Let this be a loud and clear message that any Westerner considering coming to Thailand for cheap medical care to be warned….
Has he ever clicked like on a human rights page?
Will he be arrested at the Airport?
But on another issue, don’t all the injustices that developed countries see occurring in Thailand from Thaksin’s signature on his wife’s property purchase, or his long ago asset concealment case, to the debacle on the Munich Tarmac; the numerous academics arrested, jailed, or in exile; the assassination of an outside auditor to a Sugar Company or the dropped cases of politicians cum godfathers, then throw in the occasional scandal like the Bangkok Bank of Commerce, add a few raunchy references to Patpong, and snipers being used for crowd control; and you begin to see that the Thailand of today far from an idealic beach paradise governed by rule of law.
Throw in a diamond scandal and a few dead diplomats……………..
and the occasional coup with ribbon clad tanks……. a few cluster-bombs. and border wars……….. southern insurgents…………………………well you get the drift.
This spate of LM convictions could lead to an interesting turn of events. Suppose someone established a Facebook group called “Organization to abolish the Thai Monarchy” and while vacationing in the USA or any other county which can offer asylum for political beliefs, they Friend it and Like it, and even post a political statement which might lead to trouble with the LM prosecutors. They could post wiki leaks.
They could then file for asylum and get the right to live in the USA.
The convictions and the harsh sentences give one a strong case that they are subject to persecution.
Thitinan states: “There was a palpable paucity of punditry during the floods. The leading blogs went quiet. Bangkok Pundit’s scientific approach made a few rounds but the likes of Political Prisoners of Thailand and New Mandala appeared unengaged.”
or am I just missing the meaning?
At New Mandala, there were a series of posts on the floods. I didn’t go back beyond 19 October but noted 17 posts.
At Political Prisoners in Thailand, I searched – they have a better search function than NM – and located 55 posts between 22 October and 29 November, many of them on the politics of flooding.
That hardly seems “unengaged.” Or am I just missing the meaning?
Aung Moe, there is no greater saint than your mother. Also, there will presumably be a deluge of donor money directed towards Burma now that there’s been a compromise.
Thousands of rai of fruit orchards have been totally destroyed by the flooding here in Nakhon Pathom province, especially between Nakhon Chaisri and Bang Len, and most likely the same ones again in Bang Bua Thon and your old neighborhood in the Khlong Maha Sawas community in Nonthaburi Province, which were destroyed by the 1995 flood. The losses in monetary terms to the farmers are staggering: hundreds of thousands of baht per farm as reported in Bangkok Post’s Spectrum Sunday magazine. I don’t see where they will get the money to reinvest. Certainly the 5,000 baht per family the government is promising to hand out won’t help these farmers.
Thanks to Greg for the caution yet I empathise with the hurt and anger with Umno here. I am hurt and angered by them too because I am the meat in the middle of all this. I think what is crucial here is for healing to happen and thus empathy can be a good starting point and it costs me nothing to show it to my fellow Malaysians.
I dont take money for free and neither do I want my spiritual journey and my Koran to be used to oppress the people. The miracle of the Koran is that The Koran allows for interpretation of the Book according to ones human life experiences with all its nuances and prejudicisms too.
Thus many many interpretations are witnessed from the higher path of Sufism to the lowest path of syariah. There are many levels of interpretation according to ones station in life and thus the moslem world are manifestly in confusion, at war with each other and with others because they wont confront their own fears. They think the purpose of God is to control. They dont see that it is their own need to do so . Their own Ego.
Closer to home,for Umno the agenda is too control and keep perpertuating what they are comfortable with and thus they will use the religion to convince the massess that the “kafirs” /non believers are out to destroy the malays and Islam. Not only are they disuniting the malysians the malasy are the most oppressed tied by this concept of “sin” and do not even know how to live this life.Yet one has nothing to do with the other, race and religion that is and the term “kafir” has been completely distorted in its understanding. There is too much to go into all in one day. It is a life long journey of patience to find God. And I would be bordering flippancy to sstate that the malays themselves are destroying themselves without the help of anyone else, yet they dont see this.
