Dear James
Thank you for your comments. I’m not trying to romanticise him in anyway. I wrote this piece as a satire. I’m not sure it has come across as such. Perhaps I should have been more sarcastic.
She doesn’t describe his intentions (you are of course right about these) but his tools. The fascination of the masses with his narrative of the “good person” who comes to rescue Thailand is really irritating (although I doubt that even Suthep would cast Mark as hero as she did in the article). Not sure where on this planet a supposedly democratic protester could get away with the idea of installing an unelected hero with rather vague characteristics described in quite flowery language. If you want to cater to the intellectuals, you cite Plato and his “philosopher-king”, but if you want to cater to the masses it has to be a hero’s story.
The narrative of “good people” rescuing the nation from the supposed excesses of the electoral democracy was definitely used during the rise of fascism in the last century and this “argumentation” should be burnt by now – but I guess every nation has to find this out for themselves.
A wonderful Thai fairytale,for
children,painted only in colours of black and white, no shades of gray, and the corresponding characters in real life are so transparent that no further explanation is required. Of course Mr. Suthep, in his own deluded mind, is “the knight in shining armour”, whereas in reality he is in fact the villain of the piece.There was a picture of him quite recently in the Bangkok Post, and my wife immediately commented that he had the eyes of a madman, and typified him as a “little Hitler”.This man with delusions of grandeur belongs at best in an asylum.
Soeharto, Mahathir, Lee Kuan Yew era is in tha past – but they really made they mark. They made the Asean strong and stable. By stability, they can have less worry on military & politic – hence can shifted to economic.
Issues will always be there, it’s up to us whether to escalate, we have all the reason to do so. But just remember, none of Asean member, is the super power country ! The instability just to invite other party to take advantageous ! I think that’s why ASEAN was formed before – they know that peace cannot be taken for granted but to work it out !
1/ get rid of corrupt border/immigration police avoiding new “unwanted” people come in illegally.
2/ accept the fact that the ones that are in now are in and are there to stay (unless they wanna go elsewhere). ACCEPT that, provide them shelter/land.
3/ educate people, burma is so bloody backward.
conflict is inherent to the human nature. no religion has ever done anything good about that.
Can someone/anyone please answer (or speculate on) Tom’s question.
I think its key to understanding Indonesia’s recent behaviour, and could provide some pointers as to how its regional neighbours should develop strategies to respond to this behaviour.
The writer needs to grow up ! Obviously you don’t understand why the spore ministers are concerned. Focus more on why Indonesia deliberately and purposefully select the name of the vessel.
Nice bloated Indonesian nationalistic nonsense. Focus on your 250 planes for Garuda
and not Singapore’s legitimate, and too polite, response to Indonesia’s facile bellicosity, which makes President Yudhoyono look like the lost man that he is.
PAP is facing problems at home. It is just diverting Singaporean’s attention from the serious problem at home to something trivial such as name of a boat.
Once again Srithanonchai demonstrates a wonderous capacity, firstly to turn things upside-down/ inside-out/back to front while rarely saying anything of consequence, and secondly for not taking himself/herself too seriously. Thus, this particular incarnation of Srithanonchai is perhaps best seen as a monkey with the appearance of a king rather than as a king with the appearance of a monkey.
Mr. England’s spirited Marxist interpretation has the usual fault of ignoring or marginalizing the middle class, while his own extremist sentiment in lumping Suthep in with Hitler and Mussolini further harms his own credibility. As for comparison with Phibul, the dominant cold-war paradigm presented a far different scenario.
However, those egregious errors aside, I am largely in sympathy with his views on democracy and education.
In academic discussion these days, terms like ‘truth’ (especially ‘the truth’) and (for example) ‘religion’ are generally shunned in preference to less loaded terms such as ‘facts’ and ‘belief systems’ because they are both more encompassing and less likely to mislead.
Presumably when you speak of Thaksin’s “vision” you are referring to his savvy marketing skills and “insulting” (Ammar Siamwalla’s term) populist schemes. As for your use of the term ‘human frailities’, you risk being branded as a Thaksin apologist and thereby irrelevant to open-minded debate. As for your use of the terms ‘drive’ and ‘capacity’, I would substitute just one: Blind greed.
