Comments

@PHarris:

“Stuart:

I find your lazy comments about Thais to be crass and disrespectful, bordering on colonial racism. It’s as if I was reading Rudyard Kipling describing the people of the Punjab region back in the 1800s. These uncivilized natives, they don’t know what’s good for them. What do they call an ugly American in Oz? A kangaroo? That’s you, mate.”

Well, you’ve pointed out the political correctness (as you see it) failing in my post, and you’ve resorted to ad-hominem abuse which is never encouraging.

What is conspicuously absent is any kind of substance to show my comments are not correct and fair. probably because they are both correct and fair, even if you don’t think they should be.

Political correctness is such fun. The substance you have when you don’t have any substance; it is usually the preserve of those unable to have an objective discussion.

John H

You don’t have to walk backwards through the blog in flip flops and feel frustrated! Just follow the instructions I gave in #78 (they’re subtle but any New Mandala reader can figure them out) and you’ll be soaring through cyberspace like an eagle!

McCargo made it quite clear he believed that Thaksin was envious of what he calls the “network monarchy” and wanted to take over large chunks of it for himself. He started in the South of which he had limited knowledge and where he naively thought it would easy to use the police to grab control of everything including the lucrative cash flows from smuggling and other criminal activities. He gave the police the green light to use violence to get quick results in establishing their influence over the military. The series of atrocities committed against Muslims in the South that followed, as well as the thousands of extrajudicial killings in the sham “war against drugs” foreshadowed the cult of violence we see today as a the core strategy of the red shirts, following the Maoist manual to use violence as an effective political tool. Also in line with the manual the adoring faithful are indoctrinated to repeat simple and pithy but meaningless maxims, such as “class war against amats”, “double standards”, “Thaksin helps the poor” etc but cannot answer simple questions such as, “What is the red shirts’ manifesto to improve the situation of the rural poor?”, or explain the contradiction that their political arm is essentially a feudal structure of corrupt politicians dedicated to exploiting the poor.

Perhaps we should have a thread entitled, “Adoring Thaksinistas (Foreign and Thai), the Cult of Violence and the Money Trail” t0 balance this one.

Maybe a good way to understand and try to grasp what’s next for the red shirts people is looking and what is going on now, how people are processing grievances and what has happened in the last months. it is a critical process that need to be followed more. Unfortunately i could spend only two days in Udon but it many ways i feel it is the right place to understand what is happening, at least as far as the protesters.

My report of the long trip in train with the red shirts is on my blog sopranz.blogspot.com, i don’t want to fill this board with long description people may be not interested in.

Stuart:

I find your lazy comments about Thais to be crass and disrespectful, bordering on colonial racism. It’s as if I was reading Rudyard Kipling describing the people of the Punjab region back in the 1800s. These uncivilized natives, they don’t know what’s good for them. What do they call an ugly American in Oz? A kangaroo? That’s you, mate.

An uncertain path awaits Thailand. Recent developments are only but a chord in a symphony of events. Today’s players will be yesterday’s history a few years from now. What will remain is the discord for the next set of players to sort out.

It is abundantly clear that the old ways are no longer enough to accommodate all the voices of a changing Thai society. Those who have not gained their fair share of Thailand’s economic prosperity in the last few decades are beginning to clamor for their portion. And those who have amassed great wealth and power are going to challenge any threat to their economic and political dominance. The question for Thailand is whether these competing forces can iron out their differences in the political arena or will they fight it out with each other in the streets? Recent history points to the latter but the future may hold something entirely different.

Is Thai democracy mature enough where politics can be a means to solve the differences within society? It is telling that one of the Red Shirts’ main demands is for early elections. That is some indication that they have faith in electoral results. They’ve seen it worked in previous elections (albeit only to be overturned by a coup) and still looked to the political process to address differences this time around. That’s surely a sign of maturity. And Abhisit’s camp showed they were willing to accommodate, an equally good sign for democracy. Yet, each time Thailand show signs of democratic maturation, something happens to undermine the whole process. This trend will continue for the near future.

So what then can Thais and interested foreign observers hope for? In the long term, we should all hope that Thailand becomes a vibrant democracy. But until then, we should all hope that factions within Thai society will find PEACEFUL solutions to their problems. The differences are deep and various but they are not insurmountable.

THE REDS
Recent events have highlighted the Red’s biggest failures: 1) a failure of leadership and 2) a failure of organization. If you were to ask who speaks for the Red, you will get different answers depending on whom you ask. Sopranz highlighted this in his comment above. There is not one Red Shirt movement; there appears to be multitudes of them, each with its own proposal and leader (and even their own radio stations). Even if many Red Shirts consider the Peua Thai Party to be their political arm (a very big IF), the PTP itself can’t seem to agree on what should be its future course. Strong leadership is sorely missing among the Reds.

