Erdoğan spoke up today for the benefits of overpopulation.

He is quoted here as saying:

We will multiply our descendants. They talk about population planning, birth control. No Muslim family can have such an approach.

On International Women’s Day, March 8, the President said he believed that:

A woman is above all else a mother.

In a speech peppered with quotes from from the Koran on the virtues of motherhood, he stressed that women cannot be freed:

By destroying the notion of family.

It’s a win-win, you see. More submitters for the religion, and fewer rights for women.

While urging his compatriots to protect the family, the President also insisted that:

Women are not equal to men. Our religion [Islam]

My column for the Freethinker this month is an invitation to Erdoğan to arrest me for insulting him.

RT reports on a Dutch cartoon that does the same thing.

A front-page caricature went public in a popular Dutch daily De Telegraaf, showing Turkish President Recep Tayip Erdogan as a sinister ape squashing freedom of speech in Europe.

The cartoon illustrates a brawny ape with President Erdogan’s face – turned red and puffy – squashing a slim woman resembling Dutch columnist Ebru Umar.

The Dutch cartoon is a reflection on the latest developments in Ankara’s crackdown on freedom of speech in Turkey and beyond.

Umar’s case appears to be the most recent in the growing log of media crackdowns in Turkey.

Last month the Associated Press did a piece on Erdoğan’s 1,845 prosecutions of people who “insulted” him. That’s 1,845 just since 2014.

Turkey’s justice minister says as many as 1,845 cases have been opened against people accused of insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan since he came to office in 2014.

Erdoğan has been accused of aggressively using a previously seldom-used law that bars insults to the president, as a way to muffle dissent. Those who have gone on trial include celebrities, journalists and even schoolchildren.

I wish the AP had said how many were convicted and what the punishments were.

Responding to questions in parliament on Monday, Bekir Bozdag said his ministry had allowed 1,845 cases on charges of insulting

The Washington Post reported on that nonsense about Turkey’s forlorn hope of punishing everyone everywhere who insulted Erdoğan.

What should someone in the Netherlands do if someone says something “derogatory” or “defamatory” about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan? According to an email sent out by Ankara’s consulate in Rotterdam, Turkish organizations in the country should write in to report the insult.

This email, uncovered by Dutch news organizations Thursday, has sparked anger in the Netherlands, with the Dutch prime minister demanding an explanation from Turkish authorities.

You can see how it would, seeing as how Erdoğan doesn’t actually own the Netherlands, or the world, or in fact even Turkey.

“I am surprised,” Prime Minister Mark Rutte told reporters in Germany

So Turkey thinks it gets to arrest people for saying “insulting” things about government officials.

Turkish authorities on Sunday released a Turkish-Dutch journalist from police custody but barred her from leaving Turkey as they continue to investigate tweets she posted about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Ebru Umar, a columnist for Metro newspaper, was detained for questioning late on Saturday at her home in the Aegean resort of Kusadasi, on the orders of a prosecutor for social media postings deemed to be “insulting to state leaders,” Turkey’s state-run news agency reported.

The thing is, Turkey, people with power are the ones who should be most open to public dissent, including “insult.”

In a short video posted on Metro’s website, Umar said