<b>Note to Readers:</b>
The article below was written on Friday, just hours before Thai PBS banned the broadcast of the last episode of the five-part series "Thai Monarchy Under the Constitution", a talk programme hosted by Pinyo Traisuriyathamma.
While parts of the content in the commentary remain valid, a large chunk of it now sounds wrong and naive, especially my assertion of faith, now proved false, in the future of our public television. The censorship was a great disappointment, a heartbreak even.
It invalidates the contribution that the show had made during its first four episodes, because by banning it, the station has sent out clear signals that sane, reasonable and open discussion on "sensitive" subjects cannot be allowed. It discourages any further attempt by journalists and writers to continue in the direction that the show has already started. After all, there’s no light at the end of any tunnel, proverbial or real, because once again, we're kept like sewer rats in perpetual darkness. (The original article follows below)
It was as close to an ideological thriller as we've ever had on Thai television, and I hope, my hand on my heart, that it will go down in history as the beginning of the time we finally realised the necessity of open, sane, civilised, televised, aboveground discussion as a way to scrutinise the great knots of our conflicts. Heavy flak has already flown and vilifying contempt has been heard at work, which is not unexpected, but I believe the first hurdle has been crossed.
Over the past week on Thai PBS, a talk programme Tob Jote, hosted by Pinyo Traisuriyathamma, rolled out a five-night series titled "Thai Monarchy Under the Constitution". The four guests were five-star scholars and bureaucrats on the subject of the monarchy: Former foreign minister Surakiart Sathirathai; historian and academic Somsak Jeamteerasakul; self-announced "ultra-royalist" Pol Gen Vasit Dejkunjorn; and scholar/activist Sulak Sivaraksa. The latter two, especially, are known as sharp, outspoken intellectual firebrands with huge followers and nitpicker critics; they share a broad idea on the need to update the monarchical institution and the lese majeste law, though their lines of argument and rallying calls are different (sometimes starkly).
Lately, as we all have, they've relied on Mark Zuckerberg's invention to voice their reasons, quibbles, polemics, disagreements - to fight via the keyboard - but in the past week we've been reminded why prime-time TV can be far better than Facebook. The revolution will not be televised, as the song goes, and that's fine, as long as revolutionary discussion is.
Clearly the programme is pushing the envelope. And envelope-pushing is what we need when the same old blabbering inside our old, cobwebbed envelope isn't taking us anywhere. The highlights of the five-night series were on Thursday and Friday, when Mr Sulak and Mr Somsak sat next to each other debating, eyeing up and staring down, hands moving in a complex telegraphy of their thought. First they exchanged pleasantries and then punches, verbally wrangling, sometimes heated, sometimes cool, and altogether energising. What's most important, however, is the fact that they said many things we never thought we'd hear on television. Names - Chuan Leekpai, Thaksin Shinawatra, MR Sukhumbhand Paribatra and his ancestors, and privy councillors - were dropped and dissected, sometimes in volleys of criticism, and the mentions of the monarchy were as frank, or as evasive, as the law allows. Of course they both wish the law would allow more, that's the gist of it all.
In one startling stretch, Mr Sulak went on about Queen Victoria of England and how she really had no power to govern though she thought otherwise, then he described how the monarchical protocol is all "theatre". Mr Somsak, meanwhile, homed in on a crucial point: slapping the wild-card charge of lom jao, "overthrowing the monarchy," against anyone on the opposite side or anyone who wants to discuss the monarchy - as being an utter disgrace to the democratic system.
Proponents of each man have carried on the debate online. It's characteristically fierce, fun, mocking and partisan. But it's not the point which one of them emerged as the winner because we are the winner. We as the citizens, and we as journalists, who can now take comfort in the fact that some of the "sensitive" issues often talked about in murmurs, with hand covering mouth, or online, or totally underground, have made their way to national TV, in HD to boot. Television is known for accommodating emotion (think drama series) but in the right setting, it also encourages reason as a condition of being persuasive. It's official: this five-day talk has raised the bar on possible discussion about the monarchy.
And yet, swiftly the attack arrives. Royalists are annoyed and irate, to varying degrees, and some have put forth the weirdest logic I've ever heard: Why on earth has Thai PBS, a public station funded by public money, brought aboveground and legitimises the figures and topics they believe should remain underground (or buried in an unmarked grave, especially Mr Somsak)? As if the job of public television was to keep feeding propaganda. As if the job of public television is to fawn and flatter and let us hear only what conforms to what we think. Switch to commercial channels then. To raise questions in good faith and in the service of society is precisely what public television must do, and not refrain from doing. It's fine to disagree with - even to despise - Mr Sulak and Mr Somsak, but to try to stop them from speaking reasonably and intelligently is the mark of a backward and uncivilised society.
Thai PBS is not a flawless, but this time - and thanks to the programme host Pinyo - through them we've glimpsed a flicker of light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.
Kong Rithdee is Deputy Life Editor, Bangkok Post.