TURKEY GAY GUIDE

Contents:

• EXPLORE VAST AND HIDN GAY TURKEY
• GENR BENRS, GAY INS AND MEDIA: LBIAN AND GAY VISUAL RHETORIC TURKEY
• HAVG A GAY OLD TIME TURKEY
• GAY LIFE MORN TURKEY
• WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE GAY … MOROC?

EXPLORE VAST AND HIDN GAY TURKEY

There, zenn equently perform (whout a sexual element) for straight-intified male dienc says filmmaker Mehmet Bay, whose 2012 feature Zenne Dancer explor the iendship between an Istanbul zenne dancer, a German photographer, and a gay “bear” om the nservative Urfa provce. But the past half-, zenne dancg Istanbul has gone mastream: bolstered by the media attentn paid to Bay and Alper's film as well as the succs of gay crossover clubs like Chanta: which ter their zenne shows to a largely heterosexual, female clientele. While the Turkish ernment do not crimalize homosexualy – nor do provi LGBT dividuals wh any formal protectn om discrimatn – cultural attus toward homosexualy are largely negative; acrdg to a 2011 poll nducted as part of the World Valu Survey, a full 84 percent of Turks intified gays and lbians among their least sirable neighbors.

And although Istanbul particular has beg creasgly welg to gays – Istanbul's annual Gay Pri para is the largt any majory-Mlim untry -- the risg thread of Islamism the Turkish ernment is slowg progrs for LGBT rights. In 2013, Turkey’s prime mister at the time, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, cricizg the adoptn of a Turko-Dutch boy by a Dutch lbian uple, publicly lled homosexualy a “sexual preference, which is ntrary to the culture of Islam. LGBT people are currently not protected by law, and Ankara meanwhile, a prohibn on all LGBT activy has been the bad news out of the way, remas to be said that travellers who act wh discretn, gay and straight alike, are unlikely to experience any trouble while Turkey.

GENR BENRS, GAY INS AND MEDIA: LBIAN AND GAY VISUAL RHETORIC TURKEY

Turkey’s most open-md cy, Gay Istanbul n easily be found the area around Taksim but be reful when explorg lser-veloped areas outsi of the centre, the tradnal muny of Tophane for example where tourists may not be weled que so Dpa Galani2. However, ’s important to remember that Istanbul is pal of an Islamic untry; for all s liberal aspects, Turkey is chg s way closer to Middle Eastern valu daily, and this is havg a knock-on effect on LGBT rights Istanbul that gay travelers to the area should take to nsiratn. Currently, there are no anti-discrimatn laws Turkey that protect LGBT people om discrimatn the public sphere or employment, although opposn parti have tried to troduce bills providg legal protectn for gay and transgenr people.

The social suatn for members of the gay muny is better smopolan Istanbul than ral areas but whether or not people feel fortable g out to their fay and iends is extremely ntext-pennt and still pos a number of risks. Istanbul has a fairly thrivg gay scene, wh pulsg dance floors, gay bars, and hamams; but many lols who participate are livg a double life, beg unable to be open wh their fai or at work for fear of the negative impact uld have on their future. “Indian Gay Ins: Queers Like Us, A Tribute to Indian Gay Ins” was scribed by Bombay Dost, a lol LGBT magaze, as “an exhibn of Indian gay ins featurg some of the te lears of the queer stggle who also spell excellence their profsn” (The Bombay Dost Team).

In this article’s discsn of the Turkish gay ins popular culture and the ntemporary lbian and gay practic of visual rhetoric Turkey, I analyze three sets of ntemporary reprentatns and the acpanyg practic of visual rhetoric: 1) two Turkish celebri who are wily visible genr transgrsors Turkey: the late Zeki Muren (1931-1996), a flamboyant queer male sger, [2] and Bulent Ersoy, a male-to-female transsexual sger, both of whom Kaos GL rears voted “gay ins”; 2) the gay ins issue of Kaos GL, a Turkish LGBT muny magaze prt, which adapted the Wtern ncept of gay ins to the needs of the Turkish LGBT muny through a cril engagement wh the ncept; and 3) the llegiate lbian and gay fliers, webse, and “fanz” (Turkish transleratn for “fanze, ” i.

