Monty: What if anything is your point about Thailand's royals?

The BBQ Pit
41

I’ll recap the debate.

In 1992, the King, by sheer force of his personality, forced a despised junta leader to resign. He was replaced with a widely respected civilian Prime Minister and new elections were soon called. When the King was in good health, he was surely a force for better governance.

Yet, Monty never responded to any of this. His case seems to revolve around alleged royal support for the coup against Thaksin’s sister. He’s never made it clear which “royal” he’s talking about. The frail 88-year old? The heir apparent who’s seen by some of the populace as a Thaksin supporter?

In any event, Monty’s case seems to be based on the assumption that the military government is worse (more corrupt? more incompetent?) than the government it overthrew. Yet Monty has, wisely, never pursued that debate. The corruption and incompetence of Yingluk’s government is laughably bad.

As I pointed out, the King solved the crisis (with extreme disorder) of 1992. But his efforts, in old age, to reign in Thaksin’s abuses a decade later fell on deaf ears.

There are two giant holes in Monty’s case:
[ul][li] He’s unwilling to compare the present military government with Yingluk’s government. Anyone so stupid as to defend Yingluk would get laughed off of even the ignorant SDMB. But this is all irrelevant anyway, since the debate isn’t about the present government, it’s about the King , and[/li][li] to credit or blame this frail old man for the present government is to pretend His Majesty, whatever his past greatness, is some Superman.[/ul][/li]
So Monty seeks refuge in a silly Internet article that complains about Thailand culture, giving school uniforms as an example …

… and then complains when I quote from his own cite. Yes, Monty, when you’re unwilling to make your own case, just linking to others’ instead, quoting your cites is fair game.

42

You’re certifiably insane. Yes, the link I provided did mention the uniforms; however, those of us able to read and actually understand the English language like sane people will have understood that I did not address the bit about school uniforms because I have no issue with that. What I addressed was what was clearly in my post.

Also obvious is that I did not “just link to others’ instead”. I clearly addressed the issue at hand.

Again: You’re insane. Get help.

43

Very wise of whoever is giving you hints, Monty, to steer the insults away from stupidity to mental health. :rolleyes:

You’ve doubled-down on you stupidity, and now tripled-down. You’ve blathered on and on without ever answering the question in thread title. WTF does the King have to do with the present government? As a constitutional monarch he formally endorses every Thai government.

You blame the King for any misbehavior of the present government. Do you blame him for any excesses of the Yingluk goverment, which he also endorsed? Do you also blame the King for whatever is stuck so far up your rectum it’s interfering with your brain?

44

I’m not sure why I’m adjudicating this, but sorry septimus. Your school uniform shtick was a red herring.

Yeah, I think Monte has. The answer to the 2nd question is obvious: the King hasn’t spoken out against the coup meisters. He’s not a constitutional monarch because there’s no constitution.

That said, I’m going to dodge this line of questioning. The international press has reported on these intermittent coups with some sympathy, given the craven nature of the opposition. Cite: Hell I just read an article in the Economist on the subject maybe once per year if that. Cite2: ludumdare.com/compo data is offline | Ludum Dare

The problem is that these coups are addictive. Frankly Monte has not yet cemented his claim that the Royal family is useless IMHO. But I’m not blown away by their track record. Constitutional monarchs are suppose to support, you know, the constitution. I see little evidence that King has nudged Thailand along to a stable political system, notwithstanding as yet insufficiently substantiated claims about good works.

I’m guessing that a sober take would characterize Royalty’s legacy as mixed. But there apparently have only been a couple of books on the subject, incredibly. The Thai people deserve better.

45

Thank you, Measure for Measure. I much prefer to discuss the topic than follow Monty’s lead and just indulge in an insult-fest. Let me start with two points.

(I) I used this site to compare Phillipines and Thailand for life expectancy (le) and per capita GDP (pcg). (This was the first comparison I tried; you’re welcome to try others.) In 1950, Phillipines had 65% higher pcg than Thailand and several years higher le. By 1985, Thailand caught up with Phillipines on pcg and was several years ahead in le. By 2000, Thailand had well over twice the pcg of Phillipines and still led in le by a few years!

