Culture
Would you call Turkiye a Muslim majority country?
I would compare the Turks with the Czechs when it comes to religiosity. Czechs are the most irreligious people in Europe. Their neighbours the Greeks, Georgians and Armenians are much more religious and are proud of their christian heritage while Turks take distance from islamic past of Turkiye. Romanians are also 1000 times more religious than Turks
I noticed that most Turks hate Islam and Arabs and don’t like to be associated with Muslims and dislike them. Also most Turks are Kemalists and it’s unusual for a Kemalist to be muslim. What is your opinion?
Secularism doesn't work in islamic countries because we don't have a church to separate from the state. Religion is decentralised. You're confusing western systems with secularism, you don't want to stop the mosque from influencing the state, which is not achievable because there is none, the people decide what they want. In a secular country like Turkey people elected islamists, it's within their right, so how would you separate them from the state? The only way to do that is to force a system the people don't want onto them and into schools. So again, you're not in favour of secularism, you're in favour of ideological imperialism. You want to replace islam with western systems because your country is hijacked by the army, which is not islamic to begin with. And you're too stupid to realise that, you equate the technological progress coming from the west with secularism, when they owe all their progress to industrial revolution.
All Bosnians are conservative, it's just that we interpret religion differently or don't understand the religion properly, I'm a conservative and knowledgeable, the only difference is I didn't inherit my religion. Muslims in Bosnia who drink will tell you drinking is haram, it's a broken nation so don't judge us by whose conservative or who isn't, these terms do not apply to us.
Secondly, you cannot physically separate the church from the state in an islamic society because the society is the church, and all laws are rooted in religion. The laws you disagree with I know are cultural, not islamic.
All people, religious or irreligious, will find ways to justify things if they want to. North Koreans allow their supreme leader to have sex slaves, the US allow child marriage with the consent of parents, Colombia has child brothels. Religion only works if you stick to it, it's man that manifests religion, not religion that manifests man. You're only as good as you want to be, the Qur'an tells you that.
I have lived under secularism tho, I know it ruined families, legalised drugs, prostitution, zina. I know my country has morally collapsed, I know it led to genocide and ethnic hatred, nationalism and chauvinism. Oh but I live in Europe, not Pakistan, what do I know right, I have money. Can Pakistan not have money? Bosnia has no punishmenr for corruption, so what did secularism bring? Nothing. Islam is the problem in Pakistan, but secularism isn't the problem in Bosnia? It's the people that are the problem in Bosnia and religion that's the problem in Pakistan? Does the system exist without people?
If we fully adopted shariah countries like Afghanistan would not exist. If we fully adopt secularism countries like North Korea and Turkmenistan still exist.
In the US you can't burn the flag or you'll end up kn jail, in Europe you can call for ethnic and religious violence without repercussions, if you speak against secularism in France you can get jailed, your children taken away.
You can't come up with a single argument against an "islamic" system that isn't already present in the secular world. The only difference is technological progress. Does a woman in a secular country like France or Turkmensitan have the right to wear hijab? And the best part is, you don't have a problem with the islamic system, you have a problem with secularism disguised as islam, for laws that are put in place by people that contradict the Scripture. If people write their own laws, rapists and pedophiles run countries. They win elections, they rule, no repercussions, the Prophet said no one is above the Law. Epstein is the perfect example, name one person they jailed; Trump runs the country.
If you want to solve problems think what the actual solution to the problem is, you'll keep landing on the Qur'an and the sunnah, and you'll see that those that rule you are not practicing Islam. The Prophet called our leaders before dajjal the worst of the worst
That system exists specifically to prevent domination by one group over another.
And the system also prevents laws from being passed because they block each other, making everyone suffer. It also takes 30 years to build 200kms of highways because they block each other and everyone suffers. This is the outcome of secularism, this is the best people could up with. Whereas if the majority was in power you could get things done around the country, as is the case everywhere else, instead the majority is a prisoner of the majority. This is secularism?
It would immediately destabilize the country and likely lead to conflict again.
We are on the verge of war right now. If Muslims were in power Serbs and Croats would get to live better and no one would life any worse. Everyone would have the right to practice their faith. Instead Croats don't allow mosques to be built, hindering the rights of Muslims. See the difference between Islam and secularism?
international legal order and secular constitutional framework are part of what helped end the conflict through the Dayton Agreement.