Whislt it is noble to protect those who are most vulnerable we must do justice to all too. The help and support of the malays should have been maanged over time and amended to help and support the most vulnerable of Malaysians. This the the first step to healing of this country.
The other healing process that must occur is that we collectivley should decide if we want to be Malaysians or we dont. When we have decided that then we can charter the course of our nation as a collective. We cannot move forward if we carry the burdens of the past. We should grieve for a while beacuse of the hurt that has been done by this mismanagement but we must then roll up our sleeves and collectively move away from past thoughts to create New ones whilst being aware not to repeat past mistakes we musnt not be burdened by it anymore. Because if we are constantly looking backwards how do we steer forward?
Rangsit is dry! The flood is over! Everything back to normal! Of course, nothing could be further from the truth … the crisis can only be dealt with now that the water is gone. The house had 2m of water inside it – there is no electricity or running water, so nothing can be cleaned. The contents of the house were destroyed, but no-one is collecting the detritus.
The problems have just started.
When the flood waters came to the western suburbs of Bangkok, they came with force. There was a strong current to the chest-deep water flowing through Salaya and into Bangkok’s Tawee Wantana district that created a lot of erosion to road surfaces, train tracks, and bridge casings. Last weekend after driving through the knee deep water on Phetkasem Road approaching Phutthamonthon Sai 5 a large truck rumbled across the overpass and the entire bridge structure shook violently and ominously. I have heard about another bridge failure on the Uthaiyan Road near Phutthamonthon Sai 3. Expect to read about some catastrophic bridge collapses in the the coming weeks.
Driving around what highways are accessible (Sai 5 is still flooded and Hwy 338 Boromratchonani Road is only passable by large pickups or 10-wheel lorries), it is distressing to see most of the sois and sub-sois still flooded more than six weeks after the flood waters arrived. It should be obvious to anyone on the ground that the government’s pronouncement that the floods will be gone by January 1 is a lie. Mahidol University opened on December 6, but many of my coworkers are either still wading through knee-deep water to leave their homes, or facing 3-6 hour commutes from as far away as Samut Prakan.
Yet through all of this the Bangkok governor and the BMA has yet to open the Tawee Wantana floodgate beyond half a meter to allow the water to flow out, and the small number of pumps they have installed in Western Bangkok to pump out the water have been pathetic (nearly the same number for the whole of western Bangkok as have been installed at PM Yingluck’s home); if they have installed any pumps on the Maha Sawas khlong to pump water into the Tai Chin River you couldn’t prove it by me, because the water is still flowing in the opposite direction!
Perhaps the Thais will stoically muddle on and swallow their losses, as Nick Nostitz believes, but I don’t think the Japanese or the other foreign investors in the industrial estates will soon forgive and forget. When Honda executives recently came to view their flooded factory in Ayutthaya, they informed government officials that there would be no further investment in Thailand, and when they left Thailand they flew straight to Indonesia to talk to their government about massive infrastructure investment there. Western Digital, the hard disk drive maker who has seen most of its production halted, won’t be fooled again by Thai government assurances, and it is expected they will move most of their flooded operations out of Thailand as well. Thailand made a big mistake by saving the CBD of Bangkok and sacraficing the industrial estates. Thailand will pay a huge price for years to come due to its government’s ineptitude and knavery.
Thank you for posting this. I look forward to reading the article–it seems to further expose the myth about the desirability and viability an “authentic,” village-based” agrarian lifestyle in the region. What is needed are modern extension services, public R&D, and public support for the expansion of non-farm income opportunities. Twenty-first century farmers need smart government investment, support, and regulation that cultivates local agro-industry, leads farmers to domestic and export markets, and remains cautious of hegemonic global agro-conglomerates. What is not needed are yet more romantic visions from local elites (or first world consumers) who demand the rice they eat (but never cultivate themselves) be sourced from some timeless rural “peasant” operating in some mythically pure natural order of rice-based village tranquility. It’s funny how those who promote such a lifestyle for others would never embrace it for themselves.
