METU. The Municipality claimed that the buildings of METU were illegal, and decided to destroy 45 buildings as well as to fine the university a total of 1,8 million TL. (approximately 600.000 Euros, or 900.00 USD) The issue was publicly known as “the road showdown”.

The METU administration brought the project to trial. The court decided, in 45 different lawsuits, that the destructions or the fines had no legal grounds and that they were against public interest. Following the objections of the Metropolitan Municipality, a team consisting of two academics from the Urban Planning Department and five academics from the Civil Engineering Department started working on a new plan. This new plan was called a “Reconstruction Project for Protection”. According to this plan, the essentials of the first highway route of 1994 would be kept as they were, with many additional crossroads proposals. The plan further stated that, in order to avoid damaging the environment, the second highway should be constructed as a tunnel.[4]

The Occupation and the Resistance

Students, academics and laborers of METU think that this highway serves only for political and economic interests. As a matter of fact, if the intention was to relax the city traffic, the municipality should have finished the metro construction, which lasted for 11 years already. METU witnessed protests and forestation actions since years, opposing the destruction. METU students, together with the locals of 100. Yıl and Çiğdem neighborhoods organize protests, demonstrations, and, recently, camping in the site. The municipality responded to the protests with police violence, including tear gas and rubber bullets.

While METU administration tried all legal methods, the achievements in court were overruled in practice due to political interests. On October 18th, 2013, the last day of the religious holidays due to the Feast of Sacrifice, when the number of students inside the campus was in its minimum, the destruction workers entered the campus, accompanied with police forces. The next day, METU students, graduates and laborers united to protest the situation, and the neighbors from 100.Yıl and Çiğdem joined them in support. Police laid an ambush inside the forest, attacked the protesters with tear gas canisters and rubber bullets. While barricades were formed and police violence continued all night long, it was reported that policemen beat a student and threw him to the fire next to the barricades. The student is diagnosed to have second degree burns.

After the removal of 3000 trees, METU Presidency released a statement:

“We communicated to the Ministry, Municipality and State authorities on September 11th, 2013, that we were planning to object to their plans, and emphasized that irreversible practices should be avoided in the meanwhile. Ankara Metropolitan Municipality's (AMM) Director of Techical Works and Director of Construction Affairs stated that no action will be taken without discussing with the university administration. On the same day, a written appeal was sent to AMM to declare that we do not assent to any actions until the legal suspension and objection periods finalize.

Despite of these meetings and correspondences, an abrupt night operation was executed on October 18th, 2013, without waiting for the suspension and objection periods to end. Construction machines, construction workers and many municipality employees intruded the university land on October 18th, 2013, Friday, at 21:15, without any permission, and by destroying the campus fences on the side of 100.Yıl district Öğretmenler Boulevard. Private security guards of the university tried to warn and stop the teams, as university land cannot be trespassed without permission from the administration. However, it turned impossible to prevent the numerous trucks, construction machines and municipality workers from entering the campus without permission.

…

In the morning of October 19th, 2013, an examination established that the road route inside the METU campus was completely cleaned and all the trees were removed. We are not informed about how 3000 trees (including more than 600 pine trees that were supposed to be transferred) were removed. Yet, it is impossible to transfer 600 trees in a single night.”

Melih Gökçek's agenda is to incite provocation to consolidate his voters before local elections. In a local level, he aims at the exact same goal as Tayyip Erdoğan did in Gezi Park. Moreover, this is a direct attack to the integrity of METU as a university as well as the values METU represents in the society. METU students are still in resistance, struggling for ecology, as is exemplified by the amazing tree planting action where more than 3000 trees were planted in the same area.

METU Students 3000 Trees Plantation 

Furthermore, hundreds of academics around the world released a statement, showing solidarity with the struggle and denouncing the policies of the municipality.

As the motto goes: “There is only one road passing through METU, and that is the road to revolution”.

