Violence in Society

by Muhammad Ridlo 'Eisy

THE SUN had just set. Its final rays, however, still bathed the sky in scarlet. Tomorrow, it would not be the sky that would be scarlet, but the battle fields of kurusetra below in flood of blood, flowing direcly from man’s heart as a result of the incessant conflic among the families of barata, pendawa, and kurawa. At that very moment Arjuna was tormented by doubt. Were his acuired powers all meant to kill his brothers, as well as the filks he respected, like Bisam , and his beloved teacher, Dorna ? These doubts were conveyed to kresna, Wisnu’s reircarnate, the god of life, who masterminded the barata War. In essence, Kresna stated that man are forced to use violence to uphold truth, when peacepul ways can no longer be utilized. In such a stance, tu refuse to uphold truth by means of violence would be tantamount to denying truth itself. Finally , people managed to convince Arjuna that the was still considered hallowed, even thought he was to become the exterminator of men in the Battle Fields of kurusetra. The Barata War eventually broke out, as a result of the faillure of Kresna’s diplomatic mission. As Pendawa’s representative, Kresna Negitiated with Kurawa to demand the rights of pendawa on Astina. Pendawa had been in exile for 13 year beyond the knowledge of Kurawa because he had lost at gambling with Kurawa. Kurawa could not grant Pendawa’s rights on Astina, since the latter’s exile was not yet completed , being one day short of the stipulated 13 years. Pendawa was caught in the war between Astina and Wirata, and he sided with the latter. Therefore, Kurawa could not grant Pendawa’s rights on Astina before Pendawa repeated his term of exile for another 13 years, in accordance with the agreement made chivalrously after Pendawa had lost at gambling, However, Pendawa’s party stated that they had started involving themselves in Astina’s war with Wirata aone day after the completion of the 13-year exile, which had been fully served.

NO point agreement was reached and the dalogue ended in a cul-de-sac. Diplomatic eays were ineffective, that was why violence was resorted to. War and violence are a direct result of discontinued dialogues. In other words, war and violence are the extensions of diplomatic ways. Indeed, people’s state in this world is exactly like that of Arjuna’s at the outbreak of the Barata War, or even like Arjuna when he was drenched in the blook of the people he had killed in the Battle Fields of Kurusetra.

MANY people believe that violence must be resorted to in an emergency situation, i.e., when dialogues come to a deadlock. But on top of that, there is this nagging question: why do some people feel happy when they can display power and violence to other people? How can people be happy leading an affluent life amidst others who live in poverty and those who starve, like the people in Jayawi-jaya, Irian Jaya, and Ethiopia? This question, perhaps, only repeats what has been put forward by Mahatma Gandhi when he said that he had always been puzzled by the fact that there are people who feel respected by insulting his kin. The questions above are not concocted. They are legal and cannot be refuted, being historically recorded. The present realities certainly speak for themselves. This is not just a psychological problem of the mentally sick, the psychopaths whose hearts’ desire can be satisfied after they have vented their desire for cruelty. This is a social problem, a problem of many people, because an act of violence is often implemented collectively or in the name of collectivity. During the Industrial Revolution in England, capitalists made women and children work in underground mines for low wages. Europeans and Americans treated Africans as slaves. The sufferings of the black people whose human rights were violated by America and Europe form a lasting monument to human savagery toward his fellowman. These are only a few examples. However, it can be concluded that the problem of violence is not just a problem of sick people.

VIOLENCE is a part of human culture. Man’s behavior has always been marked by violence. The universe is drenched in human blood. The one thing that cencerned the angels when God wanted to create man and make him caliph on earth has already happened. Everywhere there are local wars: in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Lebanon, Kampuchea. The world is on the threshold of Third World War. Terror is now a general phenomenon. People injure each other: children kill their mothers, and fathers kill their children. Violence appears not only in phisical form, but also permeates into law, ideology, order, norms, and other parts of culture. Law, however just, is still an extension of human violence. Anywhere in the world, justice can be bought. By means of law, human violence appears to be more civilized. In the movie "Justice for All," justice is ironically featured as a verse to be memorized and a dream for children, while in real life it is far from that. Violence also appears in order, life norms, ideology, and culture which often oppress those who attempt to look for their own choices instead of following the norm. The murder of children by their own parents is a picture of how parents raise their children. Violence is relied upon to achieve the "best results." Persuasive ways implemented in education are only, in effect. mitigating acts of violence. A baby falls into the grip of culture the moment he is born, through education, so that he cannot develop in pure form. He is molded by education to become more or less a copy of other people. It is this violence of education and culture that perhaps prompted Agnes Yani Sardjono to write the story "Anak" [(Child), Horizon, June 6, 1981]. Sardjono writes that "there are no people who are not barbaric in this world. More so, the parents. They never let their children grow naturally. I regret having put a heavy burden on my child’s shoulders, whereas he is yet unborn. This is a great sin that is unforgivable. If I go on, then I am the successor of a generation that is morally corrupt, which practices barbaric ways and abuse." The members of the preceding generation who usually are in agreement with the present generation feel that the values they hold are true, so the following generation collectively feels that it must preserve those values and pass them on to the next generations, even though the challenges of the age have already changed. The attempts to preserve those values are made through all means and forms of violence, in physical form, as well as those permeating law and order.

