Emancipation, a long and winding road for Indonesian Women

The 21st of April is just around the corner. Indonesians will celebrate the birth of a special woman who initiates education for women and questions equal opportunity across genders.

As a woman who finished my undergraduate study overseas, I should feel relief and be proud of Indonesian women’s achievements since Kartini passed away 118 years ago. Yet, I still find myself struggling to preserve my rights to pursue study, and career, and create my own path. This year is 2022, yet It’s still not easy for me. I still feel society expects women to stay at home, serve their families, and take roles in only domestic areas.

I wonder how the emancipation that has been pioneered by Kartini has changed the balance of roles between men and women.

Even though so many women have the opportunity to get higher education at the university level, Indonesia’s rank is 103 out of 162 countries on statistics about the issue of gender equality. Even in ASEAN, we are the third lowest.

To get more insight, I listened to a podcast from Indonesia Global Youth, discussing where we are now. I couldn’t agree more about how the social construction in Indonesia stays the same as in Kartini’s time. How our society still expects women to take the feminine role as caretakers Women have a tendency to get blamed if something’s wrong with their husband or their children. Therefore, we’re still a very patriarchal society.

Although Indonesia has passed the long wait for the Anti-Violence Sexual Bill, I feel somehow a journey for Indonesian women to have more freedom and get access to gender equality, is still a long way to go. Everyone must realize that gender equality or emancipation does not mean the female wants to compete with the male.

Gender equality means better welfare for women. To make it successful, it requires work between both genders to make this work socially and culturally acceptable. Men should take more initiative to be involved in domestic roles. In the end, the dichotomy does not exist. Both genders need to be able to take the opposite role. Emancipation should allow women to get the same privilege, in education, career, and social status as men do.
#opportunity #genderequality #education #career