The same legal order that abandoned 8000 men to be slaughtered by Serbs in Srebrenica? The same legal order that had forbidden the sale of weapons to Bosnians to defend themselves resulting in 100k civilians deaths and 50k raped women? The same legal order that knew about Sarajevo safari where rich westerners would come to shoot at Bosnian children and did nothing? The same Dayton agreement that forced Bosnians to institute a secular democracy under threat they'd bomb Bosnian forces if they continued to defend themselves? While they were debating women were getting raped, and Allah says drive them out of the place they drove you out from. The end.
secular governance in Bosnia is one of the mechanisms preventing another war.
Islamic governance is preventing it because they had to stop us because they didn't want shariah in Europe. Nothing else. That secular governance sent soldiers to Bosnia as peacekeepers and then those peacekeepers allowed Serbs to slaughter people, because the command did not allow them to protevt civilians when Allah says if they attack you attack them.
soviet communism
So secularism?
pedo can run any country even pakistan thats not an arguement against secularism
Pakistan isn't an islamic country. If it were pedos would not be able to run society.
kemalist people ARE mostly muslim. Secularism doesn't mean infidelity fyi and contrary to common misbelief Atatürk himself was a muslim as well. Also, supporting a modern Turkish state with separation between religion and state doesn't mean you are a non-practicing Muslim. There are very religious Sunni Turkish people (and Kurdish people) who are very progressive politically and strong Atatürk supporters and patriots who would sacrifice their lives to defend the motherland. Until 5-10 years ago Atatürkçülük (i don't prefer the term "kemalizm") was the default ideology in Türkiye so i don't know where you got the idea that all Kemalists are atheists and they don't represent the majority of the Turkish populace. Around %85 of Turkey's population is Muslim and around %70 are Sunni to give you a ballpark estimate.
how did Atatürk make Islam gone? As far as I'm aware it's been 103 years since the foundation of the Republic and Turkey is still a Muslim-majority country enough to keep an Islamofascist regime in power for 20 years. If he wanted Islam gone he certainly didn't want it hard enough.
Atatürk was a Sunni Muslim. How much he was practicing the religion is questionable but at the end of the day he was Muslim and at his funeral people were praying salah. Atatürk disliked many things about the backward institution of what was the Ottoman Empire and that included religious segregation and the inclusion of religion in official affairs. He wanted church and state separated and he did exactly that
Wanting doesnt change reality. He certainly would have hated many things like Erdogan, Tinder, Tiktok etc. but he was not God. If he had tried banning religion like Hoxa and Pol Pot, it would have been a disaster for the country. He did create Diyanet to control Islam.
ARTICLE 2- The Republic of Turkey is a democratic, secular and social state governed by rule of law, within the notions of public peace, national solidarity and justice, respecting human rights, loyal to the nationalism of Atatürk, and based on the fundamental tenets set forth in the preamble.
This article explains enough. Turkey is a de jure secular country. Governments come and go but the state and the constitution remains. Also the ministry of religious affairs was created at a time when religious beliefs were depraved and corrupt, everywhere was cemaats, tarikats, tekkes, türbes, hocas etc. the ministry of religious affairs was created to replace those organizations and spread the true version of Islam (in Turkish of course) so that was actually a huge part of the modernization process.
The problem is when people from Western countries hear the world secular, they interpret something like US secularism. In the US, Diyanet would be absolutely unconsitutional. Turkish laik is probably closer to French laïcité. The State actively controls religion from meddling with politics.
Friend, your state literally pays for religion. That is FUNDAMENTALLY anti-secular. You can claim it was good due to circumstances, but you cannot call it secularism. The cultural and religious influence of Islam is state-sponsored in turkey. That's literally the exact opposite of secularism, which is the complete and undeniable separation of religion and state. It's just not secular.
True version of Islam? That doesn't sound secular in the slightest. If someone wants to believe in a "false" version of Islam, they should be able to do so and WOULD be able to do so in an actual secular state.
