What do you think of the film Midnight Express?
I have never watched that film.
What do you think of the istanbul situation with the arrest and protests?
my opinion is very obvious, I support the protest and it pushes more people left.
I hate kemalists, most are thinly veiled racists
The image on Wikipedia actually shows two communist/socialist parties within turkey protesting alongside the others
I don’t think it’ll bring much change though. At best it’ll radicalise more people.
Do you have anything you recommend reading about kemalists being racists or nationalists in Turkey generally?
Thanks!
I don’t, I’m not sure if there is a book on the topic either
That’s fair. I appreciate it though.
I guess in that case, what is the general opinion of people in Turkey on kemalists currently as far as you know?
Atatürk has been turned into a Messiah figure after his death, kind of like Washington for USians
In the opinion of the people, he saved the republic, created policies that lifted people out of poverty and lead to democracy forming in Turkey, some love him for his mixed economic policy that essentially had state owned companies grow industries, some love him for his secularism, some love him for being a Turkish nationalist
He created kemalism, which the republican people’s party (CHP/RPP) roughly follows nowadays
You’ll see his face everywhere for this reason, many will say they’re kemalist even though they believe the opposite for this reason
In my opinion, his nationalism lead to a cultural genocide of Kurds, his politics lead to empowerment of the military which lead to right wing kemalist coups, he was a dictator and even his successor was a dictator, but his economic reforms were successful, his government owned industries had created a means of production and it also lead to a growing working class that was socialist, but his Messiah status misguided many into being left-kemalists or socialist kemalists (which is a misnomer I would say) which lead to party fragmentation
Don’t take my opinion seriously, I’m very ill read
How are Polish tourists? Assholes I presume, never trust a W*rszawiak
I can not differentiate between a pole and any other slav, and it’s more common to see Ukrainians/Russians around here.
I have never seen tourists here get in trouble though, but the fascist racist scum will say otherwise
How many cats can you see, right now?
I see more wild dogs than cats in any other city than Istanbul or maybe İzmir. It’s such an issue, because vaccinating them is hard, and they are widespread, so rabid dogs are a big risk.
BUT, in my neighborhood, I counted about 15, someone keeps feeding them all and they formed a gang.
Feed the cats and they’ll accept you into the gang
Do people ever get fed up with the ice cream guys? I think I would get pissed off and get into a fistfight if they did that shit for too long. Also, is every ice cream place like that or do they indicate as such?
I assume you mean Maraş ice cream, I think it’s niche mostly in tourist towns, most ice cream shops just serve Italian style with vanilla maraş in cups or between wafers
I lived in an international tourist city (Istanbul), internal tourist city (Eskişehir) and a more industrial less known city (inland agean) and the only place that frequently sold Maraş ice cream was Istanbul.
How’s your hairline?
Wish I had less forehead
What do you think of mass tourism?
I like that people are learning more about turkey as a whole.
But I dislike how heavily Turkey relies on this tourism economy, entire cartels are formed around construction companies, mafia in bed with literally every party.
