“Castration law has passed,” read a news title among the many seemingly surreal headlines in the post–coup attempt Turkey. The title was literal, and more. During the coup attempt and its aftermath, the law of the father was destabilized and reasserted in short order, and the symbolic threat of castration was unexpectedly redistributed. An exceptionally mighty president hid for his life for hours on a military coup night to reappear in early morning stronger on his way to a presidential system. The government’s rule seemed so fragile one day and so absolute the next. It was during this time that a chemical castration regulation was hastily passed as a “treatment/punishment” for sex offenders (Asharq Al-Awsat 2016).
Feminist and queer activists have tirelessly cultivated profeminist sensibilities against sexual violence and pushed back against the violent project of masculinist restoration (Kandiyoti 2013) and the consolidation of a religiously accentuated neoconservative...
