Being minority in a pandemic as a "state of exemption"
It is an indisputable fact that this pandemic process is an exceptional phenomenon. When we saw quarantine situations in China before, we all thought through how bad the situation was and, fortunately, nothing like that here. At least I was concerned when businesses closed in Italy. Fortunately, after a very short time when similar restrictions applied in Turkey and Greece, it was the occasion for us to face it is not normal.
But how will the laws for normal conditions in a modern state be implemented in abnormal situations or in exceptional cases, as Giorgio Agamben says? According to Agamben, the application of the genocide in Auschwitz, Germany, namely in a modern state of the Modern West, which is expected to uphold human rights was also due to the exception.
The modern state is a state where citizens' rights are seriously guaranteed. However, when we consider an example of a refugee camp, the refugee camp is an exception, as there is nothing seen in the normal course of life. Thus, the laws to be applied to the refugees after this process will show the moral character of the state, since the laws that the state has issued for its citizens will not be valid for immigrants. Here we remember Weber's saying about the modern state: "It is the community of people who successfully monopolize the legitimate use of physical violence in a certain land".
So much so that in the Auschwitz camp, which is an exception, the modern state has not seen any inconvenience about committing genocidal violence. In the same sense, we can give an example for Srebrenitsa, which was declared as a safe zone (exception) at the time and the legitimate genocide followed.
The modern state, lacking in virtue, can show all kinds of unhealthy treatment in this way. When we look at the pandemic process, we see that the world is experiencing a wholesale exception. In this process, we will see how modern nation-states or the global state will perpetrate violence around the world. However, when we look at Greece, we witnessed that the state started to take advantage of the exception at the first opportunity.
The debates on banning the adhan are at the top of these. Of course, as the religion of Islam commands, it is unthinkable to perform prayers in mosques. However, although there has been no absolute restriction to read the adhan, we have seen many attempts to restrict it. We see that muezzins/imams confronting persons already wearing a blue uniform, that is, persons who must be obeyed and scared from in such period is the indicator of the failure of the promise of modernity.
The media also played a secondary role in this process. While the previous example represents direct intervention, the media itself is often the 'ideological apparatus of the state', although the media is not in a state role here, if we speak through Althusser's mouth. How could be accepted the act of the reporter during the quarantine of Şahin village as he was questioning the village resident why he is not wearing a mask or gloves like the resident was the virus, whereas the reporter himself was not wearing? How could be explained the news published that several students tested positive among the group of 30 students who returned back from Turkey, while only one student tested positive among hundreds of students? I will not ask anymore what was the duty of the journalists who claimed that students were sent with the command of Erdogan in order to spread the virus to Greece, but how is it possible to believe in these lies? There is a lot of more disgraceful news coming to our ear, but we are reluctant to talk about uncertain issues, since we have not lost anything from our virtue.
Long story short, let others talk about what effects COVID-19 will have on the world, we will keep suffering from fascist ideology of the modern state.