I would like to thank Ms. Hongskul for her concerns of how commenters and writers of academic articles opine on the current Thai crisis. I have been a long-time reader of the New Mandala. And I must say that, based on my observations, the majority of commenters here are well-informed and have substantiated their arguments with research and with life experience. Yes, many of us are from the old country. I am from the Isaan region. And let me tell you that I certainly do not feel “inferior” for being born in Isaan. I may, though, have felt this way if I continued to live in Thailand. From what I have been reading so far, no one has attributed the current crisis to a single factor, which in your case a “class war.” Of course there are a few incidents which can be interpreted as such. Here is an example of a report by Nick Nostitz, which many people see it as “class war”: “Bangkok’s last Red Shirt fortress.”
It’s nice to have rose-tinted spectacles: Thailand has had 18 military coups since 1932; thousands have been killed fighting for democracy; Aphisit and Suthep have been indicted for murdering almost a hundred protesters; Suthep and others are wanted for insurrection; there is daily talk of a possible civil war if a judicial coup is attempted. The only reason the situation may appear “incredibly civil and peaceful” is because PM Yingluck has ordered the police not to use force to break up the Suthep mob. But the anger and hatred on both sides is there: if you can’t see it, you can smell it.
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Suthep’s romantic tale
Dear James
Thank you for your comments. I’m not trying to romanticise him in anyway. I wrote this piece as a satire. I’m not sure it has come across as such. Perhaps I should have been more sarcastic.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
Marhaen, your own nationalism is OK, but everybody else’s is bad. Sounds like nationalism to me.
Suthep’s romantic tale
She doesn’t describe his intentions (you are of course right about these) but his tools. The fascination of the masses with his narrative of the “good person” who comes to rescue Thailand is really irritating (although I doubt that even Suthep would cast Mark as hero as she did in the article). Not sure where on this planet a supposedly democratic protester could get away with the idea of installing an unelected hero with rather vague characteristics described in quite flowery language. If you want to cater to the intellectuals, you cite Plato and his “philosopher-king”, but if you want to cater to the masses it has to be a hero’s story.
The narrative of “good people” rescuing the nation from the supposed excesses of the electoral democracy was definitely used during the rise of fascism in the last century and this “argumentation” should be burnt by now – but I guess every nation has to find this out for themselves.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
Now I get it: took me a while.
Marhaen=> Marhaenism, Sukarno’s ill-fated and poorly thought out pseudo-philosophy.
Now, it all makes sense.
Suthep’s romantic tale
A wonderful Thai fairytale,for
children,painted only in colours of black and white, no shades of gray, and the corresponding characters in real life are so transparent that no further explanation is required. Of course Mr. Suthep, in his own deluded mind, is “the knight in shining armour”, whereas in reality he is in fact the villain of the piece.There was a picture of him quite recently in the Bangkok Post, and my wife immediately commented that he had the eyes of a madman, and typified him as a “little Hitler”.This man with delusions of grandeur belongs at best in an asylum.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
Soeharto, Mahathir, Lee Kuan Yew era is in tha past – but they really made they mark. They made the Asean strong and stable. By stability, they can have less worry on military & politic – hence can shifted to economic.
Issues will always be there, it’s up to us whether to escalate, we have all the reason to do so. But just remember, none of Asean member, is the super power country ! The instability just to invite other party to take advantageous ! I think that’s why ASEAN was formed before – they know that peace cannot be taken for granted but to work it out !
Beyond bigotry: Unravelling ethnic violence in Rakhine
1/ get rid of corrupt border/immigration police avoiding new “unwanted” people come in illegally.
2/ accept the fact that the ones that are in now are in and are there to stay (unless they wanna go elsewhere). ACCEPT that, provide them shelter/land.
3/ educate people, burma is so bloody backward.
conflict is inherent to the human nature. no religion has ever done anything good about that.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
Can someone/anyone please answer (or speculate on) Tom’s question.
