absolutelyBangkok archive · Culture & Arts
Originally published Jan. 5, 2010
There’s much talk in here and in Thailand forums about the kingdom’s culture of propaganda and institutionalized brainwashing. Why are Thai people not allowed to grow up and think for themselves? Which becomes all too obvious when you switch on Thai radio or TV. OK, there are some more decent radio stations, such as 98.5 Good FM with Saturday’s On the Rocks — still airing? But hear hear, when I read the following, I found a soulmate:
I bought an FM radio to listen to while I am jogging and have to tell you that Thailand must have the worst radio stations in the world: 75% of the programing is commercials, silly DJ talking about nonsense, and the official government news — which mandatorily plays on all channels, because if it didn’t, everyone would tune in to the channel that didn’t have it.
Who selects the music? Every half hour by channel surfing I may stumble on one song. On repeated days these were Puff the Magic Dragon (on an adult channel) and When Smokey Sings (I Hear Violins). These tunes are so bad nobody even cares about the copyright.
On Sunday I also tuned in to the prime minister’s radio talk, supposedly in Thai but where every polysyllabic word was in English (“competitive target,” etc.) and only the “connectors” were in Thai. I don’t understand this because all the words I heard had Thai words for them and also why not just have the whole program in English? Also, Abhisit Vejjajiva has a very boring speaking voice and is long-winded.
The hourly news program starts off with this Hitler music and the English programs have people speaking with very weird and unnatural accents.
It would be as easy as pie to beat all of these radio stations, I don’t know why someone doesn’t do it. I am guessing that either the usual connections are required, or maybe they don’t want good music since this way some people may actually listen to the propaganda.
Mr. Abhisit, you grew up in the U.K.; let’s start fixing the broken-down TV and radio programing and brainwashing.
TIRED OF MIND CONTROL
From the Bangkok Post’s
PostBag, Jan. 05, 2010.
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