Yes, during the 50 years of the comparison, Thailand’s adjusted GDP per capita increased eightfold while that of the Phillipines barely doubled. It’s hard to see this comparison as anything but spectacular.

What does this prove? I don’t know, but surely one might guess that Thai institutions played a role. If nothing else, it suggests that

is, at least as it might apply to the latter half of the 20th century, to be laughably ignorant.

(II) I’m 100% certain that the following will be met with derision. I’m posting it partly to see if anyone reading this thread has an open mind.

The United States has an institution called the Supreme Court which functions as a check on other branches of government. Thailand has its military. Obviously the idea that the military might step in to curb the excesses of other institutions will strike some as absurd, but Thailand has corrupt police, corrupt civilian government, largely incompetent press, and a poor education system. But somehow the Army has retained a level of integrity (probably because there is much less opportunity for corruption). However absurd the idea may seem, Thailand has benefited from this “check and balance.” Military coups have occurred very frequently, almost always in response to blatant corruption of elected civilian governments. And yes, the Army respects and consults His Majesty.

In this thread we do not predict or advocate any particular future for Thailand. But its past performance hasn’t bad too bad, overall, as seen in (I) above. Only an ignorant person would be confused whether this was because of, or in spite of, the Constitutional Monarchy.

And yes, it’s just being silly or pedantic to say that a country without a constitution cannot have a constitutional monarch. Britain has no particular written constitution! The term “constitutional monarchy” refers to the level of royal powers, and not to the presence or absence of any particular document.

As to the debate with Monty, I’m sorry that I found myself “putting words in his mouth.” But I did this of necessity: he refused to answer my questions or even explain his peculiar views: I had to guess.

Finally he posted a link: The Army punished some university hazers. As I’ve mentioned, the Army has done much good and there has been very strong and tangible reduction in corruption where I live. I’ll gve specific examples by PM to anyone interested.

As for whether the King’s interventions are good for the country, I notice Monty still has not deigned to comment on the royal intervention of 1992, which led to the replacement of an Army Prime Minister by a respected civilian caretaker Prime Minister, and general elections.

Will you comment on the 1992 intervention Monty ? Or is insulting me all you got?

46

Part of what’s happening I think is that Thailand got a free pass for many years because it was a third world country. I checked the numbers at your website and I see that Phillipines and Thailand were basically tied in 1985. In 2007 Thailand had double the GDP per capita of the Phillipines (PPP basis, adjusting for exchange rates), if I’m reading the table correctly. Latest data puts them solidly in the middle income range. The World Bank no longer has programs there: they are too rich.

Which I suspect is why The Economist and at least one independent author are putting the heat on the country. There are a number of Latin American countries with an analogous role for the military. But they are called banana republics. So to some extent Thailand is a victim of their own success. But I say if they want to take their country to South Korean levels or above, they will have to up their game. Yes, yes: Singapore. But they are a city state. And frankly I’m guessing that Thailand’s performance has had more to do with their common law tradition than their frequent coups - though that’s just a WAG.

Just skimmed the Economist for closing quotes. This will do (sub req): [INDENT]An empirical analysis of the impact of coups on other national economies shows that growth slows, on average, by 2.1 percentage points in the year of a coup, 1.3 and 0.2 in the first and second year after the coup. But in Thailand the idea that the recent coup might not be good for the economy simply does not arise. It tends to be pushed aside with references to the country’s uniqueness—a kind of all-season pass familiar to authoritarians around the world.

… Paul Collier, a professor of economics at Oxford who has noted that coups “are not a cheap way of replacing a government”, calculates that the cumulative effect of a coup, tracked over several years, is to reduce incomes by 7%. [/INDENT] A video at the Economist (again sub req) suggests that the Thai military receives its legitimacy not because of any foreign wars it has fought, but because it protects the King. That suggests that the head Monarch has a certain amount of leverage in these matters.

