Here is one article I got from one national newspaper in Indonesia, written by a feminist writer.
LIPSTICK IN PLACE,
NO RULES BENT²
by
Julia Suryakusuma
When I was in India last week for a meditation retreat, my husband Tim found an old copy of the Hindustani Times of 22 November 2005 lining a drawer in the guesthouse where we stayed. In it was a kinky news item about Inspector General D.K. Panda of the Indian Police who decided he was not just a woman but, in fact, Radha, the divine consort of Krishna. Having a goddess in a male copıs uniform was, of course, hugely embarrassing for the Indian government but highly entertaining for readers.
As the story went, if Inspector Panda were the woman he claimed to be, he would have had a tough time dodging the law.
³Even as the top brass of the Uttar Pradesh seethes at the embarrassment caused to the force by a Radha in their ranks, they admit the law is on Pandaıs side. Yes, his behaviour is abnormal, his conduct outrageous, ridiculous. He is a disgrace, an embarrassment to the All Indian Police Service, but what can we do? The IPS (Uniform) Rules, 1954, are silent on the penalty for a male cop sporting lipstick and nail enamel when in uniformı, revealed a frustrated police officer. Women officers could not have gotten away with turning up to work with bright red lipstick, dark nail enamel, heavy gold bangles and earrings as Panda did The central government
may have to redefine the IPS (Uniform) Rules to penalize the Pandas in the force, say officers. For now, the officer can at best be censured. After all, who could have imagined in 1954 that a male cop would wear lipstick or nailpolish?ı, said a retired Director General.²
For me, Pandaıs story clearly raises the issue of sexual identity. What makes a man a man, and a woman a woman? Gender - the way you look and behave - is a social construct, a product of the way you were brought up and conditioned by your environment. It is not necessarily related to sex, the physical-biological attributes you were born with.
If from birth a baby with female sex organs were given a boyıs name and dressed and treated as a boy, would it grow up to be a man or a woman? There might even be cases where a family has done this: theyıd surely be thought of as sick or, at least, very unusual. This is because when a person is born, it is brought up according to the gender stereotypes that society prescribes for it through tradition or religion, on the basis of its biological sex. These prescriptions like all social contracts - are just an agreement, ideally based on an agreed division of labour, but invariably determined by power politics and the economic expediency of those in power.
So, it is our sex is that first defines us. When a baby is born, the first thing we want to know is whether itıs a boy or a girl. Dorce is a well-known Indonesian singer and talk-show host who had a sex-change and became a woman. When Dorce was born, did the parents ever imagine that he would become a she, and be more comfortable as a woman because that was what she felt she was inside? Dorce is a transsexual but there are, of course, also transvestites, cross-dressers, gays (both homosexuals and lesbians) and many other complex categories. Yes, you may say, but theyıre just a minority.
Sure, but its a sizable one, consistently 10% or more of the Indonesian population and thatıs comparable to the whole of Malaysia or Australia!
In the same way that the mentally ill can help us understand what is
considered normalı, so can non-heterosexual, non-conventional sexes and genders help us better understand our sexuality and prescribed gender roles,
and not be so confined by them. Sexuality is a continuum and, as Kinsey
discovered as early as the late 1940s and wrote about in his groundbreaking
Reports, we are not fixed in our sexuality and can oscillate between
heterosexuality and homosexuality, depending on circumstances.
Then, of course, there are gender roles that are socially determined.
Nowadays, only the most conservative among us would say that that a womanıs place is merely in the kitchen, serving men and children. Increasingly, productive and reproductive tasks and responsibilities are shared and gender role-reversals are more common these days, where the wife goes out to work and the husband stays home. Despite this, women are often still expected to do the bulk of housework on top of their work outside the home.
In Indonesia women have always had a very active social role, in fact, Tim suspects women may really be running the country, albeit behind the scenes. After all, in folklore the guardian of Java is the goddess queen of the South Seas, Loro Kidul. My friend Ong Hok Ham, the historian, goes even further, claiming that all Indonesian men suffer from an Oedipus complex.
So, why is that all too often women are sidelined in daily life, politics and religion? I think itıs a sign of deep societal decline. We forget to renew, and cling to outdated customs, beliefs and traditions that punish minorities and vulnerable groups, holding these values sacred when, in fact,we created them ourselves.
So, rather than being embarrassed, perhaps the Indian government should be proud of the existence of IG Panda-Radha who had the courage (or craziness: the two sometimes go together!) to buck convention, and do what he really believes. Perhaps we need a few Pandas here in Indonesia to encourage us to act from the conviction of our hearts, rather than beliefs that are imposed on us, and not really ours.
At the very least, it would liven up the police force in Jakarta, thatıs for sure!
Julia Suryakusuma is the author of ³Sex, Power and Nation². She can be contacted at jsuryakusuma@ mac.com and jskusuma@dnet. net.id.