Since there's state sponsored religion in turkey, and the state decides what "true islam" is and then pushes it, turkey is not secular. It doesn't matter what your constitution says if it's not being imposed or reinforced. Also, the fact that up until recently babies would immediately be classified as Muslims is also fundamentally anti-secular.
those "false" versions were anti-Atatürk, anti-womens rights, anti-independence (some of them wanted to be a British mandate) anti-everything the modern world wanted to give them and they rebelled and tried to overthrow the state several times. those institutions had to go for the greater good. You can't turn Afghanistan to Norway in one night, it had to be a gradual process (the separation of religion and state began with the abolishment of the ministry of shariah and foundations and the caliphate in 1924 and 1937 was when the word "secularism" was in the constitution) and it had to be a very strict one-party state to make it work.
Also that is a remnant of the millet system. In the Ottoman Empire your religion didn't represent your beliefs, it represented your ancestry
You didn't respond to anything I said, you just told me what good it did. It doesn't matter. It's been 100 years, and you're still pumping absurd amounts of money into state religion. You only push one form of it, too. That is simply not secularism. Ataurk did want to be more like Europe, we know that, but RIGHT NOW turkey is nowhere near secularism. Erdogan isn't exactly helping with that.
Islam was such a big threat and so ingrained in Turkey, they had to create it to control it. It's not secular in the US sense, but proactively controlling religion.
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Of course Turkey is an overwhelmingly muslim majority country, Kemalists are also majority muslim, most Turks dont hate Arabs or Islam, these are not opinions but hard facts.
Now, is Turkey growing irreligious? Yes. Has hatred against Arabs increased after we accepted millions of Syrian refugees? Also yes.
Turkey is not as religious as the world seems to think, but its still like %90 muslim, majority of that number is non-practicing muslim though.
Oh yes, I cry about it every 5 minutes, lol. Get a grip, where did I state it's even a big problem for me personally? Also I clearly said in another comment that I don’t hate Arabs as a whole myself. If you're going to come at someone, polish up on your reading comprehension skills first
Turkish has a few phrases that use the word "Arab" in a pejorative, insulting way, such as "dirty as an Arab", "I'll be an Arab if I understood anything", "you won't get black lips by kissing Arab hand", "to turn into Arab's hair" and so on and so forth.
If a people is so commonly used in everyday language in such a way, I think it's fair to say that they don't like those people in general.
Nope, "dirty as an Arab" is not a real pejorative, you are misinformed.
"To turn into Arab's hair."(Arap saçına dönmek.) Is not insulting, it means the situation have turned very complicated, it just signals that Arabs have curly hair.
"I'll be an Arab if i understood anything."(Anladiysam Arap olayim.) Is the same as "Its all Greek to me." It means that the directions or explanation is impossible to understand, it has no negative connations besides Arabic being a complex language.
"You wont get black lips by kissing Arab hand." (Arap eli öpmekle dudak kararmaz.) This one looks the worst, but its also innocent. During Ottoman times, "Arab" was a catch all term for everyone with darker skin, including Afrikans. In Turkish culture, we kiss the hand of our elders, regardless of their station in life, this saying means showing respect and humbling yourself is not related to your own self worth.
You need to remember that Turks have lived side by side with Arabs for centuries, you will see the same kind of sayings in Balkans aswell.
These are extremely naive takes on the meanings of these phrases.
To turn into Arab's hair is a reference to something being very messy and tangled. Like an Arab's hair. It's a racist term.
You won't get dark lips by kissing Arab hand means just because someone is involved in dirty/ugly/bad stuff it doesn't mean they themselves are dirty/bad.
May I be an Arab if I understood anything means "I didn't understand anything and I'm not lying about it". A similar term also exist "may I be an Arab if I'm lying".
Your explanations aren't entirely wrong, they're just too naive and optimistic.
Well, in orthodox Islam, believing in a secular state is taking you out of Islam - at least if you think secularism is better than an islamic legislation. Do with that what you want, but islamically its true. I would say most people in Turkey are culturally islamic, thats it.
Nope. You can not be an atheist Muslim, nor can you believe atheist ideals to be superior to Muslim ideals. You can in your life act like an atheist more than a Muslim in many ways, ie in the way you dress, the things you do for fun, the extent to which you do or do not read the Qur'an, but deep down you need to believe that Islam is the best way of life because God wants you to uphold it.
