Arist Merdeka Sirait was showing the photos of the suspects of child sex abuse in Jakarta International School. Photo by Viva News on April 16,2014
It’s difficult to fathom that there have been three major child abuse cases in Indonesia, involving more than thirty children, since we began #CarolineHero movement backin February.
The most recently exposed tragedy is centered around contracted employees at the Jakarta International School who are accused of sexually abusing students in the schools bathrooms. It has come as a shock that these acts would occur within the "fortress" like school with all of it’ssecurity measures and procedures. How is it that child abuse still manages to existinside an institution that has beenmarketed as "your child's second home?”
Many debates will take place discussing who is the most responsible for thistragedy. The school, contracting company, teachers, Education Ministry, or even the parents. This issue has national media attention, but the information isn’t clear and often conflicting, so what should we focus on? Simply pointing fingers at each other, playing the blame game, ultimately doesn’t do anything more than create dramatic TV and boost revenue for news stations.
Let’s start with what we know for sure. Child abuse, in whatever form (physical, emotional, sexual, etc), has been happening around us all of this time even though evidence supports that many, if not most, of these cases were preventable.
We need to ask ourselves many questions such as… Have we lost our sense ofmorality? Do we still care about what's happening around us when it does notseem to impact us directly? Is the issue ofsexual abuse considered too taboo to be discussed with children? Have the police and the law makers done enough to prevent these predators from roaming freely to recommit these evil acts? Are we willing to acknowledge when abuse takes place and provide meaningful support to the victims?
There are still other questions, some of which society hasn’t come up with answers for, but there are also solutions for many of the problems we face.
Child abuse occurs in many forms, both physical and psychological based. Child abuse is often committed by the very people who are closest to the children. These predators take advantage of their position and the innocence and trust of the children. Child abuse cases often occurwithin the family circle. It can happen once or repetitively. It takes place regardless of economic and social class.
Whether a habitual act or one time event, the impact to the victims can take many forms and there is no, “one size fits all,”therapy. The scars, both physical and psychological, are life long and sadly it can even lead to generational abuse where the victims grow up to be predators.
We should ask ourselves if this will be justanother sad story in the news that we quickly forget about or will we take a stand, demanding and participating in social changes to protect our children?
Child sex abuse is not just an unfortunate and random event. Child sex abuse is by and far preventable. Education and awareness, open discussion, reporting,victim rights, enforcing laws, and just punishment all play a part in addressing this tragedy.
Indonesian Child Protection Law states thata person guilty of child sex abuse will be imprisoned for a maximum of fifteen years. Is this an appropriate punishment andeffective deterrent against abuse? What is the rate of prosecution, the averagesentence? Is this law effective?
Whatever the punishment, it will never be enough if society at large only act as TV spectators when they view cases such asthat involving the Samuel Orphanage children, Iqbal, and JIS.
What can we do? There are at least two areas that we can easily contribute to, in order to prevent this from happening again:
1. Communicate with our children, inform them about private body parts and inappropriate touching. Make sure that they will never be too frightened or ashamed to come forward if something makes themuncomfortable. While we should all takereasonable measures for the safety of our children, in the end they must learn how toidentify wrongs and protect themselves.
2. Be alert and ready to act when it comes to helping, protecting, and saving others in need. As hard as it is, reporting what happens to the police or child protectionorganizations must be done, not just to help the current cases, but to expose unreported abuse.
If each of us has the commitment to carry out these responsibilities then the window of opportunity for the predators will shrink. Don’t just sit on the sidelines. Get involved. It’s your community and you should and can make a positive difference.
Many organizations have been involved directly in providing child protection such as the National Commission of Child Protection (KomNas PA), Indonesian Commission of Child Protection (KPAI) or other independent organizations that dedicate themselves to this path. But they can only act on what they know about and it is very evident that their efforts are not enough without our continuous supportand involvement.
One action is fighting for legal change. As an example there is a petition requesting alonger period (> 15 years) of jail time for a person found guilty of committing child sex abuse. The link is below.
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| Komisi VIII DPR: HUKUMPeleceh seksual/Pemerkos... VERSI INDONESIA: HUKUM Pelecehseksual/Pemerkosa/predator seksual anak2seberat2nya, Revisi UU No. 23 tahun 2002!5-15thn tidaklah cukup. D... |
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In conclusion, we, as a society aren’t doing enough to prevent child abuse. Enough is enough! Don't let your eyes and ears only be witness to these crimes. Speak up, take action, educate and be involved. Our children desperately need our help.
Evil wins when good people do nothing - #CarolineHero
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