INDONESIA: Social Media Gives Indonesian Women New Voice

 (JAKARTA, Indonesia) — A judge being interviewed for a Supreme Court job jokes that women might enjoy rape. A local official takes a 17-year-old second wife, then quickly divorces her by text message. Both cases reflect attitudes toward women’s rights and safety that have persisted for years in this Southeast Asian archipelago nation of 240 million people. The difference now: Both officials are at risk of losing their jobs. (MORE: Movie, Books Push Indonesia to Confront Its Bloody Past) Women in this social-media-obsessed country have been rallying, online and on the streets, against sexist comments and attacks on women. The response is seen as a small step for women’s rights in Indonesia, where the government is secular and most people practice a moderate form of Islam. “We are living in a different era now,” said Husein Muhammad of the National Commission on Violence Against Women. “… Now we have supporting laws and social media to bring severe consequences and social sanctions.” Still, rights groups say the country remains far behind on many issues involving gender equality and violence. Rape cases often are not properly investigated, and victims are sometimes blamed. And although it is rare to divorce by text message, as Aceng Fikri did last summer, unregistered polygamous marriages such as his are common. Fikri, chief of Garut district in West Java province, called it quits four days after marrying his teenage bride in July. He claimed she was not a virgin, which she denied. A photo of the couple posted on the Internet slowly began to stoke chatter — and then rage. The outcry spread by local media and on Twitter, blogs, Facebook and popular mobile phone networking groups such as BlackBerry and Yahoo Messenger. Thousands of people took to the streets in December to protest. Students and women’s rights activists in Garut demanded that he resign, trampling and spitting on photos of his face before setting them ablaze outside his council building. President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono responded by issuing a rare public condemnation of the 40-year-old official and his