Blaming the Victim & Others
Jun 4th, 2008, in News, by Patung
Explanations for the FPI violence at Monas, blaming the victims, the government, and foreign plots.
Ahmadiyah
Head of the Muslim Lawyers’ Team (Tim Pengacara Muslim,TPM), Mahendradatta, says the Monas incident was caused by the AKKBB side making deliberately provocative speeches, saying such as things as
the FPI are Laskar Kafir (Infidels’ Front) and Laskar Setan (Satan’s Front).
Other provocations included the ‘fact’ that the AKKBB gathering was illegal, without police permission, and that one AKKBB person was carrying a weapon. beritasore
Tgk Faisal M Ali of the Himpunan Ulama Dayah Aceh (HUDA) in Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam (NAD) says the government needs to see the incident in a fully formed way, that the root cause is the weakness in the upholding of law in Indonesia, that it still had not banned the Ahmadiyah sect.
Presidential spokesman Andi Mallarangeng was having none of it however, and said the delay in the publication of the SKB edict concerning Ahmadiyah could not be used as an excuse for assaulting people. okezone
Conspiracies
Faisal Ali, who was also once the leader of the student group Rabithah Thaliban in Aceh, says he condemned the FPI violence but banning the FPI was not the solution, banning Ahmadiyah was, and if the FPI were banned this would mean the government was allowing the foreign conspiracies in Indonesia to ruin Islam to succeed. beritasore
Parliamentarian Soeripto, the Vice Chairman of Commission III in the House of Representatives (DPR) from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS/Partai Keadilan Sejahtera), says he suspects the FPI violence was part of an anti-Islam American plot.
Soeripto
Soeripto, who has a long history of work in the intelligence field, said Mossad and CIA had already taken over most militant organisations in the world, so they had probably taken over the FPI, and added that Al Qaeda in Afghanistan remained the only “pure” movement left. okezone
55 Comments on “Blaming the Victim & Others”
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Sylvester says:
Head of the Muslim Lawyers’ Team (Tim Pengacara Muslim,TPM), Mahendradatta, says the Monas incident was caused by the AKKBB side making deliberately provocative speeches, saying such as things as
the FPI are Laskar Kafir (Infidels’ Front) and Laskar Setan (Satan’s Front).
Fully agree with AKKBB
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RossM says:
These morons just look for any excuse to ‘provoked’, like the bully that beats people up for ‘looking at him the wrong way’.
The government’s soft stance on these thugs needs to change.
The extremist’s excuse for commiting violence all over the world is that they were ‘provoked’; somebody said something that insulted them, somebody called them a name; so naturally the only course of action open to them to make their wounded pride better is to inflict real physical pain and suffering on somebody else.
These people need to stop behaving like 2-year-olds and seriously grow up!
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gentole says:
FPI, Mossad, CIA? Oh dear, oh dear…what a crazy world we live in, everybody has gone mad.
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Lairedion says:
This Soeripto dude is really late with his predictable accusations towards the CIA and the Mossad. Did he speak on a personal title or on behalf of the PKS, a party who not so long ago pledged to abandon its staunch Islamic roots?
Why not let the CIA and the Mossad take over this God-forsaken country and let the Israelis run it? We might achieve some progress…
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djoko says:
This Soeripto dude is really late with his predictable accusations towards the CIA and the Mossad. Did he speak on a personal title or on behalf of the PKS, a party who not so long ago pledged to abandon its staunch Islamic roots?
This frustrates me to no end. At times I truly see that out of all, especially the Islamic parties, in Indonesia, PKS has an awful lot going for it, but this conspiracy theory culture still pervades what their members do and how they understand things at times. Just why in the world would Mossad care about Indonesia? Crikey they’ve got people 15 minutes drive from them who are a more pressing threat than people in Indonesia….. At times I’m not sure whether some people just don’t think or their poor education has them that shut in that they just don’t understand even the simplest of things.
To be fair on the other hand though, this kind of thought is not exclusive to Islamic parties, as even nationalists in Indonesia like to pull the CIA/Mossad causing trouble bit out of the hat as well to whip up a bit of nationalistic fervor.
Why not let the CIA and the Mossad take over this God-forsaken country and let the Israelis run it? We might achieve some progress…
You might want to ask Iranians how that worked out… with the whole Shah thing and all….
More in terms of Indonesia, I also believe they (the CIA that is) had a hand in PRRI/Permesta which didn’t turn out too well.
