The Governor of West Java, Ridwan Kamil, tweeted about the rudeness of some Indonesian netizens. Indeed, there has been research that discusses that issue.
"Why do netizens on the cover like to dig? Yes, that's our problem together. Even the roughest champion in Asia Pacific. This type exists in any group. The account owner has no power to control the followers' thumbs. What we have is to consistently educate them to always be polite and full of manners, " wrote Ridwan Kamil on his personal Twitter.
He discussed that along with other topics on the debate with people who criticized him. "Debate with critics? Always try to respond, but there's no need to be long-winded like a twitwar. I'll just give my right to answer. After that, viewers can draw their own conclusions," he wrote in a previous tweet.
In February 2021, Microsoft released the latest annual report which, among other things, measures the level of politeness of netizens or internet users with the title 2020 Digital Civility Index (DCI). Indonesian netizens are included in the research and it turns out that they occupy the bottom ranking.
Globally, the Netherlands is the country with the most polite netizens alias the first ranking. While in Southeast Asia and also in Asia in general, Singapore is in the top position and fourth globally.
Singapore is recorded to have moved up four levels, replacing Malaysia which was previously at that level. As for Indonesia, it ranks 29th out of 32 countries surveyed by Microsoft, making it the lowest in Southeast Asia, dropping 8 points with a score of 76.
In that research, the biggest risk for Indonesian netizens was hoax and fraud which increased by 13%, hate speech increased by 5%, but discrimination decreased by 2%. Four out of 10 respondents rated civility better during the pandemic. However, almost 5 out of 10 people admit to being involved in bullying and 19% of respondents admit to being a target.