INTERNATIONAL FINANCE AND HUMAN rights lawyer and WordPress blogger Ali Eteraz has written a revealing and in-depth analysis of the Turkish legal system’s nationwide block on WordPress.com. The report titled “Shooting the messenger,” and posted on the UK daily Guardian Internet edition, details the rise of Adnan Oktar — pen-name Harun Yahya — the Islamic creationist behind the current block of the “million-blogger strong blogging platform” within the borders of Turkey.
As well as listing Adnan Oktar’s publications on “topics including refutations of atheism and Darwinism, romanticism as a weapon of Satan, anti-evolution pseudo-science, affirmation of miracles, and attacks on Freemasonry, Zionists, Buddhists, and terrorism (Darwin’s fault),” Eteraz draws attention to his 1996 book “Holocaust Lies” which claims that “what is presented as [the] Holocaust is the death of some Jews due to the typhus plague during the war and the famine towards the end of the war caused by the defeat of the German[s].”
The root of the ban on WordPress in Turkey, according to Eteraz, is attributed to blogs hosted on the platform by Oktar’s “political enemy” and former mentor Edsip Yuksel. “A fuller picture about the WordPress ban thus starts to emerge,” writes Eteraz, adding: “WordPress is caught up in a long-standing political and cultural battle between two competing Muslim groups. The ban, therefore, reveals little about slander, or defamation, and I am uncertain how effective blog-protests will be (though it is an intriguing idea to try to force the hands of Turkish courts).”
Pointing to the Islamic roots of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government, “which came to power by attacking secularist Turks for their anti-free speech views,” Eteraz says the ruling party “is now enabling [the] silencing of speech itself.”
In his conclusion, the human rights lawyer asks pertinent questions: “What does this say about the promises that Islamist parties make before actually acquiring power? How does this bode for Islamist democrats in
other parts of the Muslim world? What does it reveal about the Islamist promise in general? It will be important, and instructive, to watch what happens with this case going forward. I would hope that the
Islamists will recognise the principles of openness and freedom of speech that brought them to power, and get rid of this ban.”
I find it amusing that, living near the U.S. sister community to Cesme, a Turk has managed to shut off one forum of exchange and understanding with foreigners. That alone suggests that Mr. Oktar or Yahya or whatever nom de plume he chooses is an isolationist and anti-intellectual who is also afraid of of the strength of his ideas in the face of competing thoughts.
My best wishes to the survival of the Turkish people and the Turkish state in the face of such a charlatan.
Second sign, is it not? Didn’t they block YouTube first and had to take that off?
They did block youTube, but that was due to Greeks posting videos insulting the Turkish Republic’s founder Ataturk, which were then removed and youTube became available again.
On that score, it would be best described as “secular censorship” as opposed to Islamic but, IMO, more understandable considering his much-revered status here. Anyway, it began as a spat between Greeks and Turks, with the Greeks’ calling Ataturk “gay.” As it’s one of the primary no-no’s in the Turkish Constitution nobody here really saw it as an attack on freedom of speech.
But one Islamic creationist, widely regarded by many as a serious oddball in secular Turkey, holding the entire Turkish WP network to ransom — and the Turkish legal system is also at fault here — because he’s offended is another issue entirely…
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