Are we suffering from a prevalent and epidemic mentality illness or not?

It’s possible to find an answer with a test.

There are three symptoms related with the illness.

The first one is the “symbolical defect.”

The captive people, segments and systems, of this defect, will use their own cultural signs and styles as the tool of comprehension, perception, inspection, or, rendering proponent or alienation.

Over the task of supplying a political need, or its unique characteristic or secularism comprehension, this defect will do the duty of forming a cultural and even economic monopoly field. What is being called as the public field is this monopoly field, which is continuously growing.

Then, entries and exits to this field will be dependent on the “symbolical convenience criteria”. This symbolical supervision provides keeping the Islamic identity outside of the political and public life.

The second symptom is “the obsession of the religion-dogma relation.”

The religion-dogma relation states the belief of the religion that symbolizes a patriarchal structure, and forms the opposite pole of advancing and progressivism with all its factors.

This point of view doesn’t only surround the religious people, but also the religion at the same time.

Within this frame, religions will be handled from the point of community-politics relation, rather than the person-belief relation. For example, the headscarf is generally explained as a dress, which had been put on by means of force, pressure of tradition or, the order of a man. Within this context, the desirable thing is for a religion that doesn’t become obsessive. As for the contrary, it is a threat that requires to be liquidated in every sense. For this view, religion represents not only the past and obscurantism, but also ignorance and immaturity.

The third symptom is “the lack of community visualization.”

The lack of community visualization sits on the “frozen history and community” perception. When observed from Turkey’s viewpoint the year 1923 is being accepted as the beginning point, and for the years 1923-1950, it’s being praised openly or indirectly, and as for post-1950, it is being identified as the deterioration and opposite revolution period. This “subjectivity” in the history visualization, gains meaning with an “imperfection” related with the community envisagement. As a matter of fact, the partial community understanding, which is formed of different demands, identities and actors, is actively rejected in this segment. The modernist-progressive system, which is built on the “homogeneous person”, in other words, “the community understanding that consists of the total of similar individuals” is what had been brought forth and even idealized against this.

The diversity perception is also imprisoned here.

For example, while different cultural elements and layers, which belong to the communal tissue, are being evaluated as patriarchal remnants that require cleaning, the communal differentiation is being handled with data like education, income and gender, which are accepted as being the reinforcing and founding elements of the “homogenous individual and ideal community model”. The main reason why this situation is pointing at a communal visualization imperfection next to the lack of communal visualization is the authoritative mentality experiencing a “state of mental confusion” between “the communal structure that is desired to be formed” and “the existing communal structure”. The ideal community is acting as an actual imagination function, and the present community is being placed on this imagination, or at least expected to act appropriately to this imagination. Opposite conditions are being perceived as “irrational developments” or “patriarchal sediment uprisings”.

The existence of at least two of these three symptoms means that you are seriously ill. The fact that these are stating the average elite mentality in the country, doesn’t necessarily remove the destruction of the illness, and vice versa…