WOMEN PERSPECTIVES OF IDEAL MAN

IN INDONESIAN ONLINE COMICS

FRANSISKA RAHAYU MYRLINDA, S.S.

Universitas Kristen Petra Surabaya ( Magister Ilmu Susastra, Fakultas Sastra

UKP)
myrlinda15@gmail.com
0857 2781 2086

Abstract

Comics are the media used to express ideas by images which are often
combined with text or other visual information. Comics often work as the
instruments to introduce, explain, or relate to what are still happening in society. It
has an important role as a narrative medium or may also be used as a penetrating
power in all social classes. Cartooning and similar forms of illustration are the
most common image-making tools in comics. Different countries have different
style of naming the term “comics”. It regards on their original languages where
comics are originally produced. This research is focusing on women perspectives
of ideal man which are taken from Indonesian online comics. This research used
online research in conducting the data. Line Webtoon is the means to get the
reliable data. Post-colonialism combined with race and gender theories were used
to identify the data. By doing this research, it is known that there are some
important aspects of man to be categorized as an ideal man according to women
perspectives, especially Indonesian women perspectives, such as whether or not
the man is being educated, having proper family background, pursuing education
in foreign countries, and showing appearance like a Western people. Being an
ideal man is believed as those who are honoured and being rewarded. Women, on
the other hand, are the price that turn into the reward for an ideal man itself.
Indonesian online comics show how the representation of ideal man being
unconsciously built as the common standard to judge man’s personality.

Keywords: Indonesian online comics, women perspectives, ideal man, post-

colonialism, being rewarded
Introduction

Comic is the media used by publisher to grab the attention of the readers.
It uses collaboration of visual expression, pictures, and written words to show the
meaning that the writers want to convey. Comics often work as the instruments to
introduce, explain, or relate to what are still happening in society. Comic was
historically used only for entertaining. The publication of comic was also not as
broader as what it is recently. Comic was originally read only by blue collar
workers, especially the women. Meanwhile, as time goes by, there are also
developments in comic’s functions, such as for criticizing social issues,
persuading people, or even comparing human lives with other creatures.
In comic, speech balloons are the media used to indicate dialogues,
narration, sound effects or other information between characters. Comic strips,
gang cartoon, editorial, comic books, graphic novel, and online web comics are
the common forms of comic (Martin, 1989). There are different genres of comic,
such as crime, horror, humour, fantasy, and romance. These different genres of
comic are used to imply different things. Romance genre is one of favourable
genre in comic. This kind of genre is used to symbolize that the whole story from
the beginning up to the end retell the story about love, romance, and other
pleasurable things that usually every human being wants to have in their daily life.
Comic that applies romance as the main genre is usually known as romance
comic. Romance comic is usually called as chick lit. This popular literary work
usually conveys the representation that it is being read commonly by teenager or
young adult, especially young woman adult (McCloud, 1993).
This research is focusing only in the use of Indonesian comic as the
symbolic system. The history of Indonesian comics began in 1930. The first
Indonesian comic being published was Put On by Kho Wang Gie. It was in the
form of comic strip. The first publication was in Sin Po’s magazine. It tells about
Put On’s life, a kind Chinese-Indonesian man, who is also the main character of
the comic. 1980 was assumed as the golden age of Indonesian comic. Theme that
usually used in Indonesian comic historically was about warrior of martial arts,
hero and heroine. The hero and heroine theme was the most preferable theme for
Indonesian comic writer at that time.
Indonesian comic develops faster sooner or later. To fulfil the needs of
Indonesian comic target market, online comic is being published into public.
Nowadays, it is quite easy for readers to read comic because online comics can be
found anywhere and anytime they want. The online comics then turn into the
preferable way to read comics. People no longer need to pay much money just for
having a chance to read novel. Indonesian online comic provides easy way for
comic’s readers. It is also used by the publisher to make comic become broadly
read by others, not only specifically by women, but also by both men and women
for all ages. Only by visiting Indonesian online comic websites, such as
reoncomics or line webtoon, it can be downloaded freely. The readers can easily
access the Indonesian comics they want to read as long as there is internet
connection to process it.
This research seeks to discuss the issue in Indonesian online comic. It is
aimed to analyse the types of men that are considered to be the “ideal” by
Indonesian female characters in online comics. Online research was done in
conducting the data. All the data in this research were taken from Indonesian
online comics in line webtoon. Data collection methods were varied and included
document collection and observations.