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Shloka says:
@ Lairedion,
I generally sympathise with you, but aren’t you being too harsh? Let Israelis run Indonesia? Israel is not without religious conflicts too, you know. The Orthodox, Conservative and Reform sects have significant conflicts with each other. Some ultra Orthodox accuse Reform Jews of being heretical and Orthodox Jewish women are as strictly segregated in synagogues and public places as Muslim women.
Of course, I have great admiration for Jews, their scientific contributions, the fact that although in the Middle East they have a proper democracy,are free from honor killings and child marriages and no Jew has bombed Germany as a retaliation for the Holocaust but surely the Indonesians have a right to national sovereignty. Every country from Sweden to Sierra Leone does. -
Shloka, djoko,
My apologies. I was playing with some sarcasm here. It was meant as a ridiculous answer to equally ridiculous yet predictable remarks from Mr. Soeripto. I’m sorry it didn’t work out that well.
And you’re right, djoko. Plenty of nationalist crap talk from the PDI-P as well.
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PrimaryDrive says:
And we pay for the salary of this parliamentarian?? I demand my tax money back!
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Andrew says:
Parliamentarian Soeripto, the Vice Chairman of Commission III in the House of Representatives (DPR) from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS/Partai Keadilan Sejahtera), says he suspects the FPI violence was part of an anti-Islam American plot.
HA HA HA, I knew it! I knew it! I knew it wouldn’t be long before some smarta$$ starts to accuse the US and Israel.
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Rambutan says:
To the credit of parliament and the majority of Indonesian religious organisations, there are only a few people trying to defend FPI’s attack on AKKBB. There are always some idiots giving their predictable Yahudi, Zionis, CIA, intel asing speeches. But in this case the majority is clearly in favor of tough action against FPI and finally, finally the government acted decisively. It was a great day yesterday. Seeing 800 police, Brimob and Densus 88 police officers turning up in full riot gear and taking away 60 FPI thugs was deeply satisfying. Seeing HaBabi Rizieq in police custody is just priceless.
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janma says:
Seeing HaBabi Rizieq in police custody is just priceless.
yeah, and he’ll probably be out by lunchtime today…
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Arrests are meaningless, it’s prosecutions that matter and then appropriate sentences for justice to really have served the victims.
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I concur with GJ.
To appeal to public demand and not to loose their face in front of the world (if Indonesia has any) we see some muscle flexing by the police and authorities. I’m very skeptical if we really will see the perpetrators being prosecuted and eventually imprisoned.
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Lairedion
I’m skepical too, I’m sad to admit. Posturing (arrests) may be good for the cameras/media, but victims of this type, well any type of crime actually, need justice. That means real actions, real commitment with real follow through and real outcomes. Otherwise it means diddly squat!!!!!!!
Lets try and live in hope.
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Mach Jabber says:
Ah, finally the deus ex machina came. Jewsdidit™! 😀
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The problem is, beyond heretical factions within Islam, infidels, Mossad/CIA conspiracy theories et al., that you have one group, the FPI, and it’s associates (Laskar Islam, MMI, Hizbhut Tahrir, Laskar Jihad in Papua, etc. following Islamic law and the rest of Indonesia following Indonesian law. Last time I checked we are under Indonesian law and not under Shariah (NAD excepted).
Under Islamic law, and the examples set by Muhammad and his companions in the Koran, Hadiths and Sira, the FPI are dealing with the Ahmadiyah heretics correctly. The same goes for their actions against businesses during Ramadhan. The problem for the FPI and associates is that Indonesia is not an Islamic state. We follow the Pancasila and Indonesian law. The heretics are protected under the Pancasila and Indonesian law. Any decision contrary to this by the government is against the law. This is probably why the government is taking so long. Members of the government want to disband Ahmadiyah but don’t have a strong legal right to. If Indonesia were an Islamic state then the decision would be simple. Repent and declare Muhammad as the last prophet or be executed.
Something I find funny is that we don’t see FPI physically attacking Ansor and the NU, seeing that the NU is heretical as well according to Wahhabist standards. Cowards afraid of a big SMACKDOWN.
The opportunity is here now to squash these groups that choose to ignore Indonesian law and the Pancasila. Perhaps taking some of the Wahhabist money sent here to promote jihad and turning Indonesia into an Islamic state should be confiscated and spent on one-way tickets for these assclowns to go to Mecca next Hajj and not come back. They can live happily under Shariah in Saudi Arabia and we can finally live peacefully here in Indonesia.
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Saipul says:
At least in Shah-ruled Iran the economy was growing 12% annually and there was rule of law. Indonesia’s has inflation double its economic growth rate and rule of the mob.
