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Kartini, women’s quotas, elections and patriarchy
Even if voters have a choice of better access to health services, they opt for direct assistance, whether cash or noncash (e.g. rice and other basic foodstuffs).
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Judgement day: The justices of the Constitutional Court read out decisions on April 22, 2024 on two challenges to the outcome of the February presidential election. The court rejected the losing candidates’ demands for a revote, thereby upholding the victory of president-elect Prabowo Subianto. (Reuters/Willy Kurniawan)
“When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”
This is a nice witticism that is meant to serve as encouragement, but it’s sometimes just wishful thinking, as the reality is often much more complex, preventing you from exercising your “toughness”, i.e. your strengths.
I give you three examples.
The first is Raden Ajeng Kartini (April 21, 1879 – Sept. 19, 1904), a national hero for women’s emancipation. She was an aristocratic woman who advocated for the rights of women and girls. Therefore, her birthday is commemorated every year.
Her “toughness” lay in her great desire to learn, her egalitarianism, her concern for ordinary people and her vision for an “Indonesia” (which did not yet exist), free from colonialism. She was a voracious reader, devouring books not just on women’s rights but also on socialism, literature (including classic Javanese and Greek), travel, philosophy, religion, ethics and the evils of colonialism.
As the daughter of a regent, she was able to attend the ELS, a Dutch primary school exclusively for Europeans and the offspring of the pribumi (native) aristocracy. However, her education was cut short when, at age 12, as an aristocratic woman, she was subjected to the tradition of pingit (confinement) until she was married off. This she did at the surprisingly late age of 24. Ironically, against her principles, out of respect for her father, she entered into a polygamous marriage to Raden Adipati Djojoadiningrat, also a regent.
But before marrying, she set forth some conditions, one of them being that she wanted to set up a school for girls, become a teacher and pursue her dreams of advancing women in the Dutch East Indies, which her husband agreed to.
