I am an uncle. I am twenty one, and I’ve already been an uncle of young cutie little niece, Teresia Chatra Sarasvati. My family call her Eyi. She is a very smart girl; she learns everything so fast that she memorizes every single thing and thinks in such logical thinking. My Dad (which is actually her grandpa; gosh, he is now a grandpa) ever asked her some Javanese questions and it became a short funny conversation, just like this.
Eyi : “Kula nuwun…”
Grandpa : “Inggih… sinten, nggih?”
Eyi : “Eyi…”
Grandpa : “Eyi putrine sinten?”
Eyi : “Eyi putrine mama Nova…”
Grandpa : “Daleme pundi?”
Eyi : “Rejondani…”[1]
We don’t know how she learned Javanese. She just did it. The point is that God gives her a brilliant mind and she learns very fast, more than we used to learn.
My niece also likes watching television. Just like million other children, she likes watching cartoons: Marsha and the Bear, Thomas and his Friends, Upin-Ipin, Little Krisna, and her favourite cartoon ever, Spongebob Squarepants. Unfortunately, she has a kind of weird favour of music in her age: dangdut. I don’t mean to judge it; dangdut is a popular music in Indonesia, and I also respect it. What I worry about is what she usually watches then: Yuk Keep Smile. This popular TV show appears every night with its popular jargon, “Keep smile!!” showing lots of impolite jokes, sarcastic games, and sensual dangdut music. Eyi does enjoy it, especially the dangdut music with lots of sensational dance like Kereta Malam and Oplosan. Guess what? She learned very quickly, memorized the music, the lyrics, and finally, she sang it just like this, “Tutupen botolmu, tutupen oplo’anmu…”
My mind goes wild: twenty years from now, my niece, young and beautiful, wearing such a sexy uniform, singing oplosan in front of public in a dangdut concert. Come on, who wants to have that kind of niece? I won’t. After having such a wild imagination, I asked to myself a short simple question,
“Keep smile? I don’t think so.”
Big no, big idealism
Yuk Keep Smile is the most popular variety show nowadays. Created after Ramadan holiday last year, it derived from a very popular show Yuk Kita Sahur in TransTV with its famous dancing icon, Caesar. This show was developed then by adding more entertainment features, such as games, quizzes, talk show, and dangdut music.[2] Hosted by Raffi Ahmad, Olga Syahputra, and also with its fenomenal icon Caesar, YKS became very popular variety show up to now.
Unfortunately, YKS upraising popularity is not well balanced by its quality.YKS shows lots of impolite jokes, racism, sensual dangdut music, and even sarcastic games and behaviour. Moreover, the show began at 07.00 up to 11.30 pm (a very long duration for such un-useful entertainment; fortunately, it has been reduced right after the punishment from Komisi Penyiaran Indonesia (KPI) was given, which made it 1.5 hour), which is classified as prime time for TV show. It means that lots of people watch it, including young people and even children. These young people learn from what they watch, especially children who learn imitatively from other people. They learn those impolite jokes, racism, sarcastic behaviour, sensual dance, and finally become ‘little Olga’ and ‘little Raffi’. There is a worrying case in Bandar Lampung: an elementary student suddenly opened his zipper while singing, “bukak sithik, jos!” from YKS. It is a very serious problem since the main character building occurs in childhood, and it determines the quality of young people with their character and integrity in the future.
Our people are not stupid. Lots of people started to criticize YKS with all of its sarcastic and vulgar entertainment. Dewi Noor, an activist from Peduli Indonesia, made a petition to KPIto stop YKS.[3] She invited thousand people to sign the petition and support a better educating program for our people. This petition is not made without any theoretical basis; Dewi made the petition based on Indonesian law of broadcasting, which demand TV program to be useful and to educate our people with high qualified information, knowledge, and entertainment. We can see it from the law of broadcasting chapter 36:
(1)Isi siaran wajib mengandung informasi, pendidikan, hiburan, dan manfaat untuk pembentukan intelektualitas, watak, moral, kemajuan, kekuatan bangsa, menjaga persatuan dan kesatuan, serta mengamalkan nilai-nilai agama dan budaya Indonesia.
(2) Isi siaran dari jasa penyiaran televisi, yang diselenggarakan oleh Lembaga Penyiaran Swasta dan Lembaga Penyiaran Publik, wajib memuat sekurang-kurangnya 60% (enam puluh per seratus) mata acara yang berasal dari dalam negeri.