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tomaculum says:
“Parliamentarian Soeripto, the Vice Chairman of Commission III in the House of Representatives (DPR) from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS/Partai Keadilan Sejahtera), says he suspects the FPI violence was part of an anti-Islam American plot.”
FPI trained and financed by CIA/MOSSAD?
FPI is in truth not an Islam group but a subversive special service sent by CIA/MOSSAD?
Is Indonesia a big circus arena with so many clowns?Guys, the whole world laughs at Indonesia, Indonesia nowaday is a state (a state? Ha,ha) the whole world cannot take seriously.
Gila, ah semuanya!!! -
dewaratugedeanom says:
Soeripto, who has a long history of work in the intelligence field, said Mossad and CIA had already taken over most militant organisations in the world, so they had probably taken over the FPI
This Soeripto fellow has probably been reading too many ‘Indonesia Matters’ comments.
What’s worrisome is that there are a lot of people out there who believe him.
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Aluang Anak Bayang says:
Pak Soeripto is another Javanese, so there is truth in what he said. It would be unwise to dismiss another wise Javanese.
Remember the 1965 pogrom, anyone? It was the CIA who financed the killing of the Chinese.
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@Mach Jabber,
Perhaps it’s an idea to start a website jewsdidit.com. In that way we can gather all kinds of news articles, statements from all over the world blaming Jews for everything.
@Brother Aluang,
Firstly I welcome you back. Your guidance, wisdom and straigth-out opinions are most wanted here. Lately this blog has been infected with too much political correct crap talk.
Secondly, a Javanese is basically wise but he began to loose his wisdom after Islam arrived in Nusantara. This has also happened to Soeripto. He is now enslaved to Allah and bows down to Mecca in stead of gaining wisdom by meditate at one of the many Hindu-Buddhist temples on Java and living up to Bhinneka Tunggal Ika. And I blame the CIA, Mossad and all Jews for that.
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Ross says:
One of the most peculiar explanations for the current situation came in the Jakarta Post, in two otherwise useful and interesting articles by Aril Heryanto, which he wound up with the conclusion that it was the ‘annihilation of the left since 1965’ that allowed these current problems to develop.
There are, on the contrary, hardly any seriously capitalist/ laiissez faire parties here, rather champions of interventionist policies that alas use their intevention to line their own pockets. Statism is ubiquitous, even to the extent of making citizens apply for a surat pindah when they want to move house, charging folks to leave the country and dictating who may marry whom. Indonesia doesn’t use the word socialist a lot but it is very much a theme.
On the other hand, did Ariel mean the ‘annihilation of communism’ since 1965. Hardly the same. He also lamented the absence of an ‘intellectual left.’ He must not read the paper for which he writes, since it is positively crawling wth left-libs.
I had already actually smsed the Jakarta Post urging the regime here to use the example of the PKI to deal with the FPI. Both enemies of political and religious liberty, so why ban one and not the other?
Having said that, I still can’t quite figure out Heryanto’s reasoning. Perhaps one of the left-libs that teem in these waters could clarify? -
I always love people who love to believe in “CIA and Mossad Conspiracies.”
They will always be suspicious to each other (Suripto – PKS vs FPI) thinking that their respective opponent is infiltrated by CIA/Mossad, then they will kill each other, and the winner will be stepped on accidentally by a pregnant wild pig. So in the end the pig will always be the winner.
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the FPI are Laskar Kafir (Infidels’ Front) and Laskar Setan (Satan’s Front).
But…. they are. What’s wrong with pointing out the truth when it is the truth? What religious extremists in Indonesia, other than FPI, who portray so much violence, even to their own people?
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timdog says:
Ross – as one of the “teeming left-libs” resident here, I’ll take up your request for further explanation of Heryanto’s theory, even though I believe it will make you angry…
In a country with very many Poor People, like Indonesia, there ought, by sheer weight of gravity, to be a left-leaning bias to democratic politics, a tendancy to curry favour with “the masses”; there certainly was under Sukarno…
However, thanks to the careful cultivation over the New Order decades of a horror of the “communist bogeyman”, any genuinely socialist sentiments are considered beyond the pale in mainstream Indonesian politics; at the same time, you are correct, there is an absence of serious right-wing parties too (it’s that force of gravity I mentioned that ensures that, along with the lack of a left-wing counterbalance)…
What we have instead is a great centre-ground confusion which breeds only confusion and vacillating tendencies… There is absolutely no vibrancy or broad-spectrum balance in manstream Indonesian politics, and that is indeed because of the “anihilation of the left”…Now what rises in that grey, indistinct muddle of centre-ground ideology-lite politics? Yes indeed! Politicised religion and the likes of the FPI…
Islam has sometimes been described as a “socialist religion”; personally, while i don’t think socialism and religion are incompatable, I do feel that they can’t be moulded into one body, but there is some kernal of reason in the “socialist religion” claim for Islam. Unlike other religions it theoretically has no human hierarchy, goes against inequitable social structures, and holds all men equal (before God)… I hasten to add that that is all only the theory, not the practice… but it is worth noticing that much of secular Muslim politics has been left-wing in tone (pan-Arabism, Baathism etc…)
In any country, especially in a country with lots of Poor People there is fertile soil for “socialist” sentiments (the old “Ratu Adil” stuff could be regarded as a sort of proto-communist reaction to a corrupt bourgeoise aristocracy)…
There will also, in every society, be Angry People as well as Poor People…
Pre-1965 many of those Angry People could have found their place in the arms of the Communists… There is something important about this: communism is only a political school of thought, and those who followed it were distinct and separate from everyone else, even other socialists….