Demonizing our Daw Suu again? Are you one of those foreign activists stooging for the western donors and now money is quickly drying up since Daw Suu has wisely made a compromise deal with the army.
Leave us Burmese alone and please try to find another way to make money!
The test of a tradition whether it supportive of the “human potential” or negates and represses it. Call it the two ends along the spectrum of human development. Is a teenage woman “agreeing” to marry a fifty year old man is acceptable because it’s a tradition? Or do we have another way to understand and encourage what humans aspire to?
Often what looks like exotic is also intricately entwined with intentions that may not be too evident including the possibility that such intentions are no longer make sense. That is, they were purposeful sometime in the past.
Nietzsche purported to have said that we must not believe in the moral and intellectual beauty that does not also impresses upon physical beauty. A collapsed collar is a consequence of a tradition that does not promote bodily beauty, it crushes it. A woman behind veil in a hot and humid country, whatever her moral and intellectual justifications, similarly sacrifices a higher principle: regard for the body that we come with.
He is Mr.Suraphot Thawisak, a lecturer in philosophy at Ratchaphat Suandusit University, Hua Hin campus.
He writes regularly for the Prachatai websites; his writing on political issues and especially on Buddhism and politics (he’s a specialist), appears at Prachatai almost every week, under both his real name and a well-known pseudonym “Nak Pratchaya Chai Khob” (a philosophy at the margin).
The incident for which he is being charged was his comment on article of mine published at Prachatai in September last year. But the charge and the issuing of summoning paper to report to the police have just been made about a week ago, in other words, after the current government had already pledged to the public and the UN that it would end indiscriminate, abusive use of LM of the past few years (for which it blamed the previous government.)
I know of two more separate cases of persons being charged with LM these past month. I will disclose them later at appropriate time.
john francis lee # 23 How old is your Ubuntu? I thought all up to date distros used “https” in Firefox these days instead of “http”. It’s the “s” in the url request which encrypts it thus making it difficult to block or waylay. It worked for me in Thailand anyway.
I have been following this whole situation from overseas. I am particularly interested in Ban Bua Thong because my mother lives there. I have not been able to find much quality information in the mainstream media. What I have found has been very short and superficial.
It is the social media where I received most of my information. The difficulties and suffering came through both as reports and first person accounts. I also followed the political organizing that was done. I think that many have been empowered by using the social media during this crisis and this may have further political impact in the future. The many government agencies (especially the Bangkok governor) have been shown to be unresponsive and have an inadequate response. Let’s hope that our democracy is mature enough to punish this bad performance.
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FACT’s plea for Joe Gordon
Well he got 2.5 years.
Another sad day for freedom.
Not as tragic as Uncle SMS but still a sad day.
Let this be a loud and clear message that any Westerner considering coming to Thailand for cheap medical care to be warned….
Has he ever clicked like on a human rights page?
Will he be arrested at the Airport?
But on another issue, don’t all the injustices that developed countries see occurring in Thailand from Thaksin’s signature on his wife’s property purchase, or his long ago asset concealment case, to the debacle on the Munich Tarmac; the numerous academics arrested, jailed, or in exile; the assassination of an outside auditor to a Sugar Company or the dropped cases of politicians cum godfathers, then throw in the occasional scandal like the Bangkok Bank of Commerce, add a few raunchy references to Patpong, and snipers being used for crowd control; and you begin to see that the Thailand of today far from an idealic beach paradise governed by rule of law.
Throw in a diamond scandal and a few dead diplomats……………..
and the occasional coup with ribbon clad tanks……. a few cluster-bombs. and border wars……….. southern insurgents…………………………well you get the drift.
Will UMNO give up power?
In response to a question on the Peaceful Assembly Bill, the Deputy Prime Minister assured that it was very progressive (minute 37) .
Here are views from more competent people:
United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, Maina Kiai.
