It’s interesting watching Oprah Winfrey’s Show few sessions ago that discussed how women especially teenagers were leaded systematically to believe that their identity was defined by what they saw on TV, films, videos, magazines etc. It’s part of huge pop culture industries that designed the identity of its consumers. It’s a culture that is dominated by male and sadly women are merely the object or the victims of the show. Unfortunately, women themselves begin to collaborate to justify the images of what a woman should be, or should act, dress or should say. It’s a pop culture that makes billions of dollars merely by exploiting women sexuality. Nudity, sexual exposure and gestures become the core attraction of the gigantic Hollywood industries that brought a domino effect around the world. It shaped the defined identity of women around the world.
Most of music videos or images in the showbiz industries displayed vivid pornography and free sex under disguise of arts. Shaking of butt, exposing and revealing parts of bodies, sexual activities etc…It’s repeated over and over again that it became acceptable images. Women were exploited willingly without protest and it became a devil circle that had no end. It conveyed message that to do what those images shown was cool. In fact to get accepted by the male world you have to imitate such acts because women in the showbiz of pop culture did such things. It’s an ordinary thing to get your sexuality revealed… you are sexy if you have a certain size boost, hip, waist etc…you are sexy if you wear dresses that expose your parts of sexuality…you are sexy if you look like those Hollywood stars… and the reason is…because men like it…Women were victimized and commercialized. It was done for a very long time that they were unaware being enslaved in the male dominated world. Women in the showbiz business were the role model for millions of its viewers all around the world so women became oppress the other women and the devil circle was complete. There’s no end of this as long as women oppress each other. Therefore women got lost and started to believe that their identity was defined by those images of pop culture in which mostly displayed women as the role model. It’s amazing how big the culture had impact of the way women see themselves and the standard of morality in the US. And it became an issue that arouse concern in the country lately…pornography and sex addiction that started to crumble families life.
Globalization
Globalization has spread all over the world. There are almost no boundaries between countries in this era of information and technology. Technology has created information without boundaries. You can search any information you want via Internet without ever leaving your desk. All information you need, can be instantly delivered in your desktop. Technology has accelerated globalization up to the level that no one has imagined before. Globalization combined with technology has created a world without boundaries.
Consequently, the pop culture of the western world especially the pop culture of the US (as the US is the barometer of pop culture in the western world) has easily reached Indonesia. Despite renowned for its eastern culture, Indonesia has gradually absorbs the culture to a level that no one has ever imagined before. It moves so fast and quick. What is considered taboo by our culture is now becoming a permissive one. Sex and pornography were once something that’s taboo to talk about or to get revealed in public. Now, it’s like a plague. It’s like an epidemic disease that this country has to cope with, sometimes in despair. It got worse particularly when the reformation took place in 1998. In the name of freedom of the press, news and Medias grew like mushrooms during rainy season. In the name of democracy, these Medias claimed that they had freedom to expose any content of news including pornography either explicitly or implicitly. The disaster became clearer when most of these Medias could be categorized as ‘garbage’ Medias, which exploited merely women sexuality and violence. Playboy Indonesian version was one of the examples. It’s definitely a magazine adopted from the US where in its motherland the magazine was only read by adult and not sold freely on the streets. On the other hand, in Indonesia this magazine was freely sold on the streets and no authority could control this. Even children under the age of 17 could buy this magazine easily as long as they had money. Not to mention the mushrooming garbage Medias that displayed pornographic images in their cover and contents that were piling on the streets. Hijacked porn videos were publicly sold and thousands even millions of people watched them.
The worst was the impact of TV on the mentality of young generation in this country. It only strengthened consumerism, violence and pornography. Among the many shows or TV serials, there were only few that really portrayed good role model. Even the religious TV series were vulgarly displayed violence and pornography. It’s nothing but pop culture that was packed in religious title. “Jangan Panggil Aku Anak Kecil” was an odd strange TV series. It clearly adopted western culture/pop culture without screening. The story and the dialogues weren’t Indonesian at all. It’s like living in the middle of nowhere seeing the serial. Artist mostly women were dressed in minimal clothing, revealing their body, exposing sexuality act …arguing that it’s part of the show…that the producers liked it…the audience liked it when the artists were so sexy and hot….hello…don’t they realize that you (women) were victimized and commercialized by showbiz industries which was in fact dominated by male world. So the core attraction of showbiz business was to give male ‘pleasure’. And this has conveyed to its female viewers a message that it’s what a women should be…sexy …hot…fashionable…and act stupid sometimes…that it’s ok and normal to expose your sexuality…it’s our freedom…
The breathtaking phenomenon among artists and politicians was the free sex. How many had been caught having sex outside of wedlock. Even some were intentionally recorded their sexual activity on camera that finally got leak and widely spread in public. Some artists were even start to proclaim their living together with their spouses without marriage. Some even got pregnant before married. It’s such a sad phenomenon. They played as role models for their viewers. But in the name of personal freedom, they adopted culture that was clearly against eastern and religious values. No religion permits free sex… and now they tried to defy the laws of God…The Devine…This country has been absorbing permissive culture.
