In 1818, a young woman writer, Mary Shelley, left the world not just a novel. She left a dark mirror held up to the conscience of humanity.
We are still in that story. Because that novel is not a monster story. That novel is the story of man's fear of the darkness within himself.
For years, Frankenstein was thought to be just a horror story. It was repeatedly adapted to the cinema and brought to theater stages.
And it's back in the spotlight with re-staged interpretations. But most people are still missing the most important question of the story:
Who really was the monster?
Victor Frankenstein, the arrogant scientist who wants to solve the secret of immortality, who feeds on power and loses himself in that power?
Or just trying to learn to be human, ostracized, left alone, always found wanting?
Because what Frankenstein created was not evil when it was first born.
He was as innocent as a baby.
He didn't know death. He didn't know hate. He didn't know why people were afraid of him. He just wanted to touch. He was watching people. He was learning to talk. He was trying to understand what love was.
Think of those unforgettable scenes in the movie.
The moments when he lived secretly next to a hut and watched people...
The scene where the blind old man approaches him without fear...
Because sometimes only the truly blind can see purity and goodness.
But the others made up their minds as soon as they saw him:
“The beast.”
Because he was not like them.
This is perhaps one of the oldest sins in human history:
Trying to stigmatize those who are not like you, rather than trying to understand them first.
Then to be afraid.
Then ostracize.
Then you want to destroy it.
Frankenstein's creature is constantly stoned throughout the movie. Chased. He was wounded. People took up arms wherever they saw him. He was the one they called a “monster”, even though they were the ones doing the real violence.
Isn't part of what is happening in politics today similar to this?
Think of the language that has been used against Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu for years.
Just as Frankenstein's creation was called a “monster”, for years he was called not like us and a “candidate who cannot win”.
And why?
Or is it because it is not like their language, their anger, their ambition?
Because this age is used to shouting.
He got used to the threat.
He got used to the politics of fear.
He has become alienated from those who remain silent, who speak calmly, who do not reach out to haram.
And sometimes, when one does not want to see the ugliness in oneself, one declares someone else a “monster”, a “monster”, a “loser”, an “Armenian”, a “Kurd”, an “Alevi”, a "traitor".
Perhaps Frankenstein's real monster was never the creature itself.
Maybe the real monster was the arrogance of Victor Frankenstein, who didn't know how to love.
Because Victor Frankenstein actually wanted to be a god. He wanted to defeat death, to control life, to create human beings. And the moment man thinks he is God, he starts to turn into a pharaoh, as we have seen throughout history.
Even today, some people think they are the absolute truth. They think they can decide who is good and who is bad. They judge who is “acceptable” and who is a “traitor”.
Then they put their own fears in front of society and call it “truth”.
But there was something else that stood out throughout the movie:
The creature they called the monster was still trying to learn about love, despite all the evil.
He was trying to learn humanity even from the people who threw stones at him.
Even at the end, he spoke the language of pain, not hate.
And maybe that's why the heaviest sentence of the story was the one that was never said:
What they called a monster turned out to be more human than they were.
Today, those who shout “traitor” everywhere should be asked the same question:
I wonder if there really is a traitor, who is it?
Or are they, like Frankenstein's town, afraid of those who are not like them and stoning their own darkness?
Because sometimes the thing one wants to kill the most is one's own reflection.
The darkest minds that have ruled the masses throughout history have done this. First they created an “other”. Then they pointed it out to the crowds. And people often chose to shout instead of thinking. Because the anger of the crowd was easier than facing one's own conscience.
That's exactly what Frankenstein was about.
They were the ones who stoned those who were not like them, who shot at them, who constantly hunted them. But it was they who were always afraid, victimized, threatened. The perpetrators of violence declared themselves victims.
So the hands that threw the stone, those who fired the first bullet, still thought they were innocent.
And maybe the main issue is still the same:
Was the monster really the other one?
Was it that lonely creature, innocent as a baby, just trying to learn to be human?
Or was the real monster the people who feed on their own darkness and try to hide their fear, hatred and lack of conscience by stoning others?