By saying that millions of red shirts have become republicans, Giles seems to be providing a good justification for the army to crack down on them to save the monarchy. If republican red shirts really already number in the millions, we can probably assume that nearly all of the hard core red shirt protestors fighting the army in Bangkok are indeed republicans engaged in a struggle to overthrow the monarchy, which might help explain why they rejected the offer of early elections after having stated that their only objective was early elections. On the other hand the vast majority of Thais still seem to be staunchly pro-monarchist and would accept a crackdown, if they were convinced that the hard core red shirts were as Giles asserts. He can probably do a lot more good for his Marxist cause by remaining silent.
Both yellow and red are using Thailand as their hostage.
Yesterday was yellow, today is red.
Red and yellow are using the same tactics, I must admit that IMHO red are a bit more rude but that is how they express themselves.
Frankly, I believe that both sides are not really believe in democracy. They only use it as their rhetoric to appeal for a wider support from inside and outside Thailand. World medias especially the western ones are really love democracy and prefer a system without monarch which is fine. But trying to impose your values on others does not really work.
I believe that if we have an election in Thailand today and the current government happens to win. The red who is asking for a democratic government through election will not be happy either and they will come out again and it will not be because the election fraud but because the result does not satisfy them. On the other hand, if the red supported party wins the yellow will definitely come out again.
I do believe that there is a genuine supporters from both sides who really believe it what they are preaching. Unfortunately, all of them just become a bargaining chip for both sides leaders to use to achieve their goals which not a better Thailand but a power for themselves. To categorise the supporters by class, income or demographic is really unfair. I personally know an elite who support the red and a commoner who support the yellow. To brand them is to blind ourselves. They are just ordinary people who believes in something and may try to change it with whatever means it is available.
For myself, I do not supporting both sides. Why? Because the means they are using. Using country as a hostage cannot be counted as a decent mean in my book.
However, I do believe that we are equal. Everyone have their rights and free to use it as long as using it will not violate other people’s rights and also firmly believe that “I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it”.
I appreciate that in Thailand, there is a law where it forbids people’s right to criticise a monarch but we always have a choice. We can violate the law but we have to accept the consequence.
I think the fundamental problem lies not in poverty, inequity, class, etc. but in our inability to have a discussion without becoming personal. So the root causes were never found, real discontents were never heard and real issues were never addressed. We are from the land of smile we decided to live peacefully by wipe all the disagreement under the carpet. Once in a while when the discontent has become unbearable the violence will break.
Unfortunately, it is also the past governments action or inaction that has caused today’s unbearable discontent.
We spent nearly 80 years working out how the democracy should work in Thailand and we still working it out so the real problems were never addressed. For the last 4 years, nothing much has been done since all the governments were pretty much in the gridlock because we are still working out the best system.
The other problem is we are getting to a point where there is too much division in the society. People on both sides decided to shut their minds and loathing each other instead. It is a bit hard at the moment to find the common interests and try to move forward.
As one of a Thai people who may not agree with the majority, will other Thais care about my opinions and let me have a say in our future more than just casting a ballot? Because I do listen to other Thais.
Even though the party that I support (the current government) will have a good chance of losing on the next election, I will not take to the street to drive out the other party because I do respect their choices but I will voice my disagreement. We just have to share the responsibility of the choice we collectively made. Unfortunately, the choices that the majority choose seem to be wrong most of the time but at least we can say that this is our choice.
It’s a good idea until you reach the details. The comments that it pulls towards conformity make sense to me.
So a tweak suggestion. Put a third button up there and call it “Debatable” or “provocative” or the like. Then allow those votes to cancel out an equivalent number of Negatives. It will encourage us to be more thoughtful before we click the Red button.
One of the most ironic examples of Thinglish i have ever seen. Look closely at the “Live Fire Zone” signs. They actually say, “Life Fire Zone”! Perhaps a more clearer message could be sent such as, “Life Ending Zone”!
Well, words being words, and sometimes rhetoric, being what they may or nor not be, can someone explain why I saw a bunch of motorbike boys screaming up the local avenue tonight without a care in the world?
