Be Smart to Fight Against Hoax The Imagination of Religion and Media in Politics (Attending a discussion at Duta Wacana Christian University 02/23/2019)
Monday, 25 February 2019by adminstube
To imagine means we are imagining something fun in the future. Imagination also means that we have a hope in the future that is better than today. But what about the wild imagination that lead to disintegration and drive to a new conflicts.
"This kind of imaginations are often found in this age and getting wild," said Dr. Zuly Qodir, a lecturer in Political Sociology at UMY and the facilitator when he opened the discussion. He revealed some imaginations that now occur among people lives, such as the existence of religious imaginations in media such as Islam as religion, in western media it was labelled as ‘negative religion’. (Ahmed and Matthes 2017; Knott et al. 2013), while Jews and Christians are imagined as the main ‘enemies’ of Islam (Karim and Eid, 2018). Furthermore, there are other imaginations such as political imagination in media, imagination in religious politics, ‘other’ imagination about politics and so on. All those imaginations direct and make people choose one of these, will to think for the life of the nation and state or have to think for the welfare life of their respective groups. Our society is driven to be individuals who think only about him/herself and their-own groups. It causes our society to be inhuman, the increase of violence, the reduction of social response, the rise of ethnic groups, the resistance and various problems from the grassroots to get justice,” concluded Dr. Zuly.
"The occuring problems are getting widespread and escalating immediately when it gets fuel of hoax issues. The various limitations and lack of knowledge of our society about using social media make us an easy target of the spread of hoax news on social media,” Valentine Wiji, the Head of Secretariat of the Anti-Defamation Society of Indonesia or MAFINDO. MAFINDO itself is a group of volunteers who are moved to collect data and information in various mass media or social media, or commonly called digital literacy. The focus of this group is to fight against dis-information and mis-information.
MAFINDO was established on November 19, 2016 with the spirit of fighting hoaxes by embracing various groups of society, to continue sharing information. It also joined cekfakta.com and collaborated with more than 20 credible online media such as kompas.com, tirto.id, detik.com, antara.com and several others and supported by Google, AMSI, & First Draft. Besides that, MAFINDO has one Facebook group account which can be an information channel for all Anti Fitnah, Hasut, and Hoax Forums or abbreviated as FAHHH which has 61.995 members to date and Instagram @turnbackhoaxid with 3.659 followers.
Valentine Wiji invited participants to join the FB group, so that, they could share news and provide true information to their families and relatives. Because mass media now play important role in disseminating information. Make sure that our families are free from hoaxes. According to the global web index, per January 2019, platfom Youtube 88%, Whatsapp 83%, Facebook 81% and Instagram 80% are active and often accessed by Indonesians.
If the community is wise in using social media, it is expected to reduce victims of violence in the name of religion, ethnicity and races. Especially in current election year situation. Public is expected to be actively involved in fighting issue of hoaxes that are scattered on social media. Let us campaign ‘love reading’ so that we can be smarter and wiser in social media. (SAP)
Young, Millennial and Political Literate
Monday, 18 February 2019by adminmarno
Thirty-nine students from various regions and campuses who are studying in Yogyakarta took part in Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta training held at Wisma Pojok Indah, on February 15-17, 2019. They are interested and curious about Young, Millennial and PoliticalLiterate, one topic of Spirituality program: Church and Politics. Most participants are young people whoare politically illiterate; even they can be said as ignorant and politically blind.
"This is a hot topic before April 17, 2019. The public has been enthusiastic to welcome hot atmosphere with political nuances, moreover theadvancement of information technology makes it easier for public to receive both factual news andhoax instantly. Ironically, not many young millennials are interested in politics, even more of them are apathetic and priori. Political literacy is important because inevitably the private and publiclife of society are influenced by political decisions. Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta as a mentoring institution for students from various regions in Indonesia who are studying in Yogyakarta realized the importance of correct political understanding among students because they will become agents of change," said Ariani Narwastujati, Stube-HEMAT Executive Director.
As the preparation to explore politics, participantslearned first the history dynamics of the relationship between church (Christianity) and politics delivered by Rev. Paulus Sugeng Wijaya, MAPS., Ph.D from Duta Wacana Christian University. Initially the church was separated from government politics, the church was on the different side of the government and even suppressed. However,churches kept growing and hold strategic position in the community. Galerius, the emperor of that time finally accommodated the church in people's lives. Even Emperor Constantine established Christianity as state religion. Since then church had mingled with various political interests and power, unluckilychurch began to forget its mission to fight for liberation, injustice and poverty alleviation.
During the discussion with William E. Apipidely, M.A, Executive Director of Satunama Foundation, the participants' assumptions regarding politics were revealed. Some considered politics as art, influence and power, but others considered politics to be dirty, full of corruption and even apathetic towards politics. Bad 'image' of politics was occured because of lots of negative reporting about politics and there has been a distortion of political history in Indonesia. So, participants needed to understand the true meaning of politics. Aristotle revealed that politics is intelligent and integrated, politics is an effort to distribute justice and bring justice. Political action is an act of presenting justice. This became an enlightenment for them.
Some political practitioners and legislative candidates shared their political experiences. They are Chang Wendryanto, a DIY DPD candidate, Budi Oetomo from PKB campaign team, San Akuan, Sleman Regency Legislative candidate from Indonesian Solidarity Party and M Fuad Burhan, a National Legislative candidate from Democratic Party. Participants learned about the reality of political world because this dialogue revealed constancy, intrigue, lobbying and strategy in politics. Ahmad Shidqi, commissioner of General Election Commission(KPU) of Yogyakarta, encouraged participants to beproactive in participating the election because young voters, aged 17-30 years, are countedapproximately more than 60 million. So young voters held strategic position in determining the direction of the nation in the future.
Desi, a Biology Education student at Sanata Dharma University from North Kalimantan said, "It is an interesting training and the facilitators have added my insight. I discovered something new about church history, baptism because of political influence and political meaning itself. At first, I assumed politics was dirty, corrupt, etc., but the training changed my mindset that politics is a communaleffort to reach justice and prosperity."
The participants' commitment to take part in elections and to share with others about the training experience aroused optimism for theawareness growth of political literate, and maturityto bring justice and prosperity for Indonesians. (TRU)
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