I think its key to understanding Indonesia’s recent behaviour, and could provide some pointers as to how its regional neighbours should develop strategies to respond to this behaviour.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
The writer needs to grow up ! Obviously you don’t understand why the spore ministers are concerned. Focus more on why Indonesia deliberately and purposefully select the name of the vessel.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
Nice bloated Indonesian nationalistic nonsense. Focus on your 250 planes for Garuda
and not Singapore’s legitimate, and too polite, response to Indonesia’s facile bellicosity, which makes President Yudhoyono look like the lost man that he is.
Suthep’s romantic tale
Drooling over Suthep by his low IQ fan –
Rescue Thailand? From the rural and poorer Thais?
Good person? He order the hosing down of protesters with live fire, killing and wounding thousands.
He is right about Thailand belonging to the Thai people – It does not belong to him or his fascist bunch, just go ask the majority of the Thais.
Indonesia: Why you so like that wan?
PAP is facing problems at home. It is just diverting Singaporean’s attention from the serious problem at home to something trivial such as name of a boat.
Suthep’s romantic tale
Rubbish – he is a fascist protestor who wants to be a fascist dictator and you should not try to romantacize it
Thailand’s 3D Conflict
Once again Srithanonchai demonstrates a wonderous capacity, firstly to turn things upside-down/ inside-out/back to front while rarely saying anything of consequence, and secondly for not taking himself/herself too seriously. Thus, this particular incarnation of Srithanonchai is perhaps best seen as a monkey with the appearance of a king rather than as a king with the appearance of a monkey.
Thailand’s 3D Conflict
Mr. England’s spirited Marxist interpretation has the usual fault of ignoring or marginalizing the middle class, while his own extremist sentiment in lumping Suthep in with Hitler and Mussolini further harms his own credibility. As for comparison with Phibul, the dominant cold-war paradigm presented a far different scenario.
However, those egregious errors aside, I am largely in sympathy with his views on democracy and education.
Thailand’s 3D Conflict
In academic discussion these days, terms like ‘truth’ (especially ‘the truth’) and (for example) ‘religion’ are generally shunned in preference to less loaded terms such as ‘facts’ and ‘belief systems’ because they are both more encompassing and less likely to mislead.
The King Never Smiles?
Presumably when you speak of Thaksin’s “vision” you are referring to his savvy marketing skills and “insulting” (Ammar Siamwalla’s term) populist schemes. As for your use of the term ‘human frailities’, you risk being branded as a Thaksin apologist and thereby irrelevant to open-minded debate. As for your use of the terms ‘drive’ and ‘capacity’, I would substitute just one: Blind greed.
The weakness of the Thai royalists
I would like to thank Ms. Hongskul for her concerns of how commenters and writers of academic articles opine on the current Thai crisis. I have been a long-time reader of the New Mandala. And I must say that, based on my observations, the majority of commenters here are well-informed and have substantiated their arguments with research and with life experience. Yes, many of us are from the old country. I am from the Isaan region. And let me tell you that I certainly do not feel “inferior” for being born in Isaan. I may, though, have felt this way if I continued to live in Thailand. From what I have been reading so far, no one has attributed the current crisis to a single factor, which in your case a “class war.” Of course there are a few incidents which can be interpreted as such. Here is an example of a report by Nick Nostitz, which many people see it as “class war”: “Bangkok’s last Red Shirt fortress.”
Thailand’s ‘Days of our Strife’
Defence attachés imbibe their opinions at banquets in officers’ clubs. This one has regurgitated them here.
The weakness of the Thai royalists
It’s nice to have rose-tinted spectacles: Thailand has had 18 military coups since 1932; thousands have been killed fighting for democracy; Aphisit and Suthep have been indicted for murdering almost a hundred protesters; Suthep and others are wanted for insurrection; there is daily talk of a possible civil war if a judicial coup is attempted. The only reason the situation may appear “incredibly civil and peaceful” is because PM Yingluck has ordered the police not to use force to break up the Suthep mob. But the anger and hatred on both sides is there: if you can’t see it, you can smell it.