(3) Isi siaran wajib memberikan perlindungan dan pemberdayaan kepada khalayak khusus, yaitu anak-anak dan remaja, dengan menyiarkan mata acara pada waktu yang tepat, dan lembaga penyiaran wajib mencantumkan dan/atau menyebutkan klasifikasi khalayak sesuai dengan isi siaran.
(4) Isi siaran wajib dijaga netralitasnya dan tidak boleh mengutamakan kepentingan golongan tertentu.
(5) Isi siaran dilarang :
a. bersifat fitnah, menghasut, menyesatkan dan/atau bohong;
b. menonjolkan unsur kekerasan, cabul, perjudian, penyalah-gunaan narkotika dan obat terlarang; atau
c. mempertentangkan suku, agama, ras, dan antargolongan.
(6) Isi siaran dilarang memperolokkan, merendahkan, melecehkan dan/atau mengabaikan nilai-nilai agama, martabat manusia Indonesia, atau merusak hubungan internasional.[4]
That chapter obviously show that YKS has truly broken the law of broadcasting. After few months of considerations, KPI finally gave a punishment to YKS. A court was held in KPI with TransCorp commissary Ishadi S.K., TransTV chief director Atiek Nur Wahyuni, TransTV program director Achmad Ferizqo Irwan, and some of their crew. It was stated that YKS has broken the law of broadcasting. Hence, YKS is given a punishment with the reduction of its duration.[5] However, the show goes on, and still it presents those un-educating things which decrease the characters of our people. On the other hand, the petition itself is also failed in stopping that TV show; instead of stopping, it actually raised up YKS rating higher than before. It is such an unfortunate thing after all.
The effort doesn’t stop here. Fahira Idris the leader of Masyarakat TV Sehat Indonesia questioned the work of Lembaga Sensor Film (LSF) related to YKS. “Acara-acara hiburan seperti Yuk Keep Smile (YKS) dan Pesbukers harus segera dihentikan penayangannya karena dinilai tidak mendidik serta membuat dampak negatif bagi masyarakat,” she said (2013).[6] Pandji Pragiwaksono, a professional comic[7] in Indonesia, criticise how weird TV industries nowadays. They make programs based on the rating of the shows and the majority of the audience, which actually comes from low class people. These people have low education which makes them prefer such an easy understanding entertainment, or even ‘stupid’ entertainment. “Itulah mengapa banyak program TV yang terpaksa di “Dumb it down” atau dibikin “goblok” demi mendapatkan perhatian masyarakat kelas bawah,” said Pandji (2013).[8] It also makes lots of advertisers which aim their advertisements to low class people come to them, which makes lots of money. Those TV industries won’t be bankrupt, and as the result, they ‘dumb their shows down’ and sacrifice people’s education on it. These people – Dewi, Idris, Pandji, and many others – are struggling for the sake of our people, Indonesia, and need our support to make it true.
Pandji has an interesting story related to this issue. It’s about his favourite comic, Dave Chappelle, who left America and million dollars just because of one single reason: his passion. This is how Pandji tells the story.
Saya jadi ingat Dave Chappelle, yang setelah punya reputasi hebat sebagai Stand-Up Comedian ditawarin membuat program TV The Dave Chappelle Show.
Setelah 2 season yang super sukses, thn 2005 Viacom sebagai induk perusahaan Comedy Central menawarkan kontrak season 3 & 4 sebesar $ 55.000.000,- atau sebesar Rp 550 milyar. Sekadar info, 1 season adalah 13 episode. Untuk acara mingguan maka artinya 2 season itu tayang sepanjang 6 bulan kurang lebih.
Dave Chappelle menolak kontrak tersebut, dan bersama anak istrinya pindah ke Afrika untuk hidup tenang sebelum akhirnya kembali ke Amerika Serikat.
Pertanyaanya kemudian, mengapa Dave meninggalkan uang begitu banyak?
Jawabannya, terselip di panggung ketika dia sedang dalam pertunjukan Stand-Up Comedy di 2004. Salah satu penonton sepanjang malam nge-heckle Dave (heckle atau heckling adalah ketika ada penonton yang sepanjang pertunjukan teriak teriak mencoba menarik perhatian komika yang di atas panggung). Heckler tersebut teriak berulang ulang ”Im Rick James, Bitch!”. Sebuah kalimat terkenal (catch frame) dari acara The Dave Chappelle Show.
