Beg, steal or borrow? Looting is all relative<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): At the risk of sounding archly melodramatic, a
\ncommon affliction in the media these days, I count myself among
\nthose Jakarta residents who will never forget the past May 14.<\/p>\n
But then who possibly could? The day (it was sunny when I
\nwalked out the door) started out fine enough. I was at the office
\nby 8:30 a.m. and was preparing to go out briefly a couple of
\nhours later for lunch when rumblings of something amiss started.<\/p>\n
At first, I thought it was just the proverbial rumor mill, in
\nfull swing in recent months. But ominous spirals of black smoke
\nfrom the west of the city silenced my doubts. The \"mob\" was no
\nphantom of our imaginations; soon the office had closed its
\ngates, moved a conspicuously large TV set from the glass-fronted
\nlobby and rolled out its fire hoses.<\/p>\n
There was an eerie silence as we listened to the radio reports
\n(medals for distinguished public service should be given to the
\npeople at Sonora and Maria Ressa of CNN) as though anxiously
\nawaiting the inevitable advancement of a hurricane.<\/p>\n
As it turned out, we were not in its eye. Not so lucky was the
\ndepartment store and row of small shops just 200 meters down the
\nstreet. After the vandals had finished their work, people emerged
\nlike a swarm of locusts to pick the buildings clean of everything
\nand anything they could get their hands on and lug them back to
\ntheir homes. Then they set the buildings on fire.<\/p>\n
To me, watching from my safe perch in the office, the festive
\natmosphere accompanying the mayhem was like something from a
\ngrotesque Bosch painting or Fellini movie. Children hauled TV
\nsets, men almost broke their backs trying to carry refrigerators
\nand people suddenly had whole new wardrobes, even if the shoes
\nthey grabbed were different brands and sizes.<\/p>\n
Cordoned off in my ivory tower, I felt sick to my stomach. I
\ncan say honestly that I did not fear for my personal safety, but
\ninstead the impending loss of my livelihood and the creature
\ncomforts I have come to enjoy.<\/p>\n
Like a second Lebaran, one colleague said of the stream of
\npeople making their way along the street with their booty. A
\nreporter who had been in the thick of things told me in hushed
\ntones that the looters \"had faces just like us. They weren't
\nmonsters\".<\/p>\n
Speak for yourself, I thought, as I spent a sleepless night
\nemotionally masticating all that had happened and why. For me, an
\nanthropology major, the incident sent all my assumptions about
\npeople and the trumpeted \"social contract\" flying out the window.<\/p>\n
It continued into the next day, even after I angrily changed
\nthe TV channel after some fleeing expatriate talked about her
\nthree cars in the garage and how they could have been burned.
\nBloody insensitive woman, I thought, most Indonesians cannot even
\nafford one vehicle.<\/p>\n
When I got a caption of a charred body, probably that of a
\nlooter, removed from one of the gutted shopping plazas, I found
\nit extremely difficult to sympathize.<\/p>\n
I walked around for a couple of days with a self-righteous
\nsneer on my face, wondering if everyone who passed was enjoying
\ntheir ill-gotten gains. The presence of three Army trucks at the
\nend of the street did much to assuage my fears.<\/p>\n
It was then that I began to see the irony of it all. While my
\ninsular middle-class sensibility rejoiced at the sight of
\nsoldiers in combat uniform to keep the riffraff at bay, I had not
\nblinked an eyelid as \"looting\" on a much grander scale went on
\nduring the past few years.<\/p>\n
It was all so pat back then. The country's riches may have
\nbeen raped and pillaged, its banking system used for private
\nlargess, but it did not affect me if it was not in my own
\nbackyard. As long as all the terrible excesses, the greed and
\ninsincere protestations to upholding democracy had no direct
\neffect on my immediate life, it was quite all right, thank you.<\/p>\n
But, of course, what goes around, comes around, and our lives
\ncan never be detached from the injustices surrounding us, even if
\nwe build big walls and guard ourselves with private armies.<\/p>\n
This is a simple but shocking truth that the most grasping,
\nheinous looters of all may well be confronting today.<\/p>\n
-- Bruce Emond<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/beg-steal-or-borrow-looting-is-all-relative-1447893297", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }