They couldn't defend themselves, just as they couldn't ask the questions

How painful! You call yourself a “journalist,” yet despite being on President Erdoğan’s plane, you cannot ask him the question the entire country is curious about. 

You end up as news on news sites and in newspapers for the fact that “they couldn't ask Erdoğan a question,” and you can't even respond. You are mocked on social media, and you cannot open your mouth. CHP Chairman Özgür Özel says, “There were no journalists on the plane, they didn't ask,” and you remain silent once again.

This was the state of the pro-government, hand-picked journalists who spoke with President Erdoğan on the plane while returning from Tatarstan. They could neither perform journalism nor respond to the many words and criticisms directed at them. They couldn't even defend themselves.

Of those on that plane, only Türkiye newspaper writer Yücel Koç explained the situation in his own way with indirect language, writing, “Erdoğan avoided being confronted with this question.” But what he called “avoided” was the instruction given before the chat with Erdoğan: “Do not enter into this topic,” and the journalists following that instruction to the letter. In fact, Koç was also avoiding clearly explaining this journalistic disgrace.

Moreover, what they couldn't ask on the plane was not just about the call made by ruling coalition partner MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli to Abdullah Öcalan. They also couldn't ask about the security gap and intelligence weakness in the TUSAŞ attack, where the PKK brutally murdered civilians. 

When the journalists who could face him failed to perform their function, Erdoğan took the high ground; at the EXPO Fair, he was able to blame the media by saying, “Our media is failing a bad test in these incidents. There is no acceptable side to irresponsible broadcasting.”  

Well, what was the media supposed to do, not publish the footage of the moment of the attack? The footage regarding the first moment when terrorists shot innocent civilians was traumatic and contained violence pornography; this is true. But publishing the footage after that was journalism; it was not violence propaganda.

Unfortunately, some journalists who could not question the security problems in the attack went after who leaked that footage. It is a huge mistake for a journalist to want to investigate how their colleagues obtained that footage, that is, the news source. Just like not being able to ask Erdoğan a question, this is a disrespect to journalism as well as to the reader and viewer. 

They have drifted far away from the journalism profession… What is sad is that some have internalized this surrender, seeing being taken on that plane as a reward… This is what happens when the government takes control of media bosses…

THEY COULDN'T GO TO MUDANYA EITHER

After MHP Chairman Devlet Bahçeli’s call on October 22, if one of the curious questions was President Erdoğan’s stance, the other was Abdullah Öcalan’s response.

That same evening, Hürriyet Ankara Representative Hande Fırat announced a development on social media that would allow the answer to this question to be learned. She wrote that DEM MP Ömer Öcalan had been granted permission for an Imralı visit, adding, “It is expected in the near future.”

This post by Hande Fırat became news on the internet, on news television channels, and in newspapers the next day, but on October 23, journalists did not provide sound or images from the shores of Mudanya. Only late that evening did Altan Sancar share the information on a Sözcü TV broadcast: “As far as I have learned, there is a strong possibility that the meeting took place today.”

Indeed, on October 24, Abdülkadir Selvi wrote in Hürriyet that Ömer Öcalan had gone to Imralı and met with his uncle Abdullah Öcalan. Ömer Öcalan also confirmed the meeting with his own post. 

Unfortunately, this process shows that the media does not attach the necessary importance to such a development and has become very accustomed to desk-bound journalism. If the journalistic reflex had not been so atrophied, dozens of journalists would have rushed to the pier in Mudanya on October 23 after that post by Hande Fırat. 

Can you imagine, despite there being concrete signs, journalists do not flock there; hours later, Altan Sancar and—of course, primarily—Abdulkadir Selvi get the scoop! This scoop is as much their success as it is the failure of the entire media, pro-government and opposition alike… 

How strange that while reflexes are declining, the confidence of commentators/journalists on television does not diminish. I am sure those who tried to watch the journalists who appeared on screen after Bahçeli’s call must have felt dizzy. They were all playing different tunes; none of their scenarios matched the others.

A journalist is skeptical. Especially on a subject where there is no concrete data and the interlocutors do not make clear statements, they do not speak with definitive expressions; they do not present their personal interpretation as analysis and information.

OBSTRUCTIONS AND BANS ARE UNLAWFUL 

We are a country where even the Football Federation can make a decision to block access. The Federation used the authority given by a law enacted in 2021 to block sites that “illegally broadcast football matches on the internet” for the first time last week; it closed access to Blogger, the free blog platform owned by Google.

The Football Federation’s decision may be in accordance with the law, but it is unlawful. As Yaman Akdeniz, a “Constitutional Court-certified public watchdog,” emphasized, it is not based on a judicial decision or a judge’s approval.

Minister of Interior Ali Yerlikaya also announced that 177 personal accounts, including names such as Can Dündar, Ekrem Dumanlı, and Cemre Birand, the wife of M. Ali Birand, were blocked on the grounds that they made terrorist propaganda in their condolence posts regarding the death of Fethullah Gülen.

Blocking 177 accounts is unlawful and illegal. Because the Constitutional Court had canceled the provision of the law that gave the General Directorate of Security the authority for “virtual patrol” in 2021.

