Black Lives Matter – Demo: Speech by Eda Tekin

From a very early age, I wanted to become a journalist. I wanted to write about topics that are forgotten, to draw attention to things that don't receive enough attention, about human rights, wars, corruption, abuse. I wanted people to open a newspaper and search for my article because they know they will find uncensored truth about important topics there. If I were already a journalist today, I would write about exactly this movement. I would write about structural racism. About police violence. And about Yemen, about Afghanistan, about Syria, about Kurdistan, about Kosovo, about Serbia, about Sri Lanka, about India, about Thailand, about Japan, about Australia, about Palestine. About LGBTQ+, about women, about the stigmatisation of mental illness, about homelessness, about violence, about oppression. About how shit the AfD is. I could continue the list further, because UNFORTUNATELY many, many sad things happen in this world. I'm also just a 21-year-old student who doesn't know everything. Because how am I supposed to do that? I tell my friends things I've researched and then I usually hear: "Wow, I've simply NEVER come across that before." And do I hold it against them? Do I stand there and think to myself: "Man, is that person stupid." NO. Because – how are they supposed to know? What are we taught in history lessons? And what is reported in the media? I don't think they missed the article about how a child dies in Yemen every 10 minutes. No, they couldn't have missed it, because that article doesn't exist! In my eyes, journalists always had this wonderful gift, because they had reach and they could inform people about exactly these topics. But unfortunately, journalists mostly prefer to use that for incitement: "Shisha murders", "The perpetrators: 15 foreigners and 3 Germans with a migration background." What's that supposed to mean?

Now, back to me briefly: As I said, I originally come from Turkey.
When you think of Turkey, you also think of the non-existent press freedom. Reporters Without Borders publishes an annual statistic here, and currently Turkey ranks 154th out of 180. When I received confirmation from a university last August and told my mum that I was planning to study journalism, she was a bit taken aback at first. I think for a brief moment she already saw me in a prison cell. I like to write posts about current topics on social media like Instagram or Twitter. And my mother or other family members have often told me to delete the posts about Turkish politics. Not because they disagree, quite the opposite – because they share the same opinion as me. And having the same opinion as me is dangerous in Turkey. Simply acknowledging the genocide of the Armenians is a criminal offence in Turkey. After the coup attempt, not only journalists were imprisoned, government-critical organisations were also banned. And so if I write government-critical things, let alone pro-Kurdish things, that could cause me problems.

But: The dream of becoming a journalist was not a "I'll be the next Deniz Yücel" dream for me, but rather I wanted to bring transparency to the media, I wanted – as clichéd as it sounds – to change something. And since I'm studying in Germany and not in Turkey, I've always felt very safe. Sure, later on as a Turkish journalist I'll still get labelled from time to time. Because I too have no protection from racism. But I thought: all the more reason! I'll show my teacher from secondary school that I don't just "write surprisingly good essays for a girl of Turkish origin", but that I'm an eloquent woman who writes good, important articles for German media society.

And besides: What happens in my home country doesn't happen in Germany! Here there is freedom of opinion! Press freedom! I felt incredibly safe.
Now, what happened a few days ago with a "taz" columnist was like a punch in the face for me. You could say Seehofer knocked the imaginary, safe German ground from under my feet. Because what Hengameh Yaghoobifarah wrote was IMPORTANT. FINALLY someone is writing about police violence, I thought to myself. I loved Germany for giving journalists this freedom!

So a few days ago I receive a push notification from Twitter. Jan Böhmermann had posted something. It started with "Recep Tayyip" and I briefly thought: Oh, what has Erdoğan done now? But no, the post went: "Recep Tayyip Seehofer: Police officers compared to rubbish – Seehofer wants to prosecute 'taz' columnist!" Excuse me?
The column was blamed for Stuttgart. Who was then to blame for – to name just a few examples: Halle, the NSU complex, Hanau? Even worse, however, were the comments. I quote: "The article was rubbish and the author would have been publicly executed in Iran long ago for her sexuality so stop whining" – so, instead of questioning the human rights-violating practice of public execution and a queer-hostile policy in Iran, that is used as a strange yardstick. And unfortunately that is a structure! The Black Lives Matter movement is often criticised in the same way, saying "At location XY, XY many people die daily, so stop whining." Excuse me, THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS. You can't say the problems of A are "worse" than the problems of B, so the problems of B aren't credible enough to take action on. EVERY INNOCENT PERSON WHO DIES IS ONE INNOCENT PERSON TOO MANY WHO DIES.

After everything that has happened in recent weeks, after people have finally started talking about what a structural problem the police have, after all that, Seehofer seriously thinks to himself: "Yes, how, criticism of the police? Why would that be? That's not going to happen now, is it! And what I think of racism – Yes well, let's talk about that another time, shall we?". Why wasn't Seehofer so outraged by the numerous racist headlines from the past? Because he's not interested enough in us? But the police, that's going too far, is it? Why don't you invite BILD, Seehofer, if you're talking about incitement to hatred!

And so quickly Black Lives Matter, important discussions about police violence, suddenly become "violence against police". Blue Lives Matter? Seehofer is launching a bizarre PR fireworks display to distract from the important topics. That's what you call a shift in discourse. Apparently this movement makes Seehofer uncomfortable. Perhaps because it could put him in the harsh light of uncomfortable truth. Such as racism in German politics? No! How was that again, with the "69 Afghan asylum seekers deported on Seehofer's 69th birthday"? Funny, funny. That's why my final appeal to you, dear people: DON'T allow this! This is not just about preserving press freedom. Please stay LOUD! Don't stop talking about police violence and systemic racism! Don't stop learning and teaching, having uncomfortable conversations with racist family members. Don't stop reading, don't stop getting involved. If you're white, stand protectively in front of the Black community. Black Lives Matter. And by that I mean ALL Black Lives. Don't forget that especially the Black LGBTQ+ community needs your support. We're celebrating Pride this month and we have strong Black trans women to thank for that.