We are very aware of the crimes being commited by Abbesit and his minnions . His pathetic denials of knowledge of the snipers and the denial will NOT hold water when Charges are brought against them. The Eu know about them too. He will be brought up on charges by the UN for crimes against the Thai people. This is NOT 1974 and you can not hide murder anymore. The people can not be kept down for ever. This Thai apartaid has got to stop.
A response/question for Paul (#20) and others who have repeated claims like this: “After Abhisit offered new elections, the ostensible justification for the ongoing protests was removed.” Other variants, repeated endlessly in the major media, have it that after Abhisit offered elections the red shirts issued new demands (a rendition the Democrats have pushed). Although I have found coverage of the actual content of negotiations to be limited at best, my understanding, based on conversations with people tracking them from inside Thailand, is somewhat different.
The central demand of the red shirts has always been “dissolve the parliament.” It may sound as if this just means “promise new elections,” but my understanding is that they are not the same thing and that this is not a mere verbal quibble. Technically, the parliament has to be dissolved before elections can be held, and once the date of dissolution is set, the electoral process is legally set in motion and takes on reality. Absent the dissolution, promise of an election is pie crust, easily broken. My understanding is that while Abhisit’s “road map” offered an election date, the issue of dissolution and a date for it had not been firmly settled–precisely the main issue on which the red shirts had been demanding an agreement. So if this is right, the red shirts did not in fact issue any major new demands–their central demand was what was still on the table–and Abhisit never made a serious offer, then pulled out of the negotiations himself. Does anyone have an account of the content of negotiations that suggests otherwise? If so, it would be interesting to hear.
I find it instructive, too, that Abhisit used the same term, “road map,” which the US and Israel have always deployed while maintaining 40-plus years of Israeli occupation. (Cf. here Ehud Barak’s “generous offer” which never was, and which was exposed later by insiders as a maneuver that actually scuttled the negotiations and indirectly set in motion Sharon’s provocation and the subsequent al-Aksa intifada. Abhisit may have pulled off a similar set-up of the current round of violence with his version of a “road map.”) In my opinion the Abhisit government is now in fact claiming–and being accorded de facto by the “international community”–“Israeli” privileges: float “peace plans” that make no serious concessions, blame the other side for their failure, then start shooting again, and figure that much of the media will blame the opponents for the breakdown in negotiations while encouraging “both sides” to stop the violence.
Follows is an example of why this comment stuff is, well, silly. You have Andrew’s reply to Les Abbey; Andrews reply is visible, Les’s is not but they are both talking about the same thing, and to understand Andrew’s you have to open Les’s. What’s the point? Shouldn’t yours be low-Q as welll, Andrew?
LesAbbey // May 15, 2010 at 10:40 pm
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Poorly-rated. Quality comment or not? 12 29
11 Andrew Walker // May 15, 2010 at 10:47 pm
Les, Giles had to abandon his home and job in Thailand because he put his name to his opinions. More courage than many.
Peter Boyles. Two fallacies in your arguments: 1) the date of house dissolution for a 14 Nov election could have been calculated arithmetically according to the constitution, as you and every one else was aware. Demanding to be told something they already knew was a stalling tactic of the red shirt leaders; 2) being worried about what would happen to themselves, if they dispersed the rally, far more than what would happen to their followers, if they didn’t disperse it, was an extremely selfish attitude of the red shirt leaders – it nows seems more likely that many of the red shirt leaders (those still at the protest sites that is) will perish or disappear as a result of refusing to disperse the rally than would otherwise have been the case.
Jatuporn served as secretary for Praphat Banyachartrak, a deputy agriculture minister and minister of natural resources and environment in the Thaksin government. In 2003, Jatuporn and other ministry officials came into conflict with local farmers in Nakhon Si Thammarat over government land policy. The farmers, in protest of government policy, took over a plantation owned by Thai Ruam Pattana Farming Co. The protesters accused authorities of leasing large tracts of land to big palm oil producers instead of redistributing the land to the farmers. In reponse to the land seizure, Jatuporn and other ministry officials ordered 1,000 police to retake the property. Jatuporn defended the action, saying the protesters were armed and violated trespassing laws. (Bangkok Post, October 30, 2003).