Now, with the option of communism “anihilated” the only obvious refuge for the Angry People in Indonesia lies in politicised religion…
I know you still think communism “threatens the world”; I don’t, and I think it was always inevitable that it would burn itself out…. but religion on the other hand….?
Political Islam is, unlike communism, more than a political school of thought; it may be followed by only a tiny few, but unlike the communists there is no clear boundary between them and “everyone else”… THAT is dangerous, and that’s why Indonesia would be much better off had communism not been so thoroughly obliterated, and genuine “left-wing” politics whithered by fear (and genuine right-wing politics whithered by a lack of counterbalance)…That’s my explanation…. I guess you won’t like it…. 😉
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Good grief, why would you think your argument would make me angry? You present a calm coherent case with which I don’t agree, but you don’t resort to abuse or obscenity, so I shall respond in kind. But not tonight, as I’m going out to dinner in Sydney. Sunday might be opportune. Enjoy your weekend.
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Hey, I’m delighted! It was just that I thought playing down the danger of the Reds and suggesting their removal had led to the – to me – far more troublesome rise of politicised Islam might wind you up… I look forward to your response!
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kinch says:
TD: Cogently argued.
I think of pre-1966 politics as being like two trees full of monkeys throwing faeces at each other. Sukarno was the topiarist. Unfortunately he had Tourette’s Syndrome. As long as one tree didn’t get the upper hand, it was going to be chaos as usual. If either stole a march on the other, it had to end in mass slaughter.
The rightists got the jump and did the deed. Had the communists done so, they would have been equally as bad, or worse.
Another prime example is the Philippines… there must have been some moment in time when it hung in the balance between Aquino and Marcos – one would go on from that moment to be the sainted exile and eventual martyr and the other would become the corrupt dictator.
A lot of hot air is wasted arguing about what might have been.
But we all know what we face now: Militant Arab Islam. Sooner or later there will be hell to pay.
Despite having a great deal of contempt for the left (who have killed scores more than the right in the last 100 years), I can’t help but be a partial fan of the dialectical view of historical evolution.
Anyway certain patterns are clear. None is more clear than that any mass migration from countryside to city ends up being paid for in the blood of millions. It may be civil war, or it may be war between newly conscious nation states.
Islam in Indonesia is feeding as much on this ‘move from the kampung to the city and become alienated’ dynamic as it is on any post-1965 lack of friendly neighourhood Madiun Backstabbers.
To the extent that it is impossible in Indonesian society to have an intelligent and sane conversation about communism, it’s not possible to have an intelligent and sane conversation about a great many topics in Indonesia. One more is no great loss :).
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Okay, rest day in Oz, so let’s examine Timdog’s case, starting with the view that countries with lots of poor people require, or tend to produce, parties that ‘curry favour with the masses.’
Timdog assumes this is leftiness. Frankly, I wish we in the West had more of that – not leftiness, but less elitist, mandarin mentality that talks down to real working people.
A highly topical example is the Southern Irish referendum, which elicited ‘elite’ protests that ‘any clown with a pen’ was getting to have his/her say (Irish Independent editorial) or ‘when there is popular consultation you get populism, nationalism, xenophobia, all sorts of lies,’ (Andrew Duff, one of those hugely overpaid MEPs)
The masses’ instincts are usually right and should be heeded. That’s what democracy is all about.
‘Poor’ people are not inevitably lefties, creating/sustaining a leftish polity that dispenses leftish polices. Post-WW 1 Germany certainly was economically desperate, but does Timdog regard the resulting regime as leftish (I’d maybe say yes, Hitler was a socialist, as the second letter of NSDAP indicates, but most current lefties would disagree).
