Turkish first lady says harem was 'school' for women
Source: AFP
Ankara (AFP) - The wife of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday hailed the harem of the Ottoman sultans as "a school for preparing women for life".
Emine Erdogan's comments come a day after the president triggered protests by saying he believed that "a woman is above all a mother" in a speech marking International Women's Day.
Critics have accused Erdogan's government of trying to impose strict Islamic values on Turkey and curtailing women's civil liberties.
"The harem was a school for members of the Ottoman dynasty and an educational establishment for preparing women for life," Emine Erdogan said at an official event on the Ottoman sultans in Ankara, according to Turkish TV stations.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/turkish-first-lady-says-harem-school-women-194358334.html;_ylt=AwrC2Q6eg.BWyiQAiePQtDMD;_ylu=X3oDMTByOHZyb21tBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzcg--
Ducksworthy
(55 posts)Methinks Islamic Turkey may not be ready for EU membership, or the UN for that matter.
eissa
(4,238 posts)The Turks like to pride themselves as being "secular" and "progressive" but only because they compare themselves to their neighbors. In reality, they are hardly any better. And yet another reason -- apart from denying the genocide they committed against the Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontic Greeks -- that exemplifies why Turkey should never be allowed in the EU.
CTyankee
(63,926 posts)We havw lots of Turks in a neighboring town and two Turkish restaurants. It is almost unfair that we have such wonderful food in two places. You have to bring your own wine, however. They don't serve it.
alfredo
(60,078 posts)Cleita
(75,480 posts)awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)Very cool.
D Gary Grady
(133 posts)Unfortunately the family-owned restaurant relocated to another city a few years ago, but it was excellent. They had a small bar and sold alcohol, and if I'm not mistaken alcohol is widely available in Turkey itself, despite being frowned on by more conservative Muslims. As with Christianity, there's a fair amount of variability in Islam. (Conservative Protestant churches campaigned against restaurant sales of "liquor by the drink" in North Carolina in the late 1970s.)
REP
(21,691 posts)It's only recently - especially with Erdogan pandering to extremist morons - has there been a move away from secularism.
Angel Martin
(942 posts)leaders of Erdogan's political party are now obliquely referencing it as a threat to the Kurds.
http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/03/03/turkish-pm-kurds-collaborating-with-russia-just-as-the-armenians-did/
sarge43
(28,946 posts)What life was that?
Could they leave, travel, own land, take up a profession, have a choice of husbands or ?
nichomachus
(12,754 posts)sarge43
(28,946 posts)Someone trying the idiot treatment does that.
Cleita
(75,480 posts)leader is an asshole isn't fair. We may get Ted Cruz or Donald Trump as our leader. It doesn't mean that 90% of Americans are like them. None of the Republican candidates have any respect for women and probably secretly would like to go back to the barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen days.
atreides1
(16,103 posts)Edrogan and his party are in control, seems to me that enough Turks think that way!
Cleita
(75,480 posts)How about when GWB was President, were we all assholes then?
Red Mountain
(1,739 posts)Just a majority of those who bothered to vote.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)Akicita
(1,196 posts)multiculturalism.
EllieBC
(3,045 posts)And say that some cultures are garbage.
Akicita
(1,196 posts)All cultures are equal. Only our own culture can be called garbage.
EllieBC
(3,045 posts)page 1276 or earlier.
Akicita
(1,196 posts)I guess we'll have to rely on all our cultural experts here on DU to guide us.
tabasco
(22,974 posts)were fitness camps for imported African workers.