Turkey was shaken by the apparent suicides of three families one after another in the first two weeks of November. All three families used cyanide to kill themselves. The first shocking news came from Istanbul’s Fatih district. Four siblings in the Yetiskin family, aged 48, 54, 56 and 60, killed themselves by simultaneously taking cyanide. A few days later, another shock came from Antalya, where Selim Simsek poisoned his 38-year-old wife and two children of two and five years before taking his own life by drinking the cyanide. The latest tragic news came from the Bakirkoy district of Istanbul, where Bahattin Delen, 38, poisoned his 38-year-old wife and six-year-old son and later took his own life the same way.

What do these suicides and murders say about Turkey? According to some government supporters, they are all about the weakening of religious convictions. For example, Yeni Akit Newspaper attributed the suicide of the four middle-aged siblings in Istanbul to “The God Delusion,” a book by Richard Dawkins found at the scene. 

Similarly, the dean of the faculty of theology of the Thrace University, Cevdet Kilic, asserted that people kill themselves because of loneliness and faltering religious beliefs.

In the inevitable hot debate on these horrific suicides came the usual pro-government conspiracy theories. A Sabah columnist and many other government supporters claimed that the families' economic hardships were exaggerated by some parties to foment social unrest.