You don't need to list them all, but giving one or two examples of Erdogan's anti-democratic behavior would be nice. Right now it seems as you are calling for a popular democratically elected government to resign because you simply don't like its policies and you haven't been able to stop AKP from winning democratic elections for over a decade. You seem to be trying to do exactly what the Kemalist military was doing before it was forced out of politics.
As far as I have checked major Turkish media outlets, they are reporting the situation and there is no media black out as claimed in the post you have linked to. I find such claims quite dishonest. You should know that making such easily refutable claims will cast doubt on your whole position, you should be more careful about your claims.
Entering universities while wearing head-scarves was forbidden. You couldn't physically enter them wearing a head-scarf until very recently.
Is it the eastern part trying to impose its will on the western part or is it the eastern part trying to remove what western part imposed on them over decades?
Here are what I see people are claiming to be signs of AKP Islamizing Turkey: allowing women with headscarves attend universities, forbidding shops sell alcohol in late night hours (after 10PM).
In Ontario only government owned LCBO can sell liquor and its shops close at 6PM. The consumption of liquor in public places is forbidden completely in Canada. Surely Canada is not an Islamic state. Are we sure Turkey is a Muslim majority country?
Which part is false? What fact are you objecting in his post? I think what he has written is easily verifiable so there is no need to trust him or me. As far as I have checked they are accurate.
As I understand, you have been protesting freely with the support from military, judiciary (it looks that recently Kemalist supreme court tried to close AKP while it had a majority in Turkish parliament and had just won another democratic election), and media for years and you still haven't been able to even stop the increase of AKP's popularity. Is that true? Is his claim that you are minority false?
He said that police used excessive force and AKP government has admitted that days before and have said that the police officers who have done so will be investigated.
He says that there is no black out in Turkish media and you can check Turkish media yourself. There is no black out as some are claiming. Go to say CNN Turk or other Turkish media sites and use Google translate to see that there is no such thing. Turkish media is generally secular and anti-AKP.
Since I see that some friends have got excited about the recent events in Turkey I decided to write something about it and provide some context. I think it is good to know a bit of history of Turkey before AKP to understand what is going on there. It has been more than 10 years that AKP is in power so people might not know or may have forgotten the situation before AKP.
Turkey was ruled by ultra-nationalist ultra-secular militarist groups for decades. The military overthrow several elected governments and jailed politicians. Torture, extra-judicial killings, suppression, and corruption were widespread. The laws that people often object to are from that area and the constitution written by Turkish military, including insulting Turkishness being a crime. These groups who are sometimes referred to as Kemalists had the control of military, judicatory, academia, media, etc. Yet, they couldn't tolerate even the government being in the hands of people they didn't like. The large majority of Turks who are practicing Muslims were excluded. It was illegal to wear a head-scarf in universities and government departments in a country where over 70% of women wears head-scarf. Essentially these women were banned from attending university. Public officials and even university professors would be thrown out and even jailed if they showed any sign of nonsecular tendency. Writers and intellects were jailed for expressing opinions against Kemalist ideology. Erdogan, the current prime minister was jailed and banned from politics for 10 years for reading an old poem while he was the mayor of Istanbul. The existence of Kurds who are around 20 percent of Turkey's population were completely denied (not a joke)! Speaking or reading in Kurdish was banned and the popular Turkish singer Ahmad Kaya was forced to exile for saying that he will record an album in Kurdish. Popular political parties were closed regularly even when they won elections decisively. The news of corruption in police and politics was a regular daily routine as was the news of human rights violations.
In the years before AKP there were several short-lived governments by parties both on the left and on the right. Inflation was very high (hyperinflation), unemployment was high, governments were unstable. The value of Turkish lira dropped to a third in one night. Nightly interest rates tripled to completely ridiculous amount of 139%. You can look at Greece these days to have an idea of Turkey of that time. Turkish foreign policy was essentially dictated by the US government. There was a very harsh IMF imposed economic program so Turkey could pay its debts and a technocrat from world bank was imposed as the economy minister on the Turkish government to make sure they will implement what IMF wanted. The government and the country were in such a bad shape that it is almost unimaginable today after 12 years of AKP.
AKP was formed at that time. Erdogan was still under the ban from politics as well as many prominent politicians from his previous party. But some other politicians from the party were not under the ban. They created a new party: AKP (Justice and Development Party). Its members were moderate and pragmatist politicians from the banned party plus several other pragmatist and moderates from other right of the center parties. The current Turkish President Gul became the head of the party though Erdogan was significantly involved behind the senses. The party won a landslide election and has been continuously doing so for over a decade, increasing its share of votes in every election. You have to know that the length of Turkish governments before AKP to get a feeling of its significance: a few months!
Over a decade AKP has modernized Turkey, removed many of the laws that EU objected to, fought corruption in police and politics, improved the economy to its current amazing state, forced military out of politics, ... Until Syrian crises it had perfect relations with its neighbors. It followed what I would consider an awesome independent foreign policy. It is trying to find a political solution to the Kurdish "problem" and the right of Kurds have improved significantly under AKP. The list of AKP's achievements can go on.
So what is the problem? The problem is that the support base of AKP is not the western oriented seculars, it is the conservative majority who didn't have a voice in politics for decades (the silent majority) as the Kemalist and what Turks call "Deep Government" didn't allow the political parties supported by them. In all elections AKP has lost in the touristic Mediterranean coastal cities and European parts. You can find the map of the last general election results here:
Yellow is AKP, red is CHP, and light green is MHP. The south eastern parts are Kurdish areas where independent Kurdish politicians won.
The protests that you see these days are by this secular minority who has been voting for CHP (around 25%, significant, but still a minority).
Now, what are these alternative parties?
MHP is an ultra-nationalist racist conservative far-right party. Look up Wikipedia if you want to know more about them.
CHP is the party of the founder of the Turkey, ruled Turkey for decades in a one-party system, is a Kemalist party. It had strong relations with Turkish military, right now it is essentially the party supported by the elite who ruled Turkey before AKP and their supporters. The elite tried to topple AKP government undemocratically. Try to see if they objected to continuous serious violations of human rights before AKP.
Obviously I don't agree with everything that AKP and Erdogan do. However, AKP (and Erdogan) is definitely the best thing that has happened to Turkey over many decades, and Turks know it. That is the reason AKP keeps increasing its share of vote in elections. They are creating a strong developed democratic lawful independent Turkey. When you hear about protests in Turkey against AKP and Erdogan being authoritarian it is good to remember this context.
One final thing: AKP is often criticized for ignoring secular Turkish citizens who have not voted for AKP. Watch Erdogan's victory speech after winning the last election in which AKP further increased its share of votes. His attitude was completely humble and reconciliatory.
The problem, in my humble opinion, is not Erdogan and AKP being arrogant and authoritarian, but rather the secular minority demanding more than their fair share. I mean they objected to the removal of the ban on head-scarves for students attending university and consider it Islamization of Turkey (a country where over 70% of women wears head-scarf).
As far as I have checked major Turkish media outlets, they are reporting the situation and there is no media black out as claimed in the post you have linked to. I find such claims quite dishonest. You should know that making such easily refutable claims will cast doubt on your whole position, you should be more careful about your claims.