The Land of Imported Fears
Good Fit
- Readers who want to follow Turkey's 2009–2013 agenda through columns
- Anyone who likes short, ironic and direct commentary
- Readers interested in the Turkish press and media language
Not a Fit
- Those seeking neutral analysis with wide sourcing
- Anyone put off by sharp, partisan stances in political commentary
- Anyone troubled by statistics of crime, violence and abuse
The book opens with several pages of introductions: Rıfat Ababay, Ertuğrul Özkök, Rauf Tamer, Mehmet Barlas, Sunay Akın and others present the author with praise such as «the journalist the news loves» and «an iron fist in a velvet glove». Most of the introductions repeat one another; the factual information is that the author was first a genetic engineer and then came to radio, newspaper and television.
The first columns are short, barbed reactions to everyday events. «Faith in the Hereafter, a Surfboard in This World» comments on the break-up of an elderly businessman and his young girlfriend with the proverb «even a drum is played by its match»; «The Mine Festival» builds a bitter comparison by setting side by side the computers given to children at science festivals and a meeting in Hakkari to teach children to protect themselves from mines; «Congratulations, Brother Muammar!» criticises Turkish officials attending the 40th anniversary of Gaddafi's rule.
Some columns try to show the nation's mood in numbers: «I Am in Depression…» gives antidepressant consumption rising from 14 million boxes in 2003 to 26 million in 2007 and a list of crime statistics since 2003, and the murder of Münevver Karabulut is recalled as an event the media kept reworking. The author does not give the sources of the figures.
On education and history the author uses his own childhood memories and historical comparisons: in «Education Is Not a Must» one of the classmates of a 79-pupil class ends up in crime while the weakest becomes a teacher; «Two Funerals» compares the government's differing attitude to the funerals of Prince Ertuğrul Osman Efendi and the physician Türkan Saylan; in «How Far Should It Open?» the claim of «promises» attributed to Atatürk is answered with mockery.
- The pieces are written in short paragraphs divided by «•», in colloquial language
- Each piece is dated and begins with a short news lead-in
- The mix of irony, question-and-answer and figures heightens the effect, but the figures are given without sources
- A partisan commentator's style: in most pieces the author's stance is clear from the start
At the end of the part read comes the column «How Far Should It Open?»: the author answers with mockery the claim that Atatürk promised autonomy to the Kurds, sharia to Muslims, a province to Alevis, an army to the Laz and a federation to Circassians, and says, «It is our custom: if you cannot convince the other person you find a saying of Atatürk, and if you cannot find one you invent it». What follows is outside the scope of this review.
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