---

[1]

http://acdm.metu.edu.tr/tarihce

[2]

http://vagus.tv/2013/08/26/bozkirdan-ormana-odtu-ormaninin-dogusu/

[3] Tayyip Erdoğan’s visit of METU in 2012 accompanied by 2000 policemen forces. He was protested by hundreds of students and police used so much tear gas that became visible even from far distant areas.

[4]

"The information presented in these paragraphs is mainly based on this

article [published in BCC Turkish": http://www.bbc.co.uk/turkce/haberler/2013/08/130829_odtu_ormani_gecmis.shtml

Labor unions in Turkey and in Gezi protests – F. Serkan Öngel

I'm not saying “Don't unionize.” Do it, but do it in your spare time.

The Turkish original of this article, “Sendikalı olma demiyorum hobi olarak yine ol!”, signed F.Serkan Öngel, was published on August 4th, 2013 in Birgün newspaper. For our English-speaking audience, we prepared a shortened translation of the article.

Permission to Collective Agreement and Strike

The Ministry of Labor and Social Security takes its power to violate labor rights from the laws and regulations introduced by the military intervention on September 12th, 1980. One of the most important of these regulations is the issue of syndicate thresholds, which gives the state a tremendous power to intervene in the relationship between employer and employees. The law issued after September 12th restricted the right to strike for the collective agreement process and prohibited any other type of strikes. And then introduced thresholds for competency to collective agreement. The labor unions that can make collective agreement would be decided by the Ministry. The AKP government enthusiastically welcomed this anti-democratic practice and adopted it with joy. This is the mentality underlying the recent Labor Unions and Collective Agreements Law, effective by November 7th, 2012.

The direct result of this law is the robbery of the right to collective agreement. By 2018, nearly half of the registered workers will not be able to make collective agreements, even if s/he became involved in a labor union. This new law is far beyond the 1980 policies.

Where are the Labor Unions?

By the Gezi Park protests, a public demand for general strike came out. Suddenly, everyone focused on labor unions. “Where are the labor unions?” This question was the reaction towards the unions. It is nice that people, who typically are not conscious that unions are the solidarity and unity organizations of the workers (ie. themselves), who see no other choice other than submission to their boss, who cannot dare to show solidarity to their fired colleagues, who prioritize competition over solidarity in their workplace, seek for unions all of a sudden. However, the problem is that in a society where 60% of the population takes part in the wage labor, unions are seen as an external agency. It is as if unions are some superheroes waiting somewhere for a public call. In fact, any place where unity and solidarity transform into struggle for rights is the real ground for unionization.

The basis of this ground has been destroyed by the organizational changes in the production and management strategies. While laws tied the hands of labor unions, the union movement imprisoned itself within legal boundaries. Labor unions regressed dramatically. Being a union member became an exception. The state tried to tame the unions so that they would be compatible with the interests of the capital and the state, so that they are broken off from the working class. This was mostly successful.

As a result, while around half of the registered workers were unionized before 1980, this number was reduced to 20% in the 80s, then to 10% in the 90s, and finally to one-digit numbers by 2000s. The new law mentioned above removes the notary requirements [see Labor Rights in Turkey] and thereby makes unionization easier, but makes the right to collective agreement completely out of question, therefore practically forbids strikes. Unionization becomes a pure hobby for workers after this reconstruction. The logic is to increase the number of members of labor unions (as a parameter of democratization) while at the same time making them ineffective. However, all these attempts will fail as can be seen clearly in the uprising of the non-unionized masses.

The portion of labor in the national income decreased from 52% to 30% in the period 1999-2012. In the same period, the numbers of workers who practiced collective agreement fell from 11% to 5.5%. It is obvious that there is a correlation.

This picture shows that the bells toll for the working class. It is possible to say the blue-collar workers are hardly kept in the factories¹, and the June uprising is an indicator of this.

1  Reference to the statements of PM Tayyip Erdoğan who claimed that he hardly keeps his 50% [of the population] at home during the Gezi protests.

