Kyrgyzstan Striker Joel Kojo Suddenly Famous, Don't Doubt Indonesia's Netizens' Finger Strength

Striker Kyrgyzstan Joel Kojo became Indonesia's new idol after he "rolled" the Garuda Team to the knockout stages of the Asian Cup. (Instagram @kojo_joel_10)

JAKARTA Never doubt the solidarity of Indonesian netizens on social media. Indonesian netizens have been referred to as the least polite in Southeast Asia, but other times the fingers of netizens can also make someone famous.

This is what Joel Kojo is experiencing, the striker of Kyrgyzstan, who suddenly became the talk of netizens. He is considered a hero who led the Indonesian national team to advance to the round of 16 of the 2023 Asian Cup.

The striker who was born on August 21, 1998 scored in the final match of the group stage against Oman. He took advantage of the opponent's backline error and threw the ball from a tight angle, so that the Oman vs Kyrgyzstan match ended in a 1-1 draw.

For Kyrgyzstan, a draw made them have to lift their suitcases. But not with Indonesia. Joel Kojo's goal actually led Pratama Arhan et al to create history by strolling into the last 16 of the Asian Cup for the first time.

Indonesia qualified for the knockout stages as one of the four teams ranked third best in the group stage.

Given how valuable Joel Kojo's goal was, netizens immediately hit the player's comments column. Almost all of them expressed their gratitude, because the goal had helped the Garuda Team make history.

"Alhamdulillah, thanks brother @kojo_joel_10," wrote artist Teuku Wisnu in Joel Kojo's Instagram comment column.

Another with the @mlyani_yu account, which compares Joel Kojo with the two best players in the world, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.

"I used to be very impressed by the performances of Ronaldo and Messi, but now I just realized that Joel Kojo was the real Giat".

Instagram follower Joel Kojo also jumped dramatically. Shortly after the Indonesian national team qualified for the last 16 of the 2023 Asian Cup, Joel Kojo's followers were still at 10 thousand. However, his popularity continued to rise, along with his followers. Until Saturday (27/1/2024) at 11.22, Joel Kojo had 231 thousand Instagram followers. His last five uploads were suddenly filled with tens of thousands of comments from Indonesian netizens.

Joel Kojo is only one of the figures who feel the greatness of the fingers of Indonesian netizens. You could say he was lucky enough, netizens rained down his comments column with positive words. Because netizens in the country do not hesitate to act the opposite if there are figures or anyone who is considered detrimental to Indonesia.

The official account of the well-known badminton event, All England, was once made to disappear because of the ferocity of Indonesian netizens' fingers. Before disappearing, Instagram All England was flooded with negative comments from badminton lovers in the country.

This happened because badminton fans felt disappointed after the Indonesian team was forced to withdraw from the All England 2021 event. Jonathan Cristie and his friends were forced to withdraw because they had been on the same plane with a positive Covid-19 passenger. This information was obtained by the Indonesian badminton team from the British health authority, National Health Service (NHS).

After the news that the Indonesian Team was dropped from the competition, the All England account and the World Football Federation (BWF) were attacked by netizens. If All England closes its account, BWF only closes the comments column due to not being strong with netizen blasphemy.

The same story was experienced by Thai U-23 player Jonathan Khemdeem, after the 2022 Sea Games semi-final match. Towards the end of the match, Jonathan Khemdeem was considered to have provoked Indonesian players. This action apparently provoked Indonesian players, so that the action of pushing each other was inevitable, and ended in four red cards, three of which Indonesian players got.

The provocation of Khemdee apparently sparked the anger of netizens. As a result, Khemdee's personal Instagram was flooded with blasphemy from netizens. In addition, they also carried out a mass report which resulted in the closure of the account.

The habit of Indonesians who like to gather or hang out to chat in the real world seems to have been carried into cyberspace. So, this habit, according to Digital Communications Expert Firman Kurniawan, makes Indonesian netizens often storm social media accounts.

"But the fact is, that netizens in various worlds react together massively and deter, is actually not a new phenomenon," said Firman.

Firman said, Indonesian internet users reached 202 million with 170 million of them actively using social media. The massive movement caused by the group of people, he said, was very able to build the attention of various parties.

Then, does the radius of Indonesian netizens have a positive or negative impact? Firman explained, it is necessary to see the substance and ways to assess whether Indonesian netizens' actions are positive or negative.

If what is defended is Indonesia's interest which is treated unfairly, of course it has positive value. However, he emphasized that commenting on social media also requires ethics, so there is no need to insult.

Although Indonesian netizens are recognized to have high solidarity, in fact domestic netizens are at the lowest in Southeast Asia in the Digital Civility Index (DCI) report released by Microsoft in February 2021. This means that Indonesian netizens receive the most disrespectful title in the region.

This Microsoft research measures the level of politeness of internet users throughout 2020. As a result, Indonesia is ranked 29th out of 32 countries surveyed, and the lowest in Southeast Asia.

Indonesia lost to Vietnam, which is in 24th place, while Thailand is ranked 19th and the Philippines is in 13th position. Singapore and Malaysia are said to be model countries in Southeast Asia, ranking fourth and second, respectively.

Getting the title of the least polite netizen in Southeast Asia is clearly not a proud achievement. What happened next can be predicted, namely that the Microsoft account comment column was deactivated after being flooded with cometaries from netizens who did not accept the survey results.

Professor of the Faculty of Law, Padjadjaran University (Unpad) Prof. Ahmad M. Ramli said this report was a reflection of the government. He urged the government to start managing a good internet user ecosystem.

"We build a signal in such a great way that everything can be connected. We must also build an ecosystem, socio-cultural and ethical, we must protect it," said Prof. Ramli as quoted by the official Unpad website.