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Jim Bont posted:The Singaporean plan to deal with Malaysia in a hypothetical war is hilarious, I've heard it from a few people who've served in NS so it's an open secret at this point but I still don't think I should write it down. Let's just say it doesn't involve Singapore sitting put on their side of the Causeway.  Seriously, this photo sums up about half of every stereotype the rest of SE Asia holds about Singaporeans lololol. It's unbelievably perfect. ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 03:11 on Jul 5, 2012 |
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Jul 5, 2012 03:09
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Filipina maids are great, if you get friendly with them you have access to every single piece of gossip/rumor about everyone in your apartment complex/street/whatever. Nothing gets past them. Also Singaporeans resent expats because we give them Sundays off, like it's going to foment a revolution or something.
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Jul 5, 2012 03:19
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Jim Bont posted:Also Singaporeans resent expats because we give them Sundays off, like it's going to foment a revolution or something.
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Jul 5, 2012 03:22
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Jim Bont posted:The Singaporean plan to deal with Malaysia in a hypothetical war is hilarious, I've heard it from a few people who've served in NS so it's an open secret at this point but I still don't think I should write it down. Let's just say it doesn't involve Singapore sitting put on their side of the Causeway. Speaking of Singapore...is this a popular forum for expat? http://forum.singaporeexpats.com/ Section 31 fucked around with this message at 06:06 on Jul 5, 2012 |
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Jul 5, 2012 06:02
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I know that one from some work I did. I can't say whether Singapore expats consider it authoritative, but it seemed very active for the topic I needed it for.
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Jul 5, 2012 06:16
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Singapore's military really is quite strong on paper plus they have a reserve of Gurkha commandos who are not anything to be mocked and a pretty nasty assortment of military hardware. This includes Apaches, aegis destroyers, and I wouldn't be totally surprised if Singapore has a secret nuke or two hidden under a mattress somewhere like Israel because you know.. just in case. The country itself is vitally important to U.S. interests in the region. Probably right up there with Taiwan in strategic importance.
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Jul 5, 2012 07:02
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Putting those Gurkhas with submachine guns in front of all the expat clubs and international schools post-9/11 did far more to assuage the fears of westerners than increased airport security or any speech could have done. In the last couple of years they've been withdrawn so presumably the war on terror is over. Also for anyone who's bought into or been surrounded by people who've bought into the whole, "Singapore's police are omniscient and invincible" myth, wasn't the whole Mas Selamat incident the loving funniest thing? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mas_Selamat_bin_Kastari
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Jul 5, 2012 07:51
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Singapore's plan is pretty much geared against Malaysia and Indonesia, the only two countries likely to ever invade Singapore. The Armed Forces' mission statement is to "enhance Singapore’s peace and security through deterrence and diplomacy, and should these fail, to secure a swift and decisive victory over the aggressor". Given that they're literally surrounded by their hypothetical enemies, how do you suppose a victory could be "decisive"? Could you plausibly defend an island "decisively"? One of Singapore's weapons is a Leopard battle tank. How do you even drive a battle tank in Singapore?? You got it. That said, Malaysia and Indonesia's armed forces aren't half-shabby either. Numerical superiority counts. There has been a little hooha over a Southeast Asian arms race over the last few decades. It's been a little exaggerated but every SEA country have been continually arming themselves over the years. For some countries (Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia) they're guarding against China but for Malaysia and Singapore... It's for each other. For the young Singaporean men's opinion the ludicrous (but debatably necessary) conscription service, here's a cute video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK3wi2Tt4Pc I'll be happy to talk about all things Singaporean 
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Jul 5, 2012 09:38
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I know it's a hypothetical but why in the gently caress would Malaysia or Indonesia ever invade Singapore?
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Jul 5, 2012 10:25
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lemonadesweetheart posted:I know it's a hypothetical but why in the gently caress would Malaysia or Indonesia ever invade Singapore? Malaysia never wants Singapore in the first place, Mahathir Mohammed HATED the Chinese Singaporeans and considers them becoming part of malaysia a huge detriment to the Malays, since he thought that the Singaporean Chinese are too power hungry and insensitive to others compared to the Chinese Malays and that they'd quickly move to take over the malaysian economy to the detriment of the Malays. Indonesia, back when it was a hardcore dictatorship, nearly went to war against Malaysia over the control of Borneo, so I suspect that Singapore's arming is part of that. But I think overall any arms buildup for any country in the region is going to be because of china first and foremost from this point forwards.