The Mayonnaise Phenomenon – Sinan Eden

The original of this article, titled “L'alchimie de la Mayonnaise”, was published in French in Rouge & Vert, the newspaper of Les Alternatifs, on July 11th, 2013. It was written on June 23rd.

It starts with a camp to prevent the destruction of a public park in the middle of Istanbul which is attacked by the police. The number of protesters multiply, police attacks again. In a few days, one hundred thousand people are on the street, pushing police barricades at 2:00 am. In a few days, protests multiply once again; solidarity demonstrations are held in hundreds of towns.

How did this happen? How did hundreds of thousands of people started chanting “Pepper gas ! Hooray !” in front of water cannons? How did we manage to make a human line of 300 meters in İstiklal street, carrying stones and such to our barricades? (In fact, two parallel lines.)  Did anyone of us imagine that it would be possible to hear hundreds of people in the ferry chanting “Our path is the path to revolution, come brothers and sisters, come ! Our country is filled with fascists now, charge brothers and sisters, charge !”

This article tries to give a partial answer to the above questions. It will be partial, because it will not include the real reasons behind people's anger. It will not analyze the unlawful practices of the government that keeps thousands of political prisoners in jail waiting for their accusation documents to be prepared. It will not analyze the Kurdish issue, the Alawite issue or the Armenian issue. It will not analyze the imperialistic policies of the AKP government with respect to Syria. It will not analyze how AKP declared war on all ecosystems through an integrated strategy combining GMOs, coal power plants, hydroelectric dams, nuclear power plants and giant urban transformation projects. Neither will it analyze the Islamization of the society and of politics through an extensive transformation in the education system, through bans and restrictions on alcohol consumption, and through sexist and discriminative discourse against women and LGBT individuals. It will also not analyze the violations of labor rights, prohibitions on the 1^st of May celebrations, the systematic introduction of precarious employment or privatizations.

We exclude all the above mentioned items, because we think there is one essential point that could inspire the socialists and/or revolutionaries around the world.

We will call it the mayonnaise phenomenon.

Wikipedia states “mayonnaise is made by slowly adding oil to an egg yolk, while whisking vigorously to disperse the oil”. You should not add too much oil, because then you can spoil the mayonnaise. However, you should be very patient during whisking.

It is very curious to note that the best mayonnaise is obtained by patient repetition of a single act: slowly add oil while whisking.

As any experienced cook would testify, this is not the same as being stubborn. You are following a recipe, you are not just repeating a habit. Moreover, there is a clear way of realizing that you overdid it: it becomes butter, and a very bad quality of such.

We were protesting the nuclear power plant projects. We were arrested because we published articles criticizing the government's oppressive policies. We were detained while speaking out against the strong introduction of religious discourse in elementary schools. We were attacked by gas bombs while blocking the highway in the direction of coal power plant construction areas. We were beaten by cops in our demonstrations against the government's Syria policies.

Socialists, communists, revolutionaries in Turkey were determined to fight for the emancipation of the society, to fight for a better world. We were always there, confronting the state apparatus in the shape of riot police and gas bombs, fighting for the rights of the people. Sometimes we were a few hundred people, sometimes thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands. But mostly, hundreds.

 But guess what ! The initial campers were also some hundred people. They were attacked by the police the first day of the camp, but returned the next day. They were then attacked by the police again, but returned the next day, multiplying their numbers. They were then attacked by the police again, this time burning their tents and all their material. Then, something not expected by the rulers happened: Everyone came ! Hundreds of thousands arrived to a cloud of tear gas in Istanbul. Some 250 cities witnessed solidarity protests.

A fascist state that cannot comprehend people's demands, that does not have the concept of negotiating with the opposition, declared war to its citizens. By June 21, Turkish Medical Association reported that 4 people lost their lives, 7836 got injured of which 60 are heavily injured, 101 had head traumas and 5 are in serious condition. 11 people lost their eyes and 1 person had his spleen taken. Add to this thousands of detentions and tens of arrests, continuing via police raids while this article is being written.

