Why is there such a huge difference between turkish culture in the cities and the rural areas?

Question

In the urban areas women have boyfriends and even live with them before marriage, whereas in the rural areas women are forced or were forced to have virginity tests and sometimes face honor killings.

Why the huge difference?

Answer 1

I can show you some towns and villages in France that would shock you, really...

There are backyard regions in every country all around the world, and in these remotes places people tend to be extremely conservative, indeed...And their attitude might be caused by their ignorance...

And the scandalous events and crimes that you're talking about, regarding Islam, are not a reason for a smart person to generalize...

And you are a smart person, I hope so...

PS : Blunt, wise answer, thumb up from me.

Answer 2

hi,

do you think ,for example,in USA , the social life in New York and  Utah have same feature ?or in France Bretagne and Paris?

You must read some sociology and economy books to understand the difference and similarity beetween City life and urban life!

about virginity , please be respectfully all the culture , in the world .

Do you know, todays, in USA , young guys   want to marry with the young girls who have virginity!

Honor killings are the most important problems for us ,because our country was not enough industrialized and modernized ,until now; but what do you think about these news from the  industrialized and modernized counties:

*http://www.spiegel.de/international/germ...

*http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/737104...

*http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2...

*http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world...

*http://www.wjtv.com/gulfcoastwest/jtv/ad...

*http://thenewsleak.com/2008/01/30/rebecc...

*http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=42...

*http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con...

Answer 3

Why is there such a huge difference between american culture in Manhattan and the rural areas?

In the urban areas women have boyfriends and even live with them before marriage, whereas in rural areas women are forces or were forced to give abstinence promise to their dads (what the...?) and sometimes face dire straits like being kicked out of family home.

Why the huge difference?

Probably the answer you are seeking lies there.

PS. The books I have been reading tell me that the understanding of "honor", i.e. the suppression of women about sexual matters is rather a regional thing than a religious one. The rural Armenian, the rural Rum isnot much different from the rural Muslim in that area. Also, remember the Ezidi girl stoned to death for falling in love with a Sunni boy. For those who don't know, Ezidi religion is different from the Abrahamic ones.

And rural Aegean, rural Mediterrenean, rural Blacksea are different from rural Eastern Anatolia, too. I can give many examples if somebody asks. So, please lets not generalize Eastern Anatolian "traditions" to the whole of rural Turkey.

Answer 4

The same rural-urban difference exists in practically all countries around the world, the only difference being what the "base" culture is as expressed by the rural lifestyle.

Rural America is a lot more conservative and religious than urban America.  It is just that the religion is Christianity instead of Islam, and the conservatism means not letting the pregnant 16 year old who got knocked up by the 30 year old guy get an abortion rather than having her brother kill her.

Maybe rural Sweden or rural Finland is more sophisticated than that, but that's just because the fundamental culture of those countries is more progressive to begin with.  And yet still, I am sure that you will observe the rural areas to be more conservative while the urban areas are more liberal.

This does not give the "cause", however.  And, I suspect that the cause has a lot to do with urban mixing with other cultures.  In Turkey, urban areas like Istanbul, Izmir, and Ankara have a mix of ethnic influences from minorities for centuries.  But, if you visit a village, it is mostly a homogenous population, and has been as such for centuries as well.  Again, this same heterogeneity vs. homogeneity can be seen in the U.S. too, as I suspect that it is true in many nations in the world.

Addendum: ithinkiatetoomuch_in_new_orleans seems to misunderstand causality somewhat.  As the question is specifically asking WHY there is such a rural and urban difference in Turkey and NOT asking us to LIST these differences, it is hugely relevant to note that the rural vs. urban difference is UNIVERSAL.  i_n_o continues to list in an extraordinarily condescending manner, the various fashion and labor issues that he/she amazingly witnesses about our villagers and then conjectures that they must have such a zevksiz lifestyle due to poverty.  That, despite the fact that the richest Aga's wife will still most likely wear a multi-layered floral pattern -- only with more intricate designs.

My grandmother also wears that multi-layered floral pattern that i_n_o so despises.  She is not one to obsess over fashion, to say the least.  And, despite her 80+ years, she continues to enjoy the closeness to nature, the simplicity she enjoys of working in her garden.  Despite these "deficiencies", my grandmother loves and accepts any of my new relatives who are foreign and not even Muslim.  And, if you visit any Turkish village, you will be welcomed with open arms.

Have you ever lived in a small American town?  I have, for seven of my teenage years lived in such a town with less than 20,000 people.  While it is true that I have never witnessed those multi-layered floral patterns and close-to-earth labor that i_n_o finds impossible to comprehend in these modern days, I have witnessed something far more incomprehensible to me.  The distinct feeling that you are not really accepted, foreigner.  Strange looks when I say my name.  Oh, but at least I had it better than my black friend who didn't have to say her name to be called the n-word.... Perhaps, the best part was when I was told that I will go to h**l if I don't accept Jesus as savior.  Maybe that was the best.  Considering that there were some entire Christian sects in a single church in that town, I suppose that should not have been too surprising as that meant that only 30 people go to heaven.  I mean, I can't expect VIP treatment, right? :)

Yet, there were still enough decent people to keep my parents living there to this day, and things have actually improved since the time I was growing up.  Of course, the continuous immigration due to the university helps.  And, that goes back to my point about cultures mixing.

Answer 5

Interesting answers you've been getting about every other country than Turkey. We must have taken a wrong turn somewhere.

There can be a big difference. You can be lounging on the beach and have modern everything around you in the morning, decide to go site seeing in the afternoon and drive just 15 mins. and see a completely different world of toothless old people riding donkeys wearing 5 layers of clothes all in a different floral pattern (women only, men in floral would be modern:) pumping water from a well, butchering their own animals instead of going to the supermarket and washing clothes by hand in a stream. That is village life and I can't really say WHY this is so. I guess that there are economic reasons and that village people are more traditional. And they choose to stay traditional because they could go to a city anytime they wanted.

These virginity tests and honor killings are only things I have heard about in the media and especially about Turks living in Germany. In fact, this is the first I have heard of virginity tests in Turkey.