I'd be actually interested to hear what the situation there is for someone who doesn't openly support Erdogan; a lot of moderate voices from there get drown in the sea of noise caused by him and his supporters
Disclaimer: I'm from a well-off family and I'm planning to go abroad for university by late 2018. The vast majority doesn't have the same means, and I don't think I could have endured it if I hadn't either.
From a democratic viewpoint, the situation is tragic (especially so since the failed coup attempt). Patriotic ego masturbation is
everywhere. Erdoğan riles up crowds by bashing the West, those who want to critique the government have to squeeze "The coup was wrong" into all their statements to evade the accusation of being a Gulenist (and the immediately following,
totally adhering to due process, arrest). "Fetö", short for "Fetullah", Gulen's first name (the Islamic cleric alleged to be behind the coup attempt which seems to be one point all parties agree upon), is the term. Prominent opposition members are frequently detained and/or arrested, more than
110 thousand people have been displaced of their jobs since the coup attempt the only reason being given that "They are connected to Fetö".
A patriotic slogan that translates to "We're the nation, we don't let Turkey be felled by coup or terrorism" (with a bit more of a linguistic flair) is plastered practically everywhere from TV ads to billboards to ads on public transport:
I've seen these since early August, and that's because I was out of the city between the coup until then.
There is an Anti-West sentiment everywhere (from "They didn't help us in our time of need" to "They are anxious to see us grow into a global power and they want to weaken us").
Explosions (especially in the Southeast region) are literally daily. Literally. One in Şırnak today killed two children and wounded six children. At least there's variety in who claims the attack. /s
The dollar and the euro both set a new all-time high exchange rate yesterday. The dollar actually did it thrice ($/TL went from 3.15 to 3.1550 to 3.16, IIRC).
Now if you just want my ideological viewpoint on things, then it's pretty much the same as yours: The country is hurtling towards an ultranationalist, Islamist dictatorship.
You do realise half the country doesn't want him right? It's not like he has 95 percent of the support and everyone is happy. 51 percent didn't vote for his party in the last elections. Only reason his party got to be the ruling party is because rest of the opposition parties weren't able to form a three-way coalition. I mean even that was close. Main opposition party, left-wing, secularist CHP (25 percent) and another left-wing party HDP (10 percent) were okay with the idea but the other opposition party, right-wing nationalistic MHP (12) didn't want to form a coalition with the Kurds.
So yeah, we are not enjoying the fucking dictatorship.
.
edit: Oh, and Erdoğan's party has a new constitution in the works which aims to turn Turkey into a presidential republic (and one of the main defense points for it is that "How can it be undemocratic, look at the US!"). There's been a state of emergency declared since June, I think it was extended by another 3 months last week, which lets the presidency bypass the parliament in lawmaking and establishing regulations (
BBC source).
Source for 110K people sacked:
BBC
