Thank you for booing

by

Once upon a time someone booed at me, I looked incredulously at my heckler but then I had an epiphany and the epiphany was this: To live is to be booed at.

A Tale of Two Worlds

The booing and the sudden realisation happened during a debate about Turkey and Kurdistan at my university not many days ago. The evening is well described by the words of Charles Dickens:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way.

It was the season of darkness when a Turkish girl agreed with the Turkish Minister of Women and Family Affairs that homosexuality is a disease that needs to be treated.

It was the winter of despair when a young Turkish woman insisted that the Kurdish people is not oppressed in Turkey and demanded we prove our claims of the opposite.

It was the age of foolishness when a young Turkish man stood up, demanded that Turkey was not to be likened with Israel and stormed out, slamming the door behind him.

It was the worst of times when I told them the truth about Turkey’s state terrorism and they answered: BOO!

I had to restrain myself from getting up, grabbing my bag and dignity and saying, “Boo me? BOO YOU!” seeing as I would have probably just fallen down the stairs and thereby ruined the dramatic and eloquent exit.

So I stayed and therefore entered the age of wisdom because I came to realise that I was not the slightest bit angry with them, quite the contrary: I was excited.
The reason for this inappropriate reaction of mine (it is not ethical to get excited when the subject is violation of the human rights) is as simple as the minds of my hecklers.

You remember when Leyla Zana, the Kurdish freedom fighter, was elected to the Turkish parliament in 1991 and was yelled and booed at because she wore the Kurdish colours? Well, that is what happened that evening. I, too, was booed at for presenting the truth to the Turkish audience and so is everyone else who is not afraid to reveal the truth regardless of what it holds.

Happy is he

If you are booed at, you know you have done something right, for those who boo are either ignorant or afraid or afraid because they are ignorant and my dear friends, we know that to be ignorant is to always have the season of darkness upon you.

So I was excited because now I had the brainwashed Turkish youth surrounding me whose ignorance my fellows and I could fight and whose humanity we could try to bring out. I know that these young Turks are only oblivious to the oppression because they are raised to think, “Happy is he who can call himself a Turk.”

But we can change their minds. We can teach them that happy is he who can call himself a human.

We are the world

Unfortunately it is not only the minds of the Turkish youth we need to change; apparently not every Kurdish youngster is ready to reach out to those Turks who are in denial about the oppression of the Kurds.

Some are Kurds before they are human beings and to them everything associated with Turkey is subjected to pure hatred. It is ridiculous, sometimes downright laughable seeing as these Kurds do not know a word Kurdish and use all their energy on getting into heated discussions with the Turkish youth, thus making those who were not even that anti-Kurdish say: “Kurds? You mean the Mountain Turks?”

That is a no-go. We must change this despicable attitude and not scare anyone away. We have to engage both Kurds and Turks in talks, we have to open our arms and embrace them, though if you act all lovey-dovey that will definitely scare them away, trust me.

I am a human being first and then I am a Kurd. I am not demanding that Kurds should not be oppressed; I am demanding that no one should be oppressed and I am demanding that the Turkish youth help us raise our voice against injustice by fighting ignorance. Then perhaps we will bring about the season of Light.

Are you booable?

If not, you should consider becoming booable. I promise you that once someone has booed at you and you walk in constant fear that the heckler will egg you, then you know you are living!