Dr. A. or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the ‘’Dizi’’

                I’m famous for my eye rolling among friends and family. I roll my eyes at a lot of things on a daily basis.  Turkish dizi talk, to me, undoubtedly was one of thebiggest turn offs in a conversation- avoid the topic if you want to befriend me! I would swiftly and stealthily move away from the conversation soon as someone said something along the lines of ‘’ Have you seen Ezel last night, man it was so good.’’ or ‘’ Hurrem’s neck piece last night was a stunner!’’. I did that a lot.

The first year in the university, -when I was still a sociology student- I shared a flat with two other girlfriends, Duygu and Tuğçe, from high school.  Duygu and I were doing the same major as well. So, it was basically a -together 24/7 situation- with us three girls. I loved them dearly, and they were extremely clever and talented girls who taught me something new every day. They were my event buddies, we’d chase down cheap tickets to jazz concerts and experimental theater shows. We were new in town and we wanted to get our hands on anything and everything we could. Life outside was good.

 At home, we had this 20-year-old tv barely standing on a nightstand, in the middle of our living room. Two couches and the TV was all we had in there. Every afternoon when they came back from class, they would be glued to the screen, watching reruns o Ask-I Memnu for the 100^th time. Their fascination with these shows baffled me. Once the TV lit up, there was no way you could find me in the living room. I’d tease them about their addiction, and Duygu would respond saying,’’I’m doing this for the sake of sociological research!’’. Fast forward 20 minutes, she’d be crying over the female protagonist’ troubles.  It’s still is a running gag between us. She graduated this June as a sociologist. 

After I quit my major and moved out, I didn’t get a TV for my new flat. It’s been 5 years without a TV in the living room. To tell you the truth, it has been a relief. Seeing the news and all the ‘’cheap, meaningless content’’ really worked my nerves up. Being brutally honest and self-critical here - I had an elitist approach to the matter.  On par with the decades old discussion of high and low culture, I deemed them low culture and didn’t bother. As a person who doesn’t even own a TV set at home, I must admit that my dislike of the Turkish dizi genre was uninformed. It was a strong dislike nevertheless, which looks bad on my part. How can you know that you don’t like it, if you’ve never really tried it, right?

  First of all, the most important reason of my aversion came from how it made zombies out of people. They would lose touch with reality. We live in a country of crazy fans that put down obituaries in the newspaper for a fictional character. (See link: http://www.iha.com.tr/haber-kurtlar-vadisinin-cakirina-taziye-ilani-17754/)  As a country, we lack the education that would help us make good choices when it comes to content. These days, they teach kids in elementary school something they call ‘’Media Literacy’’. I suppose that’s step towards aiding the problem. Secondly, it is actively, knowingly used to manipulate and numb people. So, it’s not only on the viewers.  And finally, I didn’t think anyone in the industry was actively working on producing better works. Whatever sells was and has been the motto for a long long time here.  Bad/trash Tv had become a reality of our lives, forcing its way in – just like the atomic bomb. It’s repercussions freak people out. Nor the viewers nor the producers of the content are willing to give up their guns. The rest of us, who find this repulsive, still must live with the fact. It’s always there in the background, literally and figuratively, making itself felt and known deeply.

Despite this, upon taking this class, I realized that there is more than one way of looking at it. Especially since it has become a global phenomenon, I’ve seen how it provides a ground for cultural exchange. And seeing how the global markets work and how other countries do, I cannot get away with putting all the blame on the people of my country anymore.  I also decided to give some credit to producers for their attempts at trying to reconcile the high and low culture. These past 10 years a few of our biggest TV hits have come from direct adaptations of very valuable literary works.

                 I still find their addictive qualities very numbing and dangerous, yet I’m also beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  Even though I still find no joy in watching them myself, I understand that if there is anything I could do to improve and/or change them, I need to learn about them first. Get familiar with their ways and tried and true formulas and knock them from the inside is MY motto for now. I’m looking forward to expanding on these ideas with the help of this class, and, I hope to become less of a stranger to a phenomenon that has power over even my closest friends. 

