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Kartini’s month of elections and Cinderella’s stepsisters
April — Kartini Month — is always a perfect moment to reflect on how far we have been progressing in women’s emancipation
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April — Kartini Month — is always a perfect moment to reflect on how far we have been progressing in women’s emancipation.
The 2018 Global Gender Gap Report reveals how Indonesia has performed among 148 countries in four main indicators: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment.
Overall we still rank far down the list in 85th place. We have actually narrowed economic and political gaps, but performed poorly in educational attainment.
Yet, even in the areas where we scored better than in previous years, are we really on the right track to close the gender gaps and achieve equality?
The latest general election on Wednesday makes this year’s commemoration of the birthday of the heroine Kartini worth getting closer attention.
What women do in politics may not fully represent women’s lives in general, but observing how women’s issues take up very little space during the election campaigns should be seen as a serious warning for us who put much hope in women’s emancipation as one of the crucial forces to improve our society.
During the campaign rallies, women appeared mostly in the background — as part of the cheering crowd considered too politically illiterate to be given a more substantial role on center stage.
On many occasions, this crowd was given only a role as a human scanner of the market prices of domestic supplies — onion, garlic, chilies and salt — to give the candidates a platform to establish a deceptive image as future leaders who would care for “women’s problems”.
Beyond these domestic issues, no real conversation was undertaken to assess the presidential candidates’ capacity and commitment for tackling persisting systemic problems such as gender pay-gaps, domestic violence, sexual harassment, maternal mortality, child marriage, human trafficking, etc., to which women fall victim too many times.
In the legislative elections, we still fell far behind the 30 percent of women candidates generally required to build a critical mass.
Most of the female candidates were those we have seen for a decade; the election rules only require a 30 percent quota of women among each political party’s candidates for each electoral district.
A new generation of young female politicians, for instance from the Indonesian Solidarity Party (PSI), who appear to have the guts to speak up loudly about defending feminism already struggle to deal with public scrutiny and demeaning comments, often regarding issues of their personal lives, long before they even come close to the center of the political stage.
As if this road to equality is not rough enough, an online movement that emerged in the past few weeks is calling for the country to reject feminism and has added a new layer to women’s struggle for equality.
On Instagram, pictures of groups of women, mostly in hijab, campaigning with hashtags #UninstalFeminism and #IndonesiaTanpaFeminis (Indonesia without feminism) are being shared widely. They claim that equality is actually a threat to women’s positions and to the whole society as it encourages women to reject their domestic roles.
Backlash has come from various feminist groups, triggering wider debates in public.
The correlation between the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and a rejection of feminism has long drawn attention in academic circles. Yet, the fact that this movement is reaching a wider audience indicates a new phase of conflict between feminist and religious movements.
Removing the negative stigma from this F-word was already a struggle on its own before women can move forward with more substantial matters. In this matter, a women’s movement that publicly demonizes other women whose efforts are to defend women’s rights is the last thing we want to see.
Yet, a tactless backlash from feminist groups only worsens the existing conflict. Instead of seeing the Islamist groups as “the other”, feminists should take a little step back to the root of feminism as an inclusive social movement that works on establishing a thriving society where each of its members benefits from equal opportunities.
Seeking a common ground where the two camps — the Islamists and the feminists — can start a conversation that serves each other’s interests is not impossible. Whether women should play public or domestic roles should not be seen as a conflicting issue but an opportunity that complements and enhances each other’s aspirations.
Women are allies. It is patriarchy that we must denounce. Those who accept feminism and who deny feminism must have the courage to work together, as both movements actually stem from a vision to see the very best version of women’s roles.
In this celebration of Kartini Month, I’d like to draw attention to the story of Cinderella as a symbol of women’s submission to patriarchy.
If we are to reach a higher perspective in our efforts to achieve equality, we have to not only raise a generation of Cinderellas who are able to save themselves, but also a generation of stepsisters who will never again see other women as competitors.
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The writer teaches literary and cultural studies at the University of Jambi.
