Rijksmuseum scraps racist term "Bersiap" in new exhibition

Bersiap (stand ready) was used as a battle cry by young Indonesian freedom fighters after the Japanese occupation of the then Dutch East Indies. They attacked people released from the Japanese camps. "The Dutch who lived through this era speak of the 'Bersiap period.' A time when Indonesians were possessed and attacked white-skinned civilians, Indo-Europeans, Ambonese, native Chinese, or anyone else they considered the colonial collaborators".

Curator and chief editor of Historia.ID Bonnie Triyana believes that this gives the term "a strongly racist connotation." "More so because the concept of 'Bersiap' always portrays primitive, uncivilized Indonesians as perpetrators of the violence, which is not entirely free from racial hatred. The root of the problem lies in the injustice that colonialism created and which formed a structure of a racism-based hierarchical society enveloping the exploitation of the colony."

The Federation of Dutch Indies (FIN) is already in a state about the avoidance of the term. "This makes me physically ill," said chairman Hans Moll, who said he will file a complaint against this "insane and shocking form of Bersiap denial." "During this extremely violent period, thousands of (Indonesian) Dutch people were brutally tortured, raped, and murdered by Indonesians because of their Dutch or European ethnicity," Moll said.

https://nltimes.nl/2022/01/11/rijksmuseum-scraps-racist-term-bersiap-new-exhibition