Non-violent METU/ non-violent university: 'The true victory against fascism'

METU Spring Festivals have turned chaotic. A group attempting to carry flags and protest İlkay Akkaya was met with an attack involving belts, bottles, and punches. 

On 26.10.2024, I wrote an article in 12punto to prevent these days from happening: see https://12punto.com.tr/yazarlar/cenk-ozdag/sizi-yaniltacak-bu-gencler-57176

Many groups, large and small, within the left ignored or forgot the 2024 incident. They did not draw the necessary lessons. Nationalist youth, instead of putting forward any program, turned to organizing their reaction against leftists through the flag and provoking the hostility of some "leftists" toward the Turkish Flag.

In my 2024 article, I wrote exactly this: ''Immediate action must be taken against the attackers and, if the attackers came from outside the school, those responsible. One of the fake leftist organizations, a puppet of dark forces that claimed the attack, declared: METU will not become Gazi. METU will truly become Gazi through these reckless attacks. The METU youth, with all its components, must condemn violence without any ifs or buts. METU must not become a stockpile for gangs and the mafia. METU will not become Qandil! METU is the home of the youth who develop the technology that flattens Qandil and similar places.

Despite all these conspiracies, irresponsible people, and puppets, the youth will surprise you. The youth will protect their homeland, their future, and their republic.''

If you create an opposition between the Turkish Flag and "Leftism," the left loses, and ultimately, Turkey loses. 

Today is May 9, 2026. So it has been 71 years... since fascism was crushed in its lair. Since that day, the imperialist order has targeted socialism, which suffocated fascism, as the "new fascism." These young people wrapping themselves in the Turkish Flag are defending the homeland in their own way against caricature leftists. Yet, these caricature leftists do not have the power to harm the homeland. Organizing the "nationalist" youth who remain silent against the real threats that harm the homeland is, in fact, the job and duty of the left. But unfortunately, the left is playing at being leftist within an imaginary struggle for living space. It drives away its friends and increases its enemies. 

For the left, the Turkish Flag is the Flag of Independence. The youth, whose purchasing power is falling, who have lost hope for the future, who are surrounded by a ring of fire, and who have become virtually orphaned by the moral decay of politics, need to reunite with the ideal of Independence. The Turkish Flag, the clearest symbol of this ideal, should be raised even higher; however, it should be raised not against the left, the youth, or fellow students, but against the enemies of Turkey and the People.

Happy Victory Day of Humanity, which suffocated fascism in its lair on May 9, 1945!

May the days when the Turkish Flag rises even higher with the struggle for Independence be ours!