The BTK’s bandwidth throttling on social media after the PKK’s terrorist attack on TUSAŞ and RTÜK President Ebubekir Şahin’s “broadcasting ban” announcement were also unlawful. The BTK restricted the freedom of communication. Şahin should have also announced the text of the court decision so that the scope of the ban could be understood, but in his announcement, let alone the text, there wasn't even the name of the court! As such, most channels did not listen to that ban and threat…

As a result, we are facing a government mentality that prefers to cover up problems with bans and obstructions that are not even based on judicial decisions, instead of solving them…

MOURINHO’S ISTANBUL DIARY

We learned that Fenerbahçe’s head coach Jose Mourinho is not staying in a house in Istanbul, but in a hotel with a view of the Bosphorus, not from our football media, but from the British media.

The Daily Mail wrote all the details of his Istanbul life, from the fact that the nightly rate of the room Mourinho stays in is 44 thousand liras, to his preference for chicken soup in the evenings and doner kebab at lunch. Our football media quoted it from there. This news was published in dozens of places, including Fotomaç, Fanatik, Goal, and Spor Arena, as well as Sabah, Sözcü, Y. Asır, Y. Çağ, and Y. Şafak. 

What caught my attention the most was Yeni Asır’s headline, “Jose’s luxury surprised the British.” I don’t think it’s possible for the British to be surprised. Because the British know Mourinho’s love for hotels from his days managing Manchester United. The Guardian wrote in 2018 that the famous coach stayed in a luxury hotel for 895 days and that a bill of 537 thousand pounds was issued to the team.

What is truly strange is that our media is not surprised and quotes Mourinho’s life in Istanbul from the British media, and even though he was once seen in that hotel with Ali Koç, they did not pursue it! Our football media should have also put a sports person like Mourinho staying in a hotel and his life in Istanbul under the microscope. 

It seems our football media cannot go much beyond stadiums, matches, and transfers; our tabloid journalists also do not constantly roam the venues, nor are they interested in football celebrities.

FEMICIDES AND “SECULAR CITIES”?

An article by Prof. Dr. Burak Gönültaş from Sivas Cumhuriyet University was announced on the front page of the Türkiye newspaper with the headline “'Secular provinces' at the peak in femicides.” The article opposed linking femicides to the “traditional structure”:

“When we look at the cities where the cases occurring in our country are concentrated, it is seen that they have a secular social structure rather than a traditional social structure. The cities where the most femicides resulting in death occur are Istanbul, İzmir, Aydın, Muğla, and Antalya.”

 Although Prof. Dr. Gönültaş wrote his article based on 2020 statistics, it is true that in 2023 data, femicides were most frequent in cities such as Istanbul (49), Ankara (22), İzmir (27), Adana (18), Antalya (16), and Manisa (13).

However, Gönültaş does not mention at all that these cities are the most densely populated places in Turkey. More importantly, he does not explain on what basis he declared these cities “secular” and which ones are the cities he calls “traditional.” The distribution of femicides by region also does not provide data to divide cities into two as “secular” and “traditional.” For example, there were no femicides in Çanakkale and Sinop last year, but there were in Konya and Şanlıurfa. 

In an article claiming to be scientific, clear definitions should have been made, and one should have been objective towards the data.

In a single sentence:

Takvim newspaper reported Minister of Labor Vedat Işıkhan’s words, “We do not foresee radical changes regarding retirement,” with the misleading headline “Radical change in retirement.” 

Sabah sanctified death by using the headline “Martyrdom suited him very well” in the TUSAŞ attack.

Karar and Sözcü used the news from Artı Gerçek, “Wolfman, who is on Interpol’s red notice on charges of organ trafficking, is in Turkey,” in their printed newspapers without citing the source. 

In Sözcü’s news, “Sex and drug party at the courthouse,” it was not clear which courthouse this “party” took place in, who was involved, or what action was taken afterward. 

Mahmut Övür wrote that the mansion known as the “Katerina Mansion” in Sarıkamış was “built in 1896 for Tsar Nicholas II’s wife Katerina,” but Tsar Nicholas II’s wife was not Katerina but Alexandra Feodorovna, and the person who had the mansion built was not the Tsar but his cousin Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich.

Although the contagious effect of suicides is known, DHA, Cumhuriyet, Sözcü, and Haber7 reported the suicide of someone whose name was not even determined as “Jumped onto the tracks at Marmaray and took his own life.”

Yeni Şafak published the promotional texts of AKP municipalities in Sivas and Yozgat under the guise of two-page news stories. 

While Yeni Asya published the words of Istanbul Bar Association’s new president İbrahim Kaboğlu with the headline “Immutable articles can be touched,” it did not include reactions to these words.

Chery took writers from Hürriyet, Bloomberg HT, Auto Show magazine, and the Web Tekno site, among others, as guests to the company’s headquarters in Wuhu, China.

In the news on the internet, “Immoral offer from a truck driver to a young person hitchhiking! Recorded second by second with a camera,” Cumhuriyet did not even have information on when or where the incident took place. 

While Cumhuriyet, Evrensel, Hürriyet, and Milliyet published the half-page text titled “Republic enthusiasm will be experienced” from the Balıkesir Metropolitan Municipality with a note, even if small, saying “This is an advertisement,” BirGün used it without putting an advertisement warning.

FOR YOUR CRITICISMS, COMPLAINTS, AND SUGGESTIONS: [email protected]