OPINION

It's love, actually

Re: "PM backs senators' picks", (BP, Feb 23). In addressing the understandable concerns of his political opponents, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha asks of the senators to be hand-picked by the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO): "Don't they love the country? Everyone loves the nation. The love of the country and democracy shouldn't be monopolised only by parties and politicians."

Although he answers his own rhetorical question, that answer should not be dismissed as disingenuous.

Surely the PM and those who support him do in fact love their nation, as do all other Thais, however dissenting in their opinions, and as do the many non-Thais who choose to make Thailand their home.

But there is more than one type of love. There is the healthy love of a husband or father who respects his beloved partner or mature child as an independent person with their own aspirations, strengths, and goals, including the ability to decide for themselves how best to live their own life.

Sensible parents and spouses enable their partners and adult children to be free, supporting them in their endeavours, even when their chosen course might be contrary to their wishes.

Then there is the sort of love, no less real, that is the pathological love that leads to stalking, to obsessive control of the beloved object, and even kidnapping and coercion.

The proof of the type of love which the senators have for the Thai nation will be evident when they vote for the next prime minister of Thailand.

Will they prove themselves healthy lovers supporting the liberty and self-determination of their beloved, or will they prove themselves inclined towards the pathology of the obsessive that keeps the beloved fed on mind-numbing drugs, locked in isolation, and restrained in a straightjacket lest their overtures not be obediently reciprocated as demanded?

It seems to me that Gen Prayut fails to comprehend that politics is all about perception. Senators will be selected by the military and if Gen Prayut becomes the PM, the possibility is that the voting public will feel that the military is still in charge and the new Thai "democracy" is nothing more than just smoke and mirrors.

A few days ago my only grandson, who is a fourth grader, related what he had learned from school when the teacher said to the class:

"On any day you wake up and you are able to see Doi Suthep clearly, it means that day's weather is very good; but if on any given day you can't see the mountain distinctly, or not at all, that's bad weather: Wear your masks, my children".

Indeed, that's the very method we, the people of Chiang Mai, use each morning to decide the state of the day's weather.

Tourists and visitors are warmly invited to use the same methodology whenever they come into town. It's free of charge.

Re: "Mother, daughter killed in train-car crash", (BP, Feb 23).

More deaths by vehicular collision with an SRT train. What is it with drivers that they cannot stop prior to an unguarded rail crossing to look before proceeding to cross the tracks.

SRT trains have loud horns which they blow almost continuously as they approach both guarded and unguarded crossings.

Unless a person has windows closed, air conditioning on max speed, or a radio playing, there is no reason why one cannot hear or see an oncoming train.

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