The Importance of the Audience Measurement for TV Sector, Case Study: Responsible Measurer Change in Turkey, 2012

In 2012, Turkish Media had a huge quake when the main governmental broadcaster TRT (Turkish Radio and Television Corporation) filed a claim to Competition Authority about TİAK(Television Audience Research Committee) and AGB Nielsen, television audience measurement responsible company since 2006, for the problem of compromised test subjects of television audience measurements. The case was concluded as decision a change of the measurement responsible company and some renovations in TİAK. After the tender in following months, the new measurer of Turkish Media became Kantar TNS Turkey. 

The new measurements of the media was based on a new SES system. SES is the socio-economic status of the people in measurement sample which increase the reliability of the result. System categorises the people as A, B, C1, C2, D and E in the order of level of education (not only a subjects itself, but also their parents he/she grown with) and income level by also considering profession, property, the type of house living in, etc. In order to be more descriptor, the one of these groups some specifications is given below. 


Group C2

• More than 4 people live in the house, even they have similar number of children with C2, families who have 3-4 children predominate.

• The goodman and his wife’s education level is elementary school. 

• More than a half of the group read newspaper.

• Homeownership rate is same with D and E: 65%, living room’s floor of the household is generally screed, usage of chandelier is less than one-fifth of the group. 

• They leave their shoes at the out of the house entrance door. 

New SES system changed the definitions of the categories and their distributions in the sampling. The changes of the rates of groups are from 21% to 11% for A and B, from 67% to 53% for C1 and C2, from 12% to 36% for D and E. As it can be seen easily, the new rankings says Turkey has a lower educational and wealth level which is highly questionable. Rather than comparing these with the real distribution of the society in terms of socio-economic status , which is also an important subject to focus, effect of these numbers should be discussed.

These whole effort to understand whose watching what has a particular objective: commercialise audiences. Broadcasters funds are highly lean on the advertisement revenue in Turkey similar to most of the countries. Therefore, productions of them focus on to get high ratings, which means production appeals to lower class of the society in Turkey will get more rankings at the end, even an upper class production is watched as much as the other. This situation leads the whole sector to be a lower class feed for making money day by day.  

The other problem these numbers bring is firms that target the A and B segment of people are generally bigger companies produces high quality products. When the society is placed as a mainly lower class, then these companies don't serve their services int he country and don't open their advertisement budgets to broadcasters.

In short, these manipulated numbers blocking broadcasters advertisement chance arising by most of the A&B group targeted organisations, companies and brands and forcing the television sector for serving to uneducated and low income level people to fill their pockets. 

What makes a Quality Television?

PART I

Since my teen years I’ve seen many series, that I liked a lot. With How I met your mother, I had a  serious connection with the characters, I enjoy seeing the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite in Gossip Girl. Maybe my favorite one was Veronica Mars a teen detective drama with highly realistic and fun and exciting content and also amazing shootings that even give me an aesthetic satisfaction from the contrasts between black, green and red colors dominantly used in the series. And I still remember it more than the occasions within the series.

However I would never consider them as a Quality Television. Maybe its because, I compare them todays shows and it might seem unfair to some. But if its the quality that we are comparing there shouldn't be an age or time for that. Maybe there shouldn’t even be a form difference, since we even start comparing some good series with the best movies of our time.

So its not necessarily true that good production and technical facilities produces high quality and vice versa. This makes me believe that technology used is not as important as content. I believe whats important about technique is how its in harmony with the rest of the plot, sounds and environment tried to be created. All in all, what kind of taste it gives to the audience and what thoughts and emotions it provokes.

When we compare the some old series and with new, form seems important but also tricky. All in all, we all love seeing scenes that seem impossible to produce or scenes that take place almost in our living room because of the high definition or camera used. Its tricky, because it reflects another kind of quality that technology brought to us more than aesthetics and far more than art.

The legendary TV drama, Twin Peaks directed by David Lynch that has started to air back again recently is a solid example for that. To fit the environment and time span told in the story, director adopts an older technique, a lower resolution even the credits has a sense of nostalgia. This increases the sense of reality and harmony of the show and makes it even more successful rather than decreasing the quality.

