"Perhaps the word humans need to use most in this century is 'No!'"

We live in an era where enforced positivity is in vogue, and popular trends are blindly accepted. But in today’s world, following the crowd is not always the right path. Our rapid forgetting of ancient truths and our willingness to be rendered insignificant play a major role in this modern strangeness.

In One Must Be Able to Say ‘No!’, one of Turkey’s most original intellectuals, Alev Alatlı, draws a map of our times marked with many necessary refusals. While witnessing one's age is a moral duty, Alatlı critiques how many intellectuals chase ready-made Western agendas instead of questioning them.

This collection of essays reveals the high cost of mindlessly emulating global trends. It argues that erasing one's selfhood to "survive" endless reforms is nothing short of a contemporary inquisition. With clear, critical, and unwavering resolve, Alatlı opens a new window in our minds, showing that saying "Yes" to everything just to appear pleasant is, in fact, the least pleasant choice of all.