Richard Barrow in Thailand 

 

@RichardBarrow

·

7m

 

The #COVID19 virus doesn’t care about your race & ethnicity, so why do some Thai banks continue to treat foreign customers differently? Additionally, with the lockdown of the borders, it’s certain to say that we have all been here longer than 14 days. So, why the discrimination.

 

Ian Beardsworth

 

@IanBeardsworth

 

Went to pay my KTC credit card at the main branch at Ploenchit this afternoon. Wasn't allowed to use the 2nd floor entrance and had to go and in through the 1st floor. Granted it only took a minute longer but was irritating to see "non-Farangs" being able to walk in.

 

Vote with your feet. Close all your accounts and terminate any business you have with this mob. Tell them why you're leaving too, don't leave them guessing.

How can we ever expect things to change here if we just accept and swallow this sh!t?

Does it really matter, I don't view this as discrimination, they are not to know if you live here or are stuck here and are just being cautious, which is their right.

16 minutes ago, JWRC said:

Does it really matter, I don't view this as discrimination, they are not to know if you live here or are stuck here and are just being cautious, which is their right.

 

Does it matter if you live there or stuck there ?? 

It's blatant discrimination if the locals are not being screened also.

Who cares? Does it really bother anyone that much? Oh no they made me use another entrance, i feel so hurt!!! ????

14 minutes ago, smutcakes said:

Who cares? Does it really bother anyone that much? Oh no they made me use another entrance, i feel so hurt!!! ????

If you accompanied a Thai person to that bank and he/she was directed to enter by the 2nd floor and you were told to go to the 1st floor, would that not bother you a little?

If the answer was no, I wouldn't believe you.

That's outrageous! 

No "foreigners" have been allowed into Thailand for a very long time already.

Well past any quarantine requirements. 

A very ignorant and offensive policy. 

I think screening everyone would be OK but not this. 

I had a similar experience at a grocery store a while back before masks were required everywhere. 

I tried to enter without a mask and a staff member ran out horrified but did thankfully offer me a free mask. 

OK. 

He then said amusingly that I should wear that mask every time in the store. Not a cloth mask that you can clean numerous times so that would have been very hygienic. 

So I go in and they're letting Asian people in without masks. 

Who knows if they were all Thai or not? 

I get the mask requirement now and support it but that kind of discrimination is so stupid. 

The people doing it obviously have no clue just how stupid. 

38 minutes ago, smutcakes said:

Who cares? Does it really bother anyone that much? Oh no they made me use another entrance, i feel so hurt!!! ????

no big deal

That is a picture of one sign in English language.

And maybe there is another sign in Thai. 

Sometime there is a big difference between the truth and the whole truth. And one picture alone does not show the whole situation.

 

That is an excellent example of possibly showing only part of the truth.

 

KTC/KTB is the worst. State owned, off course.

1 hour ago, anchadian said:

If you accompanied a Thai person to that bank and he/she was directed to enter by the 2nd floor and you were told to go to the 1st floor, would that not bother you a little?

If the answer was no, I wouldn't believe you.

The Thai I was with would probably accompany me to the 1st floor where both of us would enter together.  It's such small stuff.

Doesn't appear to be discrimination at Kasikorn or BB in Chiang Rai.

Perhaps Ploenchit thinks Thais need more exercise than farangs.

they were following Anutin's comments about the "dirty foreigners"

By definition this is discrimination.

 

Will it lead to other forms of discrimination? Only time would tell.

 

Is it something to be upset about? That's very much a personal matter and can't necessarily be judged by others.

 

I would put it down to ignorance and a failure to recognise how such action can be perceived by others.

6 hours ago, anchadian said:

but was irritating to see "non-Farangs" being able to walk in.

I assume there were no Africans, Arabs, Chinese, South Koreans, Japanese etc

14 hours ago, JWRC said:

Does it really matter, I don't view this as discrimination, they are not to know if you live here or are stuck here and are just being cautious, which is their right.

You have to be kidding me.  What country do you come from?  Or are you Thai. 
Any Western country in the world would excoriate the banks as racists and the incident would be plastered all over the front pages of news media. 
Imagine if you are capable.  Imagine a Thai person in the US entering a Bank of America and being told that "Thai people need pass though the special bank entrance" to get screened for Covid before being allowed to enter, but all non-Thais could enter though any bank entrance.  How would that fly?  It wouldn't.  It's allowed here because this is a racist country, with racist ideology starting at the top and filtering all the way thought Thai society and culture. 

Op, it sucks but fear that type of thing, along with standoffishness in general, will be the norm for (white western) foreigners. Don't forget, you're dealing with a very simple, impressionable and oft xenophobic - though delightful all the same - folk . Best try to get used to it and just let it slide or it'll do your head in. 

7 minutes ago, daveAustin said:

Op, it sucks but fear that type of thing, along with standoffishness in general, will be the norm for (white western) foreigners. Don't forget, you're dealing with a very simple, impressionable and oft xenophobic - though delightful all the same - folk . Best try to get used to it and just let it slide or it'll do your head in. 

I grew up in the US when racial discrimination was all very legal in many states.  I also grew up in a family that considered discrimination to be an offensive act of hate.

So daveAustin, you'd agree if I said that US Southerners were very simple, impressionable and oft racist - though delightful all the same - folk.  And in the pre-Civil Rights era it was best to try to get used to it and just let it slide?

There ain't no difference.  At all.  The institutional racism in the US was ugly and offensive.  The institutional racism in Thailand is ugly and offensive.  I can't fathom how people become apologists for racial discrimination.  It's a hateful, ugly practice that has no place in a country that cares at all about respect for human rights and human beings.
White entrance / Colored entrance
Foreigner entrance / Thai entrance

There is no difference in the racism that is the underlying catalyst for creating discriminatory policies such as these.  The policies are based of fear, loathing, and hate. 

If this had happened last year, then you would have a point. It is happening now. You need a hobby.

20 hours ago, anchadian said:

If you accompanied a Thai person to that bank and he/she was directed to enter by the 2nd floor and you were told to go to the 1st floor, would that not bother you a little?

If the answer was no, I wouldn't believe you.

 I could not give a flying <deleted>. I really could not. If people want to be bigoted, racist, up to them...having to use a different entrance by walking up or down some steps really is nothing.

7 hours ago, connda said:

I grew up in the US when racial discrimination was all very legal in many states.  I also grew up in a family that considered discrimination to be an offensive act of hate.

So daveAustin, you'd agree if I said that US Southerners were very simple, impressionable and oft racist - though delightful all the same - folk.  And in the pre-Civil Rights era it was best to try to get used to it and just let it slide?

There ain't no difference.  At all.  The institutional racism in the US was ugly and offensive.  The institutional racism in Thailand is ugly and offensive.  I can't fathom how people become apologists for racial discrimination.  It's a hