One might speak of a similar practice in almost all cultures, but it is perhaps especially in Turkey that politicians are remembered for their quick comebacks and speech that lampoons the opposition's ideas. They speak in metaphors rather than concepts, they undermine or exaggerate in a politically romantic language. In these lands, politicians go back and forth with their rivals. They orate, lampoon and give speeches that are openly satirical, and politicians who cannot do that have to leave the stage.
A leader's criticism of another leader is traditionally mentioned almost always with jokes, idioms, exaggerated expressions and ironic comparisons. Snubbing smiles, calculated silences, provocative designations become the headline of newspapers, news for TVs and conversation material for the public. What is unfolding is a strange Karagöz-Hacivat fight, the famous shadow theater in Turkey that oscillates between humor and insult. All politicians accuse all others of being the Hacivat, of not being local, of not knowing the people.
If we remember the theories that define laugher and humor as forms of attack, such lampooning circulated by the politicians are, if not politically correct, are humorous at the end of the day. At least they give us insight into the humorous tendency in the country and the jokes and laughter that is transmitted to the majority. Professional comedians, caricaturists, those who write and draw jokes for newspapers and magazines are not entirely outside of this aura. I argue that sparring, the idiom “the one who laughs last, laughs best,” and laughing at those who lose as one are winning is deeply entrenched in this land.
In narrating the relationship between politics and caricature, it can be noted that caricature stands against dominant values, power and those protected by it. Accordingly, caricature is an oppositional art. I am not going to prove or disprove this, because I do not believe that the proposition is either true or false. Caricature is a means of expression and based on how it is used, it can be read as radical opposition or passionate conservatism.
Caricature as newspaper art
Caricature is one of the modern arts that became widespread through media. In fact, its popularity is a result of technical needs. In times when there was no photography, or when it was not widespread, many things were depicted by drawing. The art of caricature was a medium that was used to render written text such as news articles and editorials comprehensible.
Newspapers reckoned with the low levels of literacy and wanted to increase sales through visuality. Visual material was easier to understand than written text. Accordingly, caricaturists along with the owners and top writers were among the top earning journalists in Turkey and the world for a long time. They were rare, had high salaries and were respected. Accordingly, their work appeared on the first pages and covers of newspapers and magazines with emphatic headlines.
The ties of caricature to politics and current issues cannot be thought of separately from the professional practices of journalism. Caricaturists have become journalists who think together with newspaper bosses and editors-in-chief, and who take part in important political and social matters as commentators. Their relationship to politics naturally arises out of the how up-to-date the newspaper is and the daily logic of the news. They carry over the same mentality to their own magazines and newspapers. They want editorials that they are in tune with, that are independent from the joke, sarcasm and caricature in it, and engages with a big issue, and prefer this to be written by a literary-journalist who understands politics.
I am talking about a time that begins before the republic. The caricaturists that understand themselves as journalists, and their relationship to politics did not undergo much change in Turkey until the 1970s. Magazine covers accompanied by a serious editorial with politics is a model that was repeated by each new publication. This continued until 1972, the year when Gırgır was published and reached sales of hundreds of thousands of copies. Gırgır dispensed with the editorial, reduced the heavy weight of text, and moved towards eroticism and non-political jokes. While its relation to politics changed and became more prominent with the changing agenda of the country, it never became a magazine that prioritized politics and lent importance to politicians to the extent that its predecessors did. Sparring humor, the provocation and lampooning of one's rival, understood as political satire, moved away from the magazines and was left to the politicians.
Political interest
Let me expand on the prioritizing of politics. I had mentioned the journalistic practices that impacted caricaturists. We should define these practices as pedagogical trends that construct the national identity, that are guiding and canonical. Journalists are among the elite that can take part in the bureaucracy, work in national education or in the parliament, and who might be elected to parliament. In a pro-regime mentality, they work and write with a strong sense of responsibility and belonging to a community, and understand themselves as part of the state. Humorists and caricaturists have never thought of themselves as outside of this framework. But technological developments impacted their status and reputation in the newspaper. What was that development? In the 1960s, publishing houses were upgraded, roads were developed, and photography displaced caricature and illustration in newspapers. The salaries dropped, and the visual burden of newspaper headlines started to fall on photographers. Caricaturists fell in the newspaper hierarchy, and more importantly their engagement with politics stopped being obligatory.
Gırgır emerged exactly at this juncture, where the effectiveness of caricature in newspapers was declining, but where this decline was not yet recognized. And it tried something new. This new would be criticized by old producers for many years to come for being apolitical. Gırgır began to engage with the political and parliamentary agenda six to seven years after its launch.
Its predecessor, on the other hand, is Akbaba – the longest living satire magazine in Turkey. On account of its founder-publisher who was a former MP, it prepared its covers and editorials by observing the Prime Minister, government and opposition parties and hiding the lead writers. In its long history, Akbaba wrote many “open letters” to the Prime Minister and political leaders and was issued innumerable warnings in return.