Yet the country was shouting the slogan: “This is just the beginning. The struggle continues.” The Turkish society realized its power.

We showed how revolutionaries are always on the front lines for the rights of the working class. On the other hand, we saw how the people was right behind us, providing anti-acid liquids for our eyes, providing shelter in their houses during police chases, shouting “Shoulder to shoulder against fascism !”, and spreading the word via photos and videos.

It was the mayonnaise effect in action.

The wavelengths matched, and we became millions.

One may analyze the reasons, the dynamics and the consequences of the uprising in Turkey. One may try to figure out why the government never ever tried to soothe the protests, why the battle in Ankara still continues without a single day of cease fire since more than three weeks. One may indeed learn a lot about how fascism operates.

But if there is only one thing our comrades in France would learn from the uprising in Turkey, it is the mayonnaise phenomenon. If there is only one thing our comrades in France would learn from the uprising in Turkey, it is the importance of political determination. We were not as aware of it before the uprising as we are now.

If there is only one moral of this story, it is the following: We shall never give in, we shall never give up !

Turkey's 9/11 : Reyhanlı

Editor's note: This is a compilation of news items and articles originally published in Turkish. With the exception of the introduction, we do not claim any intellectual nor political credit for the text. All the analyses belong to the authors of the texts referred to at the end of each paragraph. Yet, the mistakes and misinterpretations are due to our misunderstanding of the analyses.

Please read our previous news item on the subject and check the Syria label for further comments.

On Saturday, May 11th, two car explosions were reported in Reyhanlı, Turkey. The first numbers were 4 dead and 20 injuries. The number of deaths later increased to 8, then to 22, and then to 46, and then came the media blackout issued by the government, prohibiting any kind of journalist activities on the matter. In general, such big events cannot be analyzed without a big margin of error due to macro-political secrecies, but this time we do not even know how many citizens lost their lives. There is a widespread rumor, claimed to be reported by local hospitals, that the actual number is 177 deaths, and as for injuries hundred seems to be the significant digit.

This news item aims at separating evidence-based factual information from speculative analysis. This is not to underrate political analysis in any way. Due to media blackout accompanied with auto-censorship in mainstream media, it became especially difficult to reach proper information on the matter. Therefore, we have had hard time preparing a well-designed analysis.

Facts and observations

After the explosions, government officials pointed the Assad regime and so did the media. Vice prime minister Beşir Atalay claimed that the investigations concluded that Al Muhaberat, an organization allied with the Syrian government forces, is responsible for the attacks. Minister of Internal Affairs Muammer Güler confirmed Atalay's statement.[1] On Sunday, 10 people were arrested for investigations. The authorities did not let anyone enter the crime scene, including parliamentarians of the opposition parties. A deputy reported that the excuse was that they were collecting evidence, yet what the deputies observed was that the police was destroying evidence with heavy construction equipment. [2]

The locals are outraged due to the complete indifference in media, as almost all TV channels continued showing their prime time programs, ranging from sitcoms to reality shows. One local, when noticed the camera of a BBC journalist after a funeral, complained “What are you doing? We warned you hundreds of times before, you ignored it. Look, I am an enemy of this state. Let them put me in jail, I hope they do.” Another one reacted “So many people died, no one is sharing our sorrow. TV channels are shouting at us with their entertainment shows. What kind of mourning is this?” [3]

The National Intelligence Service (MİT) claimed that the bombs were loaded in Ar-Raqqah, Syria. This does not seem plausible due to the followings: Since March, Ar-Raqqah is under control of the Al Nusra Front, an organization affiliated to Al Qaida. It is a town that is 300 km away from the Yayladağı border gate, which MİT claimed the cars crossed the border. The area is strictly controlled both by the Syrian state and by the rebels. Furthermore, this would imply that two cars loaded with explosives managed to pass through the border gates of Turkey, which in fact turns out to be the only reasonable part of the narrative. [4]

The government officials repeatedly argued that this was the first time the Syrian civil war affected Turkish citizens. This is plain wrong, recalling the terrorist attack in Gaziantep in August 2012 killing nine [5] (successfully covered up by the government), and the Free Syrian Army militants who tried to cross the borders without passport check and get into a conflict with the security forces on May 2nd, killing one security official in Akçakale. [6]

What is actually happening?

