RI should be no place for scourge of bipolarity

RI should be no place for scourge of bipolarity

By Amir Sidharta

JAKARTA (JP): The notion of multiculturalism became
tremendously trendy in the United States in the 1990s because
Middle Americans were long used to thinking bilaterally.

Issues to them had always evolved around simplistic opposing
polarities -- the Wild West was about cowboys and Indians, the
Civil War about a battle between the North and the South, and
Martin Luther King Jr, Malcolm X and Rodney King about Black
versus White. Even issues about general elections centered on
Democrats and Republicans.

In terms of ethnic issues, whenever more than two ethnic
groups emerged, the issue would somehow be interpreted in a
bipolar way. Complexities were avoided and simplified into
bipolarities, so much easier to handle and manipulate. But 500
years after Columbus' discovery of America, in an age of
globalization of information, it was no longer possible to
simplify the complexities of culture, ushering in the concept of
multiculturalism.

Indonesia, with its many different ethnic groups and
languages, has used Bhinneka Tunggal Ika (Unity in Diversity) as
its national motto almost from the beginning of its founding, and
its people certainly do not need to be introduced to
multiculturalism.

But facts show the New Order government over and over again
pitted one group against another through bipolar means. Its main
game, which it seemed to have learned from Indonesia's colonial
past, was to set the privileged against the disenfranchised, or
vice versa. By maintaining bipolarity in the center stage, the
government managed to stay clear of the political arena and was
able to continue to hold complete control of the political
situation.

From the very beginning of the regime, Indonesians were
steered to think bipolarly. First, it was the New Order versus
the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). Then, it came to an issue
of the center versus periphery. The government claimed that the
periphery was unsafe due to the existence of many dangerous
security disturbance groups (GPK), particularly in Aceh, Lampung,
Irian Jaya and East Timor. It was tantamount to them saying the
civilized center was endangered by savages of the periphery.

Rioting and mass rapes last May and a series of previous
incidents of violence indicate the New Order government clearly
banked upon the pribumi (indigenous) versus non-pribumi
(nonindigenous) and Islam versus Christian bipolarities. Whether
it is a result of thinking bipolarly throughout the New Order
regime, or more likely done intentionally to uphold thinking
bipolarly, many discussions centered on the rioting and mass
rapes have dealt with the issue in bipolar terms.

Most recently, on Aug. 2, Republika published an article
written by Sri Muryono of Antara, titled Is It True That Mass
Rapes Occurred? on its front page. The writer made it seem as if
the reports about the rapes, most of which were regarded as
unverifiable, were spread systematically to discredit Indonesia.

Instead of looking at the reports about the rapes as a
humanitarian matter which needed to be approached sensitively, he
chose to politicize the issue and further strand Indonesians in
bipolarity, setting Chinese-Indonesians against Moslems.

He also mentioned the Indonesia Committee for the Solidarity
of Islam's (KISDI) complaint to Minister of Information Muhammad
Yunus against Jakarta-Jakarta's publication of rape victim
Vivian's testimony, which was spread through the Internet.

In her account, she mentioned her rapists exclaimed Islamic
praises. Most interesting is that KISDI only filed its complaint
when the story appeared in Jakarta-Jakarta, a magazine owned by
the Catholic-labeled Kompas-Gramedia group, but did not do the
same when other magazines published Vivian's story.

There is little doubt that while they were unable to do so
previously, KISDI was banking this time on creating an Islam-
versus-Catholic issue out of the whole thing.

There is no verification of Vivian's heartwrenching story, and
publishers should not have used it. But more disturbing is that
Muryono doubted the reports of Ita Nadia and her Tim Relawan
(Team of Volunteers), who had been working so hard for two and a
half months with the rape victims.

On July 30, Medan's Waspada also published an article picked
up from Antara, titled The Reports of Mass Rape with Hundreds of
Victims are Illogical. Muryono's article seems to be an
elaboration on this piece.

But Republika version was enriched with quotations from
Megawati Soekarnoputri, which seemed to suggest that she also
doubted the rapes happened because of the seeming indifference of
one victim when visited by police.

On the one hand, this suggests Waspada's reluctance in
complicating matters with Megawati, especially since her camp of
the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) is gaining tremendous
political strength in Medan.

On the other, Muryono's article in Republika seems to be an
attempt to discredit Megawati and to alienate her from her
growing women and Chinese-Indonesian supporters, fomenting
bipolarization among them as well.

In fact, according to a friend who attended Megawati's dialog
from which the quotation was taken, Megawati actually intended to
point out it was hard for rape victims to speak out and therefore
it was unnecessary to demand they do so.

According to my friend's account, Megawati also asserted that
the occurrence of systematic rapes must be admitted, disclosed
and handled comprehensively, without focusing on the issue of
testimony of victims, which would only exacerbate their pain.

One of Republika's editors, Nasir Tamara, explained that Sri
Muryono's article did not necessarily reflect the views of the
paper. He said the publication merely wanted to provide room for
the voicing of various opinions. Although Republika is known to
be the newspaper of the Association of Indonesian Moslem
Intellectuals (ICMI), and its general manager, Parni Hadi, has
just been appointed director of Antara, Nasir's word on this
matter can be understood.

Inclusivity is indeed an important aspect of multiculturalism.
In a country where there has been little freedom for expression,
the opportunity for voicing of opinions is especially necessary.
It is decidedly satisfying that several newspapers are starting
to provide this forum.

However, this opportunity should be approached rationally and
intellectually. Therefore, the kind of inclusivity should not
include simplistic articles trapped in bipolarity, like Sri
Muryono's piece and that of Masli Arman in this publication
recently.

From now on, Indonesians should avoid thinking in bipolarity,
let alone advocating bipolar thoughts, and start to deal with the
complexities of multicultural coexistence.

After all, there may well be a few lessons we can learn from
the concept known as multiculturalism.

The writer is a curator of the museum of Pelita Harapan
University in Lippo Karawaci, west of Jakarta.