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I'm no TRT supporter, but I can't help but feel somewhat deflated at the fact that the prevalent feeling among Thai elite (as reflected in the judges decisions) is that threatening parties should be disbanded... I find it insulting to my intellect that I'm being denied the opportunity and choice to support who I want to in a multi-party scenario. I'm being guided as to what is 'right' and what is 'wrong' when I'd rather decide for myself. I'd rather that Thai people, as a whole, be given the tools to make the right choice, so that we know why we are making those choices and can't be swayed from our views by witty argumentation.

If a government fails you, a coup and party dissolution is hardly the answer. Elect someone else in the next government, no? However, as I mentioned in a previous post, Thailand's form of democracy is hardly deliberative, so it's hard to prevent those that would use the democracy to their own ends through populist propaganda and policies from gaining power. It's arguably hard to have anyone with good intentions on a ministerial seat.

TRT may be gone, but the tactic is there. Either TRT will be back in two elections time, or else, in the meantime, some other group will adopt the tactic. Are we going to continue having coup after coup whenever those who are powerful are unhappy with the elected party? I'd like to believe that any party I support is willing to face its opponents to an audience of well-educated citizens. However, that's far from being a reality in Thailand. We seem to much prefer keeping people in the dark, and keeping those in power, powerful. After all, who's going to tend to the garden, wash the mercedes, and guard the gate to the mansion if all the poor people suddenly have the means to improve their lives?
fon @ 6:05 AM link to post * *


The democrats were just acquitted of all charges, including

1) Influencing voter turnout by labelling the Thaksin-regime... erm.. the Thaksin-regime. They found that academics had invented the term, not the Democrats

2) Trying to frame TRT of bankrolling smaller parties

3) Trying to prevent smaller parties from competing in the elections

It took almost 5 hours for the whole verdict to be read. If I were one of the judges, I would have delivered the verdict and posted the justifications up on-line.

The interesting part is going to be what the judges decide about TRT... If they decide to dissolve the party, it will look very biased indeed. If they leave the party undissolved... well, I suppose it's taking a step towards trusting citizens in making their own choice with the vote that they have. That's if Thailand is ready for a deliberative form of democracy. TRT's prior election success is due to pure populist voting.

Corrupt governments are not a uniquely Thai thing. Democracy breeds corruption in many places. Thus, punishing parties in a democratic system for acting the way that the system want them to act is certainly no solution. I'm not in a hurry to see the TRT back in power, but I also don't think going about letting the elite of Thailand dissolve parties is a solution, either.
fon @ 5:49 PM link to post * *


IDA4120 Community Development - Presentation Feedback Sheet

OverallGrade:_HD___________________Marker’s Signature…BDM……

fon @ 1:00 PM link to post * *


About a month and a half ago, on the very first night I started working at Scusami, I saw a certain "P.M." who I didn't want to see (he luckily, didn't notice me). My reaction was a renewed anger, such that I was unable to continue working and had to ask my boss to leave. I felt justified in my anger because of what he had done, and didn't give it much more thought.

But different histories with different people have different effects. I was waiting for my takeaway soy cappucino at coffee HQ at campus centre, and, looking up for one moment, I locked eyes with a familiar face as he walked past. He quickly turned away, as did I. And for a minute, I was motionless, not daring to turn around again. I felt like I'd just been electrocuted. My legs felt wobbly, and my ears were ringing, as if a ghost from the past had just screamed in my ears. I didn't only feel angry - I also felt scared, guilty, weak and flushed. My heart was pounding away like mad.

How am I supposed to feel when I had to watch a person try to kill himself in my kitchen with a steak knife? It's been over a year since that now, but thinking about it still unleashes this dark torrent of violent feelings. I feel, up until now, that maybe it was a subconscious attempt to guilt-trip me. And it worked. I feel terrible for somehow playing a part in a chain of events that led him to behave in such an extreme manner. I feel awful that I couldn't have taken better care of a dear friend. And I feel ashamed - ashamed of that deluge of tears that streamed out when the police arrived. I am sorry that I disrupted my housemate's study. Sorry I messed things up for a lot of people last year. But angry too. Angry that he tried to bribe my friend, that he suddenly were ok to drive himself home when the police were going to call an ambulance (cost=$450). Enraged that there was nothing I could say in my own defense, fully knowing what people whispered behind my back.