Do you really think there is no voter fraud or vote buying that goes on? I thought that was a fairly well-known occurrence to everyone. And that people in the villages vote the way their headman tells them to by and large. That’s not real democracy.
Anyway, Thailand has been dysfunctional forever. And as in pretty much every country the elites consolidate their power and wealth at the expense of everyone else. That wouldn’t change with the red shirts in power either. Their leaders would enrich themselves and the poor would still be poor.
kevin granahan was suggested as 'a reasonable discussion about the situation says:
you people are pitiful, at best. posting photos that are doctored, with people lying on the sidewalk supposedly dead, but obviously just lying in awkward positions (one of the photos has already been seen with only the victim, the other 5 ‘bodies’ were placed afterwards for a staged photo), reporting rumours as fact…. and meanwhile, continuing to call these thugs ‘protesters’. yes, there are certainly casualties, but for the most part they brought it on themselves. these people have been holding bangkok hostage for several months now, and while i do believe many have legitimate grievances with the government, they have been used by their leaders for their own selfish political and financial gain, not to mention all those whose ID cards were taken away from them to prevent them from leaving. are any of you spouting your propaganda actually HERE in bangkok, living with this mayhem which has gone on far to long, and should never have been allowed to reach this point by the weakness of the powers-that-be? i came to this forum because it was recommended as a ‘reasonable discussion about the current situation’ (unlike the thaivisa forum hosted by the nation multimedia), but i am utterly disgusted by what i have read so far. try a little research and discussing the TRUTH of what is happening, instead of spouting your foolish rhetoric.
The tragedy for the Reds is that the Bangkok rally was taken over by hot-heads making unrealistic demands. People led by hot-heads are a rabble by logical inference, whether Jim Taylor (82) takes offense at the term or not. A cool-headed decision to end it last week would have secured the very significant political victory of a November election, and saved all this bloodshed and bitterness.
Les Abbey (94):
No, they aren’t. Can you cite anything that suggests they have? I do recall Ajarn Chai-anan promoting assassinations, but he is of course an ideologist for the PAD. Is that who you had in mind?
“..how many expat university professors have been among the killed so far? OK any Thai professors? None, I wonder why that is? Aren’t they the ones that have been calling for this?”
Evidently trucks have been bringing in tyres all day long. Saw one nutter on thaipbs with 3 on fire in front of a shell servo. He also had a pile of about 30 next to him! Any interest in starting a book on when the first servo / mall / hotel goes up? I’m prepared to say before the sun comes up on mondi! What we saw in the south pacific over the past few years will pail in comparison compared to what the reds will do for their encore. I’m not talking Dili 99; year zero kind of thing, more like jakarta 98 x10 ! Girlfriend just told me Chavalit has skipped the country. I hope he was wearing his fresh new uniform! ps. Les like the ‘Notthenation’ Dr Weng glasses story, i suspect that the Dons would be concidered very suspect by the “Red Guards” and in need of re-education! Sorry i couldn’t resist the pun555
Facebook 
Twitter 
Soundcloud 
Youtube 
Rss
Bangkok at war
Daily Mail (UK) update
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1278378/Thai-protester-shot-head-taunting-armed-troops-laser-pointer.html?ITO=1490
.
Bangkok at war
By saying that millions of red shirts have become republicans, Giles seems to be providing a good justification for the army to crack down on them to save the monarchy. If republican red shirts really already number in the millions, we can probably assume that nearly all of the hard core red shirt protestors fighting the army in Bangkok are indeed republicans engaged in a struggle to overthrow the monarchy, which might help explain why they rejected the offer of early elections after having stated that their only objective was early elections. On the other hand the vast majority of Thais still seem to be staunchly pro-monarchist and would accept a crackdown, if they were convinced that the hard core red shirts were as Giles asserts. He can probably do a lot more good for his Marxist cause by remaining silent.
