Sexy Killers

The Documentary That Exposed Indonesia’s Dirty Climate Secret

The Sexy Killers documentary released on YouTube in 2019 was not just a documentary, but it led to an uproar in the whole country. Within several weeks, 30 million Indonesians were compelled to confront the reality in which they had never been ready to encounter: their flourishing democracy and its fossil fuel-driven development were closely interconnected with the coal industry, and politicians, who were competing to be elected, were in the middle of coal enterprises. The film directed by a journalist Dandhy Dwi Laksono was politicised, unmasked, educated and enlightened the people about climate change.

Nevertheless, the screenings were suspended a few weeks after the viral success of the film, and it was alleged to incite hate speech. Climate literacy can never be neutral, something that this song makes obvious. It poses danger to authority.

Breaking the Climate Silence: When Counter-Narratives start to be Climate Literacy.

This is where the controversial title of the film comes in, using the words of a fisherman who noticed that coal is sexy amongst politicians but a murderer in the society, that is how the film summarizes its core tactic, as it tries to reveal what has been hidden by the media, and political system of Indonesia. Tabak (2019) suggests that documentaries and other types of stories can present climate change in a more persuasive way that scientific reporting fails to do. Sexy Killers revealed audiences the filth where rice paddies had flourished, the fish that was destroyed by poison, and the black lungs of children that lived near coal plants.

According to Shwom et al. (2017), social sciences, and not just climate science, should be incorporated to be climate literate. Exemplified by making Sexy Killers intelligible to the masses, it is essential to take the societal context of the energy, politics, corporate power, and inequality and make it accessible to the people. The documentary creates awareness of climate change by exposing the latent systems. It illustrates, such as, the ways coal mining is ruining societies, how presidential contenders are aided by the coal industry, how coal-TI networks in energy policy are made dealings of the elite rather than ordinary people in the US, and how the international climate commitments of Indonesia conflict with its national coal production agenda.

Yet, we should ask why the Indonesians did not understand the impact of coal on their ecology and politics until they had seen a documentary on YouTube, not the official channels and not in the mainstream media. This can be resolved in the study by Das (2021) who uncovered that the media select certain climatic news to conceal them to society. Indonesia has been accustomed to coal as the primary source of revenue and is said to have brought about growth. The expenses of augmented emissions, domestic displacement, water poisoning, and environmental deterioration remain unknown. When breaking this climate silence Sexy Killers relied on human anecdotes and not scientific facts to form what Born (2019) describes as meaningful involvement.

The Knowledge-Action Paradox Awareness vs. Entrenched Power.

The documentary has gone through 30 million views, but Indonesia has not retaliated by shutting down any coal plants. The coal potential has continued to increase. According to Goldberg et al. (2019), this paradox shows that the knowledge of climate and behaviour or a change in policy remain disconnected. Awareness of the problem does not necessarily mean the institutional or political good will to act on it.

This brings us directly to the central argument of Oomen (2019) which asks whether it is fair to believe that science will judge on climate arguments? Sexy Killers replies, no, not, when power and not facts determine the policy. Indonesia has publicly committed itself to climate targets as a responsible climate actor in diplomatic fora as diverse as the COP to the G20. However, in the movie, it is revealed that politics and the fossil fuels industry serve as the motivation behind the policy and not climate studies. When power does, policy is not just influenced by climate information.

The Indonesian government responds to this. Governments sought to prevent the film being shown to audiences publicly and they accused the film of being hated and concentrated on the political implications of the film, not the environmental implications. Born (2019) claims that such reaction is an example of the danger of depoliticising climate problems. The possibility of environmental destruction is enabled through basic power arrangements which are ignored when the environmental problems are put forward as however technical or scientific problems. By directly mentioning the names of politicians and following financial flows, the documentary was not submissive to this depoliticisation, making it effective in spreading awareness but prone to political suppression.

This war has a direct implication on the theory of two-level games by Putnam (1988). The Indonesian government faces the challenge of balancing internal politics based on coal profits (Level 2) and at the same time ensure that it addresses international climate agreements (Level 1). Sexy Killers disturbed this balancing game and manipulated the political situation at home by shaping the opinion of the people towards coal. The criticism was since the facts in the film were true and politically awkward and not because they were wrong.

Climate Literacy as Interference: Politics of Knowing.

Fearns (2019) asserts that climate communication requires immersive scenarios that allow the viewers to feel the impact of how their future is going to be like. Sexy Killers achieves this by taking viewers down the coal supply chain of Indonesia, starting with the mines at Kalimantan all the way to the power plants in Java and finally the boardrooms where they can be issued with permits. The trip points to the too little noticed connection between environmental degradation, political favouritism, and energy policy.

The viral popularity of the movie on YouTube that attracted audiences’ way beyond traditional environmental movement spheres demonstrates how digital media can democratise the knowledge on climate change. Sexy Killers approached people on the place where they were, scrolling through the social media, unlike academic articles that had paywalls or policy research that used technical language. This availability is especially important in Indonesia where the discourse of climate communication has heretofore been dominated by elite discourse of English, which was isolated of the realities of the average person.

The government censorship of the film however demonstrates how even governments with major stakes in fossil fuel extraction are starting to take climate literacy as a focus of their security concerns. The system that is reliant on coal cannot afford an educated populace that understands the operation of coal. A democracy that prides itself as such cannot accommodate voters who make the connection between campaign finance and the extraction of fossil fuels.

Going forward, Indonesian climate communication needs to learn from Sexy Killers that visiblising climate change is a necessary but insufficient first step. A meaningful level of climate literacy must provide citizens with the information and resources they need to advocate for change, hold institutions responsible, and envision a future powered by alternative energy sources. This entails going beyond merely pointing out issues to include offering solutions, forming alliances, and establishing forums for sincere democratic discussion over Indonesia’s energy prospects.