This is not a fairy tale, it is a perfect murder plan

How can we explain the logic behind the fact that events which leave common dramatic traces in a community's memory are recorded in the form of a horror fairy tale, and then, by writing a new story over these recollections, are constantly repeated through rituals and subconscious scenarios?

In Anatolia, there are fairy tales told to young people by elderly women at night, especially when women gather together.

The narrator tells the story with a shudder, and cold winds pass down the spines of the listeners. The story, which begins with prayers, continues with repentance and ends with whispers of "may it be far from our homes." Women, young girls, and female children are sent to sleep with these seeds planted in their minds.

The story begins, "From such and such a house, the daughter of so-and-so, one night before her wedding." The name and identity of this girl are clear. This pushes the listeners even closer to the possibilities. "After a while, a voice was heard by the girl in the dead of night," the story continues, "it was a jinn from the lineage of Iblis. The girl walked and walked toward the voice, barefoot. Until she reached the edge of a cliff. Then... she let herself go from the rocks, to the banks of the Euphrates. They buried her there, silently and without a sound..."

The waters of the Euphrates and the Tigris, like the fate lines in the hands of these women, have flowed unchanged for thousands of years. Mesopotamia, whose ancient culture we speak of, is still the cradle of femicides. In these lands where countless cultures have passed, the only thing that does not change is the women sacrificed to tradition.

These murders, in which the public blames jinns as the perpetrators and the killers are exonerated, are recorded in gendarmerie or police archives as suicide cases.

While the rapist murderers live long lives and die of natural causes, the young girl who was murdered before she could live her life is buried without even her funeral prayer being performed. Even if no one wants to talk about it, everyone knows the truth of the matter deep down.

Perhaps that is why they try to cleanse the memory of the young girl in their own consciences. Months later, a tree grows where the young girl died. Her mother or sister actually planted it in the dead of night so that the place where she was buried would not be lost. So that they could go there to pray.

The villagers consider the tree that suddenly grows to be a miracle. They mix the murdered girl with the 'Forty' and the 'Seven' (saints) and declare her sacred. The crime scene is turned into a place for votive offerings. People slaughter the throats of the sacrificial sheep, which they decorate like brides, under this tree. Moreover, they say, "I have a vow, I will shed blood." The meat of the sheep, just like the girl's murder which has been mixed with lies, is divided into pieces and rendered meaningless. It is presented to the public in a form that is easily swallowed.

THIS IS NOT A FAIRY TALE, IT IS A TERRIBLE MURDER PLAN...

It is a pathological, new memory created by people who experience a kind of split in their brains to ignore a traumatic story. However, the fact that this situation is pathological does not mean it is not a conscious plan made with malicious intent. The story both teaches those who commit such murders how to cover up the incident among the public, and advises the listeners to be cautious.

Because the rapes experienced by young girls mostly happen within the family. Fathers, brothers, brothers-in-law, grandfathers, uncles, or relatives' children.

In any case, the incident is not allowed to go outside the family.

As a result, they have a girl who is pregnant or has lost her virginity. The mother, first and foremost, does not believe what the girl says.

Will she protect her husband and sons, who bring bread to the house, or a girl who will eventually be "someone else's property"?

The nervous breakdowns and fainting spells of the child, who is writhing in despair due to the disaster that has befallen her, are attributed to jinns. To support the scenario, a 'cinci hoca' (exorcist) is called to the house, thus announcing to everyone that the girl is not normal. Now everyone is ready to believe anything.

The first pressure comes from the mother: When she says, "Are you going to ruin the lives of my husband and my sons?" the young girl loses the only person in the house she believed would save her life—her mother.

After the physical and psychological violence she suffers at the hands of the men in the house, she loses all hope of escape and does one last favor for the family that sent her to her death. To ensure her younger siblings are not left without a father or mother, she agrees to the suicide she is forced into. She occupies a small corner in the newspapers under the headline "Honor killing or suicide?", and her file is closed by dropping her unlived life into the police archives.

In Europe, a girl who has turned 16 can leave her home whenever she wants. Her rent and monthly food expenses are covered by the state. She is supported by official institutions to finish school and acquire a profession. The young girl is not left alone while planning her life. A mentor who is an expert in the field is assigned to accompany her. She is not allowed to be dependent on her family or any man in any way. The state acts as a legal family here.

What happens as a result? The young girl is not subjected to torture by her family. She is not given a rope and a chair and forced to commit suicide by being told to "save our honor." She is not sacrificed for the family's honor by covering up a collectively committed murder with lies told by everyone from seven to seventy.

While the same young girl can be a bright, hopeful young woman in another country who travels the world as she pleases, dances, laughs, and chooses the profession she wants, in our country, she is buried with a story that we could not even endure in a horror movie.

While sane people say there is a need for a new system where these children are protected and rehabilitated, the voices rising from the members of parliament in Turkey make one feel desperate to a severe degree.

At the state level, in statements made to the press, it is discussed that women should be 'owned' by men...

One of the former prime ministers can say, "Cutting off the pensions of widows is necessary to eliminate the grievances of elderly men, because women who have money do not marry elderly men whose wives have died because they are not forced to."

Another one of the new deputies, whose name should not be given importance by mentioning it, while defending with all his might that "women should move away from the dream of being a man's only wife," raises the bar even higher by saying, "In our religion, a man can have four wives; besides, is it better to work in a nightclub as a free woman or to be the umpteenth wife of a man?"

I do not think we can resolve the conflict between the nightclub and home environment in the mind of this 'unrespectable' person, even if we were to count the names of thousands of successful female scientists, successful businesswomen, and female politicians who have moved the world forward one by one.

The only institution that can protect young girls or young women is seen as the family, which is sanctified by culture, religion, and traditions. However, when the perpetrator is the family, there is no force left to protect the young girl. Therefore, the protective sanctity of the state must be above the institution of the family. The state must assume the primary responsibility for the protection of the child, even against the family.

It is, of course, impossible to inspect the inside of every single family. However, a person must be able to take refuge in the state, which provides a legal family guarantee, knowing that they will not be left on the street, sold, or killed when their life is in danger. They must know that they will be provided with a home, enough money to live on, and educational opportunities so that they can save themselves from their situation without fear.

In a patriarchal social structure that constantly creates murderers and misogynists, the duty of empowering and protecting women belongs to the state. Girls should be empowered from childhood, not after they marry a man who threatens to kill them if they divorce. Otherwise, the sin of their suicides and murders rests more on the shoulders of the state, and therefore all of us, than on the perpetrators within the family.

If state officials can stand before the press and talk about weakening women, the harms of women's freedom, and the benefits of polygamy to the point of ignoring the rules of etiquette—even in Islam, polygamy is only discussed in cases of necessity, and discussing it in unnecessary places is considered shameful.

If, in parliament, instead of national issues, the grievances of the public, and wars that have the potential to drag the world into a catastrophe, they talk about nightclubs, the lust at nightclub tables, the marriage preferences of widows, and 'owning' women without resorting to manners and decency, then one should not trust the ideas or the words of these 'dervishes'.

In short, the foundations upon which the Republic of Turkey is built are too valuable to be subjected to such a severe erosion of reason.