Social media activist Andrea Gunawan is using content to de-stigmatise sexual health in socially conservative Indonesia
In 2017 Andrea Gunawan had just been laid off from her job at a matchmaking agency and was facing a tough decision: either apply for another traditional nine-to-five job or dive head first into a career as a full-time social media content creator.
The latter was a risky financial decision, Gunawan explains. “I didn’t come from a wealthy family and I didn't have anyone else to depend on. I also made a couple of financial mistakes… I didn't have any savings and I had quite a lot of credit card debt at the time.”
Despite her passion for social media activism, she also only had 3,000 followers on Instagram—a far cry from financially viable. “I knew it was risky,” she admits. “But I also knew that if I invested my time on social media it would pay off eventually. I just needed to focus and for me, it was sink or swim.”
The risk, though mammoth, ended up paying off. In the space of a few years Gunawan grew her follower count to over 239,000 on Instagram alone, and has amassed a dedicated, passionate follower-base. “Activism became my new purpose,” she says.
Gunawan’s platform originally started sharing posts about love languages and healthy relationships, but eventually morphed into covering sex education after a follower messaged her asking about the importance of virginity. “[The follower] regretted ‘giving it’ to her ex, who ended up leaving her, and she felt crushed and not worthy,” Gunawan says. After telling the follower virginity was nothing more than a social construct, she realised there weren't enough people in Indonesia talking about sex education and sex positivity on a large-scale. “So I started talking about sex in general, including virginity, and eventually I covered responsible sexual behaviour and of course, STIs and HIV/Aids.”
Partnering with major organisations such as Unicef and Linkages, a US-funded HIV services project, Gunawan ran several campaigns encouraging people to get tested for HIV. “After the Linkages campaign a lot of followers actually got back to me with their test results and they were so proud about it,” she smiles. “It was amazing, I didn’t expect that at all. They were thanking me and were so relieved that they didn’t have HIV. And others thanked me as well as they learnt they did have other things but learnt from the doctors that it can all be cured.”
See also: The Art Of Public Speaking: 5 Tips To Sound Like A Ted Speaker