Women should not laugh in public: Turkish minister
1 Aug 2014 10:45 PM GMT
A senior Turkish minister who caused an outcry by suggesting women should not laugh loudly in public waded into a new controversy on Thursday by attacking women who he said could not resist pole dancing.
Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc, a co-founder of the ruling Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP), has strongly criticised in recent days what he sees as a decline of moral standards in Turkey.
His comment earlier this week that women should not laugh in public was ridiculed by secular Turks, with women taking to Twitter en masse to post pictures of themselves laughing deliriously. Arinc said in televised comments on Thursday that those remarks had been taken out of context and he had wanted to comment on the ‘general rules of morality’. But he added, ‘There are women who leave on holiday without their husbands and others who don’t have self control and can’t stop themselves from climbing up a pole.’
‘Anyone can live like this. I can’t be angry against you but I can just have pity for you,’ he said.
Arinc’s latest remarks appear to have been prompted by the wife of a prominent Turkish footballer who posted a picture of herself pole dancing on Instagram with the slogan ‘when I see a pole, I just can’t resist’.
Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc, a co-founder of the ruling Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP), has strongly criticised in recent days what he sees as a decline of moral standards in Turkey.
His comment earlier this week that women should not laugh in public was ridiculed by secular Turks, with women taking to Twitter en masse to post pictures of themselves laughing deliriously. Arinc said in televised comments on Thursday that those remarks had been taken out of context and he had wanted to comment on the ‘general rules of morality’. But he added, ‘There are women who leave on holiday without their husbands and others who don’t have self control and can’t stop themselves from climbing up a pole.’
‘Anyone can live like this. I can’t be angry against you but I can just have pity for you,’ he said.
Arinc’s latest remarks appear to have been prompted by the wife of a prominent Turkish footballer who posted a picture of herself pole dancing on Instagram with the slogan ‘when I see a pole, I just can’t resist’.
Next Story
