Since the 1990s there have been significant changes in the Turkish television programmes that target women. The shift is from shows that teach women domestic duties (cooking, child caring, cleaning) which all refer to the domain of the home, to shows that focus on overtly feminine issues but with a sensationalist approach. These programmes are introduced as and pride themselves for being ‘the voice of women’. This is apparent in their titles. Your Voice (Flash TV), As We Discuss (Channel 7), From A to Z (Channel D), Let’s Not Talk About That (Star TV), Adams and Eves (TRT-1), Between Us (Show TV), You Are Not Alone (ATV). Issues that are regarded as private are talked about in these shows with stories including rape in marriage, adultery, sexual problems, divorce and violence. In fact, dominance of sexual themes, citing frank and open discussion of sexual practices, orientations and deviance has never been discussed on Turkish television in such way before. With the explosion of the private in the public these talk shows offer entertainment through the discursive construction of the victim, within a space full of intimate confessions.
In a statement Channel D’s management (Murat Saygi) (Sabah, 18th May, 2005) said they cancelled the show because it was becoming a ‘social problem’. In a response to this, the co-founder of the Istanbul-based Women for Women’s Human Rights, also a feminist academic, Pinar Ilkkaracan said: “The major social problem is that these women get no help; they have no other place to turn. I think these programmes have come into being because of what’s happening in the field. Women wanted to speak out, they wanted help.” The host of one of the talk shows, Aysegul Yazici, (ATV, You’re Not Alone) said she was getting around 300 enquiries every day from people who wanted to appear on the show: “The main objective of my show is to tell women that they should not remain silent, that a solution will come if they raise their voice, and take steps to address their problems. I’m trying to show women their way out.’ Interestingly, along with women fleeing an abuse home, Woman’s Voice also featured women and men looking for dates and marriage. So there is an underlying task here: to reaffirm patriarchal structures through marriage.
The idea of ordinary people speaking about their experiences is culturally significant. But do these talk shows refine gender politics and how? Do they raise any form of consciousness on women’s human rights? Sadly, it is hard to argue that they provide women (as audiences and citizens) with the knowledge of basic laws and information on the way in which political system functions or other help mechanisms (if at all available). More importantly, they hardly ever regard women’s issues as social problems. Instead these problems are individualized and do not go beyond sharing sensational experiences on the small screen. Women become constructs of commercialism and are framed as victimized individuals – hence television in Turkey ends up melodramatizing the issues which have political resonance.
