I, too, object

An entirely civil, entirely valuable and entirely meaningful to the extreme action has started: I, too, object! (InTwitter language that is: ?benimdeitirazımvar).
The initiators of this citizens’ action are known to most of you: Citizen’s Initiative.
You know, the citizens who years ago started that wonderful and very successful action that went by the name “One minute of darkness for constant enlightenment”.
Regulars to Claw Mark will be no strangers to hearing me stress: “Being a citizen is no easy task.”
I am talking about citizens who do not sit idly gawping but hold the state to account and come out in protest when this is called for, do not reject the internet but rather use it to the full, participate and make participation a fact of daily life,
An explanatory statement has been made about the ‘I, too, object’ action. I quote it to you verbatim in the hope and expectation that you will read it carefully.
 
 “We issue an appeal from citizen to citizen. We, the great bulk of this society, are unhappy about developments. We are uncomfortable and insecure. We do not know what the future holds and do not wish to live like this. Millions of citizens do not consent to what is going on; they object, but our individual voices are not heard. If we pool our strength and put our voices together we will overcome muteness, pierce the silence and become visible and audible.
Send the attached text to everyone you can using all the means and ways at your disposal; to every party and every institution; to the organisations you belong to, your friends, family and acquaintances, the TV stations, news and discussion programmes you watch, your own social media network; everywhere.
If you like, take a few sentences from this text. If you like, sum up your objection in 140 characters and post it under the hashtag “BenimdeİtirazımVar” or put the text on Facebook. Be creative about getting the objections of citizens and all of us out to the millions”
 
As to the attached text they want to be spread and multiplied as far and as wide as possible, it could well be framed and hung on the wall after having been read and distributed, so meaningful and important it is.
I will quote it and bring this Claw Mark to an end. Pay absolutely no heed to those two-faced shirkers who will say “That’s all we’ve been reading this column for?”
What could be more important under AKP rule and under state of emergency conditions, in these days when oafs wander about with their brains and consciences stuck between their legs, than not remaining silent and objecting?
(Let anybody who objects to objecting step forward.)
Here you are – Citizen’s Initiative’s basic text:


We the joint owners of this patch of land,
all Turkish, Kurdish, Armenian, Greek, Laz, Syriac, Circassian, Muslim, Christian,
Jewish, Sunni and Alevi citizens of faith or none,
who vote for the AKP, CHP, HDP, MHP or other parties,
wish for a country in which we can live in peace and tranquility.
We do not want war, we do not want loss of life, we do not want our children to die or kill
or point guns at one another.
We do not want to be split into warring fractions,
to lose our sense of siblingship and partnership.
Neither coup nor tutelage. Neither dictator nor terror!
We want to live and earn our livings, in peace of mind and at liberty.
We do not wish, just because we are women, to be manhandled, raped and killed,
be looked down on for wearing the hijab or face attack for wearing shorts,
to live in fear.
All of us, women and men,
wish to freely and equally live out our faiths, our religions and our cultures.
We do not wish to be remanded and imprisoned by courts without knowing
the crime we stand accused of and in whose name and under what law this has been ordered; to be robbed of our jobs and expelled from our professions, for our children to be condemned to hunger, without inquiry or investigation based on mendacious accusations and false evidence when he have had no truck with coups and terrorism;
to be branded terrorists when we speak of peace
or as traitors when we speak of injustice.
We do not wish for our property and chattels to be seized under arbitrary decisions,
to be deprived of compensation for our labour, our wages and salaries,
for our houses and villages to be burnt and destroyed,
for our children’s education to be disrupted
and for our youth to go to waste on the streets.
We are the people; we are good people with consciences.
Do not fill us with malice through incitement,
do not degrade us with words of rancour and hate, do not accustom us to blood and death.
We do not want war, death, execution, conflict or strife.
Those who rule this country, those who hold our fate in your hands!
You were elected, not to crush the people and eradicate their liberties,
but to ensure that we the citizens live in peace, security and tranquility.
Know that we do not consent to current developments; we object.
Hear us!