INTRODUCTION
Women and Democracy Association is deeply honored to host this exhibition that sheds light on the February 28 era.
February 28 was the beginning of a dark chapter that left a permanent scar on our memories, subjecting women in our country to discrimination. “You’re prettier this way” was a fake ‘comforting’ phrase often used to make women accept the conditions they were forced to comply with in order to participate in social life. The expression started circulating from inside persuasion rooms, denoting an effort to overshadow our self-esteem by a system of tutelage that gradually encroached upon our lives.
In that period of time, some women were deliberately excluded from public life due to their lifestyle choices. Some young women and girls were deprived of their right to education. In many families, at least one child or a spouse suffered due to the policies of a repressive mindset that dramatically altered their lives. Some families were torn apart, and some were never able to reunite.
In retrospect, the era during which women’s democratic rights—such as access to education, working in the public sector, and visibility in public life—were suspended has become one of the most defining reasons behind KADEM’s spirit. As an NGO that brings together the concepts of women and democracy under one roof, we consider it vital that the experiences of that period remain alive in our collective memory.
This special presentation, which also offers an opportunity to evaluate the period from a panoramic perspective, provides an important chance to observe the transformation of social reality and, we hope, will serve as an inspiration for studies on recent history.