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Jul 5, 2012 10:40
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Al-Saqr posted:Malaysia never wants Singapore in the first place, Mahathir Mohammed HATED the Chinese Singaporeans and considers them becoming part of malaysia a huge detriment to the Malays, since he thought that the Singaporean Chinese are too power hungry and insensitive to others compared to the Chinese Malays and that they'd quickly move to take over the malaysian economy to the detriment of the Malays. For a laugh, I asked one of my malaysian friends about a hypothetical war between malaysia and singapore. She just said malaysia would stop giving singapore water. I laughed.
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Jul 5, 2012 11:28
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Exactly, a war is never going to happen but there is a historical precedent, the Konfrontasi, and Singapore-Malaysia tensions got pretty heated over the water issue when Mahathir was around. PAS somehow magically coming to power would exacerbate things but that doesn't seem in the realm of possibility either on a federal level.
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Jul 5, 2012 11:52
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Now sit back and try to imagine what Singapore would look like run by Malaysia. The sovereign wealth fund would be looted clean by the elite Malay families overnight. Infrastructure crumbles within a decade and ethnic tensions flare up. That might actually push Malaysia and Indonesia to actual war because Singapore controls a huge amount of Indonesia's former and current dictator wealth. That's a wild scenario though.
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Jul 5, 2012 13:17
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Jim Bont posted:Putting those Gurkhas with submachine guns in front of all the expat clubs and international schools post-9/11 did far more to assuage the fears of westerners than increased airport security or any speech could have done. In the last couple of years they've been withdrawn so presumably the war on terror is over. Also for anyone who's bought into or been surrounded by people who've bought into the whole, "Singapore's police are omniscient and invincible" myth, wasn't the whole Mas Selamat incident the loving funniest thing? I always wondered why there were Gurkhas standing around our school. Always really silent with SMGs and big knives strapped to their legs. Coming from a pokey little primary in Devon to school in Singapore was quite jarring really. Was it only a post-9/11 measure? Interesting... What did they think was going to happen that could have possibly been mitigated by some armed guards?
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Jul 5, 2012 20:13
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Ocrassus posted:What did they think was going to happen that could have possibly been mitigated by some armed guards? Helicopter parent shrieking.
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Jul 5, 2012 20:51
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Jim Bont posted:Again, anecdotal and a massive generalization, but almost every single rude expat I have come across in Singapore was either British or Australian. The Americans, Japanese and the rest of the Europeans all seem to blend in better or are simply more insular. I have never, and I mean never, had an unpleasant interaction with a Singaporean. reference: I am an aussie so bias and all that but I really think what you are posting is confirmation bias. SE Asia (Indonesia, SG, Thailand and Malaysia in particular) are big big big holiday destinations for Aussies, and places like SG and KL and now starting to go into the others, huge business destinations also. You get heaps of them there. Comparatively you get less Americans and Europeans just by means of distance. Likewise take say, Americans travelling to the Caribbean. On a holiday there once when I lived in the US, someone told me "Oh all the Americans here are rude and drunk, but you Australians are great!" I really think it's just that there are heaps of Aussies there due to distance and Brits due to old school colonialism, and of course you get a bunch of wankers as well, but you notice them a lot more, like the people near the US notice the Americans being worse. Where I live I notice a heap of Singaporean expats living here who have that certain SG flavour of... I think the phrase is Kaisu? while either on the road, or in shopping centres or markets around. But I hesitate to generalise because I see so many people who aren't as well, I'm not just picking out the negatives on that one. Anyway this is a super interesting thread. For a few reasons I'm really interested in SE Asia. My Partners family is Chinese-Malaysian (KL, Penang and SG mostly) and I've loved visiting there so far, and Australia is obviously close by geographically, so soon enough our population is going to be getting closer to SE Asia by way of immigration and politically I think our country will have to make some choices sooner or later on the region and who to affiliate with also.
