'Silence Means Consent': 16 Law Students Suspended Over Lewd Messages About Female Peers in Indonesia

The University of Indonesia suspended 16 male students from its Faculty of Law after screenshots of a group chat containing sexually explicit and demeaning messages about female peers and lecturers circulated widely on social media, triggering public outrage and renewed calls for accountability on Indonesian campuses.

The case first came to public attention when the 16 students publicly apologised in a group chat of the 2023 Faculty of Law students on 11 April 2026 — an apology that, according to Faculty of Law Student Executive Board chairperson Anandaku Dimas Rumi Chattaristo, was made suddenly and without any clear context.

A Campus Reckoning

The suspension covers the period from 15 April to 30 May 2026, and was recommended by the university's Violence Prevention and Handling Task Force following an internal investigation. Among the messages that drew the sharpest condemnation was one that read 'silence means consent,' suggesting that women who did not verbally refuse a sexual advance were implicitly agreeing to sex.

University spokesman Erwin Agustian Panigoro described the suspension as a preventive administrative action aimed at safeguarding the integrity of the investigation and minimising potential interference, with the students also barred from student organisation activities and placed under close monitoring to prevent contact with victims or witnesses.

Days after the screenshots surfaced, the confrontation became visual. A group of women students berated the accused men in a public forum, and a video of the encounter — in which the men stare at their feet as they are confronted by women who said they were made to feel unsafe — also went viral. The university student body is demanding that the men be brought before an ethics board and given strict sanctions.

The scale of the harm alleged has since grown considerably. Victims' attorney Timotius Rajagukguk revealed that those affected include 20 female students and seven female lecturers — and cautioned that many other victims may not even know they are being discussed. 'We can't normalise this anymore,' he said, appealing directly to parents and senior alumni who may have once dismissed such behaviour as ordinary. The university has said it will not rule out coordinating with law enforcement if the investigation uncovers criminal elements, and has stated that sanctions could extend to dismissal.

Not an Isolated Case

The scandal has exposed a broader pattern across Indonesian universities. Verified reports and social media documentation have surfaced similar cases at other institutions, including a resurfaced clip of mining engineering students at the Bandung Institute of Technology singing a song with sexist lyrics at a 2020 event, which prompted the faculty's student association to issue a public apology on 15 April.

Education watchdog the Network for Education Watch Indonesia recorded 233 cases of violence in schools, universities, and other education settings in 2026, nearly half involving sexual violence. The watchdog's Ubaid Matraji described the persistence of sexual violence on campuses as a crisis reflecting systemic failure, stressing the need for mandatory gender and sexual education in university curricula. More than a quarter of women in Indonesia reported having experienced gender-based violence, according to the latest UN Development Programme survey.

The UI case does not exist in isolation. In March 2026, a months-long CNN investigation uncovered a hidden online world where the commodification and amplification of sexual violence against women is flourishing — with men sharing techniques for drugging and assaulting partners across chat groups and pornographic platforms. French lawmaker Sandrine Josso, who has campaigned on drug-facilitated sexual abuse after being drugged herself, described these spaces as 'schools of violence,' adding, 'I would even call them an online rape academy, where every subject is taught.'

That men training to become lawyers, judges, and public officials were found circulating messages normalising sexual coercion speaks to something larger than one university's disciplinary process. Indonesia passed a law on sexual violence in 2022 that criminalised harassment, including online. Whether that law — and the institutions meant to uphold it — will be applied with the seriousness the moment demands remains an open question.

The UI case does not exist in isolation. In March 2026, a months-long CNN investigation uncovered a hidden online world where the commodification and amplification of sexual violence against women is flourishing — with men sharing techniques for drugging and assaulting partners across chat groups and pornographic platforms. French lawmaker Sandrine Josso, who has campaigned on drug-facilitated sexual abuse after being drugged herself, described these spaces as 'schools of violence,' adding, 'I would even call them an online rape academy, where every subject is taught.'