As for organization, the Reds showed seemingly wonderful organization in bringing tens of thousands of protesters to occupy Bangkok for over two months. Yet when you look underneath, what you’ll probably find is that most of that organization came from the Thaksin machinery and money. Who paid for the buses? Who paid for the posters, the soundstage, and the radio stations? Who paid for the security? I don’t know why those heroic ‘citizen journalists’ who reported on the street fighting during the protests never asked the Reds these simple questions. If the Red movement really want to maintain their deal with Thaksin, I don’t think they can say with a straight face they are a peaceful movement. These protests have shown that the Reds will have to find an alternative to organize them and fund them if they are not to be co-opted by Thaksin and his cronies.

ABHISIT
He is history and he knows it. The only thing he has to cling to is his legacy and any chance of affecting future politics from the sidelines. Why propose a reconciliation plan when your own party seems to oppose it? Why follow through the reconciliation plan as he appears to be doing now when you’ve already crushed the opposition? It’s hard to explain his actions. Maybe he wants to seen as an honest broker for future negotiations? That’s laughable to many Red Shirters right now. We’ll see.

THE YELLOWS
Justice have never visited those who shut down the airport and took similar disruptive actions a few years back. It’s not surprising since they are the powers that be. Yellow Shirts have yet to recognize Thailand has changed and they need to be fair. They don’t have a strong need for leadership and organization because as the status quo, they control the levers of power. They will soon have to show their prowess as a political movement however will when they will be the people out of power and can’t rely on the military to put them back in. What goes around, comes around, and they better be prepared.

THE MILITARY
They have been surprisingly measured in their response to these protests. They could have slaughtered the protesters but they didn’t. The rules of engagement they announced were quite strict and well within reasonable standards. It remains to be seen if the measured response is sign of division with the ranks or just Anupong’s personal style or institutional maturity. It will be interesting to see if the military will react to future unrest in the same manner under the new chief. Whatever the case, the military will remain the ultimate arbiter of political disputes in the near future. The question for them is whether they can mature to the point where they can maintain objectivity and obey their civilian commanders even in times of crisis. The police are hopeless and useless. Enough said.

THE MONARCHY
Most Thais are Bhumibolists and not royalists. That’s the very astute observation from another NM post. Even royalists can’t fathom remaining loyal to the crown prince yet they have absolute love for the King. The monarchy will have to find its proper place in Thai politics and it will not be the outsized role it played during the King’s reign. These are smart and calculating people though and if anyone is to figure out how to play the process well, I’d bet my money on them.

Here my humble opinion.

http://theorientalhotel.wordpress.com/2010/05/23/whats-next-for-thailand/

– Giles is censored for LM offenses.

– government ignores him for his style of presentation, nonsense and repetitive arguments.

These two are not mutually exclusive reactions and they address two different problems and target to different audiences.

Censorship is for you and me, “ignore” is a flag for policy makers.

Theoretically, if Giles had some good ideas they could be implemented while still censoring him, just like the govt implements Thaksin’s.

Does Giles have any good ideas? Are they throwing the baby with the water when they put him on their mental “ignore” list?

Giles himself obviously doesn’t want any cooperation, why should the govt care and waste time digging for imaginary gold in that pit of hatred?

-Stuart_

“It will take 3 generations to remove the culture of greng-jai, patronage and corruption from Thailand, at least to the level one normally finds in the west.”

Indeed the Thais have some growing up to do when it comes to efficient venality.

In the west, institutionalized corruption is much superior to the more straightforward and , lets face it, more affordable, corruption that exists in Thailand.

Just as an example – being forced to pay insurance premiums on automobile policies that you can never collect on, is corruption on a much higher level than just slipping a few baht to a policeman.

Absolutely the dismantling of an entire health care system and replacing it with chaos is a work of great sophistication. In the west we are so lucky to be managed by such consummate artists in political rape. There should be awards for this type of artistry.

Someday they will understand that the skill required to convince the people that handing out huge sums of free money to corporations is a good thing for them personally. If you can accomplish that…. you can do anything.

Definitely the Thais have some growing up to do.

To David R

‘They really should go back to the provinces and work at the grassroots level to build up their organisation in a democratic way and engage in education and debate about democracy.

OMG I can’t believe what I am reading. If you know anything at all about education in Thailand, contrast the educational opportunities of the elite who are able to send their children to International schools against the village school in Issan. Did you know that it is not uncommon in some village schools to have up to 60 in a class and the teacher stands at the front with a megaphone. I know of at least one international school where, as the children arrived in their Jag’s and Merc’s, the expectation was that the maids would carry the poor little darling’s bags up to their classrooms. Thankfully this practise was stopped after a while.
Expecting these people to go back upcountry and through diligent education etc. bring about social change is like me telling you to go and read a book about cancer so you can then cure yourself.