Many friends, colleagues, and journalists have already criticized the new law. Without much repetition, I have four points to make:
1- The ruling party’s plans to colonize social media/ to build hegemony over social media failed. Political trolls and various types of intimidation did not work in general. Despite owning nearly 90 percent of legacy media, the regime encounters severe criticism on social media. Thus, it does what it knows best. A series of repressive and restrictive legislations (or other brute force measures such as internet throttling). The so-called disinformation law is the last one in this series.
2- The law will give the pro-government judges an automated sentencing tool. In most cases, most citizens were released after the trials as the reasons to be sued at the outset were untenable. The government criminalizes the process as effectively as possible so the judges can easily sentence people to longer-term imprisonment.
3- There are already laws to enact if the government is sincere. There have been many cases of anti-immigrant or anti-women provocations through social media, but no substantive move by the authorities.
4- No advanced democratic country initiated similar legislation despite the public debates on the harms of disinformation. It is hard to define what constitutes disinformation or not. Here, some ruling party authorities believe that they can set what is real or not. Such arrogance.
Turkey’s ‘disinformation’ bill to have pre-election ‘chilling effect,’ Europe watchdog says
Disinformation law ‘final stage of AKP’s media restrictions’
Academic Emre Tansu Keten says, “Cards such as
Advertisement Institution and
credentials will constitute the first stage of censorship. And the threat of imprisonment will serve as the second. In the end, the censorship law will be a tool to silence the media.”
Journalists protest ‘disinformation bill’ ahead of parliamentary discussions
Discover more from Erkan's Field Diary
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.