In what other country on earth can one imagine being arrested for playing the French national anthem, for reading George Orwell, or throwing up the three-fingered Hunger Games salute? The “happiness” campaign seemed to beg for ridicule, and then when British comedian Jon Oliver delivered, he too was threatened with jail if he ever set foot in the country. And then, after all that, the same junta turns around and asks people not to call it a “coup” or a “dictatorship.” If this were a Hollywood movie, it would be derided as implausible. But underneath this heap of symbolism, there is a more dangerous plot, one that resonates with past coups in Thailand to control how these events are understood and interpreted among the public, and who gets to write the history. Thailand’s unique power dynamic, which has featured no fewer than 18 coups, has been described as a form of “internal colonization,” whereby the powers of the state are frequently seized by elites and rendered virtually limitless against the rights of citizens whenever the establishment feels its survival hangs in the balance. It has led to a highly irregular and breathtaking mentality among many elites, who see the rural poor as subhuman: their rights as citizens in a democracy are seen as conditional privileges, instead of inalienable rights under law.
Posted on: Sat, 23 Aug 2014 05:24:26 +0000
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