Politically incorrect smiles: Bali incident

Politically incorrect smiles: Bali incident

Ariel Heryanto, Sociologist, University of Melbourne, Australia

The Australian public is rightfully outraged by the interview
between Indonesia's Police Chief Da'i Bachtiar and Bali bombing
suspect Amrozi. At issue was the series of smiles, laughter, and
handshakes between them, and a few other attending law enforcers.
The whole event has been taken as a gross offense, incredibly
insensitive to the sufferings of the victims, and their families.

However, what most angry commentators, Australian and non-
Australian alike, have failed to understand is the extent to
which similar gestures, and smiling in particular, has been
embedded in social lives of most Indonesians with diverse
meanings. The same is true about many societies across Southeast
Asia.

This is neither to exonerate the crime against humanity of the
Bali bombing perpetrators, nor to excuse the police officers'
failure to understand the regrettable implication of the widely
reported interview. Rather, this is an alternative interpretation
of what is indisputably a blunder, underscoring the need for
better understanding of, and consideration for different
cultures, including their respective parochialism.

Instead of simply a failure to express sympathy for the
victims, the problematic interview has in fact reflected the
Indonesian law enforcers' failure to understand that there exist
sensibilities and ethical codes that are radically different from
those prevailing in contemporary Indonesia.

Unfortunately, the foreign media and analysts have not
understood any better the failure of these less than cosmopolitan
Indonesian state officials. The event has been misconstrued,
although with good reasons.

To the Australian public several sympathetic Australian
journalists and Indonesian commentators have offered explanations
about the disturbing scene. Most of them attribute it to
"cultural differences" between the two peoples, plus the
difficult circumstances under which the Indonesian police
operate.

Those giving cultural explanations correctly stressed that the
smiles did not necessarily imply delight, amusement, friendliness
between the suspect and the officers, nor antagonistic attitude
towards the victims of the Bali bombing. They "laughed", but they
did not "laugh at" anything or anyone as often incorrectly,
though understandably, understood in the Australian context.

I share the cultural explanations, but would take issue when
they are presented, as often the case in Australian media, with
additional rationalist reasoning by Indonesians and experts of
Indonesia alike. Such reasoning was provided in effect to show
the "objective rationality" behind the smiles by considering the
political contexts.

The smiles were interpreted as if they were a well calculated
gesture, a part of a larger strategy on the part of the suspect
and his captors to achieve political gains (for instance, for the
police to appear humane in public, and for the suspect to avoid
heavy sentencing).

Cultures have no objective reasoning outside themselves. I
believe the controversial smiles have been done unconsciously.
Most likely no calculation, clever or otherwise, was involved. No
real political circumstances seem relevant here. Those people
appeared to have smiled because they could not help it, because
that's the way they were brought up since childhood.

For the same reason, most ordinary members of the Indonesian
public did not notice the very same smiles, and took issues,
because these smiles appeared so insignificant. Significantly,
with the exception of The Jakarta Post, no Indonesian press has
picked up the interview as an issue. What several dailies
reported as newsworthy was the Australian outrage, not what had
provoked it.

As French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu said, "cultures are
those what goes without saying", as they have come without
questioning, or reasoning. They are like languages or accents. To
ask why Amrozi and the police should smile is almost like asking
why English speaking people always open an official letter with
the greeting "Dear", even if this is a letter of very serious
complaint or protest.

It is also comparable to the controversial 1998 pose of IMF
Executive Director Michel Camdessus. He stood straight, arms
folded, next to then president Soeharto who bowed down to the
table to sign a new reform package. Indonesians took offense of
the pose, despite their being impatient to see Soeharto step
down!

Smiles are built-in in many languages in Indonesia, just as
tenses or gender in European languages. Thousands of Australians
have enthusiastically learned to speak Bahasa Indonesia.

One common pitfall for them, as for most English native
speakers learning the language, is to pronounce words that start
with c-, j-, t-, or p-. One can only do it properly if one
spreads one's lips widely enough. In other words, one has to
smile as one speaks. Indonesians unconsciously and effortlessly
smile as they meet people, speak with others, or encounter
experiences that are neither funny, nor delightful.

For these reasons, many first-time visitors to Indonesia (or
Asia) have been misled to think that Indonesians are unusually
always happy, hospitable, or courteous people. Their smiles have
been taken more seriously than warranted. When these foreigners
told their impressions of, and to the same Indonesians
("Indonesians are so gentle, graceful, hospitable"), the latter
have often misunderstood the remarks, taking it more seriously
than necessary. Indonesians do not -- as they are taught not to
since childhood -- habitually express such complementary remarks,
or any other strong feelings, directly to strangers or new
acquaintances.

Likewise, Indonesians learn to express embarrassment, shame,
sorrow, sympathy, or affection in ways that are not necessarily
familiar to outsiders. One example has to do with death and
funeral. Several overseas observers have described the highly
elaborate and capital-intensive funerals in several ethnic groups
in Indonesia (e.g. Toraja, Balinese) with great amazement,
commenting that "they live in order to die".

Foreigners are often baffled when visiting urban middle class
Indonesian families. While conversing casually in the living
rooms, their Indonesian hosts grab family photo albums in the
room, and show a large number of pictures of the funeral of a
deceased member of the family, with no apparent remorse or sense
of loss.

Lest be misunderstood, cultural differences do not rigidly
follow the boundaries of nation-states. Neither do any of these
cultural differences remain unchanged. There are as profound
cultural differences across sub-national groups in Indonesia,
along gender, ethnic, religious, residential, and linguistic
lines as they are internationally. The same is true with inter-
cultural borrowings. Indonesian cultures, whatever these may
mean, are nothing but hybrids of diverse world and local
traditions, under constant change.

Despite these complexities, one can still recognize that the
smiles that Amrozi and the Indonesian law enforcers demonstrated
are so common among many Indonesians. Theirs in Denpasar may be
somewhat more excessive than usually observed in Indonesia. Such
smiles can mean different things within their immediate social
environment, some are more commendable than others. In any case,
they do not solely and unambiguously imply malice to the victims
of the Bali bombing, and obviously not to the Australians in
particular.

The Bali bombing is seriously deplorable. The excessive smiles
in the Nov. 13 interview are regrettable, for reasons suggested
above rather than those indicated in the Australian media and The
Jakarta Post.

The painful incident provides yet one more opportunity for
Indonesians to understand better other people's sensibility, and
for their friendly Australian neighbors to understand why
Indonesians' have not learned this any better. It would be a pity
if this opportunity is lost.