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Jul 5, 2012 22:58
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Phuket is basically Australian bogan mecca and all the street fighting, drunken vomiting and flag wearing that entails. Australian tourists in Asia are FAR WORSE than Australian expats, IMO
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Jul 6, 2012 01:08
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"Hey man, I'm not racist. Some of my best friends are Australian." teacup basically is making the same point I made earlier. It's proximity. My Aussie friends here are some of my closest friends and they're as put off by the OZZIE OZZIE OZZIE crowd as anyone else is. That said, I've never been of the impression that Australians cause a disproportionate amount of violence or ill will here in Thailand. The British always take the cake on antisocial behavior from what I've seen. In moderately substantive news, anyone wishing to view HM (yes, him) and see what has become an increasingly rare event (until the last month, for some reason), can find a seat on the river somewhere between Siriraj Hospital and Koh Kret: http://thaifinancialpost.com/2012/07/06/king-bhumibol-on-boat-trip-to-observe-life-around-ko-kret/ He and his entourage will be boating it up to Koh Kret and the river will be lined with Thai people waving flags and showing their support. I'll be out of the country, but I've been asked to stay off my riverside balcony in the condo and to not hang laundry out there. We'll also have a policeman stationed in the lobby (so maybe I'll get fined for something!) for a few hours. There are very few things in this country that make everyone snap to attention and get poo poo done, but when HM visits somewhere you've never seen Thai people start cleaning and scrubbing and repairing with such fervor. Then they really all will line the entire route of his journey. If for no other reason than it's a Very Thai Thing and that it's very different from the kind of outpouring we'd see in most of (y)our host countries, it's worth checking out if you've got no plans. EDIT: My favorite memory along these lines involves eating dinner with my girlfriend on this street (first result on Google, I dunno) in 200# when it was either his 80th birthday or the 60th anniversary of his coronation. Anyway, all the Japanese-themed bargirls with their numbers on came pouring out into the street holding little candles to join the national singing of His special song. Little tears streaming down their faces. Then they went back to work and presumably blew old Japanese dudes for the rest of the evening. ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 12:41 on Jul 6, 2012 |
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Jul 6, 2012 12:31
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White Australian chiming in to post the best meal I had in Singapore. I caught the train to Eastpoint mall then walked the rest of the way. I nearly died from heat exhaustion but it was worth it: Kolo Mee with extra fried Sui Gao @ Yummy Wontan Mee Blk 137 Tampines Round Market and Food Centre (#01-45) Four weeks of walking around Singapore (alone) nearly killed me. Did I do it right? KingEup fucked around with this message at 12:53 on Jul 10, 2012 |
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Jul 7, 2012 02:55
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That food looks really good, but in the future this isn't the thread for that sort of thing.
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Jul 7, 2012 03:18
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ReindeerF posted:See? This is the kind of poo poo that I love learning. As Westerners we find the whole Chinese six/seven days a week thing hilariously awful, but I can only imagine the discussions on the other side of the equation. Inability to work on Sunday is probably codified as a disability by the Ministry of Manpower. I remember western English teachers asking students about the "weekend" and what they did on the weekend and/or what they will do on the weekend. There is not weekend. I told them that the topic of the "weekend" is from ignorance and that is fine but it's also a bit foolish. Western Judeo Xtian. ReingeerF Do you or did you, ever go over to Ajarn?
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Jul 7, 2012 08:11
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Positive Optimyst posted:
Second to thaivisa in sheer awfulness, according to the teachers I know.
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Jul 7, 2012 10:17
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Modus Operandi posted:Second to thaivisa in sheer awfulness, according to the teachers I know. Yup. I was a regular there for many years (AJ) until recently.
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Jul 7, 2012 14:35
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The only times I ever visit Ajarn are because a search result leads me there or because I'm checking for some buy/sell stuff. For some reason I'm obsessed with reading craigslist ads and things of that nature, mostly for the humor value, but also because you can sometimes grab oddball things that aren't widely or cheaply available outside the US (like my replacement Forerunner GPS). Basically, I'm not a teacher and I don't really know any teachers. I have a few professor friends, but they're either published international guys who circulate around the developing world or they're professors at the top 2-3 universities here, so they don't mix much with the teacher crowd. My opinion here: There's a bit of social discrimination (though not much *really*) between the teacher crowd and everyone else, but I don't think it's really contentious, it's more like they don't make any money and so they live in a slightly different world where you live in a 30sqm hovel and sit around in front of the 7-11 drinking beer because you can't afford to go to a bar. Also, they *tend* to be in their early twenties and most of the expats are in their late twenties at the youngest and probably in their thirties to seventies. They also have that entire TOEFL world that's completely governed by its own rules and social norms. Whenever I peek in I'm shocked at how strange it is. Like, a few years ago I peeked in and they were all going nuts at each other because some guy started a web site ranking a bunch of schools and placement agencies and TOEFL providers by reviews provided by teachers who worked with them. The agents and TOEFL guys and school guys all got together and found out who was involved and went after them personally. Very weird, heh.
