That morning, Jakarta looked as though it had been dusted with flour\nfrom a botched recipe. Cars had gone dull, bus-stop floors were dusty,\nand window panes held a thin grey layer. People looked up at the sky,\nsome searching for clouds, others searching for answers.<\/p>\n
On phone screens, the same images moved from one WhatsApp group to\nanother: layers of dust on vehicle surfaces, rooftops, main roads, and\nthe faces of residents beginning to don masks. The difference from\nordinary rain was that this time, what fell from the sky was ash.<\/p>\n
As is typical of unusual events, what came down was not only volcanic\nparticles but also a cascade of advice, warnings, clarifications,\ninstructions, short videos, comments, jokes, panic, and political\nposturing.<\/p>\n
This week, nearly every institution seemed to hold the same\nmicrophone. The Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Environment, the\nMinistry of Transport, the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics\nAgency (BMKG), the Geological Agency, the National Disaster Management\nAgency (BNPB), regional governments, doctors, experts, and netizens all\nspoke up in unison.<\/p>\n
I do not have statistics on the volume of their statements. But from\nthe public conversation accompanying them, one thing is clear enough:\nthe abundance of voices does not automatically produce clearer\nknowledge.<\/p>\n
The conversation about the ashfall from Mount Anak Krakatau reveals\nat least five tendencies in the public voice.<\/p>\n
First, the voice of direct experience from residents who saw the ash\nclinging to their gardens, vehicles, and public facilities. That\nexperience made a volcanic phenomenon in the Sunda Strait, which had\nonce felt distant, suddenly a matter of one\u2019s own front yard.<\/p>\n
Second, the voice of anxiety, marked among other things by increased\nsearches for and purchases of masks in various places. When something\npreviously only reported on screens begins to be sought in pharmacies\nand shops, the threat has shifted from information to a social\nexperience.<\/p>\n
Third, the practical voice of a public in need of concrete guidance.\nWhich masks are effective, how to clean homes and vehicles, whether\nchildren\u2019s activities should be restricted, and when one should seek\nmedical attention.<\/p>\n
In situations like this, what society needs above all is not\ntechnical terminology, but knowledge that can be immediately\napplied.<\/p>\n
Fourth, the sceptical voice, questioning the boundary between alarm\nover danger and actual danger. This kind of scepticism is not always\nbad. It is in fact necessary so that public warnings do not turn into\nthe inflation of threats.<\/p>\n
If every risk is portrayed as though it were a major catastrophe,\nsociety may gradually grow weary of warnings and come to regard them\nlike the constant hum of a running air conditioner.<\/p>\n
Fifth, the political voice. Posts about volcanic ash easily shift\nfrom questions of health and safety into debates about who cares most,\nwho is deemed to have failed, and who is considered more fit to\nlead.<\/p>\n
Social media indeed has a tendency to turn almost every public event\ninto a debate about perception.<\/p>\n
This is where social media acts as a mirror. A natural disaster\nenters as fact, then exits as perception. Ash becomes health, health\nbecomes policy, and policy can drift into political commodity\u2014even\nthough volcanoes never read survey results.<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/ash-falls-voices-scatter-1788764090", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }