By Jerome Bastion - Agence France-Presse

ISTANBUL - Some 70,000 people log on daily to itiraf.com (confession.com in English), pouring out their hearts or vicariously sharing in the turmoils of life on a website which holds up a mirror to Turkish society.

Many confessions touch on love and sex, matters that are otherwise difficult to discuss openly in a male-dominated society where religion and traditional values hold sway. The website, set up by Ersan Ozer, a former journalist and television producer, is now one of the most visited in the country.

Women, fewer than 20 percent of whom are regular Internet-users, are as numerous as men when it comes to connecting to this site, according to Ozer.

Using only nicknames, people write in “speaking of love, hate, joy, sadness, regret, everything that makes up life,” says Ozer, who never expected the success that has made his website a household name.

Some confessions lead to heated debates. The story of one woman who recounted how her husband broke his foot kicking her sparked a deluge of mail. It encouraged hundreds of others to talk about domestic violence, a subject that remains otherwise taboo in a country where girls are sometimes married off at a young age against their will and where “honor killings” still occur. Surveys suggest that 58 to 71 percent of women in Turkey experience violence at home.

Sociologist Ali Ergur from Galatasaray University says the stories shared reflect an image of “a society which has long been oppressed socially and culturally by the hold of family and community.” Today, society “is in transition and has trouble coping with new problems that stem from people moving to cities in ever-greater numbers and changes in lifestyle,” says Ergur.

Stories often highlight the difficulties of living in a country that straddles East and West.

“He left me recently because I was no longer a virgin. I can’t understand the men of this country — either you’re a virgin and not fit for company or you’re not and you’re even less fit for company” wrote one 37-year-old woman from Istanbul.

Ozer, who receives some 1,000 messages a day and selects about 40 for his electronic agony column, says he’s “learned a lot about the country, fellow citizens and especially about women.” “Most stories are probably true, but veracity isn’t the most important thing. What counts is the fact this forum allows people to share intimate experiences in a spirit of fellowship,” however virtual, Ozer says.