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We've read about this.

In our history books.

We've drawn fake mustaches and tattoos on Mussolini, Hitler and Stalin, amazed at how cruel they were. At what they had done. 

We've read the novels. 

We've analyzed passages from 1984. 

We've watched the movies. 

We've quoted lines from V for Vendetta. We've looked for its DVD under the "Sci-Fi" and "Action" sections in the bookstore.

Now, all of these are most easily accessible. 

Just turn on the TV in Turkey, and voila! You can see the live broadcast of 1984, Hitler's war speeches, and V for Vendetta all in one place. 

One second, Twitter gets banned. 

The next, Youtube is blocked. 

A petition to ban Facebook is now in court. 

Why, you ask?

Because records of people working (at least who are supposed to be working) for the government have surfaced and diffused through these social media platforms; records revealing every bribe they have taken, every threat they have made, every "lira" they have stolen. Apparently, "revealing" these records are unethical, but what the people in the records are claimed to have done is nowhere near that.

And with the word of the PM, soon to be sultan, I fear, the people's access to some major social media platforms gets banned. They have silenced the people as if they are turning down the volume of their TV. 

Democracy in Turkey is rapidly failing. 

There is an election on Sunday for the people to show themselves; unless a war starts between Syria and Turkey until then. Unfortunately, this isn't just speculation: today, new records have revealed ******. I had to remove this part of my post because the government has just issued a law stating that revealing the contents of this recording puts our "national security" in danger and thus is a crime. 

So, just hold on, Turkey, hold on just until Sunday. Until people can talk without having to change their DNS settings. Until we get a say in something. Until we get to make the change in our country, not our future-sultan. 

Meanwhile in Turkey...

A 14 year old child, Berkin Elvan, passes away after spending 8 months in a coma after we got hit on the head by a gas canister fired by the police during the Gezi protests.

People who protest Berkin's death are doused in tear gas and pressurized water. Ah, the irony.

The PM declares this kid a "terrorist" and makes thousands at his public meeting for election propaganda "boo" Berkin's mother.

New phone records keep surfacing, revealing how the people in the government are committing fraud and stealing from the government.

The PM says he will "eradicate" Twitter in one of his public meetings.

A couple of hours later, Twitter gets banned in Turkey.

Tomorrow, approximately 3 % of Turkey's whole population will sit for a 160 minute long exam which will partially determine which university they get into.


Some of the people who most passionately protested the government and Berkin's death will, tomorrow, be forced to sit in a room for two and a half hours, trying to wrap their minds around the multiple choice questions they're presented with and try to find the same answer as the other 2 million should find.

This youth which has rebellion in their veins is expected to narrow down and sculpt their thoughts, rather cruelly, into 5 choices. It now seems to me that everything the government does leads to the same results: shutting off the youth to critical thinking and turning them into educational zombies whose sole aim is to get high grades and perform well in multiple choice tests-decide correctly between 5 given choices.

The youth I know and hang out with has avoided this transformation, they have not yet been contaminated with this disgusting virus, maybe because of the different educational system of our school. However, a large part of Turkey's youth/future, has already been turned into mindless zombies who seek multiple choice questions rather than brains. They don't protest, they don't change their DNS settings to go on Twitter when it's banned, they don't care about Berkin or the cold-blooded, ruthless, hateful police. They can tell you the formula for a capacitor's stored energy or the square of 17 on a whim, but ask them what ideas they stand for and why, and they can't answer; they ask you what the choices are.

Because those are not in the syllabus.

I hope with all these protests and "revelations" about the people in charge, not only the studious-zombie-youth, but the rest of the people of Turkey will awaken and realize that most of the time, the real answer to their questions and their freedom lies beyond the 5 options presented to them.

The Principal-Principal Problem

School: "an institution where instruction is given, especially to persons under college age."


Let's review the hierarchical structure of a typical, IB Diploma Highschool:

The Board of Directors

School Principal

High School Principal

Head of Departments

Teachers

School is where people like me go to receive education and to prepare for life. We pay money; we invest in the school for it to, in return, provide us with the best quality of education and the best environment possible under the circumstances. Almost 200 people, from the cleaning staff to the head of the math department to the "board", work so that we, the students, can get the best education possible. At least that's what it's supposed to be like in a world where IB diplomas grow on trees and you can understand HL Math.

On average, I spend approximately 8 hours sleeping and 1 hour on the road everyday. The amount of time for which I am fully awake and functioning is about 15 hours. And I spend more than half of this time in school. So it is only natural for my school to have become like a home to me, especially because I've been going to the same school since kindergarten with friends with whom I learned to write with. I expect my school to support me and each and every student, because the reason there is a huge stone building on top of a hill 15 km outside of town with hundreds of people inside it spending their time is to educate us. We, and by "we" I mean the students, should be the priority in any decision the "school", people listed above, make. The primary and most important goal of a school being to provide the students with the best conditions and education seems like a given, but believe me, it is overlooked most of the time.

