Ql - ITO

7 Ü İSTANBUL CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
about negative effects. Serious sanctions have been imposed on the programs
that have not taken measures to protect the women participating in the program,
which thus caused tragic results.
Another format which has aroused interest the most in the daytime
broadcast in recent years is "marriage programs". In Turkey, where marriage is
one of the most fundamental social values, any assistance or support provided
to single people to enable them to find suitable spouses is considered to be a
very important proof of solidarity. Besides, in these programs the people who
want to get married teli their life stories. Thus, their content resembles that of
dramas. In this sense, it is possible to say that these programs are the televised
versions of whatis being experienced among neighbors and friends in real life.
Commenting on these programs, the President of R TSC said "They fulfill a
social function". Y et, w e cannot say that the se programs have no ad verse
effects. S ome of the participants have committed erime s by taking advantage of
the program ( e.g., some committed fraud or theft with the pretext of marriage;
some attempted to carry out "white marriage" to obtain citizenship ). Besi des,
women's groups fighting against sexismin the media eriticize these programs
because most of the female participants want financial assurance (like
properties) as a requirement from possible husbands and the TV programıners
just take this for granted.
7.4. News Debate Shows
As we mentioned above, in addition to general TV channels which are
quite popular among Turkish viewers, there are also thematic news channels
whose number has been on the rise recently. Such channels have a certain
viewer profile. The viewers of news and "reality-based" contents can also
watch debate shows in which important agenda topics are brought to the tab le.
TV programs with the quality of "forum" or open session in which political
agenda is discussed by different parties became popular also on general TV
channels in the 90s, when mixed broadcasting started. Though broadcast after