But harmony is not the thing that makes some shows better than the other. And also its not always a necessary criteria to be met considering the shows like Game of Thrones. I start to believe more as I move further in this topic that Quality Show is a combination of different assets in different shows that is unique to that show.

Obviously harmony is not the most important asset of Twin Peaks and many other great shows like Game of Thrones, Lost and some shows that does not perceived great by many but I personally like and put in the classification of Quality TV.

In the second part of my post, I will focus more on the assets those shows have their contents and what specifically makes them Quality Television.

The Rise of Fox Kids, and The Unification of a Generation

In 1997, there wasn't much to talk about in terms of TV programming, at school. The most exciting thing about our lives was to come home from school and watch the adrenaline fueled masterpiece with racist undertones that was The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. However, it was only 20 minutes of our afternoon, and after that, it was a real struggle to find something on TV that - as a small child - one could enjoy as much as the rangers. Nickelodeon had disappeared.

Then, one day, rumors started floating around, of a new TV channel, that exclusively aired awesome cartoons, all day everyday. The rumors had even reached my parents in their workplace, and one day I asked my father to seek this fabled channel.

I remember the first time I beheld the magic, the moment that I set foot on the fabled land, and saw that big red and yellow logo on the top right corner of our TV: Fox Kids.

After that nothing was the same. 
Life was FOX Kids all day, every day, not only for me, but for every child in Turkey, who was fortunate enough to own a TV and find that channel. The most commonly asked question among children was "Do you have Fox Kids?". It was more common than "Do you have internet?" or "Do you have a computer?"

The cartoons of this channel was all kids talked about. Every whimsical reference was related to one of the shows, the most prominent one being the "Wisconsin kay canavayı" (The Wisconsin Snow Monster, with a child's wisp tongue) from the show "Life With Louie".
To this day, everyone in my generation talks about shows like Eek The Cat (and The Terrible Thunder Lizards), Mad Jack The Pirate, Spy Dogs, Room 402, X-Men, The Amazing Spider Man (and the theme songs of the final two)... But the thing is, we all remember the Turkish names, and lines of these cartoons. Make anyone from my age group watch these shows in their original language, and it simply does not click. Our many adventures with these cartoons, and all the characters we've come to love and memorize lines of were in Turkish.
However, the way it brought us together back in the day, has not lost its power today. One can still spark a deep conversation about those times, and talk for hours and hours...

Louie Anderson himself is aware of this. In an interview he said something along the lines of "I found out that I had a special place among Turkish audiences, but I never could've guessed the extent of the place my cartoon had in their lives".

There are so few programs today that can even reach the hights of Fox Kids. I've wondered if this seems so because Fox Kids was such a dear and well timed presence in my life, however, with the advancements in animation technology - and thus the decline in effort in making cartoons -, and the seemingly mundane topics of kid's media, I decided to introduce my cousins (3 of them who were under the age of 10 at the time) to Fox Kids' media. They absolutely loved it, and suddenly found the content that was available to them on TV to be mediocre.

Fox Kids not only created a sense of community, it provided an entire generation with common grounds with bonds everlasting. Common grounds which still exist today. The only thing that was able to divert our attention from that magical channel was 20 minutes of Pokemon, until it was cancelled, and Nickelodeon, which went to sleep at around 8pm.
Recently a group of people started uploading the cartoons that were aired by Fox Kids (and later Jetix) to a video streaming site, and now many people in my age group, who are aware of this great act of philanthropy is filled with bittersweet nostalgia.
 
If I could still watch Fox Kids on TV today, I have no doubt that I would, because when it comes to Fox Kids, age truly doesn't matter.
Lapacı is not forgotten.

  

Italy's It-Girl: Mina

Watching Mina’s music video Ancora ancora ancora for the first time, I remember me and my friend were laughing so hard to her gestures and the overly dramatic attitude without knowing any background story with the today’s perspective. Now the historic context in the back of my mind, her attitude in the video mean so much for me and I find it very iconic. 