Again, interwar Britain went through some tough times, but remained steadfastly wedded to a two-party system, Conservative and Labour, neither of which was notably extreme. Communists were active in both countries but lost the democratic elections to the Nazis and then lost a great deal more, while in the UK they got nowhere because British folk had no interest in their propaganda.
The point being, to blame the post-Gestapu absence of the PKI for the rise of Islamofascism is not a logical ’cause and effect’ scenario.
If you go back to the run-up to 1965, both Muslim and Christian political/religious groups worked in collaboration to fight the PKI menace, so PKI may be said to have had an ‘ecumenical’ effect. (You may say that these groups success in dealing with the Reds left them with only each other to fight, but that’s surely going too far!)
Also, mad mullahs are showing signs of increasing influence in Malaysia and Turkey, two lands with fairly democratic backrounds, whose political culture and histories are quite distinct, from each other and from Indonesia’s. Islamism is a worldwide phenomenon, and would likely be just as bad here had the PKI never existed ( again you may argue that Suharto deserves severe blame for boosting political Islam -I’d say so)
Timdog made a lot of observations, so I won’t seek to cover all of them, but…
Unlike ‘other religions, Islam has no human hierarchy?’
The Caliphate was for centuries a hereditary position in Islam, vested in Ottoman Sultans, and I may be wrong but I think several present/ former Arab monarchies claimed their legitimacy by virtue of descent from the Prophet’s family (and according to an article I read recently, so did several FPI founder-members!) And the loonies in Hizbut Tahrir want the Caliphate restored – and certainly not democratically chosen. That’s gonna be hierarchical, no? Having said that, I rather think that leadership of dynastic type was, and today could well be again, better than the largely self-appointed oligarchy of clerics, and whilst I’m no Catholic, the hierarchy represented by the Pope is less inclined to lunacy than that ‘representative’ clique represented by the (presumably elected?) chairman of the MUI.The Ratu Adil was a Westerling theme, no doubt consciously chosen to evoke the right echoes among his mostly local followers, though I think he may have been into subliminal advertising for the House of Orange too. Traditional rulers here were maybe often not enlightened despots but neither were they always unduly harsh, and people cherish memories of royals (obvious example Diponegoro) who identified with the ‘national’ struggle.
Marxism, thank God, lost the Cold War in its Soviet theatre, but is still about, though I have long recognised that it is not the only threat (yet I do get exasperated with folks who say it is no longer about – just walk into most Western uni common rooms and you’ll smell it!)
Religion is part of most people’s lives, not because it is forced down their throats but because they sense a need for a wider dimension in their lives than merely ‘bread alone.’ (I say this as somebody who is not notably religious personally)
The chief architects of Soviet Communism’s collapse were the Polish Pope and Ronald Reagan, who always made it clear his was a faith-based, rather than merely capitalist, stand. And we need to give credit to the good Muslims who fought the Reds in Afghanistan.
Sadly, there were nasties in that fight too, and Osama-style Islamism, not the same as Islam, is just as ferocious a threat today as communism was once.
To be fair, there are some very odd Christians about too, like Obama’s former pastor, and less scary, the Archbishop of Canterbury.
But throwing the whole idea of religion out because it can be put to ill use is surely too sweeping. Do we dismiss Mother Teresa because of the Inquisition, or find ourselves unable to admire the Dalai Lama’s plain-to-see goodness because he is religious?
Western people are losing interest in the mainstream of organised Christianity (in my opinion because its spokesmen don’t seem to believe in its tenets themselves) but there will ber a ‘revival’ – though who knows in what form?
In the Muslim world, people (and most of the people I like here are Muslim) must eventually get fed up with a religion so utterly insecure that it looks for a death penalty for apostates and fears the competition of a harmless but obscure sect like Ahmadiyah.My personal predilection tends towards a renewed kejawan or a revival of the old Melayu pantheon as the best spiritual basis for a happy archipelago. Highly improbable at present, but again who knows?
A first step in that direction would be a principled, traditionalist political movement, Ratu Adil or something similar as its slogan. That such has not emerged is not, I’d say, because the PKI got chopped, but because ever since independence the political class has been largely, though not all, foul with self-interest. Too many cosmopolitan intellectuals on the make, not enough rajas on their thrones…?
Comment on “Blaming the Victim & Others”.
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It is getting harder and harder for an average man like me to make sense all these problems in Indonesia.
Everyone involved says they are doing the right thing. Analysts say FPI is to blame, others say AKKBB is. This is sooo confusing.
God bless Indonesia.
More importantly, May God bless me with understanding.