Jakarta – Even to people who have long worked in the industry, the current trend toward low-brow comedy television makes them scratch their heads.
Switch on any local television station at any hour of the day and the chances are that viewers will see slapstick comedy and regular outbursts of verbal abuse from some of the most recognizable names on television.
But it was not always like this. In the 1970s, two of the country's greatest comedians – Benyamin Syueb and Bing Slamet – were both refined artists who mixed humor with high production values.
Until recently, smart comedians from the likes of Bagito Group and Patrio, were the staple of even the most mainstream television programs, but observers say these comedians have long disappeared from our screens.
Ishadi SK, the former executive of Trans TV and a media observer, said there was a lack of talented and intelligent comedians today.
"It's difficult to get intelligent comedians who are able to make fun of social situations instead of people and certain groups. Comedians need to improve their qualities instead of getting complacent and arrogant because of their popularity," Ishadi said.
Uni Lubis, the chief editor of ANTV, said this trend might be motivated by commercial concerns. "The television industry depends on advertisements and ads depend on the rating of a program," Uni said.
"Stations depend on Nielsen research agency to find out the ratings of their shows. Meanwhile, Nielsen's criteria in judging television shows is not holistic. It's judgment is only based on quantitative ratings," Uni said.
"Nielsen says most television audiences come from the 'C' socio-economic status bracket, with monthly incomes from Rp. 900,000 [US$92.70] to Rp. 1.5 million per month. So stations create programs based on what they think their market segment will like," Uni added.
Uni said market segment-based selection had almost eliminated her news program. "ANTV management once suggested that my news program went off the air, because based on a survey, the majority of our audience were women, and they assumed that women didn't need to watch news programs because they weren't intelligent enough," Uni said.
Uni said she was afraid they might pick up sexist jokes broadcast on television. "Teenagers and children might imitate behavior they see on television. They might start to insult women and other minority groups," Uni said.
Nina M. Armando, an Indonesian Broadcasting Commission (KPI) commissioner, said other programs often contained jokes that insulted disabled people, people from certain ethnic groups, people with certain physical characteristics, people with mental disorders and transgendered people.
"The comedians call people names based on his or her physical characteristics – buck teeth, shorty, fatso and so on," Nina said.
She also mentioned one episode of Dahsyat, a popular music program on RCTI, a television channel owned by media baron Hary Tanoesudibjo, in which host Raffi Ahmad asked chef Renne Tanjung if he celebrated Christmas.
Renne said he did not celebrate Christmas. When Raffi asked why, Renne said "because I am a pro-Satan Muslim," a play on words on Muslim protestant, a twist on Protestant Christian.
The episode, aired on Dec. 24 last year, caused public outrage. As a response, on March 6 the KPI ordered RCTI to stop airing the program for three days.
Ishadi said that television crews needed to write the script of comedy programs instead of just letting the comedians do impromptu acts.
"I used to have a team to write the script for the Extravaganza comedy program on Trans TV. But somehow, the script writers ran out of ideas and now the show is off air," he said.
KPI chairman Mochamad Riyanto said a media literacy program was the best solution to overcome the negative effects of crude jokes on air.
"Sanctions from the KPI are not enough to deter television channels from broadcasting low-brow comedy. We recognize the need to educate the public on how to select and be critical toward television programs. Our media literacy program was intended to create a smarter audience," Riyanto said.
"The KPI has cooperated with universities and NGOs to implement a media literacy program. We have implemented this program since 2011," he added. (ogi)