Amanda Whiting had also done an extensive analysis on the Peaceful Assembly Bill
FACT’s plea for Joe Gordon
This spate of LM convictions could lead to an interesting turn of events. Suppose someone established a Facebook group called “Organization to abolish the Thai Monarchy” and while vacationing in the USA or any other county which can offer asylum for political beliefs, they Friend it and Like it, and even post a political statement which might lead to trouble with the LM prosecutors. They could post wiki leaks.
They could then file for asylum and get the right to live in the USA.
The convictions and the harsh sentences give one a strong case that they are subject to persecution.
Just sayin’
Flood flavours
Thitinan states: “There was a palpable paucity of punditry during the floods. The leading blogs went quiet. Bangkok Pundit’s scientific approach made a few rounds but the likes of Political Prisoners of Thailand and New Mandala appeared unengaged.”
or am I just missing the meaning?
At New Mandala, there were a series of posts on the floods. I didn’t go back beyond 19 October but noted 17 posts.
At Political Prisoners in Thailand, I searched – they have a better search function than NM – and located 55 posts between 22 October and 29 November, many of them on the politics of flooding.
That hardly seems “unengaged.” Or am I just missing the meaning?
An unlikely encounter
Atherton, could be a triple bluff.
Aung Moe, there is no greater saint than your mother. Also, there will presumably be a deluge of donor money directed towards Burma now that there’s been a compromise.
Flood flavours
@ Nick Nostitz #3
Thousands of rai of fruit orchards have been totally destroyed by the flooding here in Nakhon Pathom province, especially between Nakhon Chaisri and Bang Len, and most likely the same ones again in Bang Bua Thon and your old neighborhood in the Khlong Maha Sawas community in Nonthaburi Province, which were destroyed by the 1995 flood. The losses in monetary terms to the farmers are staggering: hundreds of thousands of baht per farm as reported in Bangkok Post’s Spectrum Sunday magazine. I don’t see where they will get the money to reinvest. Certainly the 5,000 baht per family the government is promising to hand out won’t help these farmers.
Race-based ideology and Islam: The Malaysian enigma
Thanks to Greg for the caution yet I empathise with the hurt and anger with Umno here. I am hurt and angered by them too because I am the meat in the middle of all this. I think what is crucial here is for healing to happen and thus empathy can be a good starting point and it costs me nothing to show it to my fellow Malaysians.
I dont take money for free and neither do I want my spiritual journey and my Koran to be used to oppress the people. The miracle of the Koran is that The Koran allows for interpretation of the Book according to ones human life experiences with all its nuances and prejudicisms too.
Thus many many interpretations are witnessed from the higher path of Sufism to the lowest path of syariah. There are many levels of interpretation according to ones station in life and thus the moslem world are manifestly in confusion, at war with each other and with others because they wont confront their own fears. They think the purpose of God is to control. They dont see that it is their own need to do so . Their own Ego.
Closer to home,for Umno the agenda is too control and keep perpertuating what they are comfortable with and thus they will use the religion to convince the massess that the “kafirs” /non believers are out to destroy the malays and Islam. Not only are they disuniting the malysians the malasy are the most oppressed tied by this concept of “sin” and do not even know how to live this life.Yet one has nothing to do with the other, race and religion that is and the term “kafir” has been completely distorted in its understanding. There is too much to go into all in one day. It is a life long journey of patience to find God. And I would be bordering flippancy to sstate that the malays themselves are destroying themselves without the help of anyone else, yet they dont see this.
Whislt it is noble to protect those who are most vulnerable we must do justice to all too. The help and support of the malays should have been maanged over time and amended to help and support the most vulnerable of Malaysians. This the the first step to healing of this country.
The other healing process that must occur is that we collectivley should decide if we want to be Malaysians or we dont. When we have decided that then we can charter the course of our nation as a collective. We cannot move forward if we carry the burdens of the past. We should grieve for a while beacuse of the hurt that has been done by this mismanagement but we must then roll up our sleeves and collectively move away from past thoughts to create New ones whilst being aware not to repeat past mistakes we musnt not be burdened by it anymore. Because if we are constantly looking backwards how do we steer forward?