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Jul 8, 2012 05:17
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With english teachers you tend to meet them at downmarket places like um Khao San or clubs around RCA. A lot of young thais from abroad with fluent english moonlight as english teachers too. So if you know a couple you end up knowing a lot of them because they all hang out together. Most are alright but it's the mostly likely group for you to encounter bonafide kiddie fiddles and other strange degenerates.
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Jul 9, 2012 03:23
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It's one thing and also not surprising to watch anti-US rally, but anti-China rally in Vietnam?quote:Vietnamese activists hold anti-China rally
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Jul 9, 2012 09:24
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Protests at all are rare there (as it points out), yeah, but of course rallying anger against the Chinese is pretty easy I bet given the historical tensions. China is completely loving its own foreign policy right now and I'd like to hear what the China thread has to say about why that is. I would guess it's because the internal military powerhouse is pursuing one agenda and the internal foreign policy powerhouse is pursuing another and this is the end result. Still, that's just a guess, because pulling this stuff with the South China Sea while the Americans are in the middle of their Asian Charm Offensive is a completely amateur move. China is getting its diplomatic clock cleaned right now in Asia and it had been making steady, silent advances like a motherfucker (still is, but who knows how much longer if they keep this up). EDIT: THREAD CROSSOVER! ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 09:45 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 09:38
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e: will post in China ee: will post here too, not sure how kosher that is but: Anecdotally I met an American guy working for a think tank here in Beijing who said that a lot of these moves on the offshore islands are being pushed by the energy companies and that was his focus. He said that the CCP had no individual department for energy or Coast Guard issues, and that as a result both of these interests were spread among different ministries, leading small groups, and SOEs. So it's really hard to tell who's calling the shots on these issues. menino fucked around with this message at 09:49 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 09:44
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Ah, that's interesting. It would make sense that Sinopec and other business interests (and other other interests too, of course) would be behind it, I hadn't thought of that. Thanks! I've always wondered when the Chinese are going to have the come to Jesus moment with their state-owned companies and how they'll handle it. It seems that any state-owned enterprise ends up getting too powerful to govern at some point (Fannie Mae, Yukos, etc) and then there has to be a resolution. I wonder what'll happen in China, as my impression is that their state-owned commanding heights-type industrial giants are seriously top heavy with powerful people intertwined (no knowledge, just impression).
ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 09:50 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 09:47
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Wow, didn't hear about these protests until checking this thread, didn't notice anything on Sunday and I was criss-crossing HCMC. I cannot imagine Vietnamese protesting, it must have been so awkward. Granted, it was about nationalistic pride and not complaining about some social issue but still.
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Jul 9, 2012 10:05
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There was similar anti-China demonstration last year in Vietnam but it was dispersed by authority (as mentioned in article), I wonder whether Vietnamese authority will respond differently this year given the higher tension between two countries.
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Jul 9, 2012 10:33
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You've almost got to believe they are, at minimum, paternally encouraging it by not disbanding it.
ReindeerF fucked around with this message at 12:32 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 12:26
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There's a professor from Australia named Carlyle Thayer who wrote a few papers a while back about Vietnam and ASEAN's relationship with China in regards to the South China Sea. He has a lot of papers up on Scribd with more details, a good one from 2010 is here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/42829909/Thayer-Recent-Developments-in-the-South-China-Sea-Implications-for-Regional-Security e: His abstract: Thayer posted:This paper provides a broad overview of four major topics. First, it discusses tensions inChina-United States relations and their implications for Southeast Asia. This section willfocus how China and the United States employ naval power to shape the political environment This section also critically examines the concept of “core national interest”that is attributed to Chinese officials. Second, the paper review multilateral efforts toaddress the South China Sea with a particular focus on the 17thASEAN Regional Forum ministerial meeting and the inaugural meeting of the ASEAN Defence Ministers Plus process. Third, the paper review China-Vietnam interaction in the South China Sea witha particular focus on China’s annual unilateral fishing ban and seizure of Vietnamesefishing boats. Fourth, the paper reviews the status the Declaration on Conduct (DOC) of Parties in the South China Sea and progress by the China-ASEAN working group toimplement the DOC. The paper concludes on a note of cautious optimism that there is likely to be some progress in implementing confidence building measures in the South China Sea but that sovereignty claims will remain intractable He has a few other papers up there, not sure how recent they are. menino fucked around with this message at 13:38 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 13:36
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kru posted:Singapore should mobilise and claim the South China Sea for the homeland Quoting this as this guy can lead the vanguard kru fucked around with this message at 15:14 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 15:11
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quote edit etc This space sponsored by the Singapore Foundation for Citizens Rights: http://static.stomp.com.sg/stomp/sgseen/this_urban_jungle/1190838/is_it_legal_to_let_these_lanterns_float_in_the_sky.html kru fucked around with this message at 15:28 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 15:13
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ReindeerF posted:Protests at all are rare there (as it points out), yeah, but of course rallying anger against the Chinese is pretty easy I bet given the historical tensions. Long story short: China is (perpetually?) distracted by domestic issues and local actors have relatively free reign to instigate conflict in the South. In this recent South China Sea debacle you have a few factors: 1) Local interests: China's central government has a lot on its plate, what with ruling 1.3 billion people. While the specifics are complicated and not easily characterized in a short paragraph, local governments are more-or-less free to do what they want as long as they perform on key metrics. One of these metrics is economic growth, and Beijing has a history of overlooking everything else including stuff like rule of law, as long as those metrics are met or exceeded. Therefore local interests like, say, the government of Hainan or Guangdong provinces will be allowed to get away with a lot, even illegal activities, as long as the continue to perform. To give an example of how this can foment conflict with SE Asia, the Hainan government has been very aggressive in growing fishing operations. Hainan province has provided and even pressured fishermen into accepting low-interest loans, subsidies, and even new ships. Anything for those sweet, sweet economic growth metrics, which do so much to further Party careers. 2) Propaganda complications: China's educational institutions preach a combination of cultural chauvinism and anti-imperialist third-worldism that produces terribly confused opinions about Southeast Asia. Chinese are eager to prove to their former oppressors that they are no longer a victim to be pushed around. At the same time, they worry that they have a lot of domestic problems (which is true) and that they are still weak (which is debatable.) The Chinese at the same time think that the "little countries" traditionally belonging to the Sinosphere ought to show proper deference to their "big brother." Naturally this leads to mutually conflicting beliefs. Vietnam in particular seems to provoke expressions of mutually exclusive opinions from the Chinese I have talked to; simultaneously being a troublesome nation that doesn't know its place and a small country admirable in its determination to resist foreign occupiers 3) Bureaucratic Infighting: Imperial China's vast bureaucracy had a long history of sabotaging national interests for personal or organizational gains, and modern China is no different. Specifically, China's maritime law enforcement is currently the subject of a jurisdictional spat between two different organizations, neither of which is a proper Coast Guard. Both organizations compete for funding, so naturally they are aggressive in proving their necessity to their higher-ups. This leads to confrontational policy in the South China Sea, since more arrests/conflicts equals more attention which equals more money. 4) Corruption: No discussion of modern Chinese politics, especially among Chinese citizens, can avoid the subject of corruption. The Chinese state is absolutely rife with bribe-taking, favoritism, nepotism, patronage, and other extra-legal power structures which are frankly a clear and present threat to the continued sovereignty of the PRC and the rule of law within its borders. The Chinese military especially is facing a crisis of corruption and knock-on problems like incompetent officers who have no authority with their troops. With any foreign interaction, it will definitely be worth following the money that prompted any action, no matter how minor. I hope this answers some questions. The China thread is somewhat dead so if anyone has questions I am sure I would be happy to take a look at them here. Arglebargle III fucked around with this message at 15:49 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 15:23
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gently caress
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Jul 9, 2012 15:44
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Section 31 posted:There was similar anti-China demonstration last year in Vietnam but it was dispersed by authority (as mentioned in article), I wonder whether Vietnamese authority will respond differently this year given the higher tension between two countries. As most of us know, "protesting" and even handing out a leaflet is illegal in Vietnam. These "Chinese protests" were carefully orchestrated and planned - and allowed - by the Vietnamese government. Any dissemination of information/protest/leaflets/blogs will land a Vietnamese person in prison for years. The Chinese are not liked that is for sure, but never believe these "protests."
