Thailand has 66 million people and only 9 million of them file tax returns. The rest are these uneducated ignorant so called red shirts who will sell their votes for cash or promises of a cheap knock off tablet computers. Thailand is not a functional democracy and a coup would be better than allowing unsustainable giveaway programs that have already destroyed the rice industry to continue. Thailand is better off run by the military than by the Shinawatra family.
Hey, Andrew– Pakistan can give Thailand a run for its money on gossip mongering, conspiracies and “insider information,” because only about three people in the entire country know what’s actually going on. But I take your point. ๐
Nostitz says that “. . . the few artists that are openly on the Red side . . . have been blocked from funding and exhibition space.”
Who is doing the blocking Nostitz? I could NOT imagine any peaceful artistic expressions by artists sympathetic to the Red cause could be blocked under the Yingluck/Thaksin government . . . If this is true, why that calls for new angry Red protests at the streets, yes?
For really gifted artists (Red or otherwise) I could also NOT imagine funding or exhibition space being a problem. Surely the ATM-cash-dispensing style of this Yingluck quick-to-compensate government could easily embrace struggling Red artists too . . . and there are also many Thai millionaires/billionaires who are/were beneficiaries of the Yingluck/Thaksin ‘largesse’ of favors/connections who could make wonderful sponsors.
But on Nostitz point that Thailand as a whole is deficient of good art and good artists, I totally agree.
(I am thinking of converting to art myself . . . my first masterpiece being a full monthy painting of Thaksin that could be hoisted at any public or private lavatory for inspiration.)
I think that the central section on the main page is too narrow. Would it also be possible to have clearer boundary demarcations between the central section and the side-sections? Or perhaps the font could be made smaller for the side-sections so that they do not have such prominence?
“The Reds are very deficient in artistic expression.”
If you discuss art here in general with curators and gallerists (other than the ones that have a financial stake in Thai art), you will find that most are of the view that art in Thailand generally is quite deficient apart from a few exceptions, such a the late Montien Boonma.
You will also find that the majority of Thai artists have chosen to side with yellow, and by choosing so are receiving many of the benefits available, such as gallery space, funding, etc.
The few artists that are openly on the Red side, if you speak with them, have been blocked from funding and exhibition space.
Art in Thailand is everything else than free, but tightly controlled by the state and patronage networks. Which is one of the main reasons that the Thai art scene, compared to Indonesia’s, for example, is to the most part mediocre at best.
Nevertheless, there are a few artists that have chosen to be openly on the Red Side, and have produced quite a few impressive pieces, such as a young group of artists that have after 2010 began to show large canvasses at protests. In Chiang Mai there is a group of Red artists.
On stages of progressive Red Shirt groups reading of poetry is a regular feature.
While most well known protest musicians have played on the PAD stages, such as Hammer, some very notable music has been composed and performed on the Red side as well. One example is Gin Gamachon’s very strong song ‘Nacsuu Turidin’. Also some quite existing Mor Lam is performed on Red Stages as well.
Therefore – no – you are quite wrong with your statement.
AM: Not so, I’m afraid. When you click on the article you get some of the comments. For others you have to click onto a stated page number. It’s inconvenient, to say the least.
It was an ironic comment, many people believe that Thais are limited by their focus on appearance rather than substance, and it seemed ironic that in this case that the ‘dons’ who run New Mandala have in my view fallen prey to the same weakness. Infection by proximity perhaps? But I was half-joking as all irony is half-joking.
Agree to a point, though one person cannot create division in the absence of one or more opposing force(s) of similar magnitude.
In this case, the opposing force is Prem, the wielder of unconstitutional power applied through the network of royalist supporters and hangers-on.
It makes no sense whatever to accuse one person of being the instigator of all ills in Thailands political landscape. As flawed as he was, Thaksin was a prime minister and Prem was the person marshalling the contrary forces to illegally unseat him, this much at least is the consensus view.
Thaksin may have been a shit (and may still be a shit), but he was the elected shit. Prem was just an opportunist, a carrion crow trying to engineer his own legend. As he continues to do.
Thailand has rather a lot of problems right now, which have been predictable and predicted, and it seems that events are proceeding towards a crescendo of some kind. Trying to understand Thai politics is difficult for foreigners, not because Thai politics are subtle or serpentine, but because they are chaotic and reflect immaturity, self- interest and unprofessionalism rather than national interest and planning.
