Moral decay and the government

Schools have opened. The theater will continue for a while longer. Students will pretend to be learning; teachers will pretend to be teaching; parents will act as if education is important. The education curriculum will be debated. 

A religious generation? A modern generation? How many religious classes should there be? New generation questions? Foreign language education? Raising a generation suited to the needs of the age? Gangs in schools? Drug use? The morality of the youth?

The economic crisis is accompanied by a moral crisis. Corruption, manipulation, favoritism, nepotism, prostitution, drug trafficking, harassment and rape... These are the proofs that we have morally collapsed...

Politicians, aside from debating who is immoral, are silent on the fate of societal morality. Unfortunately, there is no one proposing policies on how to improve societal morality. Or perhaps their voices are not being heard. 

The suggestions of most of those who talk about the morality of the youth are limited to items such as banning or blocking certain cultural products; preventing the sale of certain goods; and ultimately, injecting "morality" into the education curriculum. 

In my opinion, taking such an isolated and narrow view of the morality of the youth is problematic. The moral issue must be addressed in conjunction with our country's economic crisis, the needs of society's future, and environmental and urban planning issues. Morality is not independent of safeguarding what is entrusted to us, being accountable, and living humanely. Therefore, these must be addressed together and in a multidimensional way. 

Society is educated through taxes, trade regulations, labor regulations, urban planning, spatial transformation and planning, military service, municipal services, health services, and in short, the order of social life. The education curriculum, especially in this age, is perhaps one of the least effective topics. Today, in addition to those I have listed, media and social media usage are also among the most effective topics. However, the media is also in interaction with the order of social life. Therefore, without comprehensive planning and independent units working together, it is impossible to make an effective and planned intervention in societal morality. 

The state must be able to use its power for the benefit of society—beyond arrests, detentions, confiscations, and nationalizations—in tax applications, spatial transformation and planning, and the regulation of social life. A truly strong state and government demonstrate themselves through this planned influence on the order of social life. A government that sets out to raise a religious generation but creates moral decay is not a government in the true sense. 

Those who promise to serve Turkey must place the regulation of the order of social life and our society's morality according to the needs of the day at the center of their programs. Otherwise, our society will tumble off the cliff.