Bangkok Barry

I don't think the OP who is merely asking about the legality, or G Rex who says he regularly breaks the law, realise that, if he is involved in an accident and someone dies, even if the accident isn't his fault, he faces the rest of his life in a Thai jail. G Rex in particular isn't, like many Thais, capable of thinking past step 1. Extraordinary. At least the OP asked.

As you appear to be visually impaired I'll explain the photo, one that I took, to you. It is of around a dozen school kids sitting and standing in the bed of a pickup, some of them sitting on the side. What this means, what you describe as meaningless, is that if the driver has to brake suddenly or swerve, even if it is no fault of his own, then any of these kids could be thrown out and seriously injured or killed. A similar thing happened to my wife being transported from school and one kid was killed and another lost his legs. That was 50 years ago and still nothing has changed to prevent such accidents. There, I hope that explains it for you, and why the photo and content isn't meaningless. You aren't Thai are you, unable to see the significance and danger of the situation?

No-one actually cares if people die here. The police don't care, the school in this case doesn't care, the driver doesn't care, the parents don't care, the kids don't care. Why should we? Their country, their culture, their lives.

Are you really that stupid? Really? You aren't driving a van. You are driving a pickup from which people can be and often are thrown out because either the driver or another on the road does something stupid. How long have you been in Thailand to not care if you risk lives or not? Of course they're happy as they are too stupid to know their life is at risk. Shouldn't you know better? Jeez!

Two years in a row I arrived at LAX and a computer malfunction meant I wait in line for two hours. The first time, the IO asked how long I'd been waiting and I said two hours and I wasn't coming back, and he said 'I hear you'. I did come back though, and the next time I told the IO I'd missed my connecting flight and he told me it didn't matter. And I didn't go back. Especially after an x-ray machine thought silver paper on some mints was a security threat. If their security couldn't tell the difference between paper and explosives ......

So after he was banned, helped by unelected senators, from being PM due to a trumped up charge, the real courts declare him innocent after all. Too late though, isn't it. Those with the real power got rid of him until the next time. Add to that the fake accusation of him wanting to abolish the monarchy. What a wonderful country Thailand is. You get the government a few powerful people say you will, like Russia or China or North Korea.

Probably, as his plan wasn't to overthrow. Nothing close. Maybe they need to look up 'amend' in a dictionary.

Can anyone explain the point of the US primaries when the person the Republicans look like choosing will be in jail at election time. What happens then? Of course, there is no law that says he can't conduct business as President from a jail cell. It would be interesting then to see foreign dignitaries visit him in jail instead of the White House. They might not get the banquet food they'd normally expect though.

Try reading the link and you might get it. Bee said she asked for her money before leaving but the man refused to pay and asked her to wait until the morning.

You appear to be confused. Read the opening sentence again.

It would be much more useful if there were no emojis at all and people used words instead to communicate their reaction to a post. You know, communicate like an educated adult.

Associated with this, I've become annoyed at times when I've been dealing with something at hotel reception and the phone goes and they drop what they are doing with me and deal with the phone call as a priority and just leave me standing there. I usually ask why dealing with the call was more important than dealing with me, and of course they have no answer.

Or a gold chain in Pattaya?

This is a forum about Thailand, but since you ask I'm from the UK, where most street crime is restricted to gangs from one ethnic group killing each other. And that rarely happens at 3am or with kids as young as 13 or 14. They also often have knowledge of their 'victims' and aren't out to rob total strangers. On the subject of parental responsibility, I don't think you'd find many young teens in illegal nightclubs at 3 or 4am in the UK either. There, parents parent. It's hardly a secret that Thais do not like to discipline their kids. Especially boys, who then grow up feeling entitled to do as they like as that's all they've ever known.

In my country young kids do not roam the streets at 3am with knives and guns looking for people to rob. Maybe one or two, but we read of it often here. So no, they don't do in my country. To say it is so is complete BS!!

And how big a percentage of the population are bargirls? And if parents have to travel for work, in most countries they take their kids with them. They wouldn't dream of doing anything else. It's just another example of Thais never taking responsibility for anything. The reason Thais have kids isn't to raise them, but to use them as an insurance policy so those kids take care of them when they get old. They don't have kids to be parents of them in the western sense. And being a proper parent, being there every minute for them, raising them with proper values, is pretty important in our culture. Not in Thai culture. Just dump them with grandparents who can barely take care of themselves, let alone raise boisterous kids.

I assume, then, that you are fine with kids being able to commit crimes with impunity. Including murder, as has happened recently.

The parents are entirely to blame, for not being parents. Proper parents raise their kids, they don't pass them on to others. Some might, might do what you say and actually visit their kid now and then, but bring a parent is not a part-time job.

50/50 they aren't being raised by parents but by grandparents, who are only doing so out of a sense of duty as the parents are elsewhere and can't be bothered. It's the culture here. And when I was in my teens I was never, ever allowed to be out roaming the streets at 3am. It just didn't happen. But then, I wasn't raised in a country where kids do whatever they want and are never disciplined. As for age of criminal responsibility, what nonsense is that? If they commit a crime then they are criminals and should face the consequences, no matter what age they are. What has age got to do with it? The thugs simply exploit it and know they are untouchable.

Maybe not enough people bought them to make stocking certain beers worthwhile?

The rest of the world doesn't give a rat's fart about Thailand. What happens in Thailand only matters to those within its borders. Now, if the world did what you say to China that's a different thing. But that won't happen either. Money is king.

All you say is true. But what long-term effect did it ultimately have? None, or we wouldn't behaving this conversation.

Just part of Thai culture, surprising no-one at all.

Unfortunately, being in uproar has never had any positive outcome. Nothing happens apart from the government using the army to attack Thais, and then it all fades away with nothing at all achieved, except to give people jobs rebuilding damaged or destroyed infrastructure. And so that is why they weren't in uproar over the stolen election. People know that, at the end of the day, they are completely powerless and nothing they do will make any difference.

I'm not sure the tourists who witnessed it were 'shocked' as the headline claims. If they've done their research before coming to Thailand they probably expected it. Especially in Phuket.