Growing up as a rock’n’roll girl, Mina Anna Mazzini occupied the Italian music for fifteen years until now and her success is mostly by the dint of her TV appearances on RAI. Like the most of the Europe, in Italy, there were only the channels RAI and RAI2 until the 1960’s. RAI channels were and still are directly controlled by the parliament as public service broadcast. In 1961, Mina gained public recognition with the song Il cielo in una stanza which was featured in the musical movie, Io bacio… Tu Baci and eventually she became the co-host of the show Studio Uno on RAI. She performed several songs on Studio Uno and got more and more famous among Italy until 1963. In that particular year, Mina got pregnant by the actor Corrado Pani who was separated from his wife but still married, she refused to hide her affair and this caused to a scandal which led to her ban from RAI which is dominated by the catholic delegates in the parliament due to the moral excuses. After the ban, her career started to shatter, she couldn’t get her contract renewed. Her label betrayed her to avoid the political pressure. However, the public was already lured by her talent and unique charisma and due to the public demand RAI, invited her back to the program Studio Uno and she continued to ascend.

After the ban and the accusations that followed the ban, she embraced the role of it-girl which was given to her by the media and the political authorities. She shaved her eyebrows, made songs about love affairs, smoking and even the Satan, basically most of the taboos by then. In her song Sacumdi, Sacumda, she teases the religion by flirting with the Satan and in the video she carelessly dances in front of a fire. She knew who was against her and surely, the song was a statement, it was immediately banned. In her video for the song Viva Lei, it’s not hard to notice that she poses as a winner against the Italian State and her glances at the camera are much like a threatening. The man she was talking about in the song can be interpreted as Italians who were afraid of her courage once and tried to shut her down. She named one of her albums, Salomé referring to the character in the Bible with the same name who depicted as the most perverted person, full of worldly desires. In the cover of the album, she posed with a beard on.

She took part in Barilla’s Carosello’s and worked with lots of famous Italian directors and architects for the short video clips for these Carosello’s. Carosello is a commercial method in Italian TV to avoid the tough restrictions on TV ads. They presented the labels with short comedic sketches or music videos. In 1978, she got retired both from TV and live performances and secluded herself from the public. She still continues to produce music but doesn't serve any visual content. As an odd detail, Turkish star, Ajda Pekkan's almost all famous songs are covers of Mina. 

I find her struggle important because it demonstrates how it’s likely for the free market occupiers to win against the oppressive states. Mina got her support from the protestant Italian public who actually runs the country’s economy at any field and knows how to enjoy a sensual, talented lady who is free as men are. It's an instance on TV, but the same success can be achieved on any field. It's not possible to impose any 'ethics' on TV if no one watches it.

So that’s why, the video clip that I’ve mentioned at the beginning of this post, Ancora Ancora Ancora means a lot for me. The video was her last TV appearence in 1978. In the video she embraces the pervert role, the media and the political authority which I prefer to call as phallus, and in a way reproduces it proudly, being provocative and alluring. It’s the celebration of her victory, with the flirty, passionate attitude that gave her an authentic presence. This type of an image of a strong woman was really new to italian media by then and it made the public even more curious avbout her.

My grandmother versus Survivor team

I have not had a television since I came to the university - in fact, for five years. So I've already forgotten many of the habits that TV actually brought with us. For example, when you come home, just turn on the TV to make a sound, as if it were a living being. Or I do not have the habit of planning according to the schedule of the program I like. So I'm just an observer in this TV world.
 But in this writing, I want to talk about my grandmother who started living in television. I chose her because I thought she was not alone with her own context and feelings.

My grandmother versus Survivor Team

First of all, she lives in Survivor Island! She watches this broadcast almost every night for at least four hours. In addition, noon is watching another program, which is another format but also related to the island. She takes care of the island only 7 hours a day with a round account. (The daytime is sleeping and eating.) In the evenings, she never falls asleep and watches with all her attention. All of these processes are now affecting the whole mood of her routine. For example, the character is now able to speak for her. Or she can be very frustrating during competitions.Or she could be very upset if she lost one of her teammates during the election! 

But these are actually situations that many people have. But most of the time we do not even notice it. It sounds funny to me that my grandmother lived in a very clear way. It's always a matter of loving characters, sharing them, or putting ourselves in their place.

''SILA''
 and her hairclip

 For example, we sometimes see thousands of young girls who want to be in that girl's spot while watching a series about romantic love. Then the ornaments are sold on the market. That's why we want to be like him, to be in a romantic love. We want to look like him. In fact, we communicate with the character. These characters actually give us new possibilities in our inner world. We can make new dreams. We can live new adventures. It does not matter whether it's real or not. If we really can believe, we can race against the fame in Survivor.

Media Manipulation

When I think of the TV studies and its complex relation with culture and society, it is impressive how TV has a huge impact on individuals. I want to discuss and hear about your suggestions to which I see as the biggest problem for the media industry and its relation with society: Manipulation that usually comes from the authorities.

Like almost everything that is in the middle of different notions, TV has pros and cons. I, of course, admit that, it makes us to be aware of the happenings in all over the world enabling easy access to all kind of information. But it’s also dangerous depending on how it is used to convey information because it is so easy to manipulate mass cultures.

I started to see the manipulation as the biggest problem of TV industry and started being suspicious about the things that happened in the past only when I personally exposed to it; it was the first week of Gezi Parkı protests; I was there with my mom sitting and showing my support for something that I believe in. It was the next day when I was shocked with the news because media was reflecting the whole thing from a different viewpoint. They were not showing the ones who sat there without using any violence. All the news was saying that participants were provokers and terrorists who aim to create conflict. News were not only reflecting the happenings as the product of violence but also they were discriminating; Aiming to manipulate conservatives, news were showing drunk people in the Park saying that supporters are disrespectful junkies. 

I’m not saying that there wasn’t any violence at all, but it was for sure not a movement that is "based" on violence. But all the media did reflect it in a totally different way and my grandma (and I believe so many other people) who doesn’t have any Internet access but TV was saying that people who support that movement are actually harming the streets and using violence against the policemen.

Nowadays, we have the chance to double check the news from Internet but in rural areas where Internet is still a luxury, it is impossible to learn about the things as they really are. 

This realisation is annoying for me because those were what made me who I am today; The political standpoint, traditions, religious views and all my preferences in life were partially based on the way I see the world and TV was the strongest and most popular tool for me to rely on when I was growing up. So my question is "How can we be sure for the things that we saw on TV until today?" and "What if the government of past times also used TV for manipulations to protect its own existence?"

 

Censored

The notion behind censorship may be to protect children and the general population from harmful content that may influence said persons' behavior negatively.
To this end, RTÜK censors language, blurs out cigarettes and alcohol (yet a pile of marijuana will remain uncensored), and they will cut out - in their entirety - scenes containing nude figures, or violent or sexual content. They also, occasionally, alter the lines in a movie or TV series in the subtitles, altering the very fabric of the works in the process.
Recently they cut out every scene where the Dude in the Cohen Brothers' masterpiece "The Big Lebowski" smokes "a j", a scene, crucial to the climax of the story, in a suspenseful thriller containing a kiss between two homosexual men, destroyed Tarantino's art by blurring out cigarettes and wine in a Parisian cafe...

 Imagine blurring every single breast in a classic painting, imagine chipping off the nude body parts of Greek statues: Art should not be tampered with.

When I was a child, I was exposed to a great share of violent content, I suffered through awkward moments when I'd be watching TV with my parents and a sex scene would come on, and I saw many scenes of drug abuse or the consumption of cigarettes and alcohol... I did not turn into a murderer, I did not turn into a sex offender, I did not turn into a junkie... This may stem from the fact that I am a fortunate person in family terms. I live - and have lived- in a (rather) relaxed family environment, consisting of educated people, who spared no love, guidance, or tolerance in my upbringing. I was also fortunate enough to travel, and receive a proper (proper enough) education, so I had good role models, and a certain mindset to distinguish between good and evil (subjectively of course).

