UNAIR NEWS – In the commemoration of International Women’s Day, Amnesty International Indonesia (AII) UNAIR Chapter released the second volume of brief talk shows discussing the big theme, “Celebrating Women Human Rights Defenders”. This video was released via Instagram TV on Tuesday afternoon (9/3/2020) and invited Amalia Puri Handayani as a representative of the PurpleCode Collective.
PurpleCode Collective is a collective movement engaged in issues related to technology and feminism. The two topics are connected due to the fact that sexual violence and various discrimination or restrictions on the rights of women or other genders are often found in the digital realm. Their main goal is to increase awareness on the importance of feminism on the internet and assist survivors of Online Gender Based Violence (KBGO).
Founded in 2015, PurpleCode Collective realizes that technology, explained Amalia, especially the internet that provide a place to express opinions, has a side effect: patriarchal culture and violence against women in the digital realm.
“There is an urgency why we talk about the issue of feminism in this technology. If we look at National Women Commission’s 2020 annual report, the KBGO rate has increased by 300% in Indonesia due to the COVID-19 pandemic, ”explained the Erasmus University alumnus.
Amalia said that the challenge to overcome in voicing these issues is the complexity of the patriarchal culture that still flourishes in Indonesia, where women always experience more restrictions than men. Moreover, there is also no legal protection on KBGO in Indonesia because the Sexual Violence Eradication draft bill (RUU PKS) has not yet been enacted. According to her, the absence of this legal protection can also be exacerbated if law enforcement officials who receive reports of KBGO or other forms of sexual violence, have a patriarchal or even misogynistic paradigm.
“All of these have an impact on how KBGOs are underestimated by the community. Because the violence only occurs online, the negative feelings that accompany the violence are often belittled or excluded. Moreover, the existing culture of victim blaming, which blames the victims rather than the perpetrators. In fact, in some cases, the victims have been criminalized,” said the expert on Gender Studies.
According to Amalia, the right step to fight against KBGO is awareness on the concept that ‘our devices are our bodies, our rights’. She explained that we must have full control over the devices we have, whether it is in the form of privacy, connection, and self-expression. She also talked about the importance of working together in fighting for the KBGO issue because in truth this is a collective movement that cannot be challenged individually.
“If we understand this concept, we can validate our feelings when we experience KBGO in the digital realm. That this matter should not be underestimated and should be our main concern, ” she concluded.
Author: Pradnya Wicaksana
Editor: Nuri Hermawan