Dave kesal, kemudian pergi meninggalkan panggung. Beberapa menit kemudian dia kembali ke atas panggung dan berkata..
“You know why my show is good? Because the network officials say you’re not smart enough to get what I’m doing, and every day I fight for you. I tell them how smart you are. Turns out, I was wrong. You people are stupid”[9]
When I read this story, I was touched. Dave’s last sentence is very strong. YKS is truly worse than ever, but in other side I realize that, still, most of our people are not well educated. As long as it remains still, YKS will never go down.
Big yes, big consequence
Did YKS
do nothing on lots of accusations on them? No, they didn’t. They remain the show as it was in the name of Entertainment (or shall we call, Stupidity?). All of the contents of YKS is stated as ‘a fit show for Indonesian people nowadays’, with showing the high rating as the
evidence. Dodi Haryanto assistant producer of YKS said that the data shows that people like YKS very well. He also said that YKS make people like dangdut music, which is the typical music of Indonesia.[10] The point is that it is for the sake of entertainment only, and that’s all.
YKS audience also agree. Lots of people like this show because it reflects their social, cultural, and economical life. As what I have explained before, YKS is mad
e based on the majority of Indonesian people who comes from low class people. These low educated people tend to like sex, violence, and sarcasm as an entertainment. Some sociologists (including my sociology teacher in Seminary) said that the most accessible entertainment for low class people is sex; it is cheap, fun, and relieving. That’s why YKS is irreplaceable. It is such a suitable entertainment for most of our people in Indonesia.
But hey,
What does suitable really mean? Is ‘fit’ enough as an explanation of ‘suitable’? No, it isn’t. Suitable is more than fit, it is a harmony between the representation of one being with another being. The harmony demands the fulfilling of each others’ essential need, and in this case, our people’s need is actually a proper education, which also has to be represented by TV programs, whatever they are. The opinion that smart TV shows are not suitable and will not be well accepted by our people is actually foolish. It is true that entertainment is entertainment; it must entertain people with its content. But don’t forget that entertainment is made just for an intermezzo in our life. Shall we let an intermezzo ruin out our life, moreover, our future? And what the heck this entertainment is if it makes us people remain stupid!
YKS is actually both irony and dilemma. It is an irony since TV show is supposed to educate people, while it doesn’t. It is a dilemma since it gives us two dilemmatic options: stop YKS and our people (which are mostly low class people who also need entertainment) will lose their entertainment, or let it continue and ruin out our life, as time goes by.
Smart = scripted
Okay, enough said. Now what’s the deal? Change the content? No sex, no dangdut, no idiots? It won’t be interesting anymore, considering the majority of our people is actually low class people with their favour. I place myself as the opposition of YKS, but I do admit that YKS is fun. Hypocrite? After all that I said? No, I don’t mean to be. I just try to be honest that I myself do enjoy oplosan dance, but in other side, I realize that the future of our people is much more important, including my young cutie little niece. So what do we have to do?
Make it scripted.
Remember Warkop? This legendary trio (Dono, Kasino, Indro) successfully lifted up Indonesian comedy into a smart comedy. All of their comedies are totally scripted. It contains sex and idiots, but in an acceptable dose of humour (and they always give us some moral values in the end). For example is Kasino’s ngapak style, “Gile lu, ndro!”, “Der is a tikusto ander de tebelto? Astaghfiruloo!!”[11] which is funny, smart, entertaining, and scripted. Why is it smart? Because it lifts up one of our social issue from purwokerto, ngapak style, without underestimating or humiliating it.