So what about the masses who have not been as fortunate as I?
 I realize I'd be sailing into waters somewhat uncharted for me, however, I do believe a certain familiarity goes a long way when it comes to defending oneself against harmful agents that life may bring forth.
     -If a guy doesn't know how to react to the sight of a breast, how can said guy contain himself in     the sight of a bare ankle?
     -If a child doesn't know what an alcoholic beverage looks like, how can said child know what to avoid and what not?
     ... and so on.

Also, in terms of the censoring of cigarettes, alcohol, and foul language: Living in Turkey, a cognitive human being, no matter their age, will be exposed to this content (and in great magnitude) the minute they step outside their dwelling.

 Nowadays, when I watch something on TV, I'm faced with two situations more than I'd like to be faced with:
1)I've seen whatever I'm watching before, so I realize when and if a scene is completely removed from the work, or has been tampered with.
 2)I've not seen whatever I'm watching before, so I suspect every sudden cut in the work to be the work of RTÜK, preventing me from seeing something, someone spent considerable time on.
Both of which demolish my viewing pleasure, and those of many I know.

Do the people who control the censoring have no faith in the individual? Or have they been so terribly damaged by the horrors of TV in their past, that now they seek to protect the innocent masses of "harmful content" at any cost?

Why then, don't they simply air children's programming exclusively?

In my opinion, a person that has strong moral values, as such a person that Censorship would like to preserve, wouldn't be so drastically affected by a big fancy glowing screen anyway...


The censorship in Turkey is not a good deed, neither is it a necessary evil: It is overkill, committed by minds unable to cope with certain content, who then decide for every viewer what they can or cannot behold. "Harmful content" on TV may be a factor that influences a person's personality... but it is certainly not a standalone cause behind potential hordes of enemies against human decency.

What can TV sets do today?

This is how I am writing my entry today, because why not?

I was living alone for the last couple of months, and my parents insisted I should get a television so I wouldn't feel alone. In the other houses I lived we didn't have a TV set, and I wasn't interested in the one that my parents have. 

Since we are living in 21^st century, I wanted to get a TV that can do more. First of all, they have Wi-Fi connections now, 10 years ago I would have asked “but why?” Now I am having a hard time understanding why would they still making TV sets without wireless connection. As we spoke in the class, even the remote control is a miraculous gadget that lets us sit or lay still while watching TV. Before and after the remotes I was only aware of 4 buttons, to change the channel or volume. My remote now has a Netflix button, a button to choose my favorite channels so I can change between them easily, a 3D button (I don’t think it would work though), a button takes me to applications and bunch of more buttons I don’t really know what they do.

Of course only thing different is not the remote, the TV itself also changed a lot. When I was growing up we usually watched the TV in my brother’s room. I used to connect the DVR machine to watch cartoons and to do that I actually had to remove the antenna, because there was only one socket for cables. Now my TV has USB and HDMI sockets, and I clearly remember that most of the computers did not have them when I was in middle school.

So what do I do with the TV? First of all I can watch the mainstream Turkish broadcasts, any dizi or news. I have several applications; I don’t know the 80% of them. I can choose from Netflix, BluTv, PuHuTv, some channel applications or YouTube. Of course it is easier to find the video I want to watch from a mobile device and send it to TV. I wouldn’t even imagine that 10 years ago with my old mobile phone and the TV set we had. I also use HDMI to connect my computer so I can play video games in higher quality, or even write my assignments. I can also simply use a USB drive watch movies, even with subtitles, from my living room sofa.

Since I am not a tech person, these are the only things I am able to do with the TV, if you know other things that we can use the TV for please comment and I may try with mine.

Is the television responsible for the declining communication?

In my opinion, the television is really declining the communication between family members. The best time to talk to family members is dinner time however after the television started to grow up the communication in dinner time declined. Especially parents started to watch the news during the dinner time. However, the communication between family members has a huge effect on the consolidation of the family bond. Instead of talking about their daily routines and share their ideas about a problem or a topic, they focus on the television and some important points could be missed. Maybe a child has a problem in school or has a great news from school and wanted to share with his or her parents. 

4 or 5 years ago, I and my family went to visit my aunt in Mersin. She has a huge television in her living room. For dinner, she invited relatives of her husband. After we ate our dinner in a fun, someone opened the television and the communication is finished. I am really serious about that. It finished. We were around 15 people and everyone was watching television like they were hypnotized. The important point in here was not the program on the television at that time, the important point is just watching something. No matter what it is. 

