If you’re in Turkey, you can’t read me (or any other WordPress blog)!

This “slander! Waaaah!” rhetoric is pathetic, considering the fact that it’s coming from a developed nation with some serious EU aspirations.

Not only is it silly, it’s sort of humiliating for the Turkish government. Did I say sort of? I mean totally.

And deleting the “slanderous” blogs in questions would, indeed, set a horrendous precedent. So don’t go there, WordPress!

(And don’t get me started on online censorship in the Gulf… *grumble grumble*)

Oh, and here’s a good reaction from the comments thread:

I can’t say I’d be pleased to find myself or anyone I remotely liked criticized in a bunch of carbon-copy blogs, but so far, the universe hasn’t ordered itself to my preferences. In other words: tough nuts, guys.

There is also advice from Budi Rahardjo that may help solve the problem in the long run:

Somebody is using http://adnanoktar.wordpress.com to pretend that he/she is Adnan Oktar. If the person is using another name, not AdnanOktar, it might be a different story. My suggestion is to approach whoever using “adnanoktar” and investigate further. Perhaps changing the name would solve the problem?

And more from Gabriel (who’s got a great blog, btw, in case you’re reading this… and want more stuff to read):

Whether or not this nut job is responsible for finding a Turkish court gullible enough to make such a sweeping judgement without requiring WP lawyers to be there isn’t the only issue here. You can’t have democratic governments just turning off the information taps, fine. But even worse, for WordPress, is the idea that a democratic government can take such radical steps against a (re: Your) company for such a tiny issue. Either way — altruistic or corporate — there has to be some responsibility on WP’s part to get the Turkish blogs back up… I think it’s time to find a good lawyer working in Turkey.

Either way you look at it, it’s a mess.