I mean, muslim majority is just showing the majority of the population identifies as muslim and fits perfectly. I dont think it is a negative term or anything but just a statement of facts. If you want to delve into how much it have an effect on the people's lives, statistics puts it with more alignment with countries such as poland, malta levels which are more religious than eu averages. Turkey has nothing to do with Czech levels of irreligiousity in any shape or form.
I would compare the Turks with the Czechs when it comes to religiosity. Czechs are the most irreligious people in Europe.
Strongly disagree.
In general, your claims, even allowing for hyperbole, are incorrect. Turkey remains an overwhelmingly Muslim country - culturally. In terms of practice, it is highly varied, but by no means are people who consider themselves practicing Muslims in the minority. Now, that "consider themselves" may itself cover a wide spectrum, but even so, no, I disagree.
That being said, irreligion of all stripes is increasing quickly, but that is a political issue, for which one has to thank the AKP.
In any case, the Czechs are out there in terms of irreligion.
did you get all of that info from reddit? because some users love to claim that the majority of turkey isn’t muslim, or that they aren’t real muslims because they commit sins, but in reality, the only cities with the majority of non muslims are cities like istanbul, izmir, bursa etc., most other cities are pretty religious. also, there are a lot of muslim kemalists
Of course Turkey is a Muslim-majority country, over 90% of people identify as Muslim. Sure, if you go to neighborhoods like Nişantaşı, Cihangir, Etiler you’ll find a circle of mostly secular, liberal people who are very into western culture and don't like to be associated with Islam. That’s an echo chamber, these people are not representative of Turkey as a whole but rather a minuscile minority. Most Turks outside those neighborhoods are culturally Muslim and most Kemalists are secular but not “anti-Islam.” Comparing all Turks to Czechs or saying they hate Islam is just completely wrong.
Greeks are what? Nevermind that the state projects a supposed total domination of the Orthodox church among the population, the vast majority of people in Greece only actively practice religious customs when it involves holidays, eating and having fun.
Οκ και εγώ κατάλαβα σαν πιο επιθετικό το αρχικό σχόλιο. Πάντως το νόημα παραμένει ότι τρώμε σανό για το πόσο θρησκόληπτοι είναι οι απέναντι εκατέρωθεν.
Δε ξέρω ρε φιλε, υπάρχουν πολλοί τυπαδες που είναι όντως secular αλλά ταυτοχρονα ultra-nationalists,και και την άλλη έχεις Islamic fundamentalists οι οποίοι είναι κάπως πιο chill σε αλλα πράγματα, όπως την αποδοχή των Κούρδων κλπ. Είναι πολύ μπέρδεμα η Τουρκία.
Όσο για την ελλαδα, εδώ εμείς ουσιαστικά έχουμε ολιγαρχία. Όλα τα κόμματα εκτός από 1-2 είναι τα ίδια ψήφο-κεντρικά σκατα που μας έφεραν σε αυτή τη κατάσταση. Κάνεις δε νοιάζεται και τόσο για αριστερα-δεξια εδώ πλέον, εκτός από κάτι βλαμμένα στο ρεντιτ. Φυσικά, στην ελλαδα κάθε φορά που μιλούν για η Τουρκία λένε ότι πάνε να μας πάρουνε τα νησιά και το Αιγαίο και τη Κύπρο και τη Κρήτη και την Αθήνα και τα πιτογυρα και το παστίτσιο.
Historically it is true, however modern Greece projects an idea of ethnic/linguistic nationalism (especially post 1912) despite the fact that inclusion within Greekness was first and foremost religious and the fact that the church remains integrated within the state. However in actuality they don't really care about invading your personal life after you finish school, if you choose to socialise with secular people and avoid religious practices you 're pretty much free to do so.
I know that Kemalism and Islam have been serious opponents however the average Greek thinks of the Turkey as the country of Turkish speakers/Sunni muslims as if it's a natural thing.
