Source: Çiçek Tahaoğlu, “Lesbian Dating Site Banned Over ‘Obscenity’ Back Online”, bianet, 17 November 2015, http://bianet.org/english/lgbti/169339-lesbian-dating-site-banned-over-obscenity-back-online

The administrative measure against lesbian dating site www.lezce.com, blocked over “obscenity”, has been lifted a few hours after the incident took place.

Web administrator Erman Paçalı telling the ban has been lifted after the incident took place and was in the media, said the following:

“They shut down the website and lifted the ban out of the blue. We haven’t made any change on the website as to the content. We hadn’t managed to contact an authority from TIB despite all our efforts. When we looked at the Presidency of Telecommunication’s (TIB) query panel, the administrative measure appeared on the screen. When we repeated the same query 20 minutes ago, it states there is no decision implemented as to this website.

“The decision to lift the ban hasn’t been issued to all service providers yet, but it will be by the end of the day”.

What had happened?

Speaking to Bianet, web administrator Erman Paçalı had said that the site doesn’t have any content that could be a subject to blocking, they couldn’t find any addressee regarding the matter, and they will go to court to stop the execution.

Source: Çiçek Tahaoğlu, “Lesbian Website Blocked over “Obscenity”,” bianet, 17 November 2015, http://bianet.org/english/lgbti/169329-lesbian-website-blocked-over-obscenity

Turkey’s only lesbian dating website, http://www.lezce.com*, has been banned for “obscenity”.

“Since obscenity can’t be determined by looking at a user name and password page on our home page, it has obviously been aroused by the name ‘lezce’. We are face to face with an administration that is aroused by letters. These practices encourage homophobia by state itself”, said the administrator of the webpage that operates on a membership system.

Lezce.com content advisor and administrator Erman Paçalı speaking to Bianet said they couldn’t find any addressee relating to the blocking decision and that they will file a complaint with the administrative court to grant a motion for stay of execution.

“We’ve sent our petition to the Presidency of Telecommunication (TIB) but it is unclear when they will respond since there is no law imposing a time limit on TIB. TIB experts conveyed via central office that they won’t contact us directly. We can’t find any addressee. It is not clear what is obscene in the content and what sort of evaluation they made.

“This decision violates the principle of equality. We will go to the district administrative court to stop the execution. We want a verbal hearing because we want to express ourselves”.  

TIB doesn’t inform

Paçalı said they have tried to contact TIB but they couldn’t receive any information regarding even the grounds of the decision.

“Whenever we wish to contact the institution, they express that there is prime ministerial circular stating experts cannot be met with. Thus, as far as we understand there is a circular allowing them to not meet with anyone if they wish to do so.”

Paçalı added that TIB has taken the decision based on “reasonable doubt” and “in order to constitute reasonable doubt, there must be content in line with that. However, our home page doesn’t have any content except for username and password panel, and TIB doesn’t present any content as to the ‘doubt’”.

* Lez is shortened for lezbiyen, which means lesbian, and Lezce stands for Lezbiyence, which means lesbianish.