Letters: Who displace RI's culture?

This is my comment on an article titled "Indonesian too open to foreign culture," (the Post, May 29). My observations are that Indonesian culture is being displaced more by Arab culture than by Western culture. The increasing appearance of headscarves and body-covering clothes of Muslim women in Indonesia, the penchant of men to use Arab words to spice up their conversations and the creeping "sharia-ization" of municipal laws are all strong evidence that Western Indonesia is being "Arabized".

The argument against Western culture may be a smokescreen thrown by those elements pushing the Arab culture.

As a result of modern communications and travel, the culture of the whole world is being homogenized to some extent, to the detriment of local languages and cultures. Globalization is both good and bad, but it does seem to be inevitable.

T. Cotton
Pattaya, Thailand