Looks like that 'both sides' are counting on the West..)) They see this as a litmus test; what will prevail? Paranoia or democracy.
Ugly among friends, time to start a debate club in Istanbul...)

Dear Erkan,

I am under the impression that you consider all those protesters, "white Turks",
secular Turks, etc. as "fascist hordes", no different than Ergenekon gang. You complain about you ("democrats") being named with bad labels all the time; yet you can just as easily name others with similar bad labels.

You are so possessive of the word "democrat";
implying that the rest of us have to be fascist hordes if we do not support the new constitution and headscarf freedom without any worry or question. Believe it or not, majority of those protesters would not object the headscarf freedom if things could be handled with care by the government, instead of pushing it with revanchist agenda. I do not understand
why "white Turks" get ugly all the time in your and other liberal democrats' minds. These people are not the state, not the government; they just fear and feel their life styles
are being threatened. Do not they have the right to protest without being labeled fascist? Is this too hard to empathize for you? AKP has the presidency, the government, the parliament; and many state organizations are becoming to be under their control. Yet, they are still being victimized by those "ugly white Turks".

If you are so obsessed with democracy no matter what, why did you not even bother
to point out the irony that there was not a single female parliamentarian involved in preparations of the new constitution, mainly just for headscarf freedom. Men decide about women's clothing and this is freedom! This is a political exploitation of both islamist and secular men. If there were no men in this world, women would not make this any problem, let her be a secular or islamist; they just would not care. In fact there would not be any issue of clothing just to be hidden from men's eyes, since there would be no men. You are whining about the fascism of white Turks (I am just following your lingo here), what about the fascism of men on women? Why women have to veil to hide themselves from men? Why are they suffering for men's inferiority? Why cannot we question or ask any logical reasoning for this? Why are we conditioned to believe whatever religion our ancestors believed in as soon as we born? People cannot vote in political matters before eighteen, is religion less important that children would not be given any real choice to decide on their own beliefs? AKP is on the verge of passing (or has already passed) a new resolution banning the scenes of alcoholic beverages on TVs. How does it comply with democracy?

My main problem here is you act like a typical columnist in Turkey. You discuss the issue only from one perspective (as it fits to your argument) without bothering to bring different aspects, just not to reduce the effectiveness of your argument. If you were as democrat as you claim, I would expect from you to ask for a democracy to be applied indiscriminately not on a selective basis. But unfortunately, you seem to be satisfied with superficial democratic improvements regarding only religious symbols.

there are more than enough links given in many posts that demonstrate other counter-arguments. I have no problem with presenting them and in the mean time I am totally happy with my conscious.

Erkan I take exception to your remark.. I was never pretty in the first place..
So what's next? Will your male students begin to wear skullcaps and scraggly beards to Anthropology 101 class? When THAT happens, you will be in fear.
:P
I'm truly surprised that more Turks don't come out and curse as I do. It has a certain therapeutic effect, kind of like praying used to have..

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, same as ugliness.
Sensin white turk :)
Istanbul'a dondugumde hesap soracam hazir ol ;)

i see: paranoia prevails, still.