Pray It Loud!

pray links to original article

(Hürriyet Newspaper, 8 May 2012)

Dr. Nazan Aydın, head of the psychiatry faculty at Erzurum
Atatürk University and chief of the Erzurum office of the
Turkey Psychiatry Association, had a measurement made
of the high-volume call-to-prayer announcement coming from
a mosque near her home. It turned out that the measurement
made at Hacı Selim Efendi Mosque showed the call-to-prayer
level to be 104 decibels, whereas the legal limit is 65 decibels.

Prof. Dr. Aydın pointed out that this noise level is considered
'harmful', according to paragraphs 182 and 184 of the Environ-
ment Law, and 'dangerous', based on World Health Organization
and European Union values. Prof. Dr. Aydın noted that when
mosque officials were warned about this they told her to move
her house and even threatened her, so she filed a criminal
complaint.

Public Prosecutor Yusuf Eraslan investigated Dr. Aydın's
complaint and concluded that 'it is not possible to
characterize the call-to-prayer as noise.' Eraslan decided that
there were no grounds to pursue a case. Commenting on the
decision, Dr. Aydın said that 'excessive noise is harmful
to health and especially to mental health. We're not against
the call-to-prayer, we're just against irritating excessive
noise.'