A sixteen year old teenager named Medine was brutally killed over nothing. Her very own, family who was supposed to protect her, buried her alive. They did not even care to try to make her suffer less, but chose a very painful method to take her life.
This has happened in the South East of Turkey. I have never been to this region. Most of my life the South East of Turkey has been under terrorist attacks, therefore considered a bit dangerous to visit. There had been a few years that the region was more peaceful but I was abroad and missed that period. It is not like one cannot go but I have kept postponing it.
The life styles are so different in remote areas compared to the cities that I have a hard time acknowledging that this happened in my country.
It was an honor killing. She lived in Kahta which is a mainly Kurdish area and where most honor killings take place. She dishonored the family by merely talking to boys. Apparently in her society opposites sexes shall not communicate. In this day and time there is nothing understandable about the parent’s or the society’s behavior. The fact that the tradition is Kurdish as opposed to Turkish does not matter the least bit. It happened in Turkey. Surely the killers will be punished severely, but how does that help poor Medine who went to the police over and over again to escape the battering that she had to endure at home, only to be sent back to her family.
The law in Turkey punishes such crimes, but that does not help when the society is OK with it. Neglecting yet another Kurdish region, in the name of respecting their tradition is not OK either. The Kurds of Turkey have put up a strong fight to be able to hold on to their ethnic traditions and encountered many barriers. I recall feeling good that Kurdish songs are finally heard on TV, not because I have a taste for this music but because I believe that they should not be banned from such simple pleasures. Denying this ethnic group the basics, has not helped at all, yet worked against integrating them.
The one time that an obstruction against one of their traditions seems like a just idea, there seems to be none. *In four years there were 16 honor killings in this region. Of course those who kill are imprisoned for a long time. It does not help though. Honor killing by definition is a nonsensical thing to do. Who in their right mind would kill their own child with an insane idea of not loosing face towards others? It is premeditated, so the person, who commits the crime, is ready to spend most of their life in jail. The idea of prison does not scare or stop them. They probably never had an amazing future to look forward to anyway. In their twisted mindset, they believe that what they do is right and worth giving up their freedom.
Clearly, the girls in this region need to be protected by the state. Whether it is via shelters or other means such as police intervention does not matter, as long as they are protected when they seek help. Medine could have been saved if the police reacted to her complains but they did not and now she is dead.
As I am writing these lines I am invited to a few ‘high-end’ parties at venues overlooking the breath taking view of the Bosphorus, where you can see very chic Ladies and Gentleman mingling and enjoying each other’s company. The disparity between our life styles is immense. Medine and I are of the same nation even when from different ethnical backgrounds, by law we have the same rights, yet she was buried alive for talking to boys. She probably never even kissed a boy. They did not even care to get her to lose her consciousness, before burying her alive. She had to endure the whole thing knowingly.
She never had the slightest chance and that just does not feel right!
As Martin Luther King has once said “Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless. “
I hope that more than sending the killers to jail shall be done, to prevent other girls from becoming victims of this tradition.
Sources:
* http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8501181.stm
unfortunate and very sad:(