There are two scenarios voiced by the political analysts.

First is that the Syrian regime is responsible for the attacks, menacing the Turkish government for supporting and sheltering the rebels. The aim is to put Turkey's Syrian policies into question in public opinion and therefore isolate Turkey's aggressive interventionist policies with respect to Syria. As Turkey would not get enough support from the US, who in turn is continuing its bargains with Russia, Turkey would have to converge into a more cautious position.

The second scenario is that the attack is a provocation to get Turkey involved in the conflicts in Syria. Some elements in the opposition organized the attacks to create outrage and terror in the public, resulting in a more aggressive policy with respect to Syria. The government, in search of becoming a “regional leader”, may have direct role in the attacks. If it doesn't, it would still use this opportunity with this perspective. In short, the attacks are a kind of September 11 for Turkey, a provocation to make the government take active part in the Syrian civil war. [7]

We observe that the latter scenario is swept away in mainstream media, both Turkish and international. Yet it is voiced coherently among Turkish left, and we therefore want to highlight some of its main features below.

We start by summarizing an analyis by Hamide Yiğit in Sendika.org.

The explosions were first reported in The Syrian Revolution 2011 website of the Free Syrian Army (FSA). The website said “Explosions in Reyhanlı. Tens of deaths.” This does not sound natural, given that Turkish news agencies were yet reporting 4 deaths at that moment.

Yet there is an important detail. Mohamad Damascian who uploaded the video to the page commented “Admin, here is the video. Take it Erdoğan. With Allah's permission, the next bomb will be in Ankara, pig!” After a while when the Turkish media and the Syrian rebels started to state that the attacks were done by the Assad regime, the video was deleted and re-uploaded without the comment.

Yiğit notes that this website consists of heterogeneous members, belonging to a variety of opposition groups. Hence, it is not straightforward to relate a post with a particular organization such as Al Nusra or FSA.

It is well known that FSA and Al Nusra have conflicts of interests, although both are supported and partially controlled by the Turkish government. After the US and France putting Al Nusra into the list of terrorist organizations, it is plausible to assume that Turkey may have put a distance, and that therefore Al Nusra is now attempting to threaten the government.

Lastly, Syrian Information Minister Umran Zubi made a press conference on Sunday and argued that “the real terrorists are Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his government”. Zubi firmly rejected any responsibility and relation to the attacks, calling the dead citizens “martyrs”. He also underlined that the Turkish government is trying create an excuse to take the support of NATO for invading Syria.

Next, we highlight some points in an analysis of Hatice Pınar Şenoğuz, published in Bianet.

The article of Şenoğuz highlights that the Turkish state is actually standing firm in its border policies, in a semipermeable way.

The government first called the refugees “guests”, but later, when necessary, did not hesitate to send them back through the mined zone (Kilis, September 2012) or to start shooting at the borders to stop new comers due to lack of space in the camps. (Kilis, September 2012 and Akçakale, April 2013) When the tensions increased in Hatay, the city governor sent the refugees out of town. However, the government did not bother about the tensions caused by the rebels sheltered in the camps nor did it reallocate military camps to less tense regions.

Furthermore, it was reported that the security cameras on the streets were off due to a “system error”. Apparently many of the 73 security cameras were pointed directly at the explosion zones and this system error occurred a few days before the explosions. [8]

Finally, we would like to emphasize that government officials never mentioned a call for a national mournin (although RedHack organized one by hacking the website of Hatay City Governance [9]). This may be considered as a further evidence to argue for the government's intention for increased aggression.