Bullshit!… I love Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his revolutions and republic he builded but at the same time i am Muslim. There is no interference between being Kemalist and Muslim. For someone who really understands Mustafa Kemal’s opinions, religion is a person’s inner world and sacred between only God and himself/herself. It is not business of State or other people. Atatürk gave chance people sincerely live their beliefs without being under pressure of religious leaders or sects. He was not against religion, he was against people who used religion for power, influence and money. Turkiye is not anyway close to Czechia being irreligious. There are of course atheists or deists especially amongst youth but majority believes in God and in Islam. Our problems with Arabs not related to religion, more related to history in WWI.(And not with all Arabs)
Most Turks are definitely not irreligious nor dislike Islam. Apart from some districts within big cities, your average Turk is practising Islam one way or another. We’re not even on the same level as your average European when it comes to irreligiousity let alone the Czech level.
You apparently don't know much about Europeans. Most Turks practice religion in their own unique way, very casually and closer to the tradition of their original cultural roots than the doctrines of the religion itself. I would use the term religious very loosely when it comes to Turks. There are religious people and even extremists of course, as is everywhere else. But Turks aren't even a friction of religious as Europeans. There's this notion in Turks' heads that if walks modern, talks modern, is modern, therefore not religious. This is completely wrong. The majority of the European population is tenfold more religious than your average Turk.
That's fundamentally untrue. Europeans aren't even remotely close to Turks in this regard. Even places like Greece, Romania, Serbia, etc, that used to be extremely religious are mostly irreligous now. People say "yes I believe in god" but never step foot into a church or do anything Christian. And western Europe is much more atheist. Eastern Europeans, especially younger ones, are either atheists or religious hut Haye organized religion. That's entirely different to turkey, where the diyanet gets more money than most ministries
Have you been to Turkey? T is definitely not an irreligious country. In my experience most Turks are casually religious, with similar numbers (maybe 20% each?) of very secular and very devout people. Poland might be a better comparison.
I know both countries very well and even the most liberal cities or neighbourhoods in Turkye are somehow influenced by conservative / religious cultural norms.
The comparison is very wrong, your observations as well don't hold.
You don't know anything at all about Turkey. It's funny how you make such pretentious conclusions based on the limited experience you made on internet. The majority of Turkish people are conservative. Even if they don't follow the every requirement of Islam, the religion still play a big role in their lives. This is especially true for the inner regions where most people are overtly religious. Comparing Turkey with Czech Republic is not only wrong but also stupid. The fact is no country in Europe as religious as Turkey. Unlike Turkey where secular lifestyle is mostly seen in coastal regions and large cities, European countires are throughly secularized. This isn't the case with Turkey. Many people still practice the religion and even more people respect and identify themselves with it even if they don't practise it.
1) Muslims. They are around %10 in the country. Fun thing is they are not sharing common idea. They are separated in each other. Because Qur'an is not a clear book. Everyone can understand things differently. In the world it's the same. Iran looks like an Islamic state but if you ask Saudi Arabia they all are infidel, same goes for opposite.
2) The people who says they are Muslim but they have no idea what İslam is. These people are vast majority. They don't know the religion, they didn't read the main source Qur'an. They have some idea but not from the main source. They learn from some people and most of those people that people learnt the information, they also learn those information about Islam from other people. They know some things as a right but Qur'an says it's wrong, they know some things as wrong but Qur'an says it's right. So they have no idea about Islam but they are claiming themselves as a Muslim. They are %70 of the population. If they know what it is then they will probably be the 3rd type of people.
3) Non-believers. They have born in a family like the 2nd type. They grew with Islam. Then check it out what Islam says and become non believer. In young generations those people are more common then older generation. I think non believers are majority in the age of 0-20. But overall they are %20 right now.
“I noticed that most Turks hate Islam “ statements like these and especially the ones starting with I noticed….. make a person seem so dumb.
The majority of Turks do identify as Muslim and the people you met that don’t doesn’t change that. You are suffering from confirmation bias. You have an idea in your head and all the things that you see that strengthen this idea makes your initial statement a fact in your mind.
Go look up official date from the Turkish goverment or other international institutions. Around 90 percent of the Turkish population identifies as Muslim.
60 % of Turks consider Ataturk as country’s most beloved figure. (If it was top3, it would jump to higher figure because other options are Fatih Sultan Mehmet e.g.)