Theory of Post-colonialism

The main concern is theory of post-colonialism is the study of colonized

cultures. There are power struggle between cultures. The key concept in
understanding post-colonialism theory is the assumption that those who are
different from oneself are inferior (Barry, 2009). There is a view in post-
colonialism theory that those who are different from oneself possess an inherent
dignity and beauty, perhaps because of their more undeveloped, natural state of
being.
Post-colonialism views European (including America) ideals and
experiences are the standard. Post-colonialism theory believes that there is
imitation on the dress, manners and language of the dominant culture by the
oppressed. Peter Barry in the book entitled Beginning Theory mentioned that in
post-colonialism theory there is a belief that a great work of literature deals with
certain themes and characters that are common in European literature, Eurocentric
in nature.
The theory of post-colonialism is used to identify the data. It is used to
know whether or not Indonesia as the colonize country gives effect on the school
of thoughts or paradigm of the people themselves. By analysing the Indonesian
online comics, it is not that there are some standards for man to be called as ideal
man according to women’s perspectives and post-colonialism theory is the main
theory used to support the data in this research.

Theory of Race and Gender

Race is important part to be discussed because it is closely related to

human life. It can change human’s behaviour, mind-set about society, or even the
reaction of human itself around their own life. Race is the ordinary phenomenon
that still exists until nowadays. Race is a condition whether human beings or even
society cannot move away to let this phenomena happen in the whole life. It
results on questions that have no answer until now. It can also make the distance
between human and society is closely appeared between one and another.
Race is a member of group which is differentiated because of both
physical characteristics and cultural differences. These cultural differences include
differences in technology, customs, habits, and value (Frazier, 1957:31). Race
difference has been similarly portrayed. White-skinned people of European
origins have viewed themselves as innately superior in intelligence and ability to
people with darker skin or different physical characteristics (Paula Rothenberg,
1998).
The phenomenon of race hate appears and it is actually the product of
racism. It certainly creates and perpetuates a feeling of distrust between races.
Furthermore, the belief of the white superiority influenced the Black people who
were born before or during Civil War to be lack of confidence in their own race.
They thought that what the white people had done toward the black was natural.
Yet, the next generation’s opinion about their own race is changed little by little
when the education of the black people increases (Locke and Stern, 1946:544).
In short, it can be concluded that race refers to an idea that differentiates
some groups of people from others based on the differences of physical
characteristic, intellectuality, or culture around their society. Superiority and
inferiority can be divided according to their race. It result the different power
among the superior race and the inferior one.
Gender, on the other hand, is closely related to race in the human life to
the action of accepting the discrimination in their life. Most societies have sex-
role stereotypes that identify certain jobs or activities as appropriate for women
and others for men, and claim that these divisions reflect “natural” differences in
ability and/or interest while there is little consistency in what kinds of tasks have
been so categorized. Even within cultures that claim that women are unsuited for
heavy manual labor, some women (usually women of color and poor, white
working women) have always been expected and required to perform back—
breaking physical work—on plantations, in factories, on farms, in commercial
laundries, and in their homes (Paula Rothenberg, 1998).
Women are defined as ‘other’ or they are ignored, invisible and silent if
they do not fit with the patriarchal schemes. Outside the dominant definitions of
male dominated culture, women exist only as insane, inarticulate, or irrelevant
(Madsen, 2017:37). Shortly, being a woman in patriarchal society means that she
must accept the fact as not be considered as a whole integrity. Women are
considered as the second class citizen and their presence only be considered as the
minor role of the patriarchal society. It directly means that women have lower
position than men in society.
Findings and Discussion

Representation of Ideal Man in Indonesian Online Comics Characters

There are some standards of man to be called as an ideal man according to
females characters in Indonesian online comics. The discussion below listed the
standards that are used to categorize the symbol of ideal man.

