Murdering a Turkish woman is murdering Turkey's future

During primetime on the eve of March 8 International Women's Day, many TV channels aired a lengthy advert for a company, showing working rural women and men talking about hot potato gender topics in Turkey. It showed a number of men expressing support for their wives working and their daughters going to school, dressing up as they like, and laughing loudly in public. The advert could be seen as a measured criticism of the discriminatory rhetoric against women we have heard from the top officials of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) over the past decade or se. 

We later learned that the advert was the work of paint company Filli Boya, whose female owner had opted to protest the horrendous murder of teenager Özgecan Aslan by darkening screens for the advert two years ago. No doubt the advert left most of us with optimistic feelings, as it was full of messages we wanted to hear. But how I wish it was an honest account of reality! I don't want to dispute the good intentions behind that advertorial, but I can't help but wonder whether Turkey's men are quite so honest when the cameras are on. 

On March 8, we woke up to news of the tragic story of 42-year-old Aynur Özdallı, who was shot dead by her ex-husband for having worked at a café after their divorce. Özdallı is not the first to have been killed at the hands of a family member in 2017. According to data from independent news network Bianet, compiled from publicly available information, 53 women were killed by men in the first two months of 2017. 

In most cases, the motive behind killing a woman in Turkey is closely related to the twisted concept of "honor" that is socially imposed on men. Those men who killed their loved ones without blinking an eye seem to find refuge in...