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Commentary and analysis on politics, polarisation, the media and social change.
Turkey and the EU are like two lovers who can never be united. Turkey has drifted away from the membership process, the rule of law has declined and it has moved closer to Russia. Even so, the author argues, the EU should not give up on Turkey.
Merih Demiral’s grey wolf sign at EURO 2024 split Europe in two. The wolf appears in the mythology of many peoples, from Rome to Lithuania and from Chechnya to Scandinavia. So when does a symbol become a tool of manipulation?
Imagine a world in which no one can lie: every thought is spoken instantly and no one suspects anyone. A look at the place of lying in human relationships through the film “The Invention of Lying”.
“It’s alive, auntie, alive!” You can deceive without telling a lie. Through jokes and sketches, this piece shows how we are misled with true statements by loading different meanings onto the same word.
People are predisposed to believe, and liars know it. Ways of spotting lies and “deception with the truth” in everyday life, using the methods of former FBI agent John R. Schafer.
A lie is not merely the opposite of the truth. We can be deceived by a look, by clothing, even by entirely true sentences. The first article in the “Psychology of Lying” series enters the labyrinth of the lie.
After every election, Aziz Nesin’s quip that “60% of us are stupid” goes round again. The story of the remark leads back to the 1982 Constitution; the real issue is decision-making shaped by fear.
As every year, The Economist listed ten developments the world would watch in 2024: a record number of elections, the prospect of Trump, Ukraine, the Middle East, multipolar disorder and artificial intelligence.
The Republic is a hundred years old. But its record on democracy, press freedom, judicial independence and minority rights adds a bittersweet loneliness to the joy of the celebration.
Despite the earthquake, poverty and corruption, the opposition lost the 2023 elections. In the author’s view, the roots of this lie in a leader-centred social structure and the lack of a real tradition of opposition.
The elections in the Republic’s centenary will go down in history as the result of a period in which law and democracy were sacrificed to political interests. In the author’s view, hopes have been battered by both the government and the opposition.
At Çanakkale, Mustafa Kemal took the initiative without waiting for orders and changed the course of the battle in two hours. In the earthquake of 6 February, orders were awaited for hours. On the vital importance of initiative in disaster management.
In the first hours of the earthquake everyone prayed for those under the rubble and said “this is not the time for politics”. But then those who helped were targeted. On the relationship between the earthquake and politics.
An earthquake is above all a security problem. After every earthquake, the promises made and the taxes collected are forgotten. In the author’s view, repeated negligence is no longer negligence but betrayal.
In the 1970s the ülkücü (idealist) movement spread rapidly among devout young people in the provinces; commando camps, street clashes and ties to the deep state fed a bloody era.
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