This much is certain: if the rumour which forms the center of what seems to be latest lese majeste travesty in Thailand is true, then many if not most Thais are going to be polarised in their opinions, as anyone who understands Thais will know, and it won’t have been Thaksin that caused it. (http://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/2012/08/27/saudi-jailed-for-lese-majeste/)
Rather bemused by your sweeping statement A focus on appearance rather than substance is a particular Thai personality problem. All the more so as I thought this was run by the ANU dons if you’ll forgive my ignorance.
Thanks for this revelation, Martin!
I’ve used this image (printed on a Lao postage stamp) as illustration in an upcoming article. Now I should add a footnote…
Updated comment, though original never made it up ๐
My original comment was Ugly.
UPDATE: Overly Busy and Ugly.
Khii Maa color is depressing. Especially contrasted to nice photos at top of the old page. “Trending Posts” (dubiously raising a six year old post) is a useless distraction, especially with “Popular Posts” just below. And below that we have Recent Posts. You could add “Most Hated posts” just to add more clutter. Sorry but presume you want honesty from longtime readers.
The idea of Thaksin having or developing royalist leanings would be totally consistent with his behavioural patterns, if he believed that could assist him to acquire or retain power and wealth more effectively. It is certainly no more preposterous than the idea of him becoming a popularist hero of democracy loved by the peasantry would have been 25 years ago when he was laying the foundations of his capitalist empire. What remains to be seen is how the palace will perceive Thaksin’s usefulness in future. Currying favour with the monarch will be a different proposition from currying favour with the next in line, who is always bound to be in a tricky situation in any hereditary monarchy, having to wait well into middle age for a prestigious job while most of his or her contemporaries are reaching retirement. Thaksin’s baggage of divisiveness might turn out to be just what the palace doesn’t need when the time comes for it to reinvent itself.
I agree with you too, although I think you encounter people peddling bogus insider information much more often in Thailand than in most other countries. The reason is obvious โ Article 112 means that reliable information about the monarchy and succession is extremely scarce, and information has to be shared via gossip and hints rather than reliable official media. This gives huge scope for people pretending to have secret insights to get away with it. I make a point of calling their bluff whenever I encounter them, as the hapless Maratjp has discovered.
The self-perpetuating economy of “insider information” is actually quite general to the human population; in Thailand it’s just focused on one topic because of that topic’s ubiquity, enormity, and suppression. Go to any blog discussing US politics and you’ll get a slew of self-promoting tossers claiming to know secrets about the president, the CIA, the Freemasons. Visit any webforum about rock music and 10% of the posters will know secrets about how Hendrix/Morrison/Cobain REALLY died. Chat with Chinese people in the teahouse and they’ll all know someone who knows someone who knows what the CCP is about to do and why.
Information is currency that can be forged, and in large denominations, by those who lack the more material currencies of wealth, influence, and the respect of their peers.
Anyone who can’t reveal his “secret” but must tell everyone in the room that he is in possession of one is already revealing everything. But I see nothing particularly Thai about it.
and there is nothing to do with ัโะชัโโัโะทัโฃะัโะฑัโฃะัโฃะัโะปัโฃะัโะัโฃะัโโัโะฉัโฃะัโโัโฃะัโะฑัโฃะัโฃะัโะปัโฃะัโะัโโัโฃะัโะฉ when it comes to criticising poo yai. what you/he discuseed is so 1960’s.
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Coup talk in Thailand 2012
Thailand has 66 million people and only 9 million of them file tax returns. The rest are these uneducated ignorant so called red shirts who will sell their votes for cash or promises of a cheap knock off tablet computers. Thailand is not a functional democracy and a coup would be better than allowing unsustainable giveaway programs that have already destroyed the rice industry to continue. Thailand is better off run by the military than by the Shinawatra family.
Thaksin and the palace
Hey, Andrew– Pakistan can give Thailand a run for its money on gossip mongering, conspiracies and “insider information,” because only about three people in the entire country know what’s actually going on. But I take your point. ๐
Thailand’s silver snatched?
Nostitz says that “. . . the few artists that are openly on the Red side . . . have been blocked from funding and exhibition space.”