THE building of a nation also shows its violent facets. The taking-over of lands of people, the demolition of houses of the people for building projects are physical forms of the violence of development. Its nonphysical forms may often discard the freedom of people. Yap Thiam Hien once wrote: "The ruling of society and the managing of the building of a nation need power. The existence of power usually goes along with the misuse of power because besides having the ability to manage, power has also the potential to deviate. The greater the power, the greater the possibility to become corrupt. Therefore it would be wise to limit power and to control always those in power." In practice, it is not easy to control those in power, even though there is a good relationship between the ruler and the ruled, what more if the relationship is bad. Yap Thiam Hien wrote: ‘ A bad relationship between the ruler and the ruled may become an excuse for the ruler to demonstrate his power by more severe acts, which in turn may result in more negative reactions from his members, and so on, until a crisis, insurgency, or revolution arises. It is to be borne in mind that appression is also an act of violence, so that justifies a revolt against the oppressive power, at least in theory and from experience. A revolt is a final attempt, by means of violence, to change living conditions felt to be unbearable. However, violence seldom improves conditions and settles problems. It proves that people often resort to violence, even though the prospects are not bright. An outstanding examples is El Salvador. Enrique Alvarez Ungo, the head of the El Salvador Democratic Front, is of the opinion that one can become leftist or socialist without becoming a communist. People generally believe that the term "peaceful means" is synonymous to democracy, while armed insurgency is regarded as a nondemocratic means. But in a country like ours, which dwells in an anti-democratic atmosphere, this is something imaginary, because in this country, it is the peaceful means that are the means of domination, oppression, and restraint. The conflict in Latin America, which invites violence, really originated from poverty, as well as the very gap between the rich and the poor. The poor regard society as having sn unjust structure which forces the poor to be incapacitated, so that they remain poor, while the rich are given facilities to become wealthier. Whereas in Latin America, opposition against injustice is implemented by means of armed struggle, in India the opposition takes the form of, among others, banditry. According to some researchers, about 99 percent of the people become bandits in India. This is due to the injustice and oppression of the rich. "Bandits were not born to be wicked. They become the victims of a condition ... They protest against oppression and are forced to flee to the valleys, where they have to resort to armed defense," says Navin Chandra Singh, a researcher on banditry. The attitude of bandits in India is that of increasing hate against the rich which has resulted in the aphorism: "Kill the rich ... and God and the poor will love you" and has become well-known in the Chambai Valley (Kompas, April 16, 1981). It is to be deplored that in Indonesia there has been no publication on the results of a research on banditry. If there is, then the motivations behind the actions of the gali (gang liar, muggers), many of whom were killed in the last quarter of 1983, could be known. Until now, many of their corpses are still placed in sacks. Their fate reminds us of a poem by Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet. Yea, the guilty is oftentimes the victim of the injured. And still more often the condemned is the burden beared for the guiltless and unblamed. You cannot separate the just from the unjust and the good from the wicked.

How about the present conditions in Indonesia? As a Javanese proverb goes, Sura dira jayaningrat lebur dining pangastuti. The Javanese believe that power and violence may be melted by love. This, however, does not mean that the Javanese refuse to resort to violence when forced. There is another Javanese proverb. Sedumuk batuk senyari bumi, yen perlu dibela kanti pecahing dada, wutahing ludra. (If need be, dignity and a piece of land will be defended until the breast is split and blood is shed.) Thus, there is something to be defended until the final choice, that is, the necessity to use violence. The whol;e Indonesian nation is, of course, acquainted with the saying: "We Love peace, but we love freedom more." This means about the same as the Javanese proverb mentioned earlier. Hence, there is something to be defended by forceful or violent means at the cost of absolving peace with the other party, if the other threatens one’s freedom. On the whole, all peoples are aware of the existence of violence in various forms. Every nation has its budget for its armed forces. Every nation maintains its national resilience in every aspect of life, as the weakness of one nation will invite oppression by another through the forceful means and power it has. In a world that tries to be increasingly civilized, any conflict that can spearhead the use of destructive forces is prevented by institutions. In Indonesia such institutions are the parliament, the political party, societal organizations, and so on. These institutions function as an outlet of the aspirations of their members, as a meeting place for differences in opinions and attitudes, so as to mitigate any conflict and prevent their resulting in destructive powers. Thus, when our observations prove that violence results in destruction of society and the fruits of development and building, this is clearly an evidence that the existing siocial institutions are not functioning, and that these do not enjoy the trust of the ppeople. In such a societal condition, "truth" is defined by the strongest who are apt to use force for oppression. Under such conditions, we cannot at all evade the expression of violence. Our unpreparedness in facing violence will invite violence from another party. We have indeed the obligation to make the social institutions run so as to mitigate any conflict, to prevent it from exploding into a destructive form of violence. However, we need not fully trust the social institutions, since at any moment, they may be manipulated, so that the very institutions established to muffle violence become a means of domination to exercise oppression in the name of law and order. In such a situation man is forced to turn to himself to face all troubles in this world. Without vigilance, man will surely be overrun, because even those who are prepared are often pulverized by violence.*