a. Educated vs. Uneducated

1.1 Sweet Escape-Nana, Jun, and Kei

An Indonesian online comic entitled Sweet Escape conveys to the readers
that there is a standard of an ideal man according to female character. It is
published weekly every Saturday in line webtoon. The story tells about Nana, a
fan girl of Korean K-Pop JI:NX. Jun is her idol. They both meet in Venesia, Italy
coincidentally. As time goes by, they become closer to one another although they
have different social status. Jun is a singer and also an educated man. Meanwhile,
Nana is just an ordinary girl. Kei is Nana’s best friend. Even though he also has
special feelings to her but he has not been able to say anything about his true
feelings.
The style of creating comic characters is different from ordinary
Indonesian comics. The appearances of Sweet Escape’s characters as one of
Indonesian comic examples are different from Indonesian people in a sense that
they look like a foreigner. The color of their hair, for example, does not look like
the normal appearance of Indonesian people. The characters’ names are chosen
based on the name of Korean Singer, such as Jun. The name Kei, for example, is
also quite different from Indonesian people’s names.
From this Indonesian comic, it can be seen that being an ideal man should
be those who are educated. Even though there are two main males’ characters in
the comic, Jun as the educated one is the preferable for the female character,
Nana. Jun is also characterized as sensual and calm man. Meanwhile, Kei is
characterized as the one who is unable to control his feelings towards Nana. The
female character in Indonesian online comics tends to choose the educated man as
being an ideal man. The

b. Naming

KENT, VALERIE, NOEL, and NALA

The Indonesian In a Dream tells the story about Valerie. Valerie is a

famous girl in her school. She is a single beautiful girl who meets a handsome boy
named Kent in a world of dream. When she comes back to reality, everything
comes back to normal. The problem in the story comes up when Nala as Valerie’s
friend assumes herself as only Valerie’s follower. Whenever she falls in love with
someone, the man will never love her back. Instead, the man will fall in love with
Valerie. Because of Noel, they both are no longer as best friend anymore. This
comic used fantasy and romance as the genre. It is updated on line webtoon every
Saturday. Cindy Chwa and Angellina are the author and editor of this comic.
 In a Dream comes up with an issue that those who have western name is
categorized as an ideal. Even though Noel is someone that is closer to Valerie, he
is just assumed as a friend for her. Meanwhile, Kent who has a western name is
always remembered by Valerie. This Indonesian online comic also employs the
different characteristics of both main males’ characters. Kent is described in the
story as the man who is more confident than Noel. Being confidence is an
additional standard for female perspective in choosing the ideal man to be stayed
with. Whenever Valerie discusses about Kent to Noel, for example, Noel prefers
to change the topic. Noel, on the other hand, is characterized as the one who has
low-self-esteem.

c. Immortal

The story about human and vampire is also one of interesting genre to be
discussed. Characterized by Jiho, Sia, and Baryu, this comic entitled Untouchable
has distracted the readers’ attention to know how the story flows. This story
comes up with Sia as vampire tries hardly to get in touch with Jiho who has
OCD’s problem. Baryu, one of Sia’s childhood best friends, needs to let Sia get
close to Jiho even though in fact he gets jealous on it. He lets Sia pursue her
happiness. The story is ended by the happy ever after marriage of Jiho and Sia.
Being characterized as immortal, it creates an assumption that Jiho is
categorized as an ideal man. Jiho is described as someone who has lots of energy.
Meanwhile, Sia is the only one who cannot bear it. To keep alive, Sia needs Jiho’s
energy. Only by holding his hand, Sia can feel warmth. This comic presents
female characters as reward for the ideal man.
On the other hand, Baryu is characterized as powerless man. Because of
his love to Sia, he can sacrifice himself as long as Sia can get her happiness.
Baryu prefers to let his feelings away so that the female character can pursue her
dream with the ideal man character.

d. Family background

Ma Ri Baek and Jung Jae Min

The Indonesian online comic entitled Orange Malmade shows that the
different family backgrounds give effect on the issue around the characters. Jung
Jae Min is described as the main character in the comic. He is described as a
famous man in school. He is a good looking man. He is also the captain of
basketball team in his school. Jung Jae Min is the son of a rich and well-known
family. Jung Jae Min is described as an ideal man in the comic.
Meanwhile, Ma Ri Baek is just an ordinary student. She is a new student at
school. She does not have a friend and she also comes from a poor family. The
issue conveys in the comic that even an ideal man can fall in love with an ordinary
female character. Because of Ma Ri Baek hard effort in chasing him, they both
finally can be closer to one and another.
Conclusion

Comic is used as the tool for narrator to give critics to the society. The
issue in comic is related to what is happening in society. By the development of
comic, Indonesian comic narrator can fulfil the needs of the readers to have a
chance reading comic without spending much money on it. Indonesian online
comic appears as the easiest way for comic’s reader to have pleasure in reading it.
Post-colonialism and race and gender theories are used to get the reliable
data in the research. It can be seen from the data that Indonesian online comic
does not only have function to give pleasure for the reader to enjoy it, but also it
conveys that there an issue used as the standard of being an ideal man according
to female characters’ perspectives. The differences in being educated, naming,
immortal and family background are the fixed standard to differentiate whether or
not the man is categorized as the ideal man.

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