Another example is stand up comedy, which becomes a trend nowadays. Stand up comedy also becomes one movement who fights against stupid TV shows by giving smart comedy. It is totally scripted with all hypothesis, premises, and results of the combination from both of them in the comedy itself. One smart example comes from Dave Chappelle with his joke about how women dress. He first told about a woman, dressing with a sexy uniform, cried to a band of men who stared at her just like this, “Just like I’m dressing like this, doesn’t mean I’m a whore!” Dave then told about himself, wearing a cop uniform, being asked for a help by a citizen and answered to this citizen, “Just like I’m wearing cop uniform, doesn’t mean I’m a cop!” In the end, Dave told his audience, “Ladies, it’s true, that just because you’re dressing like that doesn’t mean you’re a whore. Bu let me tell you something: you are wearing a whore’s uniform.” See, it is such a smart joke! There is sex, there is idiot, but it makes us think twice to revalue how women should dress in front of the public. This is what I’m talking about: scripting ideas makes a clear context to be brought, that the entertainers who are involved are not able to do whatever they want to do, and say whatever they want to say, in such impolite, sexist, and even sarcastic way. It is not only about jokes, it’s also about anything inside YKS: the game, the talk show, the dance, the music, and so on. Imagine those dangdut singers, singing Garuda Pancasila in such attractive way in front of the public (not with sexist moves, of course). Isn’t that interesting? According to Naratama TV, YKS entertainers are very busy entertainers who have no time to prepare their jokes and entertainment, so that they take such an easy way to be done: combining sex, hate, and sarcasm to be a fast entertaining joke to consume, and that’s the biggest problem in YKS.[12] YKS management should provide a scripted scenario for them, so that they wouldn’t walk out of the track. This is smart entertainment. This is what we need.
It is quite relieving now to get the solution. No need to stop YKS, just make it smart scripted and packaged. We can also see our reflection from YKS, which reflects our low educated people. We should aware to ask to ourselves then, “What can I do for my people, Indonesia?” since we are a part of this country.
My mind flies away to my niece. Knowing her daughter’s obsession with dangdut, my sister downloaded a simple application in her tab: Mari Menyanyi. Eyi likes dangdut, but she likes her tab more than that music. She played the app, listened to the music, quickly memorized it, and finally, she sang just like this,
“Bintang kecil, di langit yang tinggi…”
Keep smile?
Sleman, April 4th 2014
Andreas Rahardjo Adi Baskoro
Reference
[1]Eyi : “Permisi…”
Grandpa : “Iya, siapa ya?”
Eyi : “Eyi…”
Grandpa : “Eyi anaknya siapa?”
Eyi : “Eyi anaknya mama Nova…”
Grandpa : “Rumahnya di mana?”
Eyi : “Rejondani…”
[2] Ardian, Dicky & Puspasari, Desi. (2014, January). Booming Joget di Acara TV, ‘YKS’ Tak Cuma Soal Joget. Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://hot.detik.com/read/2014/01/20/152233/2472359/230/yks-tak-cuma-soal-joget
[3]Noor, Dewi. (n.d). Komisi Penyiaran Indonesia (KPI): Hentikan program acara Yuk Keep Smile TransTV dan acara serupa yang tidak mendidik. Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://www.change.org/id/petisi/komisi-penyiaran-indonesia-kpi-hentikan-program-acara-yuk-keep-smile-trans-tv-dan-acara-serupa-yang-tidak-mendidik
[4]UU No. 32 tahun 2002 tentang penyiaran.pdf
[5]Rafika, Alia (March, 2014). KPI Pusat jatuhkan sanksi untuk program Yuk Keep Smile (YKS) di TransTV. Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://simomot.com/2014/03/13/kpi-pusat-jatuhkan-sanksi-untuk-program-yuk-keep-smile-yks-di-transtv/
[6]Syaiful. (October, 2013). Fahira Idris : Hentikan Segera Acara Yuk Keep Smile dan Pesbukers!Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://www.suara-islam.com/read/index/8802/Fahira-Idris—Hentikan-Segera-Acara-Yuk-Keep-Smile-dan-Pesbukers-
[7]Stand up comedian
[8]Pragiwaksono, Pandji. (February, 2013).Let’s move it.Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://pandji.com/lets-move-it/
[9]Pragiwaksono, Pandji. (February, 2013).Let’s move it.Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://pandji.com/lets-move-it/
[10] Ardian, Dicky & Puspasari, Desi. (2014, January). Booming Joget di Acara TV, ‘YKS’ Tak Cuma Soal Joget. Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://hot.detik.com/read/2014/01/20/152233/2472359/230/yks-tak-cuma-soal-joget
[11]Didiet. (n.d.).Warkop the Legend, “Gila lu, Ndro!”.Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from http://cingciripit.wordpress.com/2008/01/01/warkop-the-legend-gila-lu-ndro/
[12]Naratama. (n.d.).Yuk Keep Smile, antara format dan content.Retrieved April 2nd, 2014, from https://www.facebook.com/NaratamaTVClub