Women posed in magazines were even worse. They were willing to get undress to heighten the artistic scene in the naughty media. Some were even willing to get naked for the sake of art. Remember the nudity case of Azhari sisters, Sophia Latjuba, etc. They claimed it’s for artistic reason. It’s what the audience wanted. It’s part of the art. Besides, it’s my body…I have freedom over my body….Art was a world of its own. Art was not meant to get connected with moral or religiosity standard. It’s an autonomy world. Oh…come on…which art…whose definition…art is part of human culture. It’s an expression in the form of art…but the basic core of its existence was to serve humanity. Mankind creates it and certainly it’s not a world of its own. It has to follow rules created by man as well for sake of human benefit. After all, freedom has limit… others’ rights and freedom were the limit…So it’s stupid that nakedness in artistic activities was not the same thing with nakedness in the porn magazines. Naked is naked…it’s one similar thing…artistic or not…it exploited women sexuality…the difference lied only in the categorization of its viewers…nakedness in porn magazines was mostly connected with naughty male –female viewers with shallow brains and burning passion. While the latter was assumed connected with viewers with wit and artistic intuition and controlled passion…what a crap…naked is naked…porn or not…all had given advantage to one…male world…
Women who’s willing to pose naked was already selling their soul…some did it for money…others did it for pleasure only or for searching something new, something challenging…borrowing from the Oprah’s, women who did it was carving a hole in their soul. And that’s true…the consequences was massive towards their female sisters…they had unconsciously given the wrong message to the world about women. They were unconsciously led to create such fallacy because the male world had designed it. All for the pleasure of male…male and female that should exist in harmony and synergize, now become enslaving one sex….what’s wrong then? Where does it begin? Where does it end? It’s a devil circle…hard to break as long as women were marginalized …as long as women still enslaved their other fellow women…
The Weak Law Enforcement
Are there any regulations that regulate this issue? Surely there is. In fact there had been several laws passed to regulate this issue. Again, the problem lies in the enforcement of the law itself. The Ministry that issues the license of Medias should be the first place to control the irresponsible Medias. Yet it failed to perform its duties. Many Medias that got license for publication disabused the license. They covered pornographic images which were clearly forbidden. Strangely, there’s not enough action to stop this. There’s neither suspension nor an annulment of license for those naughty Medias. They kept continuing their publication without any punishment at all. Even Playboy still existed.
The police department that has authority to enact the law was powerless either. Sometimes the chief police deployed personnels to sweep bad magazines and news on the streets and stores such as in Glodok to make pornography raid. It didn’t work. It stopped at the time of raid but when it’s over, those bad guys loose on the streets again. Again it’s a devil circle. And the TV Medias that was clearly transgressed the rules about pornography and violence was free from punishment. TV has been acknowledged widely had a great impact on society because it could reach almost all viewers of any social status. It could be imagined that if those audience were constantly bombarded by pornography and violence images every single day, then the impact would massive. This country has already suffered from it…teenagers were proud to have recorded their sexual activities, teenagers raped children or other teenagers to satisfy their burning lust after watching porn videos, women wore less material for clothing that could arouse sexual abuse, etc. Who suffered the most from this situation was certainly women. Women had to pay a great price from what they were designed to do in this male dominated world.
What We Can Do
We can not rely solely on the country or the government to overcome this problem. Each citizen has responsibility to solve the problem. The entering of degrading pop culture cannot be stopped in the globalization era like this. It’s impossible to do. What we can do is to strengthen our barriers…fortify ourselves with strong and good values from our society and religion.
Women who are mothers should carefully watch over their children. Making intense discussion about what’s going on in their world…simply asking them to start to talk about what’s right what’s wrong in their perception…instilling the values about right and wrong…and most important fortify the children with strong religious values. All cannot be succeed without example. Be a role model for your children. Teach them by example. This is something we all have to start to care about.
Women must from now on realize that it’s not the Medias, which define our identity. She herself must define herself…. Don’t let yourself get lost by the dictation of the degrading pop culture. There’s so much you could do without surrender yourself to garbage activities…It’s not cool at all exposing your bodies … Be who you are …and say no to pornography and drugs…because it’s ‘crack morphine’ that could destroy your life.
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