Bangkok at war
Both yellow and red are using Thailand as their hostage.
Yesterday was yellow, today is red.
Red and yellow are using the same tactics, I must admit that IMHO red are a bit more rude but that is how they express themselves.
Frankly, I believe that both sides are not really believe in democracy. They only use it as their rhetoric to appeal for a wider support from inside and outside Thailand. World medias especially the western ones are really love democracy and prefer a system without monarch which is fine. But trying to impose your values on others does not really work.
I believe that if we have an election in Thailand today and the current government happens to win. The red who is asking for a democratic government through election will not be happy either and they will come out again and it will not be because the election fraud but because the result does not satisfy them. On the other hand, if the red supported party wins the yellow will definitely come out again.
I do believe that there is a genuine supporters from both sides who really believe it what they are preaching. Unfortunately, all of them just become a bargaining chip for both sides leaders to use to achieve their goals which not a better Thailand but a power for themselves. To categorise the supporters by class, income or demographic is really unfair. I personally know an elite who support the red and a commoner who support the yellow. To brand them is to blind ourselves. They are just ordinary people who believes in something and may try to change it with whatever means it is available.
For myself, I do not supporting both sides. Why? Because the means they are using. Using country as a hostage cannot be counted as a decent mean in my book.
However, I do believe that we are equal. Everyone have their rights and free to use it as long as using it will not violate other people’s rights and also firmly believe that “I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it”.
I appreciate that in Thailand, there is a law where it forbids people’s right to criticise a monarch but we always have a choice. We can violate the law but we have to accept the consequence.
I think the fundamental problem lies not in poverty, inequity, class, etc. but in our inability to have a discussion without becoming personal. So the root causes were never found, real discontents were never heard and real issues were never addressed. We are from the land of smile we decided to live peacefully by wipe all the disagreement under the carpet. Once in a while when the discontent has become unbearable the violence will break.
Unfortunately, it is also the past governments action or inaction that has caused today’s unbearable discontent.
We spent nearly 80 years working out how the democracy should work in Thailand and we still working it out so the real problems were never addressed. For the last 4 years, nothing much has been done since all the governments were pretty much in the gridlock because we are still working out the best system.
The other problem is we are getting to a point where there is too much division in the society. People on both sides decided to shut their minds and loathing each other instead. It is a bit hard at the moment to find the common interests and try to move forward.
As one of a Thai people who may not agree with the majority, will other Thais care about my opinions and let me have a say in our future more than just casting a ballot? Because I do listen to other Thais.
Even though the party that I support (the current government) will have a good chance of losing on the next election, I will not take to the street to drive out the other party because I do respect their choices but I will voice my disagreement. We just have to share the responsibility of the choice we collectively made. Unfortunately, the choices that the majority choose seem to be wrong most of the time but at least we can say that this is our choice.
Bangkok at war
And reporting here from soi somewhere, the local bloke said, ”G0 away now, otherwise you might get seriously hurt.”
There is no war in Bangkok.
This is not a Thai drama soap opera, so please treat this very serious situation appropriately.
Seriously, please.
Rating comments
It’s a good idea until you reach the details. The comments that it pulls towards conformity make sense to me.
So a tweak suggestion. Put a third button up there and call it “Debatable” or “provocative” or the like. Then allow those votes to cancel out an equivalent number of Negatives. It will encourage us to be more thoughtful before we click the Red button.
Rating comments
”My real name is known to Andrew so when having this knowledge is bought up by him publicly in such a way I have a right to feel disconcerted.”
Agree.
Bangkok at war
One of the most ironic examples of Thinglish i have ever seen. Look closely at the “Live Fire Zone” signs. They actually say, “Life Fire Zone”! Perhaps a more clearer message could be sent such as, “Life Ending Zone”!
Bangkok at war
Mmm ”Bangkok at war”…
Well, words being words, and sometimes rhetoric, being what they may or nor not be, can someone explain why I saw a bunch of motorbike boys screaming up the local avenue tonight without a care in the world?
