Furthermore, Nunung said that in the use of new media for an event, it is difficult for it to be a neutral storyteller. Media bias is likely to occur, making new media a trigger of human rights violation once it distributes information blindly, becoming one that minimizes violation if it carries out its interactive characteristics wisely, and even ignoring cases with the consequences of offense omission.
Recognizing the distinct characteristics of new media and the public passivity of conventional media, space of violations for new media is bigger. Objectivity as a basis for information exchange becomes a risky subject and results in violations of human rights.
This Head of Communication in S-2 Study Program added that euphoria among people involved in the virtual community could lead to a violation of human rights if propaganda, brainwashing, and superficial fanaticism are stronger in certain communities.
In response to these conditions, the husband of Ratna Winingrum argued that the country needs to provide access to new media in a fair and keen in elaborating the ability of new media for the improvement and development of the quality of life of Indonesian society. The new media can then properly maximize its presence in Indonesia to improve respect and protection of human rights, democracy, and welfare. "We need to pay attention to all of those things if we don’t want new media in Indonesia to taint human rights in terms of right of expression,” he said.
The dependence of modern human’s life on communication and information technology increased from time to time. People are increasingly accustomed and can hardly be separated from the social activities based on applications of telecommunication infrastructure. The trends in the use of computers, internet, and mobile phones increasingly implicate public and private life. Such use of IT that is based on new media has changed communication habit. This also happens in Indonesia.
"The presence of new media is presenting a number of convenience, promising positive things. Positively, this new media is useful for human life, welfare donations, solidarity, anti-arbitrary, and anti-violence, exposed and responded quickly. Human dignity is re-established through the functional superiority of new media," Prof. Nunung Prajarto, M.A., Ph.D said in the UGM Senate Hall on Tuesday (2/11) when inaugurated as professor of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences.
In a scientific speech entitled New Media, Human Rights and Communication Studies: Border and Flow of Attention, Nunung said that although new media promises positive things, various claims arise against its ability in improving people’s lives. New media is seen as less productive in democratization process because it tends to be elitist and not convenient for the public to access. In addition, state control of the dynamics of new media’s content growth is still quite high as happened in China and Malaysia.
In Nunung’s opinion, excessive control of the dynamics in fact could potentially trigger the emergence of human rights violations by the state apparatus itself. The chaos in control issues is more caused by overlapping mandates and intervention by stakeholders. "Measures that are in accordance with the new media need to be done based on laws and regulations. In this case, preventive measures depend on the providers and users of new media, while legal action should be strictly applied in case of infringement and not based on the presumption of or pressures from certain groups," the man born in Yogyakarta, 21 December 1964 explained.