Who is doing the blocking Nostitz? I could NOT imagine any peaceful artistic expressions by artists sympathetic to the Red cause could be blocked under the Yingluck/Thaksin government . . . If this is true, why that calls for new angry Red protests at the streets, yes?
For really gifted artists (Red or otherwise) I could also NOT imagine funding or exhibition space being a problem. Surely the ATM-cash-dispensing style of this Yingluck quick-to-compensate government could easily embrace struggling Red artists too . . . and there are also many Thai millionaires/billionaires who are/were beneficiaries of the Yingluck/Thaksin ‘largesse’ of favors/connections who could make wonderful sponsors.
But on Nostitz point that Thailand as a whole is deficient of good art and good artists, I totally agree.
(I am thinking of converting to art myself . . . my first masterpiece being a full monthy painting of Thaksin that could be hoisted at any public or private lavatory for inspiration.)
New Mandala site upgrade
I think that the central section on the main page is too narrow. Would it also be possible to have clearer boundary demarcations between the central section and the side-sections? Or perhaps the font could be made smaller for the side-sections so that they do not have such prominence?
Thailand’s silver snatched?
“Vichai N”:
“The Reds are very deficient in artistic expression.”
If you discuss art here in general with curators and gallerists (other than the ones that have a financial stake in Thai art), you will find that most are of the view that art in Thailand generally is quite deficient apart from a few exceptions, such a the late Montien Boonma.
You will also find that the majority of Thai artists have chosen to side with yellow, and by choosing so are receiving many of the benefits available, such as gallery space, funding, etc.
The few artists that are openly on the Red side, if you speak with them, have been blocked from funding and exhibition space.
Art in Thailand is everything else than free, but tightly controlled by the state and patronage networks. Which is one of the main reasons that the Thai art scene, compared to Indonesia’s, for example, is to the most part mediocre at best.
Nevertheless, there are a few artists that have chosen to be openly on the Red Side, and have produced quite a few impressive pieces, such as a young group of artists that have after 2010 began to show large canvasses at protests. In Chiang Mai there is a group of Red artists.
On stages of progressive Red Shirt groups reading of poetry is a regular feature.
While most well known protest musicians have played on the PAD stages, such as Hammer, some very notable music has been composed and performed on the Red side as well. One example is Gin Gamachon’s very strong song ‘Nacsuu Turidin’. Also some quite existing Mor Lam is performed on Red Stages as well.
Therefore – no – you are quite wrong with your statement.
New Mandala site upgrade
Two suggestions:
(1) The font choice(s)are wrong.
(2) Try ‘Yellow’ for color . . . but will that offend.
New Mandala site upgrade
AM: Not so, I’m afraid. When you click on the article you get some of the comments. For others you have to click onto a stated page number. It’s inconvenient, to say the least.
New Mandala site upgrade
It was an ironic comment, many people believe that Thais are limited by their focus on appearance rather than substance, and it seemed ironic that in this case that the ‘dons’ who run New Mandala have in my view fallen prey to the same weakness. Infection by proximity perhaps? But I was half-joking as all irony is half-joking.
I really shouldn’t have to explain this surely?
Thaksin and the palace
Agree to a point, though one person cannot create division in the absence of one or more opposing force(s) of similar magnitude.
In this case, the opposing force is Prem, the wielder of unconstitutional power applied through the network of royalist supporters and hangers-on.
It makes no sense whatever to accuse one person of being the instigator of all ills in Thailands political landscape. As flawed as he was, Thaksin was a prime minister and Prem was the person marshalling the contrary forces to illegally unseat him, this much at least is the consensus view.
Thaksin may have been a shit (and may still be a shit), but he was the elected shit. Prem was just an opportunist, a carrion crow trying to engineer his own legend. As he continues to do.
Thailand has rather a lot of problems right now, which have been predictable and predicted, and it seems that events are proceeding towards a crescendo of some kind. Trying to understand Thai politics is difficult for foreigners, not because Thai politics are subtle or serpentine, but because they are chaotic and reflect immaturity, self- interest and unprofessionalism rather than national interest and planning.