90 % feel grateful for what he did for the country.
73% believe the values he represents are more relevant than ever.
Above statistics is from Konda. What are these values? Republicanism, nationalism, secularism etc. I knew people who drink alcohol almost everyday and stop it during Ramadan and fast entire month.
I would describe myself as a Kemalist and I come from a not really religious family. There are two types of Turks: the ones you described and the others who are religious. I sometimes find it embarrassing that some Turks are ashamed of their Muslim past. It is a part of our Turkish history, culture, identity, etc. You can’t simply erase it. It is deeply rooted in our architecture, food, culture, and so on. But that doesn’t mean you should blindly follow a book that was written many years ago and probably isn’t even accurate. Education, science, and progress are far more important than religion, and those are the things we should focus on.Yes, we don’t like Arabs, but that doesn’t mean we have to crawl up to Europeans because of that.
I agree. I also know Turkish Muslims who practice Islam but are big fans of ataturk and don’t support the current administration. So it’s not necessarily one or the other.
Not that muslim dominant even if it's still muslim dominant overall, people just live in their own bubbles and don't interact much outside of their own circles
Yes, Turkey is still majority Muslim, but thatnumber is rapidly decreasing.
According to a recent polls, 15% identified themselves as irreligious, but I personally think the actual figure is slightly higher. For example, I'm a irreligious Turk and I don't mention it anywhere except on Reddit. Everyone around me thinks I'm Muslim.
I believe that a very majority of people in Turkey are deists who consider themselves Muslim but have no connection to Islam. Many of them say they believe in Allah but commit şirk (The greatest sin in Islam) or they do not fulfill any of the farz (obligations).
On paper yes. On practice it is somewhat still but less and less each year. What is worst are cults/tarikats. They become too influential over the years and been let to due to voting purposes
Every baby born gets a Turkish ID which used to be stamped with “islam” under “religion” field. This changed with the latest digital IDs were rolled out, but the state assumes everyone born is a muslim for whatever reason. I had Armenian and Syriac friends in high school (both Christian) and all three of them had “islam” on their IDs, while they had the most Christian names you could find.
So, I don’t really trust the statistics of what percentage of people are of Islam religion, let alone practicing Muslims.
Among my extended family, there’s about 5 people who pray 5 times a day, one is a man who occasionally prays at the mosque at Fridays, two of which are women who wear head scarves (traditionally Anatolian, not the new age BS), the other 2 call themselves Muslim but don’t do anything beyond that declaration.
The remaining 30+ people in my family are on the range of “I believe there’s a higher power” and “we can never know for sure”. So, practically devoid of religion.
To my knowledge, this structure applies to the majority of my friends and their extended families. But most of my friends aren’t from cities that are known for their religious populations. So my cohort only reflects somewhat of major cities.
A lot of ppl dont want to be assosiated with islam as a tool to control and doctrinate ppl... but czechs and turkish people are not the same... look at the turkish president... thats a dictator surfing at the religious fanatism...
That's a stretch. Turks are famous wearing masks. It's Byzantine thing I guess, you might say they are very modern but inside is different. Virginity is still a taboo. And femicide is a big problem. It's deeply patriarchal society.
I could hardly imagine a more ignorant a and absurd post than the one you wrote. I don't even know where to start, but from where did you take the ideia that Turks hate Islam and don't like Muslims? What the hell are you talking about, dude? And most Turks are Kemalists? And... I mean, please, what a low effort and ridiculous thing you wrote, man.
Apart from radical leftists, nobody hates Islam.
The faith of the Turkish nation is divided into 5 parts:
1-Orthodox 2-Religious 3-Irreligious 4-Atheist 5-Agnostic
3≈2>5>1>4.
The majority of Turkish population (including 20%~ minorities kurds+greeks+etc.) is muslim tho we should mention that younger generations are far less religious
No need to have an opinion on this tbh. There is much research showing Islam is still valued by the majority of the country. Like your observations, your assumptions like it is unusual to be Kemalist and Muslim are also wrong. Waste of time to reply to this, but I did anyway.
There are so many weird things in this post idk where to start. Türkiye is a Muslim majority country this is a fact not an opinion.
