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The National Commission on Violence Against Women has said that the Anti-Pornography Law was not properly able to combat the problem because the issue is not only a legal matter, but also one of morality and religion.

The commission, also known as Komnas Perempuan, said during a news conference on Friday that the controversial law, which was passed in 2008, would only create new problems.

“This will give room for people to conduct more discrimination as everyone has different perceptions about morality, and it will also allow people to take the law into their own hands,” said Arimbi Heroeputri, one of its commissioners.

“This is going to threaten the unity of our country,” she continued. “The porn industry is exploiting women and children. But when we mix in violence and morality, they will only be victimized all over again and we will not have solved the root problem, which is violence.”

Yustina Rostiawati, a senior official from Komnas Perempuan, said the law focused too much on people’s morality rather than catching the perpetrators.

“The substance of the pornography industry is the distributors, and by being too busy judging someone’s morality — the actors in the video, for example — we are not dealing with the matter and we are not protecting the women and children,” she said.

“Every citizen has the right to be protected and by focusing on judging someone’s morality, we are not going anywhere and the pornography industry will be always there.”

Arimbi said the Anti-Pornography Law was not needed to combat the spread of illicit materials.

“We have laws that can be used to catch the perpetrators from porn industry,” she said. “There are four laws that cover this and that do not bring up morality issues, and so far they have been enough.”

The laws that covered the issue of pornography, Arimbi said, were the Criminal Code, Law on Child Protection, Law on Broadcasting and the Information and Electronic Transactions Law (ITE).

“The implementation of the porn law is making people too busy thinking about how others should dress and how they should act,” she said.

Arimbi also criticized the minister of communications and information technology, Tifatul Sembiring, for having sparked tensions between people of different religions.

Komnas Perempuan’s Andy Yentriyani said that it was going to monitor the implementation of the law as it was susceptible to criminalizing women and children, who were most often the victims of porn videos.

“We have not seen any effect on the pornography industry with the implementation of this law, because it is too open to multiple interpretations,” she said.

“We are just getting busier conducting raids in schools to check cellphones. This is not the way to combat pornography, as the target should be the distributors.”

Komnas Perempuan praised the work of the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI), which has warned media organizations to stop sensationalizing the celebrity sex tapes scandal.

Separately, Luna Maya and Cut Tari, two of the celebrities implicated in the recent sex tapes scandal, were questioned again as witnesses at the National Police headquarters in Jakarta.

Luna’s lawyer, OC Kaligis, declined to elaborate on what was asked during the questioning.

“I cannot make any further comments about today’s investigation and about my client’s status. That is beyond my authority,” he said.

The National Police also declined to comment on the celebrities’ questioning.

Is the Anti-Pornography useful or does it do more harm than good?
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