Un-happily ever after

There are many forms of discrimination. Some inherent due to ignorance, others proliferated by economic envy. Then there are those resulting from sheer bigotry.

Perhaps the worst kind of prejudice is one that is propagated by the state, and mandated through unjust laws that perpetuate the legitimization of wrongful biases.

Indonesia's archaic Citizenship Law is one flagrant example of how a prejudicial mind set is preserved by condoning preferential treatment of one citizen over the other.

Law No. 6/1958 stipulates that an Indonesia woman who marries a foreigner cannot sponsor stay permits for her spouse or their children. Neither can she automatically claim citizenship for her children from that marriage, since they are, by these laws, required to only adopt the citizenship of their non-Indonesian father.

At the heart of these principles is a chauvinistic bias, which refuses to accord women the same rights as an Indonesian man who marries a non-Indonesian woman.

This is just one example of the many debilitating laws that propagate sexism and prejudice in this country.

When confronted, most everyone agrees about the need for change. But in practice, there is a clear lack of political will to make the necessary amendments.

Issues relating to citizenship as a result of marriage are just the tip of the iceberg. The right of citizenship for 'non- indigenous' Indonesians (e.g. Chinese-Indonesians) often remain complicated despite presidents making declarations and issuing decrees prohibiting discriminatory treatment.

The bureaucracy seems to delight in complicating administrative procedures. Reports suggest that permits from about a dozen institutions -- the community unit (RT), the neighborhood unit (RW), the subdistrict office, the district office, the municipality office, the gubernatorial office, the subdistrict police, the district police, the city/provincial police, the prosecutor's office, the district court and finally the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights -- are involved in the process of issuing a citizenship certificate before it can be signed by the president.

Eventually these "procedures" appear to be nothing more than an extortion scam for bureaucrats to exact money.

Under the guise of security, the spirit of these regulations treat those who want citizenship as "potential traitors" rather than those who desire to dedicate their life to living in this country.

We understand that regulations are necessary, and conditions are required. But we cannot accept laws that are based on gender bias and simply are in place to line the pockets of immigration officers.

An Indonesian woman must be equal in rights and privileges as those of a man. That privilege should also be extended, based on rational considerations, especially to her children who have a right to seek Indonesian citizenship.

Several of the laws relating to this issue were drafted in an era of xenophobia fueled by cold war rivalries. In this ever- shrinking world, mixed marriages will become more common. Hence the spirit of these regulations should be one of facilitation, not complication; inclusion, not exclusion.

We should modernize our narrow perceptions of an Indonesia beyond fatuous notions of skin color or blood lines. If a person from Sumatra can acclimatize and be accepted into the subtleties of Yogyakarta (Javanese) culture, for example, so too can a foreign resident, who is married to an Indonesian, become a good Indonesian.

It is ironic that while the greatest emotion God gave his people -- love -- can unite couples from different races, religions and nations, there are still people here who seek to tear them apart using narrow-mindedness and legal semantics.