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Jul 9, 2012 18:02
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Modus Operandi posted:Nations like Singapore were able to gradually overcome it but then you see Myanmar, Malaysia, etc.. where it's still very much the norm. Singapore is the only nation in SEA that has truly overcome and integrated in its culturally and religiously diverse population. It has its friction points too but they are minor in comparison with the rest of SEA. A late note here: Singapore has substituted its internal social faultlines for other ones, really, not erased them. In Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia there have been substantial demographic and social changes from the racial bargains hammered out in the traumatic 60s, plus a whole lot nationalist identity construction out of the dust of mass patriotic awakenings and such. Take Singapore. The Singaporean Chinese society today is dramatically different from what existed in 1965; essentially the English-speaking subdemographic of the Chinese population completely eclipsed the old institutions of the Chinese-speaking Chinese. At independence a fraction of a percent of the Chinese population spoke Mandarin in the home. By the mid 1980s the vast majority did; around the late 1990s even Mandarin began losing ground in households - to English. Someone noted the recent triumph of the Worker's Party and the GRC system. In fact this is not the first time the PAP's power has been seriously challenged. But the last time it occurred, the challenge was from the right-wing, the last gasps of ethnic Chinese flagwaving in Singapore. The PAP responded by (1) obliging opposition parties to broaden their racial appeal, hence GRCs, (2) moving to the right itself, calling off its siege on dialect community identity and forming its own Chinese community policies and institutions - the Special Assistance Programme for what historically Chinese schools that remained, the Speak Mandarin campaigns, etc. But this "success" was always self-limiting anyway. Successful families start speaking English, start forming family links to Australia and America, and stop being susceptible to localist Chinese ethnic identity politics. The bizarre result today is that the SAP schools all became upper-tier schools under vigorous government support - and thus attract almost wholly English-speaking-at-home students, the children of rich local Chinese (and let's be fair here, it has been possible to get rich in Singapore with hard work, in a way that isn't guaranteed in much of Southeast Asia). Chinese students, to be sure, but they feel no obligation to support the PAP for backing their Chinese schools. No difference to them if their school discarded its Chinese identity today. Only the very old alumni care - but that generation of alumni is literally slowly dying. The current disconnect is from the left-wing, where now the PAP now finds that its carefully-cultivated links to the Chinese social organizations collapsing as the organizations themselves fade in influence among lower-income Chinese households, and in the meanwhile its economic policies are at best only tolerable for the lower-income Chinese, and its social policies are completely disconnected from the new English-speaking socially-liberal "Singapore for Singaporeans, not Singapore for the Chinese" upper-middle-income demographic that the PAP fought so hard to create. The PAP wanted to break the political strength of the Chinese-speaking Chinese communities that nearly destroyed the PAP - Barisan Sosialis from all those years ago - and succeeded so well that the generation itself no longer even conceives of itself in those terms. Did you know that the PAP once campaigned, as part of its party messaging, that it aspired to make Singapore unto Sweden? That was completely discarded during the Chinese reaction period, peaking during the 1997 era chorus of Asian Values (co-starring Dr. Mahathir Muhammad). So now the PAP is shuttling back again to the left. Time will tell whether it will succeed so well that it stumbles in two decades again. Malaysia has had a somewhat analagous shuffling of the dual entrenchment of English-speaking Malays amongst Malays in toto, yet the rise of Malay-speaking Malays as a threat to claims to represent Malays, plus movements first toward the right and then the left as generations have worn on, but too many other factors also exist in Malaysian politics for the narrative to be so clear. ronya fucked around with this message at 18:56 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 18:48
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http://news.yahoo.com/us-man-jailed-translating-thai-king-book-freed-014336581.htmlquote:BANGKOK (AP) — An American sentenced to two and a half years in Thai prison for translating a banned biography about the country's king and posting the content online has been freed by a royal pardon, the U.S. Embassy said Wednesday. Business as usual in Thailand. Heh. There have been many high profile incidents like this where some Thai or foreigner or other gets thrown in the slammer or made an example of (briefly) and then gets their sentence dismissed soon afterward. I'm not going to say for certain what I feel about these events but they seem to be showcased in a certain way to raise the media profile of certain individuals. If what the perpetrator allegedly did was not really a big deal to various person(s) who have certain authority to do something about it they could have prevented certain individual(s) from going to prison to begin with. This case was particularly interesting because he was Thai-American and wasn't even on Thai soil when he allegedly said/did certain things. The ever vigilant and morally just cyber division of the Thai bureaucracy snooped him out from Thailand, demanded his name/ip info from the overseas ISP, and decided to put him on the immigration blacklist to spring a trap on him when he visited. Modus Operandi fucked around with this message at 05:06 on Jul 11, 2012 |
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Jul 11, 2012 04:55
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