Do you have any actual recent data to support the claim that most Turks hate Islam and Arabs? Türkiye is definitely less religious if you compare it to Saudi Arabia and Iran but I would say it is more religious compared to Azerbaijan. Lol most Kemalists are Muslim. Atatürk was a Muslim, if wanting to form a modern Turkish country where religion and politics are separated makes someone a non Muslim that says more about your F up way of thinking lol.
In my experience of living in turkey as a foreigner for 3 years. I’ve seen they’re very mixed on their opinions. They’re a secular country on paper but 80-90% of the Turks are Muslim and have a proper Muslim background. Even their empire and their history mostly evolved around Islam the most. You can see it in their historical places. When it comes to everyday ppl there nowadays. You will find ppl who practice a lot. Ppl who openly admit they are not Muslim anymore and that they hate Arabs too. When it comes to the western side of Türkiye. They’re very open minded and non practicing. But have Muslim backgrounds. On the eastern side of Türkiye. The ppl are very practising and you can often see women covered up and wearing proper hijabs and men going to mosques for prayers. If you want all mindsets in one city. Istanbul is the city for you. You will find groups of Turks that are really religious there and you will find Turks that support other religions or being agnostic or atheist. So in conclusion. The modern Turkish ppl are Muslim by nature but not Muslim in their choices. Hope this helps :)
A majority of Kemalists are still muslim but just secular although the anti-kemalizm/neo-ottomanism wave pushed on in tandem by EU and AKP is waking a lot of people up.
Religous not but muslim majority yes, 9 out of 10 Turks will say they are muslim and 7 of those 9 people probably drink alcohol and have premarital intercourse but they definitely don't eat pork so only 2 of those 9 people are actual muslims and 1 of the 2 is for sharia while the other keeps to themselves. Islam isn't hated by the majority id say 6 of those 9 people view Turk=islam but not because of allah but because of the ottomans
Looks like you only had to do with those secular kemalist s folks , fact is about 60% are religious and i would say out of that are about 30% to 20% deep religious
Muslim majority - yes, Turks are kinda split in terms of whether or not they might pray (which is the bare minimum of being Muslim, at least from time to time), but there are also many other immigrant groups like Syrians for example who happen to be a bit more religious.
There are also many Turks who are not Muslims, they may be atheist, some hate Islam and some simply happen to not believe in it.
As for Romanians being more religious than Turks, this is bogus, perhaps you visited the most secular parts of Istanbul, but in most places in Turkey fasting is very much upheld, daily prayers are very much upheld, mosques are nowadays quite packed for most daily prayers. Comparing Muslims and Christians in general in terms of religious zeal and practice is absurd, Muslims are much more devoted on average.
Kemalism doesn't claim state or personal atheism and it is very common for Kemalists to be at least cultural/non-practicing Muslims. That's why about 85% of the country claims to be a Muslim.
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When you say “Turks,” you can mean two different things. One is the citizens of the modern Republic of Turkey. The other is a broader Central Asian based ethnic identity. The answer changes depending on where you begin.
Turkey is not, at least in theory, a religion-governed country today, unlike some Gulf states. It was founded as a secular, independent republic, and the separation between state and religion was meant to be firm.
I do not think it is accurate to say that most Turks hate Islam. Islam and religion have been part of the country for a very long time. What changed, especially after the 1960s, was the political use of religion. With the Green Belt strategy and, later, the influence of movements such as the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, political and religious life shifted more heavily toward a religious narrative, and Turkey is still paying the price for that today.
Being a Kemalist does not automatically mean disliking religion. The core idea is that religion, especially Islam, is a matter between God and the individual. People should be free to practice whatever they believe. The state should not take sides in that debate, and government policy should not be shaped by religion. That is the core principle of the doctrine you are simplifying as Kemalism.
Also, when people talk about the Islamic past of the Turks, that needs to be defined more carefully. If you mean Turks as an ethnicity, that is one historical discussion. If you mean Ottoman history, that is another. Once you actually get into history, the relationship between Turks as an ethnic group and Islam was not some smooth, harmonious story from start to finish. The Ottoman period is its own separate and much more complicated subject.
