Last week, there was a controversial Facebook post circulating about a tragedy that has been deliberately silenced. The post was dedicated to the campaigning relative of a female college student who died of abuse a few years ago whilst training at a military camp. It was merely written by a journalist, who had been conscripted, on his personal Facebook page. However, due to the struggle of the woman fighting for justice, coupled with the journalist's first-hand experience of unfair treatment in the army, the post racked up more than 100,000 Likes in a short period of time.
Public attention to the issue also came in the wake of an earlier movement by various groups of netizens who had been clamouring through online petitions for conscription to be superseded by voluntary military service. They reason that conscription is just an extravagance while the country is not at war, and is against human rights. This is true, especially in Thailand, which is no stranger to infamous ordeals in army camps on a regular basis. Some incidents are worse than others, in particular the aforementioned case.
While we are not sure if it's possible for military mentors to treat the conscripted better, we are sure that with no conscription, everyone is given a choice of not having to be part of the military.
We are realistic enough to know that it is a pipe dream for conscription to be phased out, although we have been more than eager to talk about the issue and discuss alternative ways for the country to recruit the soldiers it needs. Of course, there are countries that still adopt conscription but it's at least legitimate and understandable for some of them to do so, such as South Korea. But given the current state of Thailand, where menacing threats arise from inside the country, solutions to fix them should focus more on quality than quantity.
I think the people who are in favour of abolishing conscription have a point when they say that Thailand doesn't need it.
But as some of us rather optimistically wait for change to happen, it seems like our hopes have been dampened after hearing of another even more troubling development.
We felt hopeless when we learnt that the National Legislative Assembly recently passed the Armed Forces Reserve Act, a new bill that makes it possible for Thai men, who have finished or been exempted from military service, to be re-enlisted.
The Armed Forces Reserve Act aims at calling up military reservists who have gone through conscription, reserve officer training corps students (those who took a course in high school so they didn't need to be conscripted later), and even those who were once lucky enough to draw black cards and so were exempt from training.
This means 4.5% a year out of the total of 12 million reservists could be called up. In other words, every Thai man should brace himself. This could very well mean that no matter wherever in the world you are, you may be asked to drop everything because your country needs you to hold weapons instead.
There are people who support this bill.
They are the same people who support conscription and are never tired of saying that it's unpatriotic if a Thai does not want to serve his nation by holding guns.
May I kindly suggest that such people should not only show their support by voicing their opinions, but also sign up themselves.
After the government's shelved idea to buy a new submarine, the constant purchase of the most high-tech weapons on the market, and the recent bill, I wish I knew what it was that caused the military to shift focus from reform and "returning happiness to people" to having a sabre-rattling war obsession.
But I'm not here to ask because I know I'm not going to get an answer.
Call me unpatriotic if you want, but do you seriously think Thailand could win a war if such an eventuality ever happened to occur?
Duangphat Sitthipat is a feature writer of the Life section of the Bangkok Post.