Come and don’t miss Babiali

Mehmet Avşar – GJC Widespread Media Councillor

In recent years, information and technological developments that have deeply affected the lives of societies, including the digital field, have affected some professions both for good and for bad.

There is no doubt that journalism is at the beginning of these professions. The digital world has taken the profession of journalism to a completely different medium. Even a farmer who fed his animals in his barn in the village could immediately implement an idea that came to his mind in an instant on Facebook. From that moment on, he can be both a farmer and a journalist by opening a page and writing his name in a newspaper, a television or a news agency. And without hesitation, he reaches the point where he can even report blackmail and threats.

What happens after that? Society considers it normal, does not feel strange, does not condemn it. “Let the journalist do his journalism, farmer farming, garbage scavenger scavenging, teacher teaching, imam imamate, ” he does not say. For example, let this person’s name be Hasan.

“Hasan Ağa was a journalist””  Hasan’s newspaper, his television, his word-of-mouth advertising begins to spread. Even Hasan Ağa said, ” I did a job for my daughter, look, everyone took me seriously, this journalism is a good thing, I see a reputation. The governor also takes me to the castle now, he cries me in his office as a journalist, I better continue this work,” he says. He began to neglect production, which was his main job, because the governor did not welcome him as a farmer in this way, he did not even dare to pass through the governor’s door. If those calloused hands had seen enough attention in bureaucracy and politics, maybe they wouldn’t have tried it. He had fallen into the middle of a world he had never known, and he saw value as a journalist, maybe he didn’t make any money, but it was more attractive to him.

Journalism is an important and respected profession, of course, a journalist should see the necessary value everywhere, but my objection is that a non-journalist sees value as a journalist. People should also see value as human beings.

Of course, these events also ignite the fuse of a tragically funny sequence. Who’s holding our Hasan now? Begin live broadcasts. He even offers a news bulletin, but as his mobile phone constantly vibrates, viewers constantly warn, “Hasan abi, keep it steady, keep it steady.” Sometimes he puts his finger in front of the camera, and the image is sloppy. Bird has a Turkish, per the enemy! Sentences make Turkish miserable.

But since we are not an interrogative society, no one will say, “Brother, let this comedy go, you have drained it in this business, let the people of this business do it.”

That’s our biggest flaw as a society. And because we do not question, the square remains empty, lies, mistakes fly in the air.

I recently had a chat with a construction master at a friend’s work. “Master,” I said, ” how’s business? “No, brother,” he said, ” the pandemic ended US.”;

“I set up a news agency on social media, I get ads for a wife, a friend. It’s better, I’ll be a journalist from now on, we already have 50 thousand followers.”

WE MISS OUR BABIALI

Takvim-i Vekayi was the first newspaper to appear during the Ottoman Empire and in the territory of today’s Turkey. It was the first official publication of the state and was a newspaper published from 1831.

Of course, 9 years after that, Ceride-I Havadis began to be published. Since the word “Ceride” was used instead of “newspaper” at the time, it can be pronounced as Havadis newspaper with its present name. Although the owner was an Englishman, it was” Turkey’s first private newspaper”. Later, in 2020, Anadolu Agency was established at the request of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

About two centuries ago, when the first newspaper came out, the name “Babiali”, given to the location of the administrative center of the Ottoman Empire; it functioned as a press center, as newspapers, magazines, publishing houses and printing houses were gathered there. So journalists who took their first step into the profession would also take “Babiali”????. He could not be a journalist who did not go over the counter, the literary works taught in today’s textbooks are the crop of that era.

For example, Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a good journalist, had Babiali in the past of his power in discovering genius. In taverns, master journalists and apprentice journalists would come together, and it would turn into a training nest. The master writers of that time were more knowledgeable, more experienced than many columnists today. They were genuine muharrirs or correspondents, as the old saying goes, who used Turkish well. Many of them were doyen.

NO FREE JOURNALIST WITHOUT ECONOMIC FREEDOM

So why has the profession of journalism been so trampled under? Why for 300 TL can you be a journalist so easily by opening a site?  Shouldn’t this be a legal regulation?

Here are these pirate journalists, most of the real journalists are unemployed or working hard. If a journalist can’t get paid as much as a governor, that journalist can’t actually perform his profession. One day, he sells his pen for a pack of cigarettes. Now the thriving digital world has become a big village. It will be possible for people to be properly informed, to be aware of the facts, thanks to honest and real journalists who have achieved their economic independence.

Dividing journalism into “local” and “national” camps is a disaster. As a result of this phenomenon, with the development of the internet, journalists multiplied, the journalist became worthless. All newspapers, magazines and television channels should be nationally recognized, each national broadcasting body should have an office in each province, and employees should have the salary that a governor has, not the minimum wage. Otherwise, let alone criticize the governors, local journalists continue to say Pasha, Agha, who came to stay afloat, and we journalists always look at the present, constantly remember the past.

LANGUAGE ERODES IF JOURNALISM CAN’T BE DONE RIGHT

Every news, every column published in newspapers and magazines should be an example to society. The spelling rules and grammatical language structure used by Anadolu Agency, a well-established and exemplary organization of the state, should cover all private publications published in other print or internet media. These should be checked, publications that do not use Turkish correctly should be closed indefinitely after being warned three times. See, they ask the famous Chinese scholar Confucius: “if you are called to rule a country, what do you do first, What do you do first?” Confucius says, “I start with the language first.” Everyone is surprised. “When there’s all this chaos, all this work, and you start with the language?” “Yes, from language, “” he says. “Because if language is imperfect, words do not express the thought well. If the thought is not well explained, the things that need to be done cannot be done correctly, if the tasks are not done properly, the ceremony and culture will be disrupted. If ceremony and culture are disrupted, justice is misguided. If justice goes astray, people who are confused do not know what to do or where to go. That’s why nothing is as important as language.” That is why the burden on the shoulders of journalism is great, if it is not done correctly, the language will erode, the Earth will become a desert.

As long as we, as a Turkish society, do our job in the best way, whether in journalism or in other professions, we come into line with modern developed countries. Otherwise, no structure whose infrastructure cannot be intact can be intact on top. So as 83 million we have to work hard and produce. I’d like to leave you alone with a poem I humbly wrote while I finish my words on this subject. I wish that 2021 will be a means of good for our 83 million citizens, including us. Welcome, you have brought joy 2021.

It is nice to work,,

Work gets the rust of iron,

Work, peaceful elbow grease,

To work, to have a good tomorrow.

Work, on the wings of time,

Is being satisfied with the tea you drink,

Work takes away the dirt of the heart.

Sema Kavs-I mutalsam potion,

Work, a land of mysterious dreams,

Drops a clove into a person,

Work, the great love within us

The glaze in the belt that wraps around your slim waist

Work, early in the morning,

Beberekli???? the doctrine left over from farmers,

A little bit of the best of everything,

And the greatest legacy from my father.