47

I should apologize to Monty. I wanted to discuss Thailand and its King, but the conversation descended into an exchange of insults. I started this thread because I was sincerely curious what Monty’s brief remark meant; he’s answered that by now. No more gratuitious insults of Monty !

And thank you, Measure for Measure. While it might not be legal for me to fully predict or advocate for its future, Thailand certainly does have problems, and is in need of structural changes.

One of the major problems is a cycle of criminal corruption: Criminal wealth accumulation leads to vote-buying, which leads to a Parliament dominated by criminals, feeding the cycle. Something that gives me hope is that the present government is making a serious attempt to reduce crime and corruption. I can see this personally.

Sooner or later, the military government will call for general elections. Let’s hope a new civilian government earns as much respect as the present military government has.

48

Bumped because of this recent news:

Yeah, right. Chucking someone in prison for making a joke about the dog should really show how much respect the actual government, the junta, deserves. It’s long past time for the monarchy to go away and for the junta to quit. But, hey, as long as the king isn’t bothered with people dying in prison awaiting charges (different case than the one in the link above), then all’s cool, right?

49

To be even-handed, he also “defamed” the king, or at least “liked” defamatory images, so he got 15 years for the dog and 15 years for the king, and a few additional years for some sort of satirical infographic about graft and kickbacks related to the building of a park. Which should be the disturbing part, that he is being punished for criticizing the military, under the mantle of the lése majesty law.

But that is not the disturbing part. I looked around, casually, for the material he posted/liked. I mean, heavy searching might turn it up, but the media sites do not readily offer it for our perusal. Media sites not based in Thailand. That is seriously fucked up. Thailand is exporting their censorship. That should not be forgivable.

50

your unhealthy obsession with the Thai royal family means you have no right to cast aspersions on others’ mental states.

I mean, for fuck’s sake, this is what you want to hang your hat on? Some king in a country which can’t keep a functioning government to save its life?

51

Viewing Asian governance through a Western looking glass is doomed to failure. Their cultures are very different from the West. While Westerners want to export total freedom to criticize anyone, Asian governments are of a different stripe. More a respect to the Father thing. It’s deeply ingrained. In some ways it works for them and provides stability. Of course in some ways it works against them.

But let’s take a look at the West for a minute, where free rein criticism of the leader often contributes to citizens being cynical, suspicious and distrustful of any and all governance. So much so that a Trump could make it to the White House. Western governments are notoriously gridlocked.

Is either one actually responding successfully to the will of the people? In so many ways, in both cases, no!

Asian democracy is never going to be a duplicate of Western democracy. And Westerners need to tone down their outrage that it’s not ‘true’, freedom or democracy if it’s not a clone of American democracy.

The Thai Royal family has shepherded their country through many more centuries than America has existed. Even just this past century the Thai royal family has shepherded their nation through wars and conflicts that devastated their neighbours (whether you agree with the choices they made or not!) the Second World War, the Khmer Rouge, the Vietnam war, the junta in Burma, the drug lords on the northern borders, etc, etc. Did they do it how you would have? No, but they served their people well. While their economy is not without corruption, (neither is the West), it’s still one of the Tiger’s of SEAsia.

Coups would seem to be their favourite way to change government, as long as they’re good with it, we should let them do what they find works for them. I was in Thailand for a couple of those and they were largely little more than traffic annoyance and professed so by Thai’s on the street, at the time.

I have been in Thailand to see the King step in and decide banking rules with a edict. At that time unsophisticated bank laws allowed for mercenary currency trading, which was being spectacularly exploited by the powerful gangster faction. The battle to change those laws raged in the National Assembly with the powerful profiteers thwarting the needed changes at every turn. It was the Thai Kng who stepped in and said it will be done to protect my people and their sprouting economy. And both sides immediately dropped any opposition, as it was pointless. The people would never tolerate defiance of the King, and they knew it. Both sides went back to bickering over other matters.

All to say it is very wrong to say that the King has not contributed, has not helped to shape his country into what it is today.

