BY ELIF SAFAK
ZAMAN- The world media is closely watching our elections set for this weekend. But that doesn't mean they grasp what's happening. They often use clichés in reporting on Turkey. They depict Turkey as being divided in half: Islamists and secularists. It's as if there were two types of people in Turkey who never meet, speak or listen to each other. It's as if they live on two different islands or are so different that they have nothing in common. Some of the Western media show Turkey this way and focus solely on the extremes. Striking photos accompany these clichés: Women in headscarves are juxtaposed with others wearing swimsuits, with the caption: `Modern Turkey's dilemma.'
The focal point of news reports, editorials and photos about Turkey in the Western media is women's bodies and clothes (especially their hemlines, hairstyles, and headscarves), which are seen as both the center and symbol of deep ideological and political divides.
But in real life is that really true? Are Turkish women so deeply polarized? In this country, in an average family one girl may wear a headscarf while her sister doesn't. Or a girl who wears a headscarf gets married to the son of a family whose women wear headscarves. Or one of two women working in the same workplace may wear a headscarf. Or the doctor or dentist of an unheadscarved woman may wear a headscarf, or vice versa. We could give thousands of similar examples. This is Turkey's reality. Women wearing headscarves or not are shoulder to shoulder in every walk of life.
Turkey is a country of synthesis, hybrids and nuance. It is too complex, variable and multi-layered to be understood using clichés. In many respects it has a sui generis nature. It can't be treated as equivalent to the countries of the Middle East, Balkans, Europe or the rest of the Muslim world. There's always a `but' in analyses of Turkey. And in this every `but'.
It is the world of al-Qaeda, the Taliban, 9/11, violence in Iraq, terrorist acts in London and the mosque raid in Pakistan. Hence, no one has the time or desire to examine the nuances. Using clichés and talking about dilemmas is what is valued and respected by everyone in such a world. Western democracy is on the one hand, whereas Islamic civilization is on the other. Clash of civilizations.
Doesn't Turkey have extremes? Of course it does. Aren't there basic structural dilemmas? Of course there are. But there are also syntheses, balances, grey areas, in-between places. This what the Western press ignores about Turkey.
One of the reasons why Turkey is treated using such simplistic analyses is that it hasn't expressed itself properly and so hasn't been easily understood by observers from all over the world, whereas the other reason is rising global polarization.