In my opinion, it is because Turkey lacks a full-fledged democracy and a mature democratic mentality that the Republic of Turkey runs into serious problems with different social groups in different periods, and these problems may even develop into violent conflicts. In a Turkey where democracy is perfected, the rule of law is saved from the domination of the ruling elites and rights and freedoms are upheld at the highest level, you can be assured that it would be impossible to talk about a Kurdish issue or any other ethnic or religious issue, at that.
Do not get me wrong, as I am not trying to make the Kurdish initiative, which has been the hottest agenda item these days, seem insignificant by over-generalizing it. Rather, I find the joint will and courage wielded by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and the state, led by President Abdullah Gül, toward the settlement of the Kurdish issue admirable. I think that there are many reasons to hope that the process of settlement, which is being conducted in a sound manner, although no technical details have been made clear so far, will end with positive results. Moreover, I think that these positive results can be attained despite the resistance that amounts to chauvinism or fascism by the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and despite the struggle of the terrorist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) to survive. This can be done if the government and relevant state actors act resolutely in the settlement process and concentrate on the results and do not yield to the obstructions or provocative attempts that they will face in this process.
Nevertheless, it is obvious that there are some aspects of the Kurdish issue that go beyond the policies that will be developed by the government or the state. As it is clear that Turkey needs to be reformatted completely in institutional and legal/constitutional terms, it is certain that Turkish society should be reformatted in mental/emotional terms. As we need to draft a new constitution that will not discriminate among citizens based on some linguistic, religious or ethnic differences and restructure the state from scratch in light of this new constitution, it is equally important that we need a mental revolution that will wrap up the entire society. This revolution that we need for an ultimate solution will require us to ward off many chauvinistic elements of our life, which seem so natural to us at the moment.
For instance, in a Turkey that intends to settle the Kurdish issue on the basis of equal citizenship, equal cultural rights, a common homeland and a single flag, the slogan, “Turkey belongs to Turks -- Türkiye Türklerindir,” which the Hürriyet newspaper is using, would seem to be completely primitive and out of place. For this reason, the biggest test of Hürriyet's sincerity in the settlement of the Kurdish issue will focus on whether it will abandon this racist slogan. If the boss and the executives of the Hürriyet newspaper, acting of their own volition, announce that they have dumped this racist slogan, this will be the greatest psychological support to the settlement process. Of course, we can expect this surprise from them only if they really have sincerity and demand the settlement of the Kurdish issue and Turkey becoming a full-fledged democracy.
Likewise, the controversial racist slogan “How happy is the one who calls himself a Turk,” uttered by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of this crooked state structure perhaps due to necessities of the time, should not only be eradicated from the mountain slopes in Kurdish-dominated regions, but we must also readily banish it from our lives. Furthermore, we must either pick up and remove racism, chauvinism and fascism-tainted sentences such as “I hereby dedicate my existence to the Turkish entity” from the oath that we require every primary school student who is citizen of the Republic of Turkey to say, be it a Kurd, a Turk or a member of any ethnic or religious minority, or we should completely abolish this oath, which clearly embodies the mentality of the 1930s.
The settlement of the Kurdish issue, which is the direct outcome of Turkey being an imperfect democracy and insufficiently upholding the rule of law, will be possible with the adoption of a new state mentality that treats everyone, not only Kurds, and every lifestyle equally and that does not disparage its citizens because of their ethnicities, religious beliefs or political or philosophical views. This new mentality must be a contemporary mindset that does not discriminate between an atheist and a Muslim or between a Christian and a Jew or between a Turk and a Kurd or an Armenia or between a Sunni and an Alevi.
Supposing that the new initiative brings about a settlement, if a Kurdish girl wearing a headscarf is not discriminated against based on her ethnic identity but is not allowed to attend a university because of her headscarf, then it would mean that the state has failed to settle the Kurdish issue completely. In the same vein, if the state mentality that tries to deprive the Greek Orthodox Patriarch in İstanbul of his title of “ecumenical” with some unknown complex continues preventing Orthodox people from obtaining their religious education, then it is really difficult to imagine that the Kurdish issue could be completely settled without leaving something unresolved.
There is no doubt that the Kurdish initiative and the search for a solution are considerably important and worthwhile. But it is more important to reformat and reorganize society and the state from a democratic perspective in a way that would settle the problems of all groups. Now that we have set off to change the mentality of the state and society with respect to Kurds, why shouldn't we use this opportunity to democratically reformat the state and society?