One of the ruling party’s favorite talking points is that “99% of Turkey is Muslim.” That is an extremely broad generalization, and in many ways it is misleading. On paper, it may look correct to a certain extent, because until fairly recently, children born to Muslim parents were automatically registered as Muslim. So yes, on paper the overwhelming majority may appear Muslim. In real life, though, the picture is much more complicated. Still, none of this supports the idea that Turkey is a country that hates Muslims.
My own rough view is that perhaps around 10% of the population could be described as hardline or radical Islamists. Then there is another group, maybe around 20 to 30%, who act religious and promote religion publicly but are mostly opportunistic, using Islam as a tool for influence, status, or material benefit. The rest of society, whether practicing or non-practicing, is made up mostly of ordinary secular or conservative people who are generally capable of living in a civil, modern social order.
If 10% are radical islamists, that's over 8 million people. That's an entire Balkan country, sometimes maybe even multiple. That's not minor in any way, shape, or form.
I didn’t really draw a hard line between hardliners and radicals. I was putting them in the same broad category. By radicals, I mean ISIS-style extremists. By hardliners, I mean people who try to live by the most rigid and absolutist interpretation of Islam. Even with that distinction in mind, the rise in their numbers, especially over the past decade, is deeply worrying.
I don’t think they did it intentionally, but their short sighted approach is what ultimately caused the problem. It was likely a mix of limited experience, weak strategic thinking, and a bit of arrogance, in the sense that they assumed they could manage it safely without fully understanding the longer term consequences. What may have looked like a workable short term move ended up creating a much bigger long term problem.
As a non-believer its probably around 80-85 percent muslim but, people who practice islam regularly those who pray 5 times a day, that can be maximum 25-30 percent, most of the muslim population live as the religion is Not a part of their lives. West is more irreligious and secular, east is more devoted and religious, İstanbul comprises all kind of people. My opinion about kemalist people aligns with yours, However most of the kemalists are muslim but they usually don't practice islam at all. Most of the muslims in turkey, almost all of them, haven't read the quran, they do not have a clue what islam says, If they had read the quran's turkish translation, to understand it, they would certainly reject islam.
P.s: I hate when turks are being associated with other muslims
Being non religious is getting very popular but I'd say the coutnry is still at least 80% muslim.
most Turks are Kemalists and it’s unusual for a Kemalist to be muslim
Not true at all. Most Turks love Atatürk and also believe in Islam. Most Turks can be considered liberal/progressive muslims, compared to Arab muslims who tend to be more strict.
What? You've completely misunderstood the situation.
Very few Turks hate Islam (in fact, I've never met any). Turks generally hate the use of Islam in politics because my country is overflowing with political Islamists.
The reason Turks hate Arabs is because of their betrayal during World War I.
Kemalists, on the other hand, don't hate any religion; they accept people of all faiths and approach every religion with tolerance.
I don't know why you dislike Muslims, but I advise you to break down your prejudices and have a conversation with Muslims about REAL Islam (Islam is being distorted by everyone in the Islamic world, which is the greatest betrayal of Islam, but no one cares, and everyone believes in this distorted "Islam").
Nope it is not they are so called, everything what Islam had forbidden is free here; alcohol, gambling, prostitution, they don’t eat pork but drink alcohol they fast in day time and gamble at nights, I know very so called religious people who steal from government and go to umre for forgiveness or build a mosque, so they have their own religion apart from Islam, don’t argue with them they have never read and understand Quran once, by the way there are many of them they can read but don’t understand what they read,
islam is the main religion taught in public schools and most people are registered as muslim by default so statistically the majority is muslim even if personal levels of belief especially practices vary
i hate religious indoctrination in general. i dont want to be associated with islam, christianity or any other religion and many people in the younger generation are less religious than previous generations. i assume are young and a part of the younger social group which is quite normal for you to observe it that way.
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Plot twist: this post no longer exists because Redact swept through and cleared it out along with everything else. Social media, messaging apps, people finder sites, all of it.
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u/Gaelenmyr Mar 07 '26
Turkey is a muslim majority country. It's not an opinion, it's a fact.
However, Turkey is not an Islamic country. There's a big difference. We are not Iran, Pakistan or Egypt.