Flood flavours
Rangsit is dry! The flood is over! Everything back to normal! Of course, nothing could be further from the truth … the crisis can only be dealt with now that the water is gone. The house had 2m of water inside it – there is no electricity or running water, so nothing can be cleaned. The contents of the house were destroyed, but no-one is collecting the detritus.
The problems have just started.
Flood flavours
When the flood waters came to the western suburbs of Bangkok, they came with force. There was a strong current to the chest-deep water flowing through Salaya and into Bangkok’s Tawee Wantana district that created a lot of erosion to road surfaces, train tracks, and bridge casings. Last weekend after driving through the knee deep water on Phetkasem Road approaching Phutthamonthon Sai 5 a large truck rumbled across the overpass and the entire bridge structure shook violently and ominously. I have heard about another bridge failure on the Uthaiyan Road near Phutthamonthon Sai 3. Expect to read about some catastrophic bridge collapses in the the coming weeks.
Driving around what highways are accessible (Sai 5 is still flooded and Hwy 338 Boromratchonani Road is only passable by large pickups or 10-wheel lorries), it is distressing to see most of the sois and sub-sois still flooded more than six weeks after the flood waters arrived. It should be obvious to anyone on the ground that the government’s pronouncement that the floods will be gone by January 1 is a lie. Mahidol University opened on December 6, but many of my coworkers are either still wading through knee-deep water to leave their homes, or facing 3-6 hour commutes from as far away as Samut Prakan.
Yet through all of this the Bangkok governor and the BMA has yet to open the Tawee Wantana floodgate beyond half a meter to allow the water to flow out, and the small number of pumps they have installed in Western Bangkok to pump out the water have been pathetic (nearly the same number for the whole of western Bangkok as have been installed at PM Yingluck’s home); if they have installed any pumps on the Maha Sawas khlong to pump water into the Tai Chin River you couldn’t prove it by me, because the water is still flowing in the opposite direction!
Perhaps the Thais will stoically muddle on and swallow their losses, as Nick Nostitz believes, but I don’t think the Japanese or the other foreign investors in the industrial estates will soon forgive and forget. When Honda executives recently came to view their flooded factory in Ayutthaya, they informed government officials that there would be no further investment in Thailand, and when they left Thailand they flew straight to Indonesia to talk to their government about massive infrastructure investment there. Western Digital, the hard disk drive maker who has seen most of its production halted, won’t be fooled again by Thai government assurances, and it is expected they will move most of their flooded operations out of Thailand as well. Thailand made a big mistake by saving the CBD of Bangkok and sacraficing the industrial estates. Thailand will pay a huge price for years to come due to its government’s ineptitude and knavery.
Cambodia’s rice conundrum
Thank you for posting this. I look forward to reading the article–it seems to further expose the myth about the desirability and viability an “authentic,” village-based” agrarian lifestyle in the region. What is needed are modern extension services, public R&D, and public support for the expansion of non-farm income opportunities. Twenty-first century farmers need smart government investment, support, and regulation that cultivates local agro-industry, leads farmers to domestic and export markets, and remains cautious of hegemonic global agro-conglomerates. What is not needed are yet more romantic visions from local elites (or first world consumers) who demand the rice they eat (but never cultivate themselves) be sourced from some timeless rural “peasant” operating in some mythically pure natural order of rice-based village tranquility. It’s funny how those who promote such a lifestyle for others would never embrace it for themselves.
An unlikely encounter
What are you trying to do Mr. Graham?
Demonizing our Daw Suu again? Are you one of those foreign activists stooging for the western donors and now money is quickly drying up since Daw Suu has wisely made a compromise deal with the army.
Leave us Burmese alone and please try to find another way to make money!
Bound by tradition
The test of a tradition whether it supportive of the “human potential” or negates and represses it. Call it the two ends along the spectrum of human development. Is a teenage woman “agreeing” to marry a fifty year old man is acceptable because it’s a tradition? Or do we have another way to understand and encourage what humans aspire to?