This week (so far), I've had 3 quizzes and an oral commentary, one math test, and 5 lab reports and one essay due. I also go to Dersane, private teaching institutions preparing students for the final 2 exams which will get them enrolled into university, and its only Tuesday. Last night, I came home at 8 pm, after a 2 hr 40 min long exam at Dersane, and started writing these lab reports then. You must have understood that I don't get enough sleep. Or rest. Or relaxing time. Or freedom.  None of us, seniors, get enough of these. So much is expected from us that we're trying very hard not to crumble under this stress. We burst out laughing when we hear the words "mock exams" and "IB" and "getting a 7 from HL Math", we slack off sometimes, uncomfortably watch  an episode of How I Met Your Mother instead of doing the math homework, and then stay up until 2 in the morning to finish that same math homework.

You would expect that people around us seniors would try everything to make our lives easier.

They don't.

Instead, for the first time in my 14 years in school, I've been feeling that the school is doing everything in its power to make our lives harder. I wouldn't have thought things could get any harder, but, hey, I was mistaken.

Maybe the first time it wasn't intentional; the people on top of the educational food chain thought they were actually helping us. We went and spoke to these people, and they listened.

The second time is also somewhat understandable though not excusable. We went and spoke to other people, and they did not listen at first. Apparently, a board "commitment" was more important than people's parents attending their child's high school graduation. Only after we bantered them with our requests and got our parents involved did they decide to do something.

But when this happens for the third time, when the people who are supposed to be helping us try to tackle us for their own personal benefits, for what they have understood of the current national education system and their (rightful) hate towards it, and perhaps, just to show their stance and "prove", rather despairingly, to the rest of the schools in Ankara that they are different, I personally don't want to go and talk to them. I now know, unfortunately, that we don't matter. Their decisions do.

With every regime, there arises a problem called the "principal-agent" problem (funny how the wording fits the exact situation at hand). This is when the people elected to represent the people (agents) do not serve in the best interest of the people (the principals). It is somewhat inevitable, because human beings are selfish and crude- and I'm sorry Mr. Freud, but the super-ego does not always kick in. Sometimes though, there is one person high up in the chain who you can rely on; who you know you can trust. Unfortunately, that person, being a "predator", is also the "prey" for some people.

Who suffers from this problem is the principals. The people. The students. The agents get what they wanted all along. It is true that the people have great power; they can go against the system and the agents, and with enough will they, too, can get what they want. But when the "principals" are broken, when they have no hope that the agents can be changed, when all they really want to do is to get these horrible few months over with and never look back again, when the place they called "home" turns against them, well, then, there is nothing anyone can do. The agents may proceed with their merry lives. The seniors (oops, I meant "principals" (!)) can suffer on for the next months and wait for the principal-principal problem to claim its next victim.

Millions of Euros & Bulletproof Ideas

"Did you get rid of all of it?"

"No, daddy, we still have 30 million euros. We can give half of that to Mr. Berat and with the rest we can buy an apartment."

"Ok.  Try not to talk on the phones too much."

"Ok daddy. I'll try to get rid of the rest of the money."

"Don't talk like that. You're being listened."

"Ok daddy. Bye."

This conversation just surfaced on the internet a few days earlier. It takes place between the Prime Minister of Turkey, and his son. They're talking about all of the money they've stolen from the people and how to get rid of it, in the light of the new investigations. Only a few hours after this recording was published on Youtube, the Ministry made an announcement that "the recording is fake." However, sound engineers all over the world disagree.

And still, these guys are ruling the country and making decisions on our behalf, manipulating our lives while probably still, secretively, stashing some 10 million dollars at a house somewhere.

In our economics class, we talked about "equality" and how one of the goals of every nation is to reduce inequality in their country. We defined "equality" as everyone having the same market value from birth, or when they enter the job market, meaning that nobody was born without a leg or with an extraordinary talent for painting, or that every child has access to the same quality of education. One of our current government's principal arguments for they've "improved" the country is that, supposedly, they've reduced inequality. They handed out refrigerators to people living in villages with no access to electricity. They've increased income taxes. Turkey has the second most expensive petrol. They have, however, "improved" healthcare. The only thing wrong with that is that they're already supposed to do that.

And I seriously doubt that stealing from the people and stashing millions of euros reduces inequality.

Now we wait. We wait for the people to show themselves. We wait for the ones who are guilty to be punished, and get what they deserve, hoping that justice will be served. And that 50 % of my nation can finally rip off their blindfolds, break their chains, get out into the sun, and realize that they've been living in a world of shadows and deceit.

The "other 50 %", in the words of our PM, was on the streets the day after this recording was made public. They were doused by teargas and pressurized water, and aimed at with guns which fire plastic bullets. The PM's toy soldiers thought they could put out the fire of anger and passion burning in those people with water and gas. They thought they could shoot those thoughts and let them bleed to death; those thoughts which the wonderful people of my nation have; those thoughts which are NOT clouded by free coal or empty promises or pointless election campaigns or religious propaganda.  It didn't work. Because, "behind this mask, Mr. Erdoğan, there is an idea. And ideas are bulletproof." (and teargas-proof, at that)