Gırgır's success in terms of sales and Akbaba's closure has to be understood in connection to the transformation of the readership and society. Gırgır targeted an educated, middle class and metropolitan youth that did not culturally identify with politicians, and who even disliked them. Akbaba was too old for them, and unlike Akbaba, they had no idealist hopes in relation to the existing politicians.
The myth of leftist opposition
Public humor is shaped by the choices of the middle class, and a joke can become widespread only when it is compatible with the values of majority. One cannot think of humor, and popular culture at large, as outside of the elements that determine the public space. Accordingly, humor in Turkey has been intertwined with nationalist, secular and modernist mottos from the beginning. It is from these political roots that it has derived its rivals and allies. For instance, Sharia law and communism in particular were understood to be the main enemies of the regime. Minorities, modernists and foreigners were depicted by clichés that satirists rejected or frowned upon in various ways.
That the nature of humor is oppositional per se needs to be discussed first. If it is impossible to become widespread and well-sold without reconciling with the values of the majority, and if the enemies of the regime are the enemies of the satirist, one must ask to what/whom is humor oppositional?
Republican humorists have a critical disposition that came about with western, secular-nationalist values. Their political and cultural choices were first informed by Unionism and later the paradigm of the Republican People's Party (CHP). On the other hand, some leading names became especially important, transforming the humorists of their period, as well as the subsequent ones.
Pragmatic publisher Yusuf Ziya Ortaç and the winner of first international satire awards Aziz Nesin, with the support of the big publishing group Simavis, Oğuz Aral, have been the most important trend-setting producers. Nesin and Aral worked with Yusuf Ziya, argued with him, disagreed with him; they were names that wanted novelty and transformation of the politics of humor.
Nesin became the most important reference for all magazines that wanted to venture beyond the Akbaba lines until the 1970s. His approach to humor and political attitude has impacted almost all humorists. Even Gırgır, when it had to define itself politically, turned to localist, nationalist left tendencies that came out of Nesin's corner. These tendencies also comply with the values of the majority. And this is why Gırgır could reach such high sales numbers. Gırgır's talent for “getting angry with, and laughing with the majority” is often not remembered.
There are a few bases to the claims that humor magazines are a part of the oppositional left. To begin with, Turkey has been governed by right-wing parties since 1950. Criticism of the government makes the labeling of leftists quite easy. The conceptualization of the historiography of caricature and humor around the axis of Unionism-CHP further entrenches this claim. The inclusion of Adnan Menderes' dislike of caricatures in the historiography, the glossing over of the 1923-1950 period and the initiation of the axis of struggle with the Democrat Party (DP) were exaggerations, and much like the axis itself, rarely discussed.
According to this logic, Cemal Nadir is a libertarian and Markopaşa was captured and silenced by the police-National Security Service, caricaturists were unable to draw anything under pressure during DP rule, etc . None of these is completely the case. Locating the beginning of humor in the 1950s, understanding it through the DP-CHP power struggle, acting defensively and throwing around accusations is as easy as confusing criticism of right-wing parties for leftism.
If we try to approach satire magazines from this perspective, we let ourselves be overtaken by a one sided-outdated historiography that is stuck to the axis of judges, punishment and tolerance. Satire magazines seek popularity, which is their only criterion of survival. They have not been completely oppositional within political criteria – neither today nor in the past, or their engagement with politics has always been limited. There is no interest outside of the cover, first few pages or certain columnists.
After Gezi
Today, especially in light of the Gezi Uprising of last year, it appears that humor lives in and through social media. Magazines could not deal with television, and they could not keep up with the oppositional humor that evolved minute by minute in social media. To be fair, they are not leading this humor. They contribute to it, but they could not become its guiding force.
Were they in the past? Were humor and caricature magazines in Turkey locations that sprung to mind in relation to political criticism in the past? There is no definite answer to this question. Satire magazines whose total sales exceeded half a million between 1975-1989 are today drastically below this number. Moreover, the population has increased. So they were more effective in comparison to today.
On the other hand, each period must be approached through its conditions, and we are now in one where the written press is receding. The avenues of politics and entertainment have been significantly pluralized. Caricature and caricaturists are not as effective anymore, but the best selling printed magazines still take their place amongst those of satire. Maybe one should adopt the reverse perspective: just as we cannot reduce opposition to political parties and politics, we cannot reduce the impact of humor magazines to sales. If we consider that those in political power occasionally files court cases against caricaturists, it appears that there is a desire to punish them because they create discomfort for those in power.
To sum up, humor magazines and caricaturists in Turkey have criticized political power within the confines of the public space and legal publishing. They have remained within the limits of journalistic practice, and developed a tradition of critique that is secular and at times nationalistic. In recent periods, they were considered oppositional with increased criticism of right-wing parties, marginal when critical of majority values, and apolitical when they criticized daily life. On closer examination, all of these critiques can apply. How they are evaluated, what they do, what they want to do, what they sell, which punishments they receive, and when they are not loved, are all complicated and chameleon-like matters, much like the other products of popular culture.
--------------------------------------------------
1 In reference to the Committee of Union and Progress – translator's note.
2 A former Prime Minister – translator's note.
