Gallant Indonesia

KOMPAS/WAWAN H PRABOWO

The General Election Commission (KPU) held a draw to determine debates of the presidential and vice presidential candidate pairs of the 2019 general election in the KPU building, Jakarta, Wednesday (26/12/2018). The activity, which was led by KPU chairman Arief Budiman (center), was attended by television station representatives. The debate between the presidential and vice-presidential candidate pairs in the 2019 general election will be held five times.

In welcoming the New Year, Tempo\'s main headline was "The Danger of Prabowo\'s Rhetoric". Prabowo Subianto is considered to have placed himself at the level of divinity, as messiah (the savior), while his political opponents are the source of all problems. The frank view explicates the mystical atmosphere of society which is sad, anxious, and fearful (angst psychose) due to hoax hysteria and widespread hate speech, which have become our daily meal. If political contestation is already at the doctrinal level of divinity, the 2019 general election is feared to divide society categorically and antagonistically, black and white, life-death, or heaven-hell.

The public sphere is increasingly dirty and riotous through twisting and deceitfulness, which has exceeded the community’s ability to bear it all. Prabowo\'s remarks about "the faces of Boyolali", which is an expression of intimacy, for example, are "fried" massively as an act of humiliation and demeaning to the local community. On the contrary, the accusation that President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo was a member of the banned Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) was repeated over and over again even though the figure regarded as its initiator, La Nyalla Mattalitti, has apologized and is now supporting the Jokowi-Ma\'ruf Amin ticket. Not surprisingly, after being repeatedly asked about these rumors, Ma\'ruf angrily responded: "PKI matamu! (Having a bone to pick with someone).” A human expression that wants to confirm that the rumor is not true.

Public expectations are that, in the 2019 general election, the winner must be able to anticipate the challenges, which are not light, to manage power at least for the next 50 years. The central issue is whether democracy as a power order that realizes people\'s sovereignty for hundreds of years can still be carried out with traditional standards, protocols, political processes, and political institutions, such as political parties, people\'s representative institutions, and bureaucracy. Modern democracies are considered to be increasingly obsolete.

The main cause, according to Yuval Noah Harari in his book on future humans, Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (2017), is the fact that the acceleration level of technological sophistication that produces artificial intelligence cannot be followed by the ability of humans to form political institutions in line with the acceleration rate. The next few decades are predicted not to be a prophecy that must be realized, but tendencies that might be achieved; the validity of technology has been able to compile biochemical data in algorithms so that human organisms are merely algorithms. Humans are increasingly able to engineer human organisms.

In short, all human experiences consist of aspirations, emotions, ambitions, and thoughts, which can be processed in such a sophisticated processing system that it endangers humanity. The voter tendency in general elections and the choice of the merchandise by customers can be driven by an algorithm. The sophistication of creating the algorithm separates intelligence capabilities from awareness.

However, what is more worrying is the human ambition to try to achieve happiness, immortality, and divinity. Humans act as if they want to be a "human God" (Homo deus), surpassing the highest human evolution of the present Homo sapiens. Data becomes supreme, the battle of the complex processing capabilities of megadata determines who is superior and dominates the world. Today, new religions appear, which are called "data religions".

In a political perspective, Yuval said, "Democracy will fade and even disappear [...] political institutions such as general elections, political parties, and parliaments are expired, not because these institutions are unethical, but are unable to process data more efficiently [...]" (Page 436).

Responding to such challenges, Indonesians are prohibited from being pessimistic, apathetic, losing hope. On the contrary, they must be vigilant and not believe the talk that the nation will disappear because a general election has been lost. The rhetoric is only political superstition that is used to make anxiety and legitimacy appear as a messiah.

A power political strategy that frightens people is going against history. Since the formation of the nation and state of Indonesia, the founding fathers of the nation bravely fought for a nation united in diversity. The history of the formulation of the Pancasila ideology is a monument to the authentic competence of the Indonesian people to glorify a shared life in primordial diversity, religion, language, and beliefs.

The attitude of being gallant has also been sculpted in the history of independence and continues with the ability to face tough challenges, which if they were experienced by other nations would leave them in disarray. The political elite should not, simply because of the attractiveness of power, sell compassion, be merciful and follow policies of other countries that are contrary to the principles of the struggle of state policies. They are required to provide examples to face the challenges that are not simple, democracy which is increasingly obsolete, data religions, and giant corporate ambitions that want to achieve desires beyond human nature as God\'s creation. (J. KRISTIADI, Senior Researcher, Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS))