Hysteria: A fruit of repression

Hysteria: A fruit of repression

By Rahayu Ratnaningsih

JAKARTA (JP): Several recent incidents in this country have
made me ponder; what's happening to our people and society?
What's got into the population that makes them so vulnerable to
the syndrome of collective hysteria which serves no purpose
whatsoever?

It's still fresh in our memories how they descended on
supermarkets to buy large quantities basic ingredients such as
milk, cooking oil and rice leaving many shelves empty for weeks.
Then they rushed the ATMs and withdrew their money from certain
rumor-plagued banks. Millions of them have been traditionally
rushing train or bus stations every year on the Idul Fitri
Holiday to go back to their villages leaving Jakarta a ghost town
for a week or so.

The most recent outbreak was when the government, "out of the
blue", on a clear scorching day, announced the disproportionate
hike in fuel prices. It shouldn't have been very hard to predict
what effect that announcement would have on the people who have
been bled dry for months in an attempt to survive the savage
economic crisis.

In circumstances where public confidence toward their system
of governance and the figures behind it, has worn awfully thin,
our people, who are traditionally easy to ignite with rumors,
either unfounded or "semi-official", descended in droves on every
available gas station. Mile-long queues of public or private
vehicles decorated every road in Jakarta.

How our people can succumb to this non-sequitur? It may be
understandable that in these hard times saving 15,000 or 20,000
for fuel is really significant, especially for public
transportation drivers, but is it not clear that the costs of the
attempt to save money come close to exceeding the saving itself?
It is very simple logic, really, but how our people could miss it
is beyond my comprehension.

Insisting on buying the fuel that day might have saved you
15,000 (let's say 30 liters x 1200 = 36,000, minus 21,000 old
price of the same amount of premium gasoline, equal Rp 15,000).
Unless they had with them a large container, that's all they
could save maximum in one day before the increase.

However, the struggle for that gain is painful and involves
sitting in gas guzzling traffic jams for ours on end. So apart
from the long line to the petrol pump that takes at least one
hour, they also had to face the consequences of the collective
frenzy; a total block of mobility for at least another two, three
or four hours, something that significantly depletes the coveted
fuel they had just agonized themselves over.

Frankly, then, it's quite probable that by the time they reach
home that afternoon they had spent an equal amount of money to
what they saved, and expended a great deal of time, energy and
frustration in to the bargain. For public transport drivers, this
is compounded by the fact that they had to abandon their
passengers and spend more time in the traffic, thereby receiving
less income that day. So, what saving did they make?

It's incredible how counter-productive this mass hysteria is.
When people rush the banks in fear of their bankruptcy, their
very act could cause this bankruptcy, which in calmer conditions
would be unthinkable. Even the soundest bank can be broken when
it's rushed due to baseless rumors. The same applies to the fear
of price increases that made people hoard foodstuffs; the act
itself could be construed as the main source of price rises that
would otherwise have been minimized. And now, the fuel rush!

It's clear that our people are now paying the costs for the
inefficient and ineffective governance over the last 30 years.
However, it's also clear that, ultimately, in every society, the
people deserve the government they have. We deserve the
government we have. We deserve the kinds of high ranking
officials who say one thing one day and withdraw or rephrase it
the next day.

The same ones who withdraw a decree on the very day it's meant
to be implemented; the ones who repeatedly propagate
constitutionalism and Pancasila self-servingly and selectively;
who regularly come up with unintelligent, sometimes laughable
remarks, unaware that our people are no longer a bunch of
ignoramuses. It is true though there are still many
underprivileged who will temporarily worship their leaders for
feeding them a free lunch for two weeks. Many say that our
current cabinet minister are funnier than Srimulat, our funniest
group of comedians.

Our students shall inherit this failure in the years to come
when they leave university. They'll have to face the uncertain
future before their eyes. Are they going to get a decent job or
will they just end up being another statistic on the list of our
educated unemployed? More urgent than that, are they going to
have public vehicles take them to and from school for Rp 100? It
was a tough daily struggle for them before the bus fares hike
since few public vehicles drivers would let them ride in or even
on their vehicles.

Yet when they voice their anxiety, they're told what a
cardinal sin they've committed by being involved in "practical
politics" when they're main duty is studying. We, in fact, should
question the effectiveness of our education system if our
students remain silent amid the rampant injustice, inequality,
violations and mismanagement of the country they try to study in.

Today more and more people are probably fed up with being
apolitical or politically correct. Political correctness has
brought about stagnation among our people. One simply can't
expect a country to be successfully run with a political literate
or a propaganda fed people. So yes, even a priest needs to be
"political" and one assumes that was what led Father Sandyawan to
do what he did, and rightly so.

Can anyone really be completely apolitical? It very much
depends on how politics is defined. Is talking about and fighting
for social justice being political? Is speaking up against gross
violations of human rights in society a manifestation of
political mindedness? I think so, however at least we can
distinguish being political in a bureaucratic sense and
"political" in an altruistic sense.

No concerned citizen can be absolutely free from being
"political". Men are political animals by nature. They have to
strive for their political rights at all times. It is, hence,
quite unacceptable for our ministers to blast the students or
Romo Sandyawan as being inappropriately political, in accordance
with their "duties and responsibilities", backgrounds or "job
descriptions".

This is what we have as a nation: a people who are politically
ill-empowered due to decades of systematic conditioning and
repression, who resort to riots, rushes and panic instead of
using their persuasive power and institution, which
understandably have long been sedated, to solve their problems,
anxieties and dissatisfaction. There are only two options:
changing or dying.