Finally, a further step to being human

Finally, a further step to being human

Ati Nurbaiti, Jakarta

No one in my family knew what to do about my aunt. She had
been subject to her husband's beatings for many years. Even the
children, when they had grown up, had cried out to her to get a
divorce. Then her husband, for some unknown reason, changed his
religion and it would have been easier for them to separate. But
she didn't seek a divorce. No one could really figure out why;
the tall, handsome woman was the breadwinner, the girls were now
adults, and her religion, Islam, clearly permits divorce under
such conditions.

Was the prospect of becoming a divorcee so terrifying compared
to the repeated physical and verbal abuse? It was not talked
about in the open and the couple just seemed to have gone their
separate ways.

Over the years the whispered stories of acquaintances with
similar stories would come up. No clear solution was heard of.

In the late 1980s, at the first proposal to set up a women's
crisis centers a female lawyer had remarked: "Indonesian women
wouldn't report abuse in the family. It would go against family
honor and their own."

This may explain the case of my aunt -- and that of
unfortunate women in high places. But then there were others who
did come to report their cases once they knew there was a place
to turn to.

Now, a milestone has been achieved; on Tuesday, the
legislature endorsed the bill on domestic violence. Never before
has there been state recognition, that domestic violence exists
and that it is a crime. At long last even rape within marriage is
now a crime: "Sexual violence" is defined in part as "forcing
sexual relations on someone within the household".

Never mind that legislators may have just followed the
politically correct trend of being "gender sensitive."

For the first time people in Indonesia are now told that no
one may use "violence in the home" whether it is physical,
sexual, or even "psychological". Likewise one may no longer
"neglect the household", with reference to not providing
adequately for the family.

The perpetrator of constant mental torment, for instance,
could receive four months imprisonment or a Rp 3 million fine. In
the case of death, the penalty for violence is 15 years
imprisonment or a Rp 45 million fine.

Recognition of the crime also means acknowledgement of state
responsibility in such actions: "Within 24 hours of being
informed of receiving a report of domestic violence police must
immediately provide temporary protection to the victim," the bill
says.

Thus a major obstacle is gone -- that a victim must be able to
provide evidence and a credible witness to the crime -- while
within the home the only ones would likely be the hysterical
spouse, silent child or servant apart from the perpetrator.

Most cases have been either withdrawn by the victims
themselves, or could not be taken to court due to insufficient
evidence. The National Commission for Violence against Women
reports that out of almost 6,000 cases of violence, about 46
percent involved domestic violence, but only 162 reached court.

Women activists are not entirely happy; given that only two of
10 acts of violence do not carry minimum penalties, they fear
judges could just hand down probation sentences.

The bill is a milestone nonetheless. Improvements can come
later on. The women are relieved that deliberations need not go
begin anew with the new term of legislators, with which arguments
about the sacral nature of marriage, the family and the
household, recycled all over again. In the haggling over this
bill, even women legislators were clinging to all arguments
against a bill that threatened to raise the divorce rate.

A law which spells out a crime that could even be carried out
by loved ones conveys a strong message of what is right and wrong
-- to parents, spouses and employers bent on "disciplinary
measures", to mothers chiding their whining daughters and
reminding them of the traditional and religious virtues of
patience in marriage, or to neighbors restraining themselves for
fear of being inquisitive and intrusive in private affairs.

There is a big gap, of course, between having such a law and
changing women like my aunt, and the clerics forever preaching
that a woman is assured her place in heaven just because she is
devote and submissive no matter what.

But with adequate information and education, younger men and
women would sooner or later take it for granted that in no nation
claiming to be democratic could anyone walk scot-free after
beating someone black and blue. That it is no less a cowardly
crime as the bombing of innocents.

The younger generation would no longer accept it as normal,
albeit unpleasant, when a fellow human is kicked around just
because she earns more than he does -- or just because the victim
is the most accessible, silent punching bag in the frustrating
rat race to wealth and power.

The writer is a staff writer for The Jakarta Post.