In what has become an annual tradition almost as old as the holiday itself, various cities throughout Indonesia have banned celebrations of Valentine’s Day tomorrow.
(Yep, it’s tomorrow, so if you haven’t got a gift for your special somebody yet, you can just say you thought it was banned throughout Indonesia this year as an excuse).
Most of the cities affected have specifically prohibited students from participating in the Western holiday associated with romance. Education Departments that have announced bans this year include those in Depok, Tangerang, Bogor, Semarang and Tasikmalaya. The West Java Education Department has also issued a blanket ban on Valentine’s Day celebrations in school.
Public Valentine’s celebrations have also been banned in Ambon with the justification that it could disturb the peace before the city’s mayoral election on Wednesday.
The Blitar branch of the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) banned Valentine’s Day celebrations as haram, saying that it promotes negative things like sex, smoking and drinking, which is contrary to Muslim culture.
In addition to schools, the government of Sukabumi, West Java, has also banned nightclubs and hotels in the city from holding Valentine’s Day celebrations or even putting up Valentine’s “attributes” (sorry, Cupid), which they said could lead to immoral acts like prostitution and drug trafficking.
The only person we could find speaking up in defense of Valentine’s Day was Semarang Mayor Hendrar Prihadi, who said he was surprised to see a letter from his city’s education department banning celebrations of the holiday in schools as it had not been coordinated with him.
Hendrar said he was surprised because Semarang has long been known as a very tolerant city, especially in terms of religious harmony, and that they did not adopt policies that could provoke or foster intolerance.
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