Often what looks like exotic is also intricately entwined with intentions that may not be too evident including the possibility that such intentions are no longer make sense. That is, they were purposeful sometime in the past.
Nietzsche purported to have said that we must not believe in the moral and intellectual beauty that does not also impresses upon physical beauty. A collapsed collar is a consequence of a tradition that does not promote bodily beauty, it crushes it. A woman behind veil in a hot and humid country, whatever her moral and intellectual justifications, similarly sacrifices a higher principle: regard for the body that we come with.
FACT’s plea for Joe Gordon
Joe Gordon is supposed to have his verdict read today.
Will the US State Department have comments on it?
Will Sec. Clinton?
Will President Obama?
What about the good Senators from Colorado, Bennett and Udall? Will they express outrage?
Will they condemn the injustice that occurs in Thailand under Article 112 and the Computer Crimes Law?
Flood flavours
Khun Thitinan, my compliments, great stuff. I’ll read again in the morning and surely have more to say.
An unlikely encounter
Well, the effect of this article is basically to add to the mystique which you purport to decry.
Is this some kind of double bluff?
Thailand’s Fearlessness: Free Akong
This is one of the three new LM cases I mentioned at #6. A statement, in Thai, by the accused.
http://www.prachatai3.info/journal/2011/12/38210
He is Mr.Suraphot Thawisak, a lecturer in philosophy at Ratchaphat Suandusit University, Hua Hin campus.
He writes regularly for the Prachatai websites; his writing on political issues and especially on Buddhism and politics (he’s a specialist), appears at Prachatai almost every week, under both his real name and a well-known pseudonym “Nak Pratchaya Chai Khob” (a philosophy at the margin).
The incident for which he is being charged was his comment on article of mine published at Prachatai in September last year. But the charge and the issuing of summoning paper to report to the police have just been made about a week ago, in other words, after the current government had already pledged to the public and the UN that it would end indiscriminate, abusive use of LM of the past few years (for which it blamed the previous government.)
I know of two more separate cases of persons being charged with LM these past month. I will disclose them later at appropriate time.
Mallika Boonmetrakul: an appalling Thai Politician
John
Yes, I know the Cyber Warriors didn’t have anything to do with Ar Kong.
My point is that Abhisit is the leader of party. He has fostered and allowed to take root this culture of snitching stalkers.
It’s all part of the Democrat Party’s nasty and malicious ambience.
Race-based ideology and Islam: The Malaysian enigma
Liang #14
Thanks for your explanation
I was not referring to you but a general caution to everyone not to blame race or religion when the issues are complex.
Thailand’s Fearlessness: Free Akong
john francis lee # 23 How old is your Ubuntu? I thought all up to date distros used “https” in Firefox these days instead of “http”. It’s the “s” in the url request which encrypts it thus making it difficult to block or waylay. It worked for me in Thailand anyway.
Flood flavours
I have been following this whole situation from overseas. I am particularly interested in Ban Bua Thong because my mother lives there. I have not been able to find much quality information in the mainstream media. What I have found has been very short and superficial.
It is the social media where I received most of my information. The difficulties and suffering came through both as reports and first person accounts. I also followed the political organizing that was done. I think that many have been empowered by using the social media during this crisis and this may have further political impact in the future. The many government agencies (especially the Bangkok governor) have been shown to be unresponsive and have an inadequate response. Let’s hope that our democracy is mature enough to punish this bad performance.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/р╣Ар╕нр╕▓р╕Щр╣Йр╕│р╕нр╕нр╕Бр╣Др╕Ыр╕Ир╕▓р╕Бр╕Щр╕Щр╕Чр╕Ър╕╕р╕гр╕╡р╣Вр╕Фр╕вр╣Ар╕гр╣Зр╕зр╕Чр╕╡р╣Ир╕кр╕╕р╕Фр╕нр╕вр╣Ир╕▓р╕Зр╣Ар╕Ыр╣Зр╕Щр╕гр╕╣р╕Ыр╕Шр╕гр╕гр╕б/311934235499404