Vita est ludus…
Bangkok at war
We are very aware of the crimes being commited by Abbesit and his minnions . His pathetic denials of knowledge of the snipers and the denial will NOT hold water when Charges are brought against them. The Eu know about them too. He will be brought up on charges by the UN for crimes against the Thai people. This is NOT 1974 and you can not hide murder anymore. The people can not be kept down for ever. This Thai apartaid has got to stop.
Bangkok at war
A response/question for Paul (#20) and others who have repeated claims like this: “After Abhisit offered new elections, the ostensible justification for the ongoing protests was removed.” Other variants, repeated endlessly in the major media, have it that after Abhisit offered elections the red shirts issued new demands (a rendition the Democrats have pushed). Although I have found coverage of the actual content of negotiations to be limited at best, my understanding, based on conversations with people tracking them from inside Thailand, is somewhat different.
The central demand of the red shirts has always been “dissolve the parliament.” It may sound as if this just means “promise new elections,” but my understanding is that they are not the same thing and that this is not a mere verbal quibble. Technically, the parliament has to be dissolved before elections can be held, and once the date of dissolution is set, the electoral process is legally set in motion and takes on reality. Absent the dissolution, promise of an election is pie crust, easily broken. My understanding is that while Abhisit’s “road map” offered an election date, the issue of dissolution and a date for it had not been firmly settled–precisely the main issue on which the red shirts had been demanding an agreement. So if this is right, the red shirts did not in fact issue any major new demands–their central demand was what was still on the table–and Abhisit never made a serious offer, then pulled out of the negotiations himself. Does anyone have an account of the content of negotiations that suggests otherwise? If so, it would be interesting to hear.
I find it instructive, too, that Abhisit used the same term, “road map,” which the US and Israel have always deployed while maintaining 40-plus years of Israeli occupation. (Cf. here Ehud Barak’s “generous offer” which never was, and which was exposed later by insiders as a maneuver that actually scuttled the negotiations and indirectly set in motion Sharon’s provocation and the subsequent al-Aksa intifada. Abhisit may have pulled off a similar set-up of the current round of violence with his version of a “road map.”) In my opinion the Abhisit government is now in fact claiming–and being accorded de facto by the “international community”–“Israeli” privileges: float “peace plans” that make no serious concessions, blame the other side for their failure, then start shooting again, and figure that much of the media will blame the opponents for the breakdown in negotiations while encouraging “both sides” to stop the violence.
New political force
Yeah! WhooooooWeeeeeee! I fully support the Blue Shirt movement. Yep, each and every one of them! ; – )
Rating comments
Follows is an example of why this comment stuff is, well, silly. You have Andrew’s reply to Les Abbey; Andrews reply is visible, Les’s is not but they are both talking about the same thing, and to understand Andrew’s you have to open Les’s. What’s the point? Shouldn’t yours be low-Q as welll, Andrew?
LesAbbey // May 15, 2010 at 10:40 pm
Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
Poorly-rated. Quality comment or not? 12 29
11 Andrew Walker // May 15, 2010 at 10:47 pm
Les, Giles had to abandon his home and job in Thailand because he put his name to his opinions. More courage than many.
Highly rated. Quality comment or not? 36 8
Reds’ fatal flaw: Thailand’s fatal flaw
Peter Boyles. Two fallacies in your arguments: 1) the date of house dissolution for a 14 Nov election could have been calculated arithmetically according to the constitution, as you and every one else was aware. Demanding to be told something they already knew was a stalling tactic of the red shirt leaders; 2) being worried about what would happen to themselves, if they dispersed the rally, far more than what would happen to their followers, if they didn’t disperse it, was an extremely selfish attitude of the red shirt leaders – it nows seems more likely that many of the red shirt leaders (those still at the protest sites that is) will perish or disappear as a result of refusing to disperse the rally than would otherwise have been the case.
Crackdown? Abhisit’s last stand?
