regarding this incident, Jakarta government try to reform the public transport system. at the same time, the Governor of Jakarta made remarks about the rape cases as follows :
"women should not wear miniskirts in order to avoid being raped"
Indonesia is a country based on patriarch society, so it is no wonder women are often objectified. The Governor of Jakarta is a product of the same patriarch society where women are seen as second class citizen, objectified, and often regarded as the 'devil' who incite amorality.
men will always defend their kind i guess, even if their 'kind' is a rapist (or rapists)
why is that a woman's fault if she gets raped? or endures any kind of sexual assault?
men blame us because we wear revealing clothes, because we have boobs, because we have vagina, and generally because we are women.
sure i do agree that women should not wearing revealing clothes in public transportation. but as a human we have choices to wear anything like men have choices to wear turban, suits, jeans, even short-shorts and wife-beater tank tops (oh believe me, i have seen such man)
and really, sexual harassment have little to do with clothing. i once had this old man showed me his ugly, disgusting penis at a full bus. and he asked me to touch it. and what did i wear back then? jeans, not even a tight one, T-shirt and a jacket. no part of whichever body part society deem inappropriate, lewd or could incite arousal, was showing. (of course the sick sick old man had the gift of a hard slap in his face and humiliation from me screaming).
it's not the clothing, it's the paradigm that men could get away with anything.
it's the culture that see women as punchbag. it's the so-called eastern culture, where everything is veiled in heavy hypocrisy.
even after raped, a rape victim often blamed. blamed for being raped, that is.
you can hear society whispering 'oh it's her own fault, she was wearing miniskirt' 'oh it's her fault, she walked alone at night' which work on the same logic as 'oh it's her own fault for having a vagina, thus available for rape'. sometimes the whispering will evolve to 'oh it's allright, she's a slut anyway'
as if being raped is not traumatizing enough. the victim still have to endure society skewed judgement. not to mention if the victim was a virgin, society could determine the value of said victim as 'worthless', since after rape the victim lost her virginity, thus worth less in virtue in whatever twisted logic our society working on.
what about the rapist? they spend 3 to 15 years in prison. (if they were ever caught, that is..mostly they don't. but that's another story..)
how is that several years could compare to the victim's lifetime physical and psychological scarring?
and how come a victim is antagonized,when the real problem is that men could not hold their penis in their pants?
this culture is too ignorant at women. where women often seen as mere property, we really couldn't hope much. and sadly, the people we see as authority, the same people who should provide a safe environment for their citizen, are the product of the same ignorant, patriarchal culture.
it shouldn't matter if we wear burqa, veil, work suits, a simple jeans and t-shirt, or miniskirt.
it shouldn't matter because men OUGHT to respect us, as human being equal with them and not as a walking vagina buffet to fuck anytime anywhere and as much as they want.
i think before anyone could make statement on how women should dress, they have to reflect on their own morality, their own paradigm towards women, their own tiny tiny penis and their ability to hold it in their pants in sight of women in mini skirt.
