In his latest call for more stringent Internet controls, Communication and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring has unearthed more statistics on teenage sex that are suspiciously similar to another survey that was debunked the day before.
He quoted a 2007 survey of 4,500 teenagers in 12 cities, carried out by the Indonesian Child Protection Commission (KPAI), that showed 97 percent of respondents had access to pornography, 92.7 percent had engaged in oral sex, 62.7 percent had had sexual intercourse and 21.2 percent of girls had had an abortion.
Tifatul claimed he only received the report of the findings three weeks ago.
“You can pretty much say all the respondents had access to pornography, because there’s a 3 [percentage point] margin of error,” he said on Wednesday. “The rest of the results indicate an alarming situation. We need to come up with a solution.”
The minister said he would bring up the issue with the Ministry of National Education, the State Ministry for Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection, and the State Ministry for Youth and Sports.
The survey is remarkably similar to one recently released then promptly disavowed by the KPAI.
On Monday, KPAI deputy chairwoman Masnah Sari said its 2010 survey, also of 4,500 teenagers in three cities, 93.7 percent of respondents had had oral sex, 32 percent for intercourse and 21.2 percent for abortion.
Masnah blamed the high figures on unfettered access to the Internet, though there was no data linking Web use to sex. She urged the government to limit access to the Internet and implement a monitoring system that could be applied at home and in Internet cafes.
On Tuesday, however, KPAI chairman Hadi Supeno denied the group had ever conducted such a survey. He said the only remotely similar survey was of 100 respondents in Jakarta, Bandung and Surabaya, and contained nothing about oral sex. He also said that survey was never meant to be published.
Masnah has since been unavailable for comment.
Tifatul, however, picked up on the theme that Internet porn fed teen promiscuity. He said it was “bothersome” that Google search results for the keywords “SMP” or “SMU” (junior high and senior high) brought up links to porn content instead of school or educational information.
“Think of all those kids looking for legitimate educational content who keep stumbling on these adult links every time they run a search,” he said.
Parental guidance, Tifatul said, should be the first line of defense against explicit content, but that outside the home, the responsibility lay with schools, clerics and society at large.
“The government and its regulations should always be the last line,” Tifatul said, adding that the “survey” findings and other isolated incidents of casual sex among teens reinforced the urgency for tighter controls on Internet content.
“We’re currently deliberating a draft regulation on multimedia content, for which we welcome feedback from the public,” he said.
Ministry spokesman Gatot Dewa Broto said it would revive the controversial draft regulation on multimedia content with several major changes, adding that the ministry was committed to “totally revising” the planned regulation to monitor Internet content.
He quoted a 2007 survey of 4,500 teenagers in 12 cities, carried out by the Indonesian Child Protection Commission (KPAI), that showed 97 percent of respondents had access to pornography, 92.7 percent had engaged in oral sex, 62.7 percent had had sexual intercourse and 21.2 percent of girls had had an abortion.
Tifatul claimed he only received the report of the findings three weeks ago.
“You can pretty much say all the respondents had access to pornography, because there’s a 3 [percentage point] margin of error,” he said on Wednesday. “The rest of the results indicate an alarming situation. We need to come up with a solution.”
The minister said he would bring up the issue with the Ministry of National Education, the State Ministry for Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection, and the State Ministry for Youth and Sports.
The survey is remarkably similar to one recently released then promptly disavowed by the KPAI.
On Monday, KPAI deputy chairwoman Masnah Sari said its 2010 survey, also of 4,500 teenagers in three cities, 93.7 percent of respondents had had oral sex, 32 percent for intercourse and 21.2 percent for abortion.
Masnah blamed the high figures on unfettered access to the Internet, though there was no data linking Web use to sex. She urged the government to limit access to the Internet and implement a monitoring system that could be applied at home and in Internet cafes.
On Tuesday, however, KPAI chairman Hadi Supeno denied the group had ever conducted such a survey. He said the only remotely similar survey was of 100 respondents in Jakarta, Bandung and Surabaya, and contained nothing about oral sex. He also said that survey was never meant to be published.
Masnah has since been unavailable for comment.
Tifatul, however, picked up on the theme that Internet porn fed teen promiscuity. He said it was “bothersome” that Google search results for the keywords “SMP” or “SMU” (junior high and senior high) brought up links to porn content instead of school or educational information.
“Think of all those kids looking for legitimate educational content who keep stumbling on these adult links every time they run a search,” he said.
Parental guidance, Tifatul said, should be the first line of defense against explicit content, but that outside the home, the responsibility lay with schools, clerics and society at large.
“The government and its regulations should always be the last line,” Tifatul said, adding that the “survey” findings and other isolated incidents of casual sex among teens reinforced the urgency for tighter controls on Internet content.
“We’re currently deliberating a draft regulation on multimedia content, for which we welcome feedback from the public,” he said.
Ministry spokesman Gatot Dewa Broto said it would revive the controversial draft regulation on multimedia content with several major changes, adding that the ministry was committed to “totally revising” the planned regulation to monitor Internet content.
