Heavier penalties cannot deter sexual abuse of children

“I ask [you] to have the perpetrators who are children jailed for life, and that the adult perpetrators be sentenced to death,” said the mother who lost her daughter to a gang-rape and murder committed by men and boys in Bengkulu province last month. She was addressing Yohana Yambise, the women’s empowerment and child protection minister, who was visiting her.
On Wednesday, President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo presented his answer to the public outrage, and to parents whose children have been killed or scarred, perhaps for life, by similar crimes, including those reported in recent weeks. Jokowi issued the controversial regulation in lieu of law, imposing heavier penalties on rapists of children, because, he declared, sexual violence against children was “an extraordinary crime”.
The regulation automatically amends the Child Protection Law so courts can now impose heavier penalties on child rapists than the previous maximum of 15 years’ imprisonment. Repeat offenders, gang rapists and rapists who are victims’ family members and guardians can be subject to an additional one-third of their sentence on top of the maximum punishment.
People found guilty of raping more than one child or causing death, physical or mental trauma or sexual dysfunction or disease, will receive either the death sentence, a life sentence or a 10-to-20-year prison term with possible chemical castration and/or implantation of microchips for monitoring offenders once sentences are completed.
Yet despite Jokowi’s resoluteness, we doubt the regulation’s effectiveness as a deterrent of child rape; and also whether the courts will adopt the heavier punishments.
The light verdicts at recent trials show the great constraints in providing redress for victims and their families. The gang-rapists and killers in Bengkulu were sentenced to 10 years’ jail despite the maximum allowed 15 years. A man in Kediri, Central Java, who allegedly raped 58 girls over the past few years, has also received 10 years; only a few of the cases have reached the court.
Few will, or can, step forward, given the stigma and threat of further harm.
Further, sexologists have argued regular chemical castration does not necessarily remove rapists’ urge to rape; as the drive also stems from past experience. Advocates for abolishing the death penalty insist the crimes will continue regardless of the threat of the sentence. Most importantly, they say, the belief that males must overpower females and demonstrate dominance through rape must change.
The 2013 UN study on rape reported that from 10,000 respondents in six nations including Indonesia, 73 per cent believed men had a right to sex with women regardless of consent; 53 per cent said rape was committed for “entertainment”.
The researchers said rape “[…] is used against those over whom the perpetrator perceives he has power and […] where that kind of violence is normalised because of cultural acceptance and impunity”.
Therefore, even castration and the death penalty, we fear, cannot end such attacks on children. Unless such acceptance and impunity ends, even boys – as shown in Bengkulu – will continue the evil rites of a misguided masculinity.