STAY RELEVANT WITH THE IRRELEVANT DEMOCRACY

By Abdillaah Jabbaar (Jeje Hadid)

University Students throughout Indonesia are in turmoil condemning the drafting of a new law made by the Indonesian House of Representatives a week ago. There was a lot of protest that Indonesian students expressed their aspirations by becoming representatives of the Indonesian citizen to fight for justice.

Many of the students at the protest this time raised the issue of their privacy disturbed by the existence of a new bill. They protested that why the state was interfering in matters of sorting out and limiting someone to live together as long as it was still positive, for example overseas students living together in one place.

Most of the students expressed their aspirations through Posters, Banners, Videos, and social media posts. But some of the posters that they showed invited questions. One of them is from student protests in Surabaya by wrote, "RIP Kos Kos an Bebas + Rabbit / Playboy Symbol." Which means that students can no longer arbitrarily live with their friends in a familiar place called boarding house / apartment.

( picture source : https://www.instagram.com/p/B21cHEvnMEk/?igshid=sblhxb19ogsl )

The Draft Law that is relevant to the poster which made by the owner of the Instagram account named @brojabroo falls into the category:

Article 488 of the draft Criminal Code Bill (Criminal Code) states that everyone who commits to live together as husband and wife outside a legal marriage, shall be sentenced to a maximum of one year imprisonment or a maximum fine of category II.

Based on my research, the owner of the @brojabroo account who posted himself holding a poster "RIP Kos Kosan Free + Symbol of Rabbit / Playboy" is one of the private college students in Surabaya and is an overseas student from outside Surabaya, Malang City. The action denounced that as a student, he chose to live in a foreign place with anyone without any threat because generally overseas students, living together in a place with someone that they comfortable with to live together. Wether it is the opposite sex or same sex. But it also becomes a question why the symbol of the playboy symbolized by the rabbit logo is inserted in the poster?

Many of the students at the protest this time raised the issue of their privacy disturbed by the existence of a new bill. They protested that why the government was interfering in matters of sorting out and limiting someone to live together as long as it was still positive, for example overseas students living together in one place.