Celebrities Abroad
It is both joyful and ironic: Two influential foreign magazines have picked four Turks as "important" persons.
According to Foreign Policy magazine, two Turks, Fethullah Gülen and Orhan Pamuk, are among the top 100 influential persons in the world.
The list compiled by the magazine includes Jurgen Habermas, Umberto Eco and Richard Dawkins. The two other Turks — Mehmet Öz and Patriarch Bartholomew — made it onto the list prepared by Time magazine. This is a joyful report, because four out of 200 of the most influential people in the world picked by these two magazines represent a remarkable average in a world of 200 states. This is also the case in terms of population size: Turkey, which constitutes 1 percent of the entire world population, occupied 2 percent of the lists. Without ignoring the joyful part, let us also consider the ironic side of the case.
Three of the four currently live in the US. Öz is a very successful doctor. The other two prefer to live as expats because of imperative reasons — should I say because of health reasons or in consideration of the "be wise" warnings? The patriarch is still among us, but if we managed to make him go away then those strongly opposed to the patriarchate would be relieved. He would probably also have been gone by now if he had not represented an institution. What I would like to ask is why these successful people are abroad — and not among us. This is a paradox!
I just recalled the young Turks era. Back then, those who became famous used to flee to Western cities like Paris. In the later stages, the list of escapees due to domestic pressure included Halide Edip, Nazim Hikmet and Sabahattin Ali, who never made it to a foreign country. I am not including a huge number of members of the non-Muslim minority and hundreds of political refugees simply because I am now talking about the celebrities who felt they had to leave this country. The celebrities opt to leave while the murderers, traitors and other criminals were supposed to do so. Is all this a coincidence?
The ironic part of this case is the identity of those popular names in Europe (interestingly, sometimes we call this world the representative of the modern world, while sometimes we tend to regard it as "a monster with one tooth left"). Two religious clerics have become two of the most influential Turks in the world while we have been putting special emphasis on laicism. This is really an irony. The country that has been run under secular precepts for 70 years has promoted two religious clerics. How can we explain this? Is it a conspiracy staged by external actors, the shortcoming of the secular model or a reactionary thesis-antithesis mechanism? The Dalai Lama is also included on the list; but his case is about his exclusion in his country by foreigners and violation of his rights by the same actors. It would not be accurate to seek similarities between these separate cases. But why did two religious clerics stand out in Turkey? What was the reason that made them famous? This case is actually ironic and sad as well.
One of these clerics is the patriarch; I should note that we do not regard him as a Turk. In addition, we are prone to cite his every action as part of anti-Turkish propaganda. Should we call this contradiction an inconsistency, a conspiracy or an enemy plot? Does this Turkish citizen represent us? A similar problem occurred in regards to the case of Leyla Gencer; she was living abroad (maybe we would have bothered her earlier if she was not). Some even failed to stand as they consigned the ashes of her body to the waters of the Bosporus. We remained reluctant and timid even in her last journey. These are our people that the country has difficulty in embracing, but why? Don't get me wrong. I heard Zeynep Oral saying on TV when defending Gencer in good faith that she was a better Muslim than many fellow believers. We frequently hear the statement indicating that the patriarchate is a good thing for Turkey. We often read the success stories of the schools opened in the world upon recommendation by Gülen. We have always told other people how Hikmet promoted Turkish poetry and the country in the world. These favorable references imply that a person should do something heroic in order to be safe from persecution. But, shouldn't an ordinary person — regardless of his or her achievements or failures — deserve equal treatment as long as he or she remains a citizen of this country?
Why should a person be a good Muslim, do something good for his country, become a promoter of his country free of charge and prove his loyalty in order to be accepted by society? Isn't being an ordinary citizen enough to live in this country like a real human being? Some are forced to prove themselves — those who allege they are admirers of Atatürk, those who express their fondness of the military, those who make it clear that they are religious and those who assert they were not born rich. There is an ongoing campaign of self-defense in this country. However, saying "I am an ordinary citizen" should be sufficient.
But the grave question is something different. Who is answering to whom? Against whom are we defending ourselves? Against whom are we forced to prove our loyalty — an unjust order, a state not entitled to ask such a question, talkative figures speaking on behalf of these, actors of neighborhood pressure? Being a celebrity or a successful man should not create additional entitlements for us, just like being an ordinary man should not make us less privileged. The athlete who wins a race should be considered equal to the one who finished last. This will be the case if awareness of citizenship is prevalent in society. In short, that people feel they have to defend themselves is a violation of human rights. We should all have the right to be how we would like to be. Our celebrities who came to the fore owing to their successes and the assaults against them made me think this. Just think about the situation of those who are famous! I would like to close by congratulating Nuri Bilge Ceylan, who was picked as best director at the Cannes Film Festival. He is living abroad as well. We will see whether some will find something wrong with him!
Herkül Millas is a political scientist.
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