Besides sleeping pills, we need a daily dose of fantasy to make life tolerable. A fantasy that we could bankrupt the US by boycotting American products after the cocky imperialist has branded us a hotbed of human trafficking (Starbucks and McDonald’s for starters, but excluding Facebook because that would be masochistic).
A fantasy that former politician, monk and marathon walker Suthep Thaugsuban would apply the same moral outrage against the current regime as he did the previous one, say, on the issue of blanket amnesty and parliamentary dictatorship. A fantasy that reform could be done while people are being told to shut up, while villagers saw tanks and troops at public hearing forums.
A fantasy that the dormant Pheu Thai politicians would not come close to relinquishing their dignity, given that their top-ranking Somchai Wongsawat was photographed topless and being anointed by a red-robed guru monk to ward off “a nightmare”. Green monsters chomping you up?
Let’s start with the American boycott. For Ayatollah’s sake, even the US is on the verge of lifting the sanction on Iran — the world has moved on — and some Thai patriots, in some pathetic corners of their fervour to support the military without question, are still dreaming of spanking Obama.
The fantasy that our small nation could undermine the US economy is yet another symptom of our surreal perception of how the world works. Even if through some cosmic miracle we could rattle the American foundation, say, by stopping eating cheeseburgers or buying 140-baht frappe-oliang for a few months, those who would get laid off first are the Thai employees of those businesses. In the 21st century, their interest is always ours, while ours isn’t necessarily theirs. Regardless of the American hypocrisy, our deranged fantasy of Thai exceptionalism only makes things worse.
No one doubts that Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha and his men are working hard to solve the human trafficking scandal. But the signal sent out to the world is fuzzy: You try hard to catch the traffickers, you uncovered mass graves, you arrested people connected with the evil — but still you have an ongoing court case against two Phuket journalists who covered the alleged involvement of military officials in the trafficking rings. You also ship off the Uighurs to China in a clumsy manner, and you don’t exactly treat your own people who dare ask questions very well. No one doubts that the US parking us in Tier 3 humiliation is partly political. In that case, well, solve it politically, starting by making clear that our commitment to electoral democracy is a tangible reality and not just another fantasy.
But now that the ex-Democrat, ex-Moses Suthep Thaugsuban has left the temple, the memory of his poll-smashing vanguard (acquitted of all charges) returns with the clarity of Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible 5. From protest leader, now he’s naturally a cheerleader, tagged along by pom-pom boys and girls at Thursday’s press conference announcing Muan Maha Prachachon for Reforms Foundation (The Great Mass of People, yeah). Mr Suthep wants to see the military government accomplish its reform plans before elections are held, no matter how long it takes. We assume that he wishes it would take 10, 50 or 100 years, to be safe that dirty politicians have no chance of sneaking back, and that all the projects he once vehemently opposed — the expensive high-speed trains, the arbitrary transfers of civil servants, the appointment of family members into power positions — would be realised without any street mobs stopping them.
“We will not storm anyone’s offices,” he said, as if storming offices was the most natural thing in the world. He stresses, for the thousandth time, his goal to see “reform before election” — but this time it sounds woefully redundant: Mr Suthep and his “people” have already achieved that goal when the military came out 14 months ago. In other words, they have won, and the goal now is to keep that victory alive by letting the military regime lurch along, shakily but uncontestably. To do that, he only needs the pom-pom girls, and not the poll-smashing vanguards who brought us here.
Mr Suthep also said that he would respect the legitimacy of the post-coup law by not staging rallies. He will also send a representative to talk to foreign countries that misunderstand Thailand. No boycotting of American goods, luckily, and no concern about the amnesty bill of the interim constitution. An ex-monk but a current Rasputin, Mr Suthep’s assignment now is to keep reality at bay and fantasy running at full steam.
Kong Rithdee is deputy editor, Life, Bangkok Post