Smear campaigns and hoaxes Khairil Azhar  ;   A school consultant at the Sukma Foundation, Jakarta

JAKARTA POST,  02 Juni 2014

                                                

                                                                                         

                                                      

However extreme it might be, we must sometimes admit that the old adage, homo homini lupus (man is a wolf to his fellow man), is applicable. No more so than when we witness the heated political atmosphere amid the presidential election campaign. In a smear campaign, people intentionally set out to ensnare their political opponents. While some may argue that such behavior is to be expected, what we are seeing in the current political arena is excessive and the heat is becoming alarming. Moreover, both in print and broadcast media, politicians and pundits relentlessly compete with one another. Despite their blaming perceived culprits, they unconsciously keep fueling the fire with unnecessary comments along with their not-so-impartial analysis. And certainly spice is added by sensationalist media outlets following such “hoaxes”. On the other hand, what is even more worrying is how these political hoaxes circulate in social media. Our friends — both old and new on, say, Facebook — keep sending us information that goes against our sound minds. They often confidently tell us how one of the candidates is actually not a Muslim or that he is fighting for a different religious sect or ethnic group. Merely copying and pasting the news from an untrustworthy source, they take it as the truth and propagate it to everyone they know. Taking a closer look at what is going on, we acknowledge that there is a problem of what might be called “intellectual laziness”; these people may actually be well-educated and possess an adequate IQ, but they lack a rigorous approach in terms of social responsibility, which impacts their logic and reasoning. As the hoaxes mainly deal with religious and ethnic issues, the intellectual laziness first relates to how democracy is comprehended. In this democratically transitioning country, the acceptance of diversity is still a knotty issue: “I do what I want, while thinking of others is another business”. We can also see that even the leaders — despite perhaps having sufficient knowledge on sophisticated political theories — still have difficulty differentiating between what is democratically (or ethically) acceptable and unacceptable. In this sense, most of them are potential hopefuls of founding Indonesian versions of the Ku Klux Klan or Boko Haram. Second, in what some may call a phenomenon of an underdeveloped or developing country, education has so far played a minor role in building shared thinking and attitudes. We have material provided in school textbooks and on test papers but it is intended to be memorized rather than critically assessed and put into practice. In addition, in classrooms where many of the teachers are themselves insufficiently equipped with reasoning skills, it is impossible to expect them to be impartial and not to indoctrinate their students. Most teachers and students are, therefore, likely to still be intellectually illiterate in politics. Third, with our current political system, we can see puzzling individual and small group political mobility. As pollsters and previous elections clearly show, Indonesian politics is recognized for its disillusioned electorate and huge floating mass. An individual or a social group can easily swing from one choice to another and become psychologically volatile. Disappointments impulsively come and go and as there is always a different choice, a new hope but in a month or two, it disappears as the choice is proved to have been wrong. Here and there, sound minds are often subjugated by sudden enthusiasm, opinionated religious teachings, ethnic prejudices or cults. Hate speech at a religious service is enough to make an individual or a group of people think differently. Considering, however, that prejudice still plays an essential part in everyday life, most people are easily persuaded to do detrimental things. So, what can we do? In the short term, with less than two months remaining in the presidential campaign, besides hoping that both candidates and their campaign team’s set an example that they are not intellectually lazy, “the war” being waged in mass and social media must be conducted wisely by all concerned. It is not so hard to offer positive comments over a morning coffee or afternoon tea or during other informal gatherings. Moreover, a few constructive comments on Facebook or Twitter would be very welcome. As there are also opportunities in public meetings with the candidates, they must be warned that general attitudes will be decisive in winning votes, and not give in to some emotional posturing to stir up potentially dangerous sentimentalities. A smear campaign may appear to be an effective shortcut, but politics has its own logic: As you plant, so shall you reap. In the long term, as a nation, we have arrived at a situation where we seek any excuse to keep it up. However, all ideas and practice will mean nothing if mandated governance lacks public control, which will depend on how caring and intellectual people are. Therefore, as the quality of people’s intellectual abilities will decide much, improvements to education with an acceptance of diversity as its cornerstone is a very possible outcome. ●