For a while, concerned, I followed his life on his blog... and perhaps I shouldn't have ever found it. I was happy that he was doing well, and I mentioned on my own site that I was happy for him. I suppose I never should have, because after a short series of blogs defaming me, he disappeared off the internet entirely. And so I've been worried for him.

After all those claims that he was going back, that he couldn't stay in Australia anymore, and that he was going to make his sister go back too, seeing him here was the last thing that I expected. I wish I'd smiled. I wish I'd said something. I wish I hadn't stood there, pale, transfixed on the wall.

So why am I saying all this now? I've always turned to written words when I am troubled, ever since I was a child. And this... well, because it still makes me mad. I had nightmares about it at night, and I still feel chilled to the bone today.

But after all those unleashed emotions subside, the truth is, I still miss my friend.
fon @ 6:16 AM link to post * *


If we were to believe Hobbes, we might put the struggles we see around us in a rather bleak, but expected context, and with a shrug, dismiss them as symptomatic of the warlike state of affairs that is natural to us. We would think that fighting, torture, terror and greed are all essential facets of human nature. We might, as Hobbes did, long for that authoritarian monarch who would ensure peace by controlling every aspect of our lives, restricting our movements, choosing our destinies. So long as it ensured peace.

But then, turning to Foucault, we would see that history is nothing but a series of shifting violent paradigms, and that no matter who rules, there are groups of people who are intimidated, oppressed, killed... and for what? Not conforming to the majority, being deviant. Women were medicated for not wanting to bake cakes and do the dishes not so long ago. Valium was the word of the day. Not that it's gotten any better. In the western world, there's a way to 'medicalise' just about any 'deviant' behaviour. Feeling sad is not a valid response to the violent world around us. Instead, we must pop pills and continue producing money to buy assets, and further institutionalise the existent power structures.

So what is this elusive 'peace' that many of us hunger for somewhere in the back of our minds? How can it be achieved? Do we mean an end to violence? What kind of violence? Do we pretend that somehow, nothing ever happened to the oppressed or killed, and simply begin to live justly? Or are we accountable to those that have suffered? And to what extent?

Chaiwat Satha-Anand, a writer filled with hope - a far cry from either Foucault or Hobbes - reminds us a more just reality lies in the hands of individuals. We are not powerless to break chains of violence.

Terror has three main factors to it:

• It severs the connection between the victim and the reason for the crime. So, without a real explanation for the violence, all must live in fear of it happening to themselves and their families.
• As a result of this fear, it undermines society's normal functioning, because anyone could, at any stage, become a victim
• It inspires people to avenge those who have fallen, and thus, creating a violent loop

The concept can also be applied to psychological violence. Traumatized childhoods often breed traumatizing parents.

It is a very bleak cycle, and any person would be tempted to give up and say "well, that's just how things are!" There is something very comforting about that thought. Perhaps then I can concentrate on doing more "fun" things, like watching TV, clubbing, drugs - anything to make me forget that there are people suffering in the world - and thus reaffirm the whisper in the breeze that says "it's ok to forget; it's bliss to disconnect".

But no! Satha-Anand gives examples of individuals, such as Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish man who acted on his own courage to save a community of 700,000 Jews in Hungary. But more importantly, he reminds us of people within those violent circumstances who insisted on using their own moral judgement, sometimes at the cost of their own life. There were SS officers who helped Jews escape - there was Oscar Schindler, who, even as a rich and influential member of the Nazi party, risked his life and lost his fortune to save the lives of the 'enemy of the state'. There was a Sikh man who crossed the border into Pakistan to help save a Muslim girl he barely knew, who had been taken away by Pakistani officials. All this in a background where the man was the son of a Sikh man who had been killed by Muslims, and the girl, the only remaining survivor of her entire family that had been killed by Sikhs.

So, it's not "just the way it is". The question is whether you think it's more important to 'stay alive' or to 'stay human'.

Foucault, M. (1975), Discipline and punish : the birth of the prison

Hobbes, T. (1651), Leviathan

Satha-Anand, C. (2001), 'Crossing the Enemy's Line: Helping Others in Violent Situations Throught Non-Violent Action', Peace Research vol. 33 iss. 2 pp105-114

Satha-Anand, C. (2002) ‘Understanding the success of terrorism’, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Volume 3, Issue 1, pp 157-159

fon @ 5:49 PM link to post * *


If there's something I've learned in the past few weeks, it's this: Grassroots work is rewarding.

Arguably, I've done grassroots work in the past. My role as an international student representative could arguably be 'grassroots' - but in reality, it was highly bureaucratic. It was a highly ineffective effort to try to reach out to a 'grassroot' that, in all honesty, really didn't give a shit what NLC or MUISS was doing. Case in point: We practically had to bribe people to attend any forums we were organising. "Reaching out" was more of a theoretical problem that had to somehow be solved.

Volunteering in SAIL (Sudanese Australian Integrated Learning) for eight weeks now, and in 'The Homework Club' (run for kids who live in public housing in Collingwood), has been immensely rewarding. The attendees want to attend (there's even a waiting list for The Homework Club!), and are appreciative of the efforts of all the tutors involved.

At SAIL, I'm working with this gorgeous 14 year old girl who's migrated to Australia about 4 months ago. She's so keen to learn, and I'm teaching her to touch-type at the moment. It's a shame that she's now moved to a different suburb. I'm not sure if she'll be there this Saturday. I want to keep working with her, but she didn't know the phone number of the place that she was moving to. I gave her my e-mail and phone number, but she doesn't know how to use e-mail (I was going to teach her this Saturday), and she said to me "I'll call you if I have money". That made me so sad. These people are really struggling when they arrive in Australia. I want her to contact me, but I know it's probably not going to happen. She seemed so uncertain of what her future would hold. But she's a bright girl. I'd like to believe that she'll make the best of any opportunities that come her way.

Last night, at the Homework Club, I was working with this little boy of Vietnamese background - an absolute lovable rascal in third grade, who kept trying to present arguments as to why I should be the one doing the reading, and not him! He wanted me to read a book of 101 magic tricks to him... I told him he had to do the reading, and once he could read it himself, we'd do as many magic tricks as he wanted! So we settled on a book about Walter, a dog who farted all the time, instead. Well, at least he found it very funny, even though the content was slightly dubious...

So really, I'm very happy to trade off Wednesday evenings and Saturday mornings for such a rewarding experience. The kids are beautiful, and all of them are on their way to finding their own struggles in this life. I can only wish them the best. Everyone deserves a chance, and everyone deserves to be empowered to realise that they can achieve whatever it is they want in life. It's unfair that the many of us that have been given a head start in life have the gall to look down on these people that need a helping hand to catch up. It's not a race. It's a life. I think we shouldn't be competing with the rest of the world - I think we should be helping everyone along as best we can.

So why is it, that when we see others fall, we have a tendency to walk past? These people are sometimes the beggars on the road, the habitual alcoholics, the poor, the uneducated, the drug-addicted, the 'handicapped'... the people that don't have the access to the services that you and I are using now in the participation in this web-community. For example.

How can anyone justify turning a blind eye to others who are suffering? And worse yet, in many cases, people blame those that are suffering themselves, as if they chose to be worse off! Case in point: "Those girls like sex, that's why they are prostitutes!"

People! Find out the truth before you make sweeping generalizations like that!

My student at SAIL: "My father was killed."

Not died. Killed.

The little boy at the Homework Club: "My mother and father hate each other so they both got new husbands [sic]. That's why he doesn't help her. Her new boyfriend doesn't help either."

