Oxymoronic Jakarta Post Reporting – Conservatism = Radicalism?

While it was heartening to read that lots of good Jakarta citizens have appealed to the security forces to crack down on the Islamist menace…

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http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2017/05/04/jakartans-call-for-help-against-radicalism.html

… it is baffling to read through the Jakarta Post’s report on the situation, replete with contradictory descriptions of the problem of Islamist intolerance as at once ‘conservatism’  – a growing wave of religious conservatism…

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…and ‘radicalism’ – the headquarters of the National Police, the Jakarta Police and the Indonesian Military (TNI), were adorned with dozens of flower boards bearing messages calling on the government to curb radicalism. 

Can’t have it both ways!

And if the JP journos can’t make up their minds, why not just tell it like it is – Arabisation of Indonesia, or Islamist fanaticism ( I admit that’s slightly unfair on Middle Eastern people, especially Middle Eastern women, who also suffer Islamist injustice The Glory That Was Egypt – When Women Were Unashamed To Be Women!  )

In making up their minds, Indonesian media people must be aware that Indonesia was founded on the pluralist principles embedded in the state ideology of Pancasila. It had to be, because the archipelago is home to various religions and multiple cultures.

So a genuinely conservative Indonesian will be proud of his country’s heritage of traditional tolerance and seek to preserve it.

Any movement or ideology which seeks to undermine that heritage is by definition radical.

Whether that subversion be an alien import called marxism, bent on fuelling class hatred, or the equally alien import – from the Arab World – called Islamism, it needs to be recognised and struck down.

Indonesians did a good job in 1965, excising the communist cancer called PKI (the Indonesian Communist Party) from the body politic.

Nowadays, the threat is also an ideology which proclaims its internationalism, aspiring to force people to acknowledge a global sectarian allegiance.

If the decent citizens who toted all those flowers into town seriously seek to preserve a civilised way of life from evil, they should appeal to President Jokowi to match his words –  – with deeds…

 

…and stick to his plan to impose a ban, similar to that on the PKI, on Hizbut Tahrir and all other like-minded fanatic gangs who would place Indonesia under an international caliphate based on iniquitous shariah.

At the moment, Jokowi is facing an uncannily similar situation to that which besets President Trump, whose good intentions are being thwarted by politically motivated people using specious court manoeuvres.

Jokowi too is being urged to spend time pushing the ban through courts, and after the Ahok verdict, God only knows what Indonesian judges might do if faced with predictably raucous fanatic demos.

All civilised countries should welcome any action against radical Islamists.

Especially Australia, where timorous Turnsteer, like his predecessor, cowers from that sensible step – Grubbing for Sectarian Votes – Labor Vies With Mufti’s Mate Malcolm!  – which would be welcomed by millions of patriots!