Be civil to one another, democratically

Mochtar Buchori, ,  Jakarta   |  Mon, 01/05/2009 11:05 AM  |  Opinion

The way I see it, our rules about politeness are still very much based on the concept of feudalism. Polite behavior must always be shown by those in the lower strata of society toward the ones in the higher strata. But when people in the higher strata communicate with those below their rank, politeness is not always required. They can be polite if they want to, but it is considered "normal" if they fail to do so. In other words, it is not considered impolite if people in the higher strata do not observe the rules of politeness in their interactions with those from the lower strata.

This rule is still observed even after we became politically independent and had officially adopted the Pancasila philosophy as the basis of our civility. This philosophy clearly states that democracy is one of the five main pillars of our new way of life, the Indonesian way of life. Old people like me quite often overlook or underestimate the difference between the Indonesian way of life and our original ethnic way of life, which in my case is the Javanese way of life.

At times this situation puts many of us in an awkward situation. There are occasions when to behave politely in a proper way becomes a difficult matter. Some of us then make the mistake of being excessively polite, while others make the mistake of being unintentionally rude.

It is time, I think, that we begin thinking about modifying the bases of our civility or our politeness, and to make them correspond with the essence of democracy, i.e., that all persons are equal in their human dignity. The practical questions we have to answer are, for instance, "How to be polite without fear?", or "How to be frank without becoming rude and offensive?"

The absence of such clear rules has sometimes created the impression that our society's democratization process has made many of us become less concerned about matters of politeness. It has made many of us think that since our society has become democratic and is no longer a feudalistic one, observing politeness is not an important matter. "Democracy should give us more breathing space in our social interactions." That is how many of us think democracy impacts politeness.

This is the impression I have gotten from my personal experiences. The gap that lies between our understanding of politeness that is based on democracy and of politeness that is derived from feudalism has never been examined. Consequently being polite in a democratic way and being polite in a feudalistic manner are still very much confused. Those who are trying to introduce a new kind of politeness based on democracy are quite often considered impolite.

At this stage we seem uncertain about the form of society we sincerely want to build and the code of politeness we want to implement: Do we want our society to become democratic like the U.S. society? And do we want to apply their measures of politeness in our future society? Or do we want to preserve a bit of our traditional feudalism in our mannerism?

This uncertainty is very visible in our political life. While our system of electing our heads of government -- from the national government down to village government -- has become democratic, our way of conducting governance cannot be called democratic. Our government bureaucracy is still very feudal in character.

It is true that as times progresses many of our traditional formats of polite conduct have been modified. Some have made our new format of politeness become the better, but other modifications have made them look vulgar, uncivil or just silly. This is because we do not sufficiently grasp the meaning of "being polite".

As I understand it, being polite toward others means showing respect toward others, toward the merits shown in their personal behavior. We often confuse "politeness" with "etiquette" and "hypocrisy".

This is, I think, a national assignment that we must complete. It is unrealistic to expect that the present generations will be capable of completing this national task. It can only be completed by two or three successive generations. Failure to do so will make us a nation of hypocrites. As Honore de Balzac (1799-1850) put it, "Manners are the hypocrisy of a nation". We will then become a nation in which politeness is not guided by genuine respect toward each other, but driven rather by mere formalism.

In this kind of society manners and mannerisms "hardly differ from dress". How difficult it is to be genuinely mannered was stated by G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936, English journalist, essayist, novelist, poet) "We are justified in enforcing good morals, for they belong to all mankind, but we are not justified in enforcing good manners, for good manners always mean our own manners."

This means, to me, that in a truly democratic society, morality is not identical to mannerism. It is in societies that are not truly democratic yet that mere mannerism can be presented as morality.

How do we democratize our present way of civility?

By looking into ourselves every time we interact with other people, be it those above us, our equals or those underneath us. In every encounter, especially with those above us, we ask ourselves, "Do I really respect this person? How much respect do I have vis-a-vis him or her?"

If deep in our heart we really respect the other person for his or her personal qualities, then we can rest assured that we are truly a polite person, a person with genuine morality. But if we are polite merely because the other person is powerful or influential, then we should not think that we are really being polite. We are merely behaving like hypocrites.

The writer holds a PhD in education from Harvard University.

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