He's 8 years old.

And we go on blaming people because they are poor?

If you are reading this page, my friend, you are amongst the lucky minority of the world.
fon @ 7:32 PM link to post * *




So, as you can see from the table, Asian-born Australians are overwhelmingly likely, if not at least to want an increase, to want the level of Asian immigrants to remain the same.

But that's not the point - the point is that everyone else wants less Asians to come into the country. I've chosen my friends well enough over the past few years that I was almost convinced that Australians are not racist!

Australian-born people are also less likely to mind immigrants who are Southern European, and then still less likely to mind British born immigrants.

Overall, there is opposition to taking in more immigrants, but this much is clear: opposition to taking in Asian immigrants is more than double that of British or Southern European.

But those from the Middle East have it worse - Whilst 36.7% of Australians think we should accept less Asians, (compared to 14.3% and 16.3% who think we should accept less British and Southern European, respectively), a majority of Australians think we should be accepting less Middle Eastern immigrants: 54.3% !!

And who says Australians believe in the 'fair go'?

Reference:
Betts, K. (2005) ‘Migrants' attitudes to immigration in Australia: 1990 to 2004’ in People and Place, vol. 13, no. 3, pp.21-32

fon @ 7:14 AM link to post * *


P'Ant now has three released music videos with his band, 'Emotion Town' (numbers 1, 2, and 3 on his new album... but number 4 and 5 are still my faves :P). I promised him that I would listen to his music every day, so I've set number 3 as my alarm clock tone :P I'm supposedly supposed to be able to sing his songs in karaoke (that's the goal...)

Here's two of them:





Visit his myspace site for more music :)


On another note... I was slightly surprised that Tears of the Black Tiger, a movie from Thailand that was highly acclaimed at the Cannes in 2002 is only now opening in New York!



I wonder if that means that his film after that, Citizen Dog (2005?) won't be released in the west until 2010?



Huh? And the Americans think they are so quick to release everything? Here's a couple ads by the same director, Wisit Sasanatieng ... Good stuff!






fon @ 12:00 PM link to post * *


You know who you are: Thank-you & I love you.
fon @ 7:56 AM link to post * *


That feeling from Thursday night just refuses to go away...
fon @ 11:18 AM link to post * *


Since my computer got stolen, I've been mucking around a lot less on photoshop/illustrator etc... and the strange offspring of that is that I've bought a sketchbook, and have been drawing a bit for the last few days...

And for some reason it's just dark...

I was going to draw a girl sitting down - something simple... but then it's like my pencil took charge, and it ended up being a girl sitting down and hugging one leg because the heel was cut and bleeding. She is in pain... Is she me?

Then... I thought I'd try something serene... like a gnarled up old tree... but then out of the gnarls on the bark and the branches emerged the silhouette of a woman, dying/dead - but part of the tree... Maybe it depicts autumn, maybe it is my mind's subconscious comment on the kind of relationship we've developed with nature. We're killing nature, and at the same time we are slowly dying?

Maybe it was another self portrait. But it's strange, this relationship I have with fictional writing and drawing... it's almost always very very dark. I can't draw a happy picture any more than I can write a happy story. I wonder why?
fon @ 7:57 PM link to post * *


I had this strange sensation last night that things weren't really where i wanted them to be...

I don't know if it was a fleeting feeling, or whether it's going to grow...

So I took a long walk home at 2 a.m. (it took about an hour because i managed to get lost, as i always do)...

and I woke up this morning feeling like my achilles heel is my need to jump without thinking where i'm going to land.

But then, that's also often a strength... the positive construction of that is that i'm very on the ball and respond quickly.

However, this morning it was definitely a feeling like i'm tripping over myself... that i'm not really sure whether i would have embarked on this journey two years ago if i'd had the foreknowledge that it would be like this right now.

I hope this feeling is only a fleeting moment... but it feels as though it's been lingering around, waiting to surface... now that it's surfaced, i can only hope it'll become a beached whale.
fon @ 9:34 AM link to post * *