A study documenting how non-practicing Turks feel forced to conform to a former-Islamist government’s conservative values if they want government jobs or promotions has sparked heated debate, revealing once again the depth of divisions in this secular Muslim country.
The first study to provide backing for secular Turks’ fears that political Islam is influencing their lives, the report, titled Being Different in Turkey, clashes with popular characterizations of Anatolia as a font of religious and ethnic harmony. Based on lengthy interviews with 401 people in 12 provincial towns across the country, it catalogues day-to-day acts of intolerance. Schoolchildren tell of pressure from classmates to fast during Ramadan; civil servants say getting food in staff canteens on fasting days is now impossible; Kurds in nationalist Turkish areas describe how they hang up on their non-Turkish speaking mothers, so as not to be overheard speaking Kurdish in public; and there has been a 13 percent drop in the number of bars and supermarkets licensed to sell alcohol since 2005.
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off site, courtesy Eurasianet.org