HAVG A GAY OLD TIME TURKEY

In this manner, I monstrate that while visual rhetoric n empower non-Wtern lbian and gay populatns to rist the domant lol reprentatns of homosexualy and produce and dissemate affirmg alternativ, the medium utilized and the uneven ndns of productn and circulatn om one medium to another terme the extent of the relative fluence of existg reprentatns. For Turkish lbian and gay dividuals the 1980s and 1990s, this search often began wh the genr-bendg celebri Zeki Muren and Bulent Ersoy, who appeared extensively on stage and mastream Turkish media on televisn, films, and newspapers. Yet, paradoxilly, this visibily did not mean that Turkish society accepted non-normative sexual and genr inti, cludg homosexualy, and the knowledge about sexual subcultur still remaed “fugive” spe the mass-mediated queer visibily of the two celebri.

From the perspective of the homosexual dience, however, as I discs the next sectn the ntext of Kaos GL‘s special issue on gay ins, Muren and Ersoy’s barga wh the heterosexist hegemony is seen as havg negative nsequenc for this particular segment of the Turkish dience, sce meant distancg, nial, and erasure of LGBT existence, fuelg heterosexism and homophobia Turkish society. ” However, this labelg of the Turkish ins on the top ten list piled by Kaos GL as “gay” refers to their fluence on the Turkish gay dience, pennt of whether or not they personally or publicly intify as beg gay or homosexual, or even profs any solidary wh the LGBT muny.

In fact, only two (male thors and poets Murathan Mungan and Kuc Iskenr) out of the ten people listed are known the gay muny to intify as gay; the remag eight ver a broar range of the genr and sexual spectm: a heterosexual male, heterosexual femal, a queer male (Zeki Muren), and a male-to-female transsexual (Bulent Ersoy), wh Muren and Ersoy beg historilly the most visible genr transgrsors and wily promoted ins the Turkish mass media, as discsed the prev sectn. While the (sometim multiple) pictur of the top four ins, Han Yener (female pop sger, seen Figure 3 on the ver of the issue), Ajda Pekkan (female pop sger), Murathan Mungan (gay male thor and poet), and Aysel Gurel (female pop songwrer), are promently featured as part of one-to-three-page articl about them, there are only two small (one ch by one ch) photos of Zeki Muren and Bulent Ersoy (the photos are the same imag I discsed the prev sectn).

GAY LIFE MORN TURKEY

The magaze’s edors published the photos next to the rears’ ments about why they view certa celebri, as opposed to others, as gay ins; the imag and the ments are prted a separate one-ch pk strip that ns across the bottom of the pag that clu the issue’s in-related articl. The paratively small size and the placement of the pictur of Muren and Ersoy downplays their importance visually, spe their beg historilly the most fluential and visible ins thanks to the mass media; some of the articl discs and cricize their ambivalence and ambiguy as “gay” ins tail. As for Zeki Muren, Guner, the same Kaos GL lumnist, lls him “our homophobic in” (41) and lks Muren and Ersoy’s legacy of distancg themselv om the LGBT muny to Tarkan, a younger pop mic sger who was also clud on the list of the top-ten gay ins.

Most recently, Tarkan, a self-proclaimed heterosexual— the face of qutns about his sexual orientatn, not to mentn his naked pictur wh another male on the beach—adopted the same strategy of nformg to the Turkish public’s genr expectatns through statg, for stance, that homosexualy uld be cured through psychoanalysis. Consirg the issue’s troductn of the ncept of gay ins and s celebratn of the top ten ins (wh the notable exceptn of Muren and Ersoy), Ysel’s ments should not be viewed as the muny’s rejectn of the ncept self, or even of Muren and Ersoy for that matter, sce the rears who took the survey did vote for them.

WHAT’S IT LIKE TO BE GAY … MOROC?

What Ysel’s ments nvey is that wh the ntext of Turkey, where homosexualy as a public intifitn the Wtern sense is a new phenomenon, the applitn of the ncept of gay ins as a purely affirmative ncept is not yet possible, pecially when the most visible and fluential gay ins never intified as homosexual or transgenr, rpectively, and liberately distanced themselv om the muny. At the same time, however, Han Yener’s public self-alignment wh the gay muny uld be taken as a sign that thgs are changg, but is important to remember that Han Yener is heterosexual, while for other celebri, like Tarkan, is still risky to own their sexualy publicly.

Fally, Kaos GL‘s special issue on gay ins reprents a liberate attempt to terfere wh and modify the tablished visual s of genr and sexualy, as dissemated by the mass media, through s troductn and adaptatn of the Wtern ncept of gay ins. From the begng, Legato’s clared missn of tablishg lbian and gay stunt clubs through activism on universy mp has necsated that stunt activists who grew up watchg Muren and Ersoy generate their own visual rhetoric for publicy on universy mp.