What the Heck Is Happening in Turkey? A FAQ for the Rest of Us | Hacker News Reader

What the Heck Is Happening in Turkey? A FAQ for the Rest of Us

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25 pointsricheyrw5 comments

Democracy has always struck me as an interesting form of government, precisely for the reason being shown here: If the voting wasn't rigged, and we have no reason to believe it was, then Erdoğan was indeed voted into office according to the laws of Turkey, and thus has about as legitimate a reason to do what he's doing as anyone in his position would, at least if you buy into how a representative democracy works.

So then a man who was ostensibly elected by his people starts taking actions that some (it's not all) of his people disagree strongly with, and they attempt to show that disagreement in the form of protesting. So far so good, right? The system is working, about as well as it can. There is a vocal minority attempting to gather numbers by protesting the actions of an elected official the minority disagrees with. That sounds like a country I'd like to live in, right?

But then the oppression begins, and here is why this got so bad, from what I've just read: out come the tear gas and the riot shields. This goes from a beautiful process of democracy in action to what we in the US would call a blatant violation of First Amendment Rights (capital F, A and R). Now you've got a national incident, which grows as the mistreatment grows, and soon it's an international incident that looks a little bit like what many other countries in the area have gone through, which lead to the ending of a government. But it's not that, because what would you replace this government with? A democracy? That's what got them to this point in the first place.

So what exactly happens now? By all rights, Erdoğan should remain in office for the remainder of his term. How can the protesters ask for anything else? He is, after all, a fairly elected leader of their country. I honestly don't know what the alternative would be. I keep trying to imagine how this would go down in America, and I can't imagine a President stepping down because of violent protesting in NYC or D.C..

These protests remind me a lot of protests that were seen during the world trade talks or other free trade conventions in the US. Passionate young people protesting about injustices they see in the world and severe retribution by an aggressive militarised police force.

You mean the G20 riots in Pittsburgh, PA in 2009?

Here's some information on those protests: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_G-20_Pittsburgh_summit#Pro...

Those were much smaller, and the reaction from the authority there seems to have been harsh, but not much like what the pictures I've seen have represented the violence in Turkey. Those riots also seem to come in the form of the economically disenfranchised, where what's happening in Turkey has religious undertones, which in my subjective opinion gives it a more powder-keg feel.

Oh yeah those are the ones. I remember I was in Australia a few years back when there was some economic forum going on and they had locked the entire city down in anticipation of protests. The protests did start (probably more because young people love to protest) and the police got carried away in some cases toto.

I think you're right though, Turkey is much more unpredictable and inflammable. I mean the country has a long history of military coups, it has major political parties which are extremeley well organised and committed and a long and interesting history which has developed a strong culture.

I think this is a religious issue as you said as well, in the sense that the traditionally poor, religious under class (farmers etc) have gained the most during Erdogans tenure and now the upper, liberal secular class may be feeling threatened by this growing religious and productive force. Allahu alim though.

That article was much more informattive than most that have been posted on HN but it still misses a lot of issues. For instance it leaves out the fact that Erdogans party first came into party with 35% of the votes. That shows that theres been a steady inccrease in support for his party over the years.

I think HNs need to realise theres more to this than a simple park and underlying social tension. There are a lot more issues at play. There are political parties taking advantage of these protest tto cause social tension. There is unacceptable police violence which is fueling protestor anger and there is a constant superficial narrative as to why these protesst have started and continued. This is a very complex issue which isn't black and white and which can't be summed up in a 140 character tweet!

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