Issue: ‘Men, women have separate queue lines’

June 10, Online: The TransJakarta management body (BLU) has started to apply separate queues for men and women in 140 busway shelters following a sexual harassment case reported last week. Control manager Gunardjo said the separation, which was expected to minimize crime and sexual harassment, did not apply on the bus. “We suggest that physically challenged passengers, elderly passengers and children join the female line,” he said over the telephone Thursday. He said the familiarization program had not been completed yet and a number of passengers still had to get used to the new system.

Your comments:

This is ridiculous. The intention is good but certainly not efficient nor effective.
Do you honestly think sexual harassment is only committed on the opposite sex? No. The same thing goes for racism. Do you honestly think the Indonesian minorities (no need of mentioning which) do not experience discrimination, racism and harassment everyday in their life? Does the government ever even try to solve this? No.
The solution is definitely not to separate lines, but stronger action toward perpetrators and not just dismiss them if there’s no other witness. Reports were made because things actually happened. Note that!
Fiz Ramdhani
Jakarta
 
Wohoo, it is a great solution and so practical! There will be no sexual harassment and is safe.
Dyna
Kinabalu, Malaysia
 
I think this policy needs to be supported by TransJakarta users. It is good to give comfort to passengers especially women, elderly and children. To make it effective, the Jakarta government and bus operators have to communicate and control the policy.
Abu Mikail
Jakarta
 
It is very strange to see how the very same people who are normally very kind, friendly, helpful, talkative and polite, suddenly turn into totally different personalities every time they stand in a queue?
Isn’t it totally different with people in other countries who are not as friendly, but highly respect other people’s rights and consider queuing and helping elderly and women as sacred?
Do Indonesians think that queuing is part of the culture of Russia or China or Western societies and is not necessarily applicable here in Indonesia?
Robby Kaware
Jakarta
 
I think this is a nice solution for short-term action (to prevent sexual harassment). But, education is more important because we won’t have a bus that separates its seat for men and women.
Andhika
Jakarta

I agree with one of the comments under this short article. It takes educational solutions to overcome harassment and the lack of manners in using public transportation.
Separating men and women will not motivate a change of behavior or create awareness on how to behave in the public arena.
Or is there a political agenda behind this new system?
Dea
New York

It sounds wonderful in theory but being a regular TransJakarta user I cannot see this working,
particularly in places like Duku Atas 2 where its narrow design combined with it being a start-up point for different routes is already at saturation point.
During peak hour,  lines of passengers waiting to board regularly extend outside the actual station right up the steps to the overpass from Dukuh Atas, and the situation here is far from unique.
Have the people proposing this ever experienced either Dukuh Atas 2 or Harmoni at peak hour?
I should think not. From a male’s perspective I would be delighted to see separate boarding queues for male/female as I wouldn’t have to suffer the “pushing, shoving and elbowing” which seems to be far more prevalent from “ladies” (term used loosely here) whenever a bus arrives at a station/shelter.
Les Williams
Jakarta