And it’s very, VERY wrong to think if it’s not a clone of US democracy it’s hopelessly flawed. Asian culture highly values respect for the leader/father/King, while Westerner’s tend to despise such leaders universally, and highly value complete freedom to call their leaders any foul thing they like.

I am not a supporter of the laws to protect them being enforced as its currently being practised, by the way. But then, it’s not my country. When I am there, I am respectful of the King. When people come to my country, whether they agree or not, I expect them to be respectful of our laws not to spread hate speech. Whether they agree with them or not.

52

None of that explains why some rando feels the need to carry their water on an Internet message board.

53

Those who hold a different position than yours become rando, water carrying, obsessed with defending the King?

My bad, I thought this was an actual discussion, wherein people (not randos), presented their differing viewpoints.

Not quite sure why you’re so bitter, but have at it!

54

What a bunch of Orientalist, essentialist bullshit. These sorts of arguments are really only different in degree and not kind from claims that Asian lives matter less since because of their fatalistic culture, death were regarded with less concern. I mean is there more of a culturally ingrained sense of obedience to authority in Asia compared to the West? Yes, but it is not genetically ingrained certainly and there are plenty in Asia who oppose it.

Better TRUMP then the Throne and Altar I say. And liberal democracies (whether in the West or elsewhere) have produced the most successful socioeconomic and political models in human history building mass middle-class societies and with policies in the interests of the majority of the people. Also you don’t think your average peasant in Imperial China was “cynical” and “distrustful” about government when he was at the mercy of the oft rapacious and corrupt Mandarin who he could not vote out?

The difference is democracies respond to the will of the people at least some of the time.

Nobody’s demanding that Thailand adopt republicanism much less our federal, Presidential system of government but a basic tenet of liberal democracy is the right to criticize one’s rulers as part of freedom of speech.

I also note the French Royal family also shepherded their country through far more centuries than America ever existed.

What makes you think most Thais want it considering most of them voted for the party that formed the government which were overthrown in these coups? Did Pinochet’s coup in Chile also represent the will of the people? Was it the Chilean people’s favourite way of changing government?

I’m not to here to argue the specifics of Thai politics but the broader implications of your post nor am I going to deny that the Thai monarchy hasn’t done anything good at all. But you can see this about pretty much every authoritarian leader.

Westerners don’t despise their leaders and indeed have a much healthier view of them where they can like them while criticizing them. And in Asian countries where democratic political cultures have developed there’s just as much criticism of their leaders as here-if not often even more abusive (just look at pictures of fights in Asian parliaments). But of course that doesn’t fit in with your Orientalist view of the obedient Asiatic man.

55

Ofc, Shin Ji continues to be the biggest cuck on the Dope. lmao.

56

And the junta doubles down on the abuse! This time, it’s taking cues from Orwell:

The article continues:

So, the person accused isn’t arrested or detained; they’re “invited” and “not considered to be in detention”. That’s an interesting twist on “not detained” as they’re certainly not free to leave:

Well, they are free to leave, once they

Nice touch, that. Arrest and detention without charge, kept in jail until coerced to agree to forfeit whatever they own.

Mind you, I’m not defending people’s right to drive drunk as nobody has such a right. Nor am I defending one’s right to race on the public roads because, again, nobody has such a right. What I am defending is the idea of decent governance, something Thailand lacks and the king is complicit in Thailand not having a decent government.

57

You keep using the word ‘cuck’ which is very popular right now with rightwing white nationalists, no matter how shoehorned in. Very juvenile.

58

Have you read his posts? He literally is the dictionary definition of one. Also funny how so many people complain and gets #triggered about me using one little word “cuck” while everyone ignores the actual blatant racism of posters like elbows.

59

Not agreeing with you doesn’t make me a racist, sweets. You never fail to give me a laugh though, keep up the good work!

60

But, you see, you don’t use the dictionary definition, 'cause there isn’t one. You use it to mean “a tool of the oligarchy”. You’ve said that. That is not only not the dictionary definition of the word, it’s not the definition of the people that invented the word.

I’ll assume that you’ve gone through the looking glass.