BangkokReady

This whole topic is highly subjective, so what is morally right to one person is not to another. We could say that morals are linked to religion, or we might suppose that religion is informed by morals, or that each evolved and shaped each other over time. (It's fairly clear that a lot of religion is about trying to make people live a good life and treat each other with some level of respect and kindness.) We could also suggest that as people moved from living in tribes and solving their problems by smashing each others heads in, it was only natural that some sort of laws or rules of how we should treat each other to get along and survive and prosper as a community. (And, of course, religion, laws and morals are fairly intertwined, with religion and law only relatively recently being separated in the West.) There is of course the "golden rule", do unto others as you would have done unto you. I think most people, even the immoral ones, know there are ways that they would like themselves to be treated and it seems that even without religion, there's a chance that people would come to the conclusion "if I don't want X to happen to me then perhaps I shouldn't do X to anyone else". I suppose the problem here is that "immoral people" would simply ensure that no one found out about them doing X, hence religion has the element of "God is watching you all the time".

Based on what is reported on this forum, I sometimes wonder if we're in the wrong country to hope to expect this.

This is one of the most annoying things about cultures obsessed with "face", the fact that the reality doesn't matter, only what people think matters. So people can be broke as long as they can pretend they are rich, or can be absolute scumbags as long as they can pretend to be good. The thing is, this pretence actually leads to a lower quality of life for everyone involved. The whole "I should do something that is bad for me so that people will think something good about me" is maddening.

Why does it sound like the writer is experiencing some joy or amusement at the fact that this guy is the victim of a crime?

This helps to illustrate my point above. I won't give my opinion, but there are three "metrics" here that different people would probably make different judgements about your level of "quality", financial success, physical appearance and, I guess, cultural habits (not exactly sure what to classify that as). What about morals? Are you trustworthy? Would you help someone without being asked to do so? Do you have empathy for those worse off than you? Would you cheat on your wife or have sex with another mans wife, or try to?

Interesting idea to think about. Obviously it depends on what each individual person values or considers high quality. I can think of ways that I am high quality and ways that I am not. I can think of people who would value my facets that I consider to be high quality, and I can think of people that would ignore them and think that other features (or lack thereof) would make me low quality. It seems likely that a man looking for a reliable and trustworthy friend to have an interesting conversation with might find a certain man to be high quality, while a woman who is looking for a high status guy who can provide a certain level of material wealth might find a guy who is kind, intelligent, humble and honest to be a low quality guy if his wallet is empty. At the end of the day, it is pretty hard to change once you get to a certain point in life. It's probably best to not compare yourself to others, but try and be "the best you you can be" and "compare yourself to who you were yesterday not what someone else is today". A little cliched, but they sound good to me. ????‍♂️

The problem is that drinking and driving is completely acceptable behaviour in Thailand. Even if they made it unacceptable behaviour, unacceptable behaviour is tolerated the majority of the time and the idea of proper law enforcement or consequences for doing something illegal/immoral isn't really a thing. Like with most issue legal in Thailand, it would take a complete change in attitudes across the whole population. I'm not sure this is even possible without a grass roots change where the future generations are educated differently and the "mai bpen rai" attitude is adjusted or removed.

Disgusting. Did anything come of the teachers that gang raped student(s) in the school in Mukdahan? The one where they then threatened the family and some of the other teachers defended them for doing it?

Or what is described in the article?

And that's 70% of people have had two doses of a vaccine so far. With Sinovac and the need for boosters, it is unlikely that the number of people protected against the current or future variants is anywhere near 70%.

Nah, people want to get back to normal as quickly as possible. Most people hate working remotely and want to get back to the office. It just works better for everyone. Also, hardly anyone really cares about sustainability or eco-blah-blah enough to actually change anything about their holidays. Even the advent of the internet, which has changed so much about our lives, holidays have remained relatively unchanged. Go somewhere nice, relax, eat, drink, do fun things. All that has changed is that people can organise their holidays more easily and share it on social media. Filler article.

How many breasts do Thai women have? ????

They don't care and felt no need to do anything about it. Now that an organisation has got involved, they feel the have to do something.

They probably meant it was like being burnt alive (to death), but remaining alive.

A very racist person.. ⬆️

Nah, it's a bigger issue than consonant clusters, i.e. ending/final sounds.

Apparently so. So my mistake in terms of labelling the example, but the issue being described was final sounds rather than specifically consonant clusters. Thais have different problems with consonant clusters at the beginning of words than they do as the final sounds in syllables.

Yes. I appreciate the correction.

You're confusing an example with being a complete account of the problem. (Possibly in haste to get to correct someone.) Thais also have a problem with sounds like "t", "p", "d" and "s" at the end of words. It's a final sound problem, as I said. I don't know the exact term for it. Maybe closed or unaspirated consonants. Basically most Thai syllables end in a kind of closed or muted way, so they have difficulty with the way English syllables end because we don't "close" them off or "silence" them in the same way as they do in Thai.

While Thais do have a problem with consonant clusters, that isn't what is being discussed in the comment you are replying to. It's simply syllable/word ending/final sounds and their correct pronunciation. Consonant clusters are sounds like "bl" "br", etc., where two consonants combine to make a different sound. What the user you are replying to is talking about is where a Thai attempts to pronounce a word like "six", but pronounces it as "sic", due to the different pronunciation of ending/final sounds in Thai.

Large crowds in Asia are nothing like large crowds in a Western country, in my opinion. You may have experienced this in BKK. Compared to somewhere like London, they are just far easier to deal with. Less annoying, less shouty, less "f you, me first", and so on. I don't think it's fair to say you need to get used to crowds in your home country in order to be ready for crowds in Asia. I realise that when things go south they can do so a lot quicker and with more dire consequences than you might expect back home (if the news is to be believed), but the average day-to-day thing is way calmer and less aggravating. You're also right to avoid places with drunken tourists. I hate that back home and have no desire to visit it in Thailand.

They can be quite acidic. Also some can be soaked in some weird juice. I went through phases of eating them regularly, and other fruits, but sometimes I would buy some and then leave them to rot and throw them out. My food purchasing varies with my mood, as it often involves going to food vendors. Also, I'm kind of absent minded sometimes and go through phases of visiting different areas. Covid has made my interactions with locals slightly tainted, so I choose to go to places that I feel the most comfortable. This means sometimes no fruit.

Are you talking about pineapples or women here?

It's genetic and due to the climate. Why have the ability to easily pile on the pounds if you don't need to? You should search about genetic differences between races and their causes. The "race is only skin deep" is a lie. There are biological differences between races. (I'm saying nothing about intelligence.)

Che Guevara is a cultural icon for many in the West (on t-shirts and posters all the time) and they don't really know what Mao did or who the Khmer Rouge and Pol Pot were. I wonder why Hitler always comes up on his dates though... "Wow. What's taking the waiter so long?" "I know, ri..." "So what do you think about Hitler?"