This much is certain: if the rumour which forms the center of what seems to be latest lese majeste travesty in Thailand is true, then many if not most Thais are going to be polarised in their opinions, as anyone who understands Thais will know, and it won’t have been Thaksin that caused it. (http://thaipoliticalprisoners.wordpress.com/2012/08/27/saudi-jailed-for-lese-majeste/)
New Mandala site upgrade
Rather bemused by your sweeping statement A focus on appearance rather than substance is a particular Thai personality problem. All the more so as I thought this was run by the ANU dons if you’ll forgive my ignorance.
Two’s company …
Thanks for this revelation, Martin!
I’ve used this image (printed on a Lao postage stamp) as illustration in an upcoming article. Now I should add a footnote…
New Mandala site upgrade
Updated comment, though original never made it up ๐
My original comment was Ugly.
UPDATE: Overly Busy and Ugly.
Khii Maa color is depressing. Especially contrasted to nice photos at top of the old page. “Trending Posts” (dubiously raising a six year old post) is a useless distraction, especially with “Popular Posts” just below. And below that we have Recent Posts. You could add “Most Hated posts” just to add more clutter. Sorry but presume you want honesty from longtime readers.
Thaksin and the palace
The idea of Thaksin having or developing royalist leanings would be totally consistent with his behavioural patterns, if he believed that could assist him to acquire or retain power and wealth more effectively. It is certainly no more preposterous than the idea of him becoming a popularist hero of democracy loved by the peasantry would have been 25 years ago when he was laying the foundations of his capitalist empire. What remains to be seen is how the palace will perceive Thaksin’s usefulness in future. Currying favour with the monarch will be a different proposition from currying favour with the next in line, who is always bound to be in a tricky situation in any hereditary monarchy, having to wait well into middle age for a prestigious job while most of his or her contemporaries are reaching retirement. Thaksin’s baggage of divisiveness might turn out to be just what the palace doesn’t need when the time comes for it to reinvent itself.
Thaksin and the palace
I agree with you too, although I think you encounter people peddling bogus insider information much more often in Thailand than in most other countries. The reason is obvious โ Article 112 means that reliable information about the monarchy and succession is extremely scarce, and information has to be shared via gossip and hints rather than reliable official media. This gives huge scope for people pretending to have secret insights to get away with it. I make a point of calling their bluff whenever I encounter them, as the hapless Maratjp has discovered.
Thai Studies in the Shadow of (Self) Censorship
What boggles the mind is how Thai people know the truth but nevertheless choice to believe in lies.
Thaksin and the palace
Fully agree. Well noted.
New Mandala site upgrade
The masthead looks cheap and lacks any design. The movement on Trending Posts is distracting. The theme color is the color of an infant’s feces.
But I come here for good free content and mostly intelligent discussion, which remain. So it’s cool.
Thaksin and the palace
The self-perpetuating economy of “insider information” is actually quite general to the human population; in Thailand it’s just focused on one topic because of that topic’s ubiquity, enormity, and suppression. Go to any blog discussing US politics and you’ll get a slew of self-promoting tossers claiming to know secrets about the president, the CIA, the Freemasons. Visit any webforum about rock music and 10% of the posters will know secrets about how Hendrix/Morrison/Cobain REALLY died. Chat with Chinese people in the teahouse and they’ll all know someone who knows someone who knows what the CCP is about to do and why.
Information is currency that can be forged, and in large denominations, by those who lack the more material currencies of wealth, influence, and the respect of their peers.
Anyone who can’t reveal his “secret” but must tell everyone in the room that he is in possession of one is already revealing everything. But I see nothing particularly Thai about it.
New Mandala site upgrade
I agree. It feels cluttered. And less distinctive from other sites. It’s more difficult to find the newest postings now.
The only new feature that I found positive was the grouping of posting by country.
It’s a pity, because New Mandala is very useful. Now it will be less pleasurable to read – more a duty than a pleasure.
Thai Studies in the Shadow of (Self) Censorship
and there is nothing to do with ัโะชัโโัโะทัโฃะัโะฑัโฃะัโฃะัโะปัโฃะัโะัโฃะัโโัโะฉัโฃะัโโัโฃะัโะฑัโฃะัโฃะัโะปัโฃะัโะัโโัโฃะัโะฉ when it comes to criticising poo yai. what you/he discuseed is so 1960’s.