GUN OWNERSHIP

Criminal events are increasing in the whole World. One of the most important reasons for criminal events is gun ownership. Gun ownership is restricted by laws in some countries contrary to other countries where governments let people use guns/allow people to use guns. The latest incident in the US leads to debates regarding gun control. A person carried out an attack with guns in a school. Therefore, the government has enforced/passed a law according to which teachers can be trained in the use of guns. However, gun ownership involves a lot of/ both advantages and disadvantages.

First of all, gun ownership has a number of benefits for people. Criminals will always find a way to obtain guns; therefore, banning gun ownership prevents innocent people from getting killed or hurt. Gun ownership is very easy now. Many people can obtain guns  in illegal ways. For example, in the latest violent attack in Australia, an attacker had a number of guns which are used by military forces and armies. It is seen that it is impossible to prevent people from having guns. On the other hand, women and weaker individuals may have no means of self defense from rape or other crimes. Gun ownership provides innocent people with protection from attacks. Consequently, there are a number of advantages of gun ownership.

Secondly, gun ownership leads to a number of drawbacks for the society.  Many crimes are committed with guns. Thus, restricting gun ownership will likely reduce the number of such crimes; that is, gun ownership is the main source of criminal events. Only the security forces must have guns. Trained people such as armies and the police have to have guns. At the same time, suicides and crimes of passion are higher with gun availability. If people have guns, they can easily commit these crimes. For example, people can feel deep depression; in this case, people can kill themselves with guns. Consequently, gun ownership has a number of disadvantages.

To sum up, criminal events are on the agenda. Especially, one reason for the increase of criminal events is gun ownership. The right of defense is valid for all people. However, gun ownership is not the solution to the problem of criminal events. Governments  all over the World have not an effective programme to control gun ownership. Checking all people who have  guns is not possible. Therefore, no matter what happens gun ownership should  not be allowed  by law.

 NİLÜFER ÇAVUŞ

EMOTIONAL COURAGE

    There are several forms of courage. The most powerful one is emotional courage. It briefly means to be open to both positive and negative emotional experiences. Courage is not the absence of fear. It is to challenge the fear. The only emotion in life is not fear. There are core emotions such as anger, shame, sadness, happiness, enjoyment. Emotional courage appears when we face these emotions. Showing emotional courage is not always easy. However, there are some ways to practice it.

First of all, we should not suppress negative emotions such as sadness, grief, fear to develop emotional courage. It is not possible to always be happy every moment of our lives. What makes life meaningful is our emotions, both positive and negative. For instance, courage does not mean fearlessness. A brave man is not someone who is afraid of nothing; he is someone who conquers that fear.

Secondly, we should act on our emotions even if we are afraid of the outcomes. For example, let's assume that you will go to a job interview. Even if you know that you may be rejected, you should go to that interview. Developing emotional courage starts with taking risks. This is also valid in interpersonal relationships. We should not always think about negative things. We need to be able to think that we will feel good afterwards.

Lastly, we should be able to be open to vulnerability. We cannot always be strong or resistant against all situations. We can be down, we can be disappointed or we can make mistakes. However, what is important is to be aware of faults and not blame others for failures. We should learn from our mistakes without punishing ourselves or avoiding them. We should be honest with ourselves about what we can do or not do.

In a nutshell, emotional courage is not to escape our emotions. It is to know that all emotions are worth living. Therefore, to improve emotional courage, we should not suppress either negative or positive emotions, we should act without fear no matter what results are and we should be vulnerable, truthful and honest with ourselves.

                                                                                                                                       Seher Çakmar

                                                                                                    

WHY WE NEED ART IN OUR LIFE

There is no doubt that man is a civilized creature. One of the components of  civilization is art. While other components deal with man’s environment and man’s outside world (the outside world of man) , art examines the inner world of human beings, and shows the good and the bad in people. Thus, art creates a second nature and beautifies the inner nature of human. Even though there are several reasons why people need art in their life, increasing of man’s capacity and development and transfer of culture can be claimed to be the most important two.

To begin with, the increase of man’s capacity is known to be the primary reason why people need art in their life. Art provides a problem and then solves this problem. For example, if a curriculum includes arts such as making statues, painting, pottery or dance, these are the kinds of things that lead students to view the world differently. These abilities give young people a chance to really develop a vision of self. Artistic activity matures the kids passions and thanks to it, young people feel that school is about making different things. Another point is that, being able to imagine has a vital role in man’s life. It is a fact that arts distinguish human beings from other species. A man devoid of imagination  is unthinkable , because man’s dreams allow him to find new things, make innovations and improve them. Shortly, art enables people to think outside the box.

Furthermore, development and transfer of culture seem to be the second reason why people need art in their life. People use hundreds of different languages to communicate. Someone has to learn his language to transfer information or an emotion to a stranger. However, artistic activities, just like  science, are universal. To exemplify, music that caresses the spirit of humans in Austria influences all people positively, not just now but forever. Moreover, art engages with society and it engages also with the key issues that affect people all day. Although the works of art seem to belong to a person, in fact they carry the traces of the depth of history. Therefore, feelings similar to each society can be revealed in the works. In brief, art is universal and leads to connections between the past, the future and the present.

All in all, increasing of man’s capacity and its universality are said  to be the most common reasons why people need art in their life. I think, art is a phenomenon where our dreams and our emotions reach their peaks and we must value it very much.

Burak Özçifçi

JOINING THE EUROPEAN UNION

The European Union is a de facto confederation of 28 member countries in Europe, started in 1957 as the European Economic Community. Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands are the founders of the European Union. Turkey is not yet a member of the European Union. The membership to the European Union is leading to many debates. While some of the people support the European Union, some of them are not willing to join the European Union for various reasons.

Some people would question whether Turkey’s economy will improve with the introduction of Turkey into the European Union and whether exports will increase. This idea is a misconception in its simplest definition. The best example of this is the Greek economy. Greece, which joined the EU in 1981, has one of the worst economies in recent years. With the wrong practices in the Greek economy, the country has reached the point of sinking. In short, being an EU member country does not mean that the country will be an economically successful country.

Some people strongly oppose Turkey's EU membership. When Turkey becomes a member of the EU, they claim that some industrial companies, such as car factories, that are unable to compete with EU products, will suffer or even shut down. It is perfectly natural to have such concerns. The market for EU countries is very attractive and remarkable. If Turkey is a member of the EU, Turkish citizens will demand the goods of EU countries rather than the goods of their own country. As a result, our domestic and national products will not be produced because of the lack of demand. This will adversely affect the Turkish economy. So it's normal for people who think like that to worry.

Another reason why you don’t want to be a member of the EU is the possibility of unwanted impacts on economic relations with non-EU neighbors. For example, if Turkey joins the EU, it will ally with countries like Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. As is known, these three countries are hostile to Russia. If Turkey is allied with these countries, relations between Turkey and Russia, especially the S400 missiles agreement with Russia and natural gas projects will be reduced and perhaps the two countries will become enemies. This landscape is very frightening.

As a result, although Turkey’s accession to the European Union seems to be in favor of Turkey, it is clear that this is not a good idea in the long run. The European Union has already proved its unity and togetherness with Brexit events in recent years. If Turkey wants to make an alliance with a group, it should not be with the European Union.

                         Gülis Beyza Yıllar