Now we are waiting for the Erdoğan and Obama meeting, it seems only after that will we receive more news/analysis about Reyhanlı according to the needs of this strategical collaboration.

4 + 4 + 4 Why “Religionization” of Public Education is Harmful – Özgür Düşünce Hareketi

Editorial note: This article, “4+4+4 Dinselleşen Eğitim Sisteminin Zararları” (Part 1 and Part 2) was written collectively by Özgür Düşünce Hareketi (Free Thought Movement) in Turkey. It makes a thorough analysis of the recent transformations in the Turkish education system. We, Out for Beyond, decided to take this opportunity to provide an account of the educational reforms, referred to as 4+4+4 in Turkey (meaning that primary education, secondary school education and high school education will take four years each). The original text is intended for the Turkish audience, we therefore shortened the text and added footnotes in the translation for the English-speaking readers.

We are thankful to Broyd who carefully went over the translation, made essential corrections, and read the proofs of the text.

Note on translation: The original article frequently uses a term, which literally translates as “religionization”.It is in fact a well-established political term in Turkey, which is used as an antonym to “secularization”. It is not the same as reshaping the education system (or the society in general) in a dogmatic, non-evidence-based way; because the process is considered as a planned introduction of religious ideology into the social and political realms. It is also not Islamization, since it encompasses many aspects (such as creationism in biology textbooks) that are not restricted to Islamic ideology. Therefore, we chose to keep the literal translation “religionization” within quotation marks.

Hundreds of topics arise under the issue of “Turkey's education problems”. The most recent of those is the new system, referred as “4+4+4”, which prescribes an education system of separate schools, each taking four years. However, in order to understand this last reform and its singularity, we must first take a broader look at the education system in large and how it operates.

It is clear that the AKP¹ government pushes the education question as part of the “religionization” of the country as a whole. A combination of many factors led AKP to rise and enabled structural transformations in several items. This can be seen as AKP's desire as well as its promise. In accordance with the regional changes in the Middle East, the state paradigm must have changed too, and the arrow of change pointed against existing progress.

AKP's policies have always accorded with this wind of change. Hence, the intervention in the education sector started far earlier than the most recent reforms. Some concrete indicators are as follows: In contrast to the huge need for teachers, many unemployed teachers are put aside in the annual assignments whereas thousands of religion teachers are employed – and many of them take administrative roles in the schools. The curricula have been constantly modified in favor of creationism. The Imam Hatip High Schools² were taken off from vocational school status. There is an increasingly common discourse of “prayer rooms for each school”. The personnel of TÜBİTAK³ were replaced according to government's ideological priorities. In the rectoral elections in the universities, the president Abdullah Gül has not complied with the election results and assigned rectors according to other political preferences.

Although AKP had the opportunity to demolish the education system in Turkey, the foundation of this transformation was laid by previous governments. The greatest damage done to Turkish education system was due to the military intervention of 12 September 1980. This coup d'etat inserted religious education into primary schools and secondary schools, a strategic step towards a more religious society. The 1982 Constitution states in Article 24 that

“Education and instruction in religion and ethics shall be conducted under state supervision and control. Instruction in religious culture and moral education shall be compulsory in the curricula of primary and secondary schools. Other religious education and instruction shall be subject to the individual’s own desire, and in the case of minors, to the request of their legal representatives.”

This article not only immersed a harmful element into the formal educational curriculum but also paved the way for small children to be registered into religion courses not controlled by state authorities.

Let us now take a deep breath and ask ourselves: Why is the “religionization” of public education harmful?

It is a well known pedagogical fact that education should be given according to the cognitive and physical development of the child. With this in mind, we have a three-fold answer to our question.

1) Between ages of 6 and 11, children are capable of internalizing only concrete concepts. They can find simple solutions to simple problems, understand commands and exercise the necessary actions. What they cannot do is to contemplate abstract concepts and take actions about them.