Jatuporn has had no problem in using force to disperse protesters
in the past. Would occupying several city blocks for 2 months count
as trespassing?
http://siamreport.blogspot.com/2010/02/jatuporn-promphan.html
Jatuporn served as secretary for Praphat Banyachartrak, a deputy agriculture minister and minister of natural resources and environment in the Thaksin government. In 2003, Jatuporn and other ministry officials came into conflict with local farmers in Nakhon Si Thammarat over government land policy. The farmers, in protest of government policy, took over a plantation owned by Thai Ruam Pattana Farming Co. The protesters accused authorities of leasing large tracts of land to big palm oil producers instead of redistributing the land to the farmers. In reponse to the land seizure, Jatuporn and other ministry officials ordered 1,000 police to retake the property. Jatuporn defended the action, saying the protesters were armed and violated trespassing laws. (Bangkok Post, October 30, 2003).
Reds’ fatal flaw: Thailand’s fatal flaw
Do you really think there is no voter fraud or vote buying that goes on? I thought that was a fairly well-known occurrence to everyone. And that people in the villages vote the way their headman tells them to by and large. That’s not real democracy.
Anyway, Thailand has been dysfunctional forever. And as in pretty much every country the elites consolidate their power and wealth at the expense of everyone else. That wouldn’t change with the red shirts in power either. Their leaders would enrich themselves and the poor would still be poor.
Bangkok at war
you people are pitiful, at best. posting photos that are doctored, with people lying on the sidewalk supposedly dead, but obviously just lying in awkward positions (one of the photos has already been seen with only the victim, the other 5 ‘bodies’ were placed afterwards for a staged photo), reporting rumours as fact…. and meanwhile, continuing to call these thugs ‘protesters’. yes, there are certainly casualties, but for the most part they brought it on themselves. these people have been holding bangkok hostage for several months now, and while i do believe many have legitimate grievances with the government, they have been used by their leaders for their own selfish political and financial gain, not to mention all those whose ID cards were taken away from them to prevent them from leaving. are any of you spouting your propaganda actually HERE in bangkok, living with this mayhem which has gone on far to long, and should never have been allowed to reach this point by the weakness of the powers-that-be? i came to this forum because it was recommended as a ‘reasonable discussion about the current situation’ (unlike the thaivisa forum hosted by the nation multimedia), but i am utterly disgusted by what i have read so far. try a little research and discussing the TRUTH of what is happening, instead of spouting your foolish rhetoric.
Crackdown? Abhisit’s last stand?
The tragedy for the Reds is that the Bangkok rally was taken over by hot-heads making unrealistic demands. People led by hot-heads are a rabble by logical inference, whether Jim Taylor (82) takes offense at the term or not. A cool-headed decision to end it last week would have secured the very significant political victory of a November election, and saved all this bloodshed and bitterness.
Bangkok: A dangerous new phase
Les Abbey (94):
No, they aren’t. Can you cite anything that suggests they have? I do recall Ajarn Chai-anan promoting assassinations, but he is of course an ideologist for the PAD. Is that who you had in mind?
“..how many expat university professors have been among the killed so far? OK any Thai professors? None, I wonder why that is? Aren’t they the ones that have been calling for this?”
Bangkok: A dangerous new phase
Evidently trucks have been bringing in tyres all day long. Saw one nutter on thaipbs with 3 on fire in front of a shell servo. He also had a pile of about 30 next to him! Any interest in starting a book on when the first servo / mall / hotel goes up? I’m prepared to say before the sun comes up on mondi! What we saw in the south pacific over the past few years will pail in comparison compared to what the reds will do for their encore. I’m not talking Dili 99; year zero kind of thing, more like jakarta 98 x10 ! Girlfriend just told me Chavalit has skipped the country. I hope he was wearing his fresh new uniform! ps. Les like the ‘Notthenation’ Dr Weng glasses story, i suspect that the Dons would be concidered very suspect by the “Red Guards” and in need of re-education! Sorry i couldn’t resist the pun555
Bangkok at war
[…] Open thread on the New Mandala, Bangkok At War. […]