Can Dündar'dan Deniz Göktaş yorumu: BİZİM DENİZ

What I'm about to tell you is well known to those who lived in Ankara: In the 1970s, Mamak, on the outskirts of the capital, was like the capital of the revolution. It was close to the industrial zone. It had a large immigrant population. Alevis from Central Anatolia were in the majority. The Revolutionary Path found a comfortable base there. They established a model settlement. But the price was high. After the September 12th coup, Mamak became famous for its prison; it became a center of oppression and torture. After taking its revenge in this way, the state built many mosques to "reform" the neighborhood. It brought in the shantytown mafia. When Erdoğan won the Istanbul mayoral election and Melih Gökçek won the Ankara mayoral election in 1994, Mamak once again became a stronghold of secular democrats against the rise of political Islam. Why did I tell you this? 1994 is also the year Deniz Göktaş was born… The fact that the son of an Alevi family from Çorum, born in Mamak in the 90s, is today one of Turkey's most talked-about and courageous stand-up comedians, doesn't surprise us Ankarans at all. Especially if you know that he later studied at METU, another stronghold of the revolution in the capital… When I first saw him in Berlin, the revolutionary light of the capital, which also nurtured us, shone from the stage… His jokes were subtle, his speeches sarcastic, his criticisms sharp. We talked afterwards; he was definitely "from our neighborhood." Yesterday, while watching his legendary final Gülhane show, like many others, I couldn't help but laugh and worry. We don't have the luxury of Robert de Niro, who openly insulted Trump from the stage; our artists don't have the immunity that mafia bosses have. And the price of courage is very high here… But Deniz, knowing all the risks, facing them head-on, and without boasting, as if the fireball he was playing with had never burned anyone's hand or house before, with a relaxed and childlike demeanor, taunting the political elite, made us all say "finally." Finally, someone said, without mincing words, that "the king is naked." While saying, "If I killed someone, my father wouldn't protect me," in a short sentence, he took his hat off to a migrant father from Mamak, and also reminded us how Burak Erdoğan's Sevim Tanürek murder was covered up. He didn't put his head in the background for nothing; he didn't name the show "Dead Deniz" for nothing. Deniz carries the genetic memory of Mamak… But he also knows how humor is a weapon of resistance, how it can instill courage in two million people in two days. He inspires us all. Bravo to you, kid.