In this period, one can talk to a child about all concrete things such as apples, toys and cars, but the child cannot make sense of concepts such as god, heaven, hell, demon and so on. Therefore, such a child would not have a healthy cognitive development because s/he would grow up in a terrifying environment where someone who watches her/him all the time, making notes of every single action and which s/he cannot see nor touch nor hear, an entity which will punish her/him for all her/his faults. The child would further grow strong guilt feelings whenever s/he does something (intentionally or unintentionally) that the religion orders her/him not to do. This would have deep psychological consequences.

After age 11, on the other hand, the child enters a critical stage in cognitive skills where s/he develops critical thinking skills. Therefore, the teaching of dogmatic, unquestionable knowledge would hinder this development.

2) Another harmful aspect of the “religionization” of education was deliberately introduced by the policy makers. The 1982 Constitution defines the religion course as “Religious Culture and Moral Knowledge”, thereby implying that morality is a concept directly linked to religion. Via compulsory religious courses, the borders of “morality” are framed and restricted by a particular sect (the Sunni interpretation) of a particular religion (Islam). This approach not only indoctrinates the unfounded claim of “no religion means no morality” but also undermines the education of morality and of religion.

3) As a direct consequence of secularism, public education should see to it that each individual is provided with the critical thinking skills that would enable her/him to reach her/his own conclusions about the world and give her/him the possibilities of self realization.

We have been observing the harmful consequences of the “religionization” of education for a long time, especially with the theory of evolution. This “spiteful of science” attitude will increase with the recently introduced religion courses. For instance, the new “Basic Religious Knowledge” course includes phrases like “the fine tuning in the universe”, “perfect human”, “intentional creation” as chapters' morals. These statements are not supported by evidence, and in fact contradict with it. The same course aims at teaching that “the aim of the creation of human is to worship Allah”. It is further clear that whenever there is conflict between the content of this course and other courses, the values and the information in the other courses will be censured.

The new education system surpasses the 1982 Constitution. Not content with the so-called “Religious Culture and Moral Knowledge” course, the system introduces “Arabic” in primary school and “Basic Religious Knowledge”, “The Holy Koran” and “The Life Of the Prophet Mohammed”, thereby teaching religious knowledge continuously. We should emphasize that by religious knowledge is meant the theological knowledge of Islam's Sunni sect.⁴ One example of this approach can be seen in the textbook for the course “The Life Of the Prophet Mohammed”, aimed at ninth grade students:

“By linking chastity with faith, Our High Prophet states that pudicity and faith are inseparable. On this issue, he spoke 'As a matter of fact, pudicity and faith are holistically united. If one disappears, the other disappears as well.' As can be understood from this hadith, pudicity and faith are closely connected to each other. When one is nonexistent, there is a danger for the other to vanish too.”⁵

Yet another problem of this system is that the Koran will be read in Arabic for the course “The Holy Koran”, as in the religious courses enforced by the state, due to the ridiculous claim that the book has its own language. However, for someone to understand the Koran or any other book (independent of whether it is considered holy or not) it is essential that one reads it in a language that one is competent in and at an age when one can grasp its content. It is clear that the (elective) Arabic course would not suffice for the students to comprehend the book properly and therefore what is expected from them is that they memorize it. This is manifested publicly several times. One instance is that the 85^th page of the instructor's book for “The Holy Koran” course gives hints on “some principles on how to make surah apprehension easier” where it is explained how the students can easily “memorize” those surah's. Moreover, Ömer Dinçer, the Minister of Education, confessed in an interview⁶ that the students “would not understand what they read”:

“But the Parliament declared: The teaching of Koran and the Life of Our Prophet. We will teach it in secondary school and in high school. We will teach how to read the Koran like Turkish. After all, Arabic is an elective course. We will not teach Arabic. It is a different issue to read Koran based on the Arabic alphabet in the Arabic language. This means, the child will learn how to read a word written with Arabic letters, but the thing s/he will read will be Koran. We will create a curriculum. S/he will read but will not understand. After all, the majority of those who read the Koran do not understand it, they read it as a holy book.”

