26/01/2023 | Writer: Selma Koçak
Urologist Zeki Bayraktar, famous for his discriminatory attitudes against LGBTI+s, was heard as a relevant expert within the scope of the evaluation of the proposal regarding the “redefinition of the family” at the Parliamentary Constitution Committee.
Sexual orientation and gender identity titles were discussed at the Parliamentary Constitution Committee yesterday, within the scope of the constitutional proposal regarding “the constitutional guarantee for headscarf and redefinition of the family” which was brought to the Parliament on December 9, 2022 by Justice and Development Party (AKP), Nationalist Movement Part (MHP) and Great Unity Party (BBP).
At the committee, the discussion began with Nationalist Movement Party İstanbul MP Feti Yıldız’s statements: “The lobbies of LGBT – we cannot even pronounce its’ name – of this perverted trend are supported financially, in one way or another, in order to create a great conception.”
Urologist Prof. Dr. Zeki Bayraktar, who is famous for his ideological and discriminatory speeches against LGBTI+s, was assigned to the Committee as an expert in order to present an opinion about the issue.
According to Bayraktar’s empty rhetoric, existence, itself, shortens the life, not discrimination
Bayraktar attributed homosexual and transgender existence to “faulty parental attitudes in early childhood” within the scope of his claims which are deprived of scientific validity: “If we are not able to manage it correctly with rational methods and without panic, unfortunately, we may face a booming in homosexual and transgender cases in the coming years.”
Bayraktar justified the proposal, which aims to redefine the family with a discriminatory motive in the Constitution, by “the responsibility of the state to protect mental and physical health of the citizens” claiming that “the average life cycle of LGBTI+s is sixteen to twenty years shorter”. Bayraktar said ”Psychiatrists don’t know this” regarding his claims.
Bayraktar’s nonscientific claims didn’t grind on; he associated the psychological oppression created by social discrimination and heteronormative and binary social order on LGBTI+s with being “homosexual and transgender”. He attributed sexually transmissible diseases, which go for everyone, to being LGBTI+.
CHP MP Emir: Are protecting mental health or gender identity in an urologist’s line? Is the Grand Assembly doomed to these?
Republican People’s Party Malatya MP Murat Emir stood up to Bayraktar’s discriminatory and unfounded claims. Emir explained why he disagreed to listen urologist Bayraktar as a relevant expert with the following statements:
“You hear, some words like ‘heresy’, ‘perversion’ are being used. I had proposed to invite a representative from Psychiatric Association of Turkey and a scientist from Turkish Medical Association to inform us and clarify the issue. Unfortunately, what I see here is nothing more than ignorance. I am asking, referring the concepts used as adolescent confusion, gender identity search, normative behavior, psychological problems, suicide, depression, are any of these in an urologist’s line? Surely not, these come within psychiatrists’ and psychologists’ area of expertise, invite a relevant expert in order to explain the issue. Is this Grand Assembly doomed to these people?”
In response to Murat Emir’s question, Bayraktar claimed that psychiatrists have never seen an intersex person.
Tags: human rights
