Pete, Pete, and Repeat walk into a bar...

Let me try to connect the dots...

I've been listening to a podcast called "The Best of the Left", and last week there was a discussion about metaphorical echo chambers. According to Wikipedia, "the term echo chamber is any situation in which information, ideas or beliefs are amplified or reinforced by transmission inside an 'enclosed' space." I gather it is not an actual enclosed space, but instead the simple act of talking to, reading, or listening to opinions that already agree with one's own (thus reinforcing them as correct).

When you hear someone say, "you're preaching to the choir," they are basically saying to you that the echo chamber of your relationship is redundant, in this case.

The point made in the podcast, or what caught my ear, dealt with a study that sought to determine whether readers of online news were ghettoizing themselves into echo chambers, and only reading information from sources that reflected their opinions.

Turns out, they don't, defying the expectations of researchers.

The study showed that bloggers and their readers alike, prefer to read what the other side is saying. Thus, ideologies are defined dialectically, in relation to one another, rather than through echo chambers. Blogs go a step further, creating a venue where people can interact with the "other" side. Posting comments to a blog is one example of how this process works, mechanically speaking.

Another nail in the coffin of the newspaper industry!

This relates to Turkey, in a minute...

I was raised, like most Americans, on the assumption of an objective media. The idea that journalism should report "just the facts, ma'am", and that the field brought with it none of the dishonest taints which accompany academia, politics, or discussions around the water-cooler.

Thus was I in for a shock, my first summer in Turkey. Myself a young leftist at the time, I learned through leftist friends of leftist newspapers and leftist magazines. These were clearly and aggressively ideological publications, and available in most news-stands (except those owned by the political right). A magazine rack provides a number of political stances, and while searching for one, a reader inevitably learns about others. Publications are also pressed to keep each other honest, because what could be more fun than discrediting your ideological foes.

Some of these papers are sufficiently extreme, that they are constantly being closed by the government, and then re-organizing under different names. One specifically, Gündem, used to print a "Victims" column, everyday featuring a journalist, lawyer, or revolutionary killed by the Turkish "Deep State". To carry Gündem in public was to declare to other Turks your ideological stance.

I remember a man in Tatvan, who was holding up his Gündem such that any passerby could see the headline and title as they passed. I felt that he wasn't reading, so much as making a statement about his politics, a proclamation of his leftist-ness.

Certainly, it was an act of defiance. Gündem was shut down in 2005.

The New York Times seems intended for hippy-pussies by comparison.

I noticed long ago that Turks are generally more politically aware. My political persuasion often differs from those with whom I speak, but there is clearly a mutual understanding of the political spectrum, the agents of political change, and the means available for exercising power. We disagree, but we understand one another. It's like we're speaking the same language, even though we're not.

Turkey is a military state. What I find interesting, is that with political action literally paralyzed by the threat of imprisonment or extra-state assassination, dissident voices constantly emerge from all points of the political spectrum. Their contribution to the larger conversation resonates meaningfully. The closest thing we have to this is Jon Stewart getting into an argument with Tucker Carlson.

Either ours is a fundamentally conservative country, or our leadership has complete control, for the differences between liberals and conservatives never come down to ideology, but rather policy. Americans all seem to want basically the same things. I know I'm failing to define this clearly, but I'll need to think on it more. The Turkish Left and Right want radically different things for Turkey (different from each other and different from what the Turkish state presently provides).

I could be wrong (and perhaps I ran from the America of my parents' generation, and not mine), but I get the sense Americans just want a middle/upper-middle class, college educated, nuclear family, lifestyle. Something which could be described as "Compassionate Capitalism", which is maybe also eco-friendly.

My ideology leads me to want collective ownership of the means of production and democratic participation in all levels of society, also maximization of local political authority into smaller geographic areas than nations (of our size) would be appreciated.

Those are distinctly different goals...

Some Links...

I wanted to make the lives of the curious that much easier, and gathered several links about the revolution (not sure what else to call it) in Greece. They include:

Statement by Greek Anarchists/ Anti-Authoritarians

Blog of a British Anarchist

Link to pictures... everything is basically on fire.

There was a call for global solidarity protests today, and I'll be checking the newspapers tomorrow to see if anything happened in Turkey. Last night, as we strolled past the Greek consulate, along the Istiklal, I noticed a police bus parked directly in front of the entrance, several cops dozing inside.

It was a rainy day today, but I do so hope they had to earn their paychecks.

Pepper gas makes me sneeze...

There is a key component to political activism, one that all of my direct action experiences have lacked, and that is the potential to go completely bat-shit crazy.

In the run-up to the Iraq war, myself and 200,000 "focus group" members marched on Washington D.C. It was icy-cold, we had driven all night, and after listening to speeches on the mall, we took a long walk through the city toward the Navy yard. I knew I was there to oppose the coming war, but I remember saying to a friend:

"If we have all these people, and we really want to prevent this war, why don't we take over and occupy the White House and the Capitol Building. It'll at least be warmer."

So much for that plan. It's a lucky thing we were wrong and the war was a success.

Last May, I participated in an Istanbullu leftist right-of-passage, marching on Taksim Square to commemorate the victims of the 1 Mayis, 1977, state-authorized massacre there. About 20,000 protestors came out this year, in various parts of the city. Ultimately, we weren't much of a match for the 30,000 police and 2,000 jandarme, who had a busy day, and began raiding buildings and making arrests before dawn.

My friends and I got into Taksim on our good looks and charm, talking our way past a few cops by playing the "English teacher" card. I participated in one clash with police, which was a lot of running away from pepper grenades and water cannons, and after that I spent part of the day wandering the neighborhood observing smaller clashes, as the police demostrated their complete control of the situation. So thorough in their control were they, that at one point they beat and arrested some tourists. Me, I mostly just drank coffee in a leftist cafe, filled with other leftists hiding from an almost certain ass-kicking.

Walking home that day, my nose began to sting a little, like I'd just eaten something spicy. As a fit of sneezing set in, I realized I would probably never be much of a revolutionary. Sneezing like a baby panda doesn't exactly inspire fear.

Because these experiences were both unfulfilling and unsuccessful, I have the utmost respect for what Greek anarchists are doing to their country. In response to the slaying of a teenager by police, Greek leftists and youths have asserted their destructive potential. What better way to let your government know it has screwed up, than to burn it to the ground.

It has certainly gotten the attention of the powers-that-be.

I don't want this to be a treatise on government, or I would explain my reasoned argument for my support (I've even decided to start learning modern Greek!). I think it is sufficient to say that property destruction, interruption of infrastructure, and the shock-and-awe value of such tactics, is what state authorities respond to and how reform is provoked. Certainly, there are other methods, but those I listed above should have remained on the table before the Iraq war began, and they could make a valuable point here in Turkey as well.

In the last year, Turkish police violence has risen dramatically, detainees have been tortured or killed, and such behavior from police has become the rule, rather than the exception.

It's an old platitude, but one that appears tried and true:

No justice, no peace.