The “religionization” is not the only problem arising from the new 4+4+4 system. At first glance, we notice the following: The system lets children of age 5-5.5 enter the primary schools, when they are not physiologically ready to hold pencils nor cognitively prepared to understand and implement commands. As a consequence, primary education is now reduced, in practice, to three years. Furthermore, by fifth grade, the classes will be given by branch teachers, resulting in reallocation and unemployment of many teachers. Also, the early start to schooling without any infrastructural preparations will result in overly crowded classrooms. We would like to give some examples of complaints in order to make the point clearer.

The Education Workers' Union released a declaration⁷, emphasizing that the separation of primary and secondary education in a manner that is not based on pedagogical principles would imply an increase in child employment and child brides. The way is now legally cleared away for the seclusion and forced marriage of female children, as child brides are generally of age 13, 14 and 15.

According to an interview published in haber.sol.org.tr on September 21st, 2012, Ertan Uysal, the chairman of the Education Workers' Union in Tokat, made the following remark:

“... while the mere existence of religious culture courses in private schools is controversial, it is a big problem to introduce forced elective courses on religion. This imposition of religious education on students who would primarily need courses such as arts, music and sports resembles the paradigm of the Middle Ages.”⁸

Much earlier than this interview, Hürriyet newspaper made a news item⁹ on the letters sent to the Ministry of Education by the parents. Here are a few items from those letters:

“ - I don't want my 5-year old child to get on and off the bus by himself to reach home.

- I don't want my child to be pressed by the class teacher who is forced to finish the annual curriculum.

- I don't want my 5-year old child to be open to the same risks as the students of age 12-13.

- While 7-year old children are having difficulties, I don't want my 5-year old child to start primary school.

The “religionization” of education is a big problem. When this transformation is accompanied by unhealthy, inconvenient practices, it may give rise to a social disaster. In order to prevent this, it is urgently needed to sweep away religious ideologies, not only from education but from all levels of the state affairs.

As Özgür Düşünce Hareketi, we believe that several reforms should be made.

1. Mixed-sex education should never be questioned. The religious separation of the two genders is one of the most important causes of gender inequalities and male violence. Furthermore, children that grew up in an environment where men and women are categorically separated would have difficulties in making sense of transgender identities and would be conditioned to transphobia.
   
2. Religious knowledge should be presented in the context of the history courses, under the title of history of religions and then one item being Islam. If religion teachers will be trained, they should get proper pedagogical formation.
   
3. Imam Hatip Schools should be abolished, as they give the teaching of the practices of a selected religion.
   
4. The so-called elective but practically compulsory religion courses should be abolished. Religious practices should not be taught to non-adults.
   
5. The new regulations on the dress code that promotes the imposition of headscarves on female children should be withdrawn.
   

1 Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi – Justice and Development Party. The governing party in the Turkish parliament since the 2002 elections.

2Religious Vocational High Schools, that are meant to train imams but are in practice training for any profession.

3Türkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Araştırma Kurumu – The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey.

4 Talim ve Terbiye Kurulu Öğretim Programları: http://ttkb.meb.gov.tr/www/ogretim-programlari/icerik/72

5 Ortaöğretim “Hz. Muhammed’in Hayatı” 9. Sınıf Öğretim Materyali: http://ttkb.meb.gov.tr/dosyalar/kitaplar/hzmuhammedinhayati_9.pdf – s. 41.

6 http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/20293658.asp

7 http://www.egitimsen.org.tr/genel/bizden_detay.php?kod=217&sube=0#.UQZLPx3VdHJ

8 http://haber.sol.org.tr/kent-gundemleri/444-sistemi-tokatta-da-bircok-sorunla-basladi-haberi-59890

9 http://siyaset.milliyet.com.tr/tbmm-ye-4-4-4-sikayeti-yagdi/siyaset/siyasetdetay/02.04.2012/1522766/default.htm