However, the decline started with the television but it continued with the other technological advances such as smartphones, computers and tablet. 

I really feel bad about that because I think sharing ideas is one the essential point of being a human..

The Rwandan Genocide: How To Use Power of Radio In Bad Ways

Radio and television has a great impact on people and it could affect people in different ways. The power of radio and television could be used in different ways which are good or bad. It could be used to educate people, to make their aware or to provide some musics or activities to help them to have a great time. However, the bad ways could cause horrible results if it used by wrong people and leaders.

The Rwandan genocide, which happened in 1994, is a terrible example of the misuse of the power of the radio. Rwanda consist of 3 ethnic groups which are Hutus, Tutsis and Twas. There was a political tension between Hutus and Tutsis because of the things that done by the western countries especially the Belgium and the France. The countries wanted to use and colonize the Rwanda that they separated the population when they go the Rwanda in the first time and they gave identities to the Rwandan people. The Hutus were the majority in the population with %90 and the Tutsis were avarage in 9% of the population. (It could be change in different sources.) In addition to that, the western countries gave Tutsis power in politics . After some events like death of the Hutus leader, the genocide triggered by the radio and that terrible, huge massacre happened.

The highest percent of the population was really connected to the radio and because of the economical situations the radio was more common than television in Rwanda. Before the genocide, before the assassination of the Hutus leader, the radio station which is called Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) made a lot of propaganda against Tutsis. After the death of the leader of Hutus, they radio announced that the Tutsis killed the leader of Hutus and Hutus need to take their revenge and they made the terrible announce which is: cut the tall trees!*

During the genocide, the RTLM continued their propaganda and the propagandas increased the anger of people against Tutsis and in 100 days 800,000 Tutsis murdered in the Rwanda by Hutus.

In my opinion, the radio is a great invention for humans but the important point is who is going to use it? Is there any way to protect radio from the bad people and propagandas? How to prevent that?

*The western countries separated the Hutus and Tutsis according to their skin color, face and nose shape, their head measure and their height. The tall trees refers to the tall people which are tutsis.

TV's of my family

After talking about television in class, I started to think about what it means for me and my family. Growing up in a nuclear family of four people, we always have at least two different television sets in our house. They were the center of our entertainment, until of course when my brother received his first computer. Even though my relationship with television now consist on connecting YouTube videos via Wifi, the meaning of television for my parents and their families always interests me. 

My grandmother was born in Crimea and had to move to Turkey when she was six. She always liked telling and reading stories but she loved watching them. I remember her coming to visit us, since we lived in different cities, with a bus and right after she kissed my brother and I several times she always asked about her "dizi"s and whether we can make it on time to watch them. If you could ask her she would have told you about a hundred episodes and never left a detail. It was a delight to watch any dizi with her, because she used talk to the screen, make comments and exclamations as if the people in the show were right there. My favorite story of her about television is when she was in US for a year, visiting her siblings in 1970's. Noting that everyone in the house was speaking Turkish or Tatarian, she was actually able to understand English because she was watching "General Hospital" on television, 

Her son, or my father, has a slightly different relationship with the television, or maybe I should just call it sports channel. Like most of Turkish people he is a football fan. If there is a match on dinner time, we used to have our meals in front of the TV, even when we have guests. My parents are still living in a two-story house in Bolu which gets really cold and snowy in winters and we had our satellite dish on the roof. I watched him countless times while he was climbing our roof to clean the satellite dish because there was a football game. Predictable enough, we made them move the dish near the kitchen window due to his nine broken ribs. He still loves to watch and yell at the games as much as he used to though. 

And finally, my mother loves to talk about the television trips they used to make when she was a child. She and her extended family had to go the village in an hour away to watch the only television and the only channel. Today, I have a big screen television, an iPad and a mobile phone to watch Netflix from. Clearly from my point of view a television set is not a necessity but my parents it is the single most important thing in their house. 

I am sure they are watching a dizi or a football game while I am writing this.