Political Battles on Social Media

Starting from calls on social media, the #2019ChangePresident hashtag in just a short time has managed to form a fanatical political crowd while at the same time sparking strong rejections, causing the political temperature to heat up long before the presidential election takes place.

KOMPAS/ AGUS SUSANTO

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From the sky down to earth, from cyberspace to the real world. The #2019ChangePresident hashtag is everywhere.

Starting from calls on social media, this hashtag in just a short time has managed to form a fanatical political crowd while at the same time sparking strong rejections, causing the political temperature to heat up long before the presidential election takes place. Political camps have been in confrontation and carrying out warfare of speeches in the virtual world.

What is important here is that what happens in the virtual world then spreads to the real world. The #2019ChangePresident hashtag has transformed into a mass-mobilizing political movement. Political complications emerge when the movement is also responded to with mass movements by opposing political groups, colored by the involvement of security forces.

The #2019ChangePresident hashtag shows the dramatic changes in the political sphere in Indonesia. Social media has become the new epicenter for political communication. The process of message dissemination, social interaction, opinion mobilization and political campaigns has found a new locus that promises efficiency and effectiveness.

The problem is how we behave and act politically is also influenced, even reshaped, by social media. We are more than ever saying whatever is on our minds without thinking twice and becoming increasingly expressive in affirming our political stances, as well as acting aggressive toward those who are in opposition to us. Ethical standards in communication have also changed quickly. Empathy to the interlocutors, prudence in taking into consideration the impact of utterance, consideration of appropriateness or politeness in speaking increasingly fades as a reference for the norm of communicating in the public sphere. Expression is increasingly given emphasis over empathy, freedom is considered more important than maintaining a responsible attitude, speed is more dominant than feasibility.

Social media bias

What happens in this virtual world then spreads to the real world. This is not only reflected in the reaction of the mass groups who reject the #2019ChangePresident movement, as well as the response of the security forces. The authorities\' decisive action against the #2019ChangePresident movement is like a double-edged sword. On the one hand, that action may be needed to reduce the negative impact of a movement that has the potential to cause clashes among residents. However, on the other hand, the same action raises questions about the reasons why the authorities are blocking or prohibiting public events promoting the hashtag. Caution and wisdom are needed in this regard even though security considerations remain a priority when the political temperature heats up even more.

It should be noted that the reactions at these levels can have a delegitimative effect on a party, while on the other side produce symbolic benefits for other parties. As a regime that prioritizes institutionalizing freedom of opinion and freedom of speech, the government faces a real test here. The same thing happens with security forces, which should be impartial and stand in the middle. It is very possible that there is intentional action to provoke an overreaction by the government.

KOMPAS/ALIF ICHWAN

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The perception that develops at this level can be that impropriety has been responded to with impropriety, a priori attitude has been responded to by another a priori. Therefore, both the camps that support and the victims of the #2019ChangePresident movement are then in the same moral category, nothing which is better than others. Of course this is detrimental to the camp that is previously perceived as the victims of the hashtag.

Communication that does not take face-to-face, like on social media, tends to make users apathetic. What is rife is that, once again, impropriety is responded to with impropriety, intolerant character is responded with intolerant character, a priori collides with the other a priori. It is deplorable if the community, as well as the government, are not aware of this tendency, even deeply involved in it. From the sky down to the earth. Impropriety on social media is continued in the real world.

Social media position

With regard to the position of social media in the general election, we need to learn from the United States Presidential Election in 2016. Besides the vulgar political communication, full of a priori and conflictual, another problem that surfaced at that time was the use of religious and racial issues. The politics of division colored the US Presidential Election at the end of 2016. In September 2017, Facebook found 3,000 political advertisements from 470 accounts related to the Internet Research Agency, the Russian intelligence agency. Accumulatively, the accounts have spread 80,000 political messages reaching 126 million people, mostly in the US. Twitter also found 2,752 accounts related to the intelligence agency. Google identified 18 YouTube channels related to the organization.

What is presented in the political ads, messages and accounts? Not only pro-Hillary Clinton and pro-Donald Trump sentiments, also Muslim vs. non-Muslim sentiments, blacks vs. whites, immigrants vs. indigenous people. Religion and race issues were the main object of political propaganda, regardless of the impact of division in society. It was not the rationality of social media users who were developed, but their primordial sentiment. Indeed social media did not know the limits of intellectuality. Once touched by primordial sentiments, social media users -- whatever their educational background, profession, and social classes -- can become intolerant towards their fellow people. Experience like this is of course very relevant for Indonesia which also has latent potential for religious and ethnic conflicts.

The government faces serious problems here. Freedom of opinion and expression must also be protected. The "policing" action against anti-government groups must really be based on laws that are fair to everyone. It is important for the government to ensure that it is not provoked by extra-judicial actions or counter-democratic actions.

ARSIP PRIBADI

Agus Sudibyo

It is time for the government to institutionalize the responsibilities of social media service providers. Hoaxes, hate speech and hashtag wars occur on platforms owned by media companies Facebook, Twitter, Google and others.

The greater number of users on social media platforms, the more popular the companies will be and the more data on their behavior can be collected. The popularity then correlates with the companies\' stock values. Meanwhile, data of user behavior correlates to the clever artificial intelligence products being produced to gauge users. Therefore, these companies should not be immune from the responsibility of helping to overcome the epidemic of hoaxes and hate speech.

Agus Sudibyo, Head of New Media Research Center ATVI Jakarta