From: godfrey@vxdesy.desy.de
Subject: Re: The Good Woman of Bangkok
Organization: (DESY, Hamburg, Germany)
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 09:18:40 GMT

In article <1993Jan27.024609.21224@nuscc.nus.sg>, matmcinn@nuscc.nus.sg (brett mcinnes) writes:
> godfrey@vxdesy.desy.de writes:
> : 
> : Well, well, Khun Samart!  I'm not your favourite poster?  Could this
> : perhaps be because you have lost face over the cmu incident?  You left
> : it to the readers to say whether they thought your defence of cmu was
> : convincing and we had 3 against, none for, and a few emails to me saying
> : that your case was not convincing - total around 6 against, none for if you 
> : believe me about the email.  I've nothing against you, but I can't help feeling
> :  that you're not as willing to discuss certain aspects of Thailand as some of
> : your postings suggest.
> 									   
> And he claims he's not bitter about his adventures at cmu. And yet that
> subject somehow manages to insinuate itself into every theme.             
> We have not heard the cmu side of the story, and we can actually only
> speculate. My guess is that the following is an approximation to the
> truth. Khun Lawrence rubbed somebody the wrong way, an activity for which
> he has a real talent. That somebody decided to "fix" him. In every
> country,my dear Lawrence, there are people who dislike being insulted or
> slighted, and some of them are not above seeking revenge. That's probably
> all there is to it.							  
> Anyone with any experience of academic life, particularly in the UK and
> the US, knows that academe provides a refuge for a certain species of
> borderline paranoid who would find it difficult to find other employment.
> These people are marked out by a tendency to become furiously indignant at
> all real or imagined infringements of their "Rights" [ a favourite and
> diagnostic word]. Anyone who knows the Thais will know what they will
> think of such a one: they will regard him with utter contempt. Farangs of
> this type invariably end up having a hard time in Thailand. Usually, that
> is what they deserve.  							  
> : 
> : My point is that arguments about whether the bargirls or good or bad people etc.
> : are irrelevant, and trying to tackle the problem in isolation (if indeed,
> : it is recognised to be a problem) is simplistic.The high incidence of
> : prostitution arises from much more fundamental defects in Thai society,
> : social organisation, the economy, management of the police, licensing of
> : businesses etc.  Also they exist because a significant number of Thai people
> : want them to exist - those Thai men who use prostitutes (a very substantial
> : proportion), those who make money from the tourist sex industry, the police
> : chiefs who benefit from the trade, the hotels and other tourist-related
> : industries that depend on it etc.
> : 
> This is the most pretentious and vacuous statement about this matter that
> I have ever read. 

Indeed!  Perhaps you could have been a little more explicit and explained why?

By the way, you're quite wrong about cmu - and why do you think your guess,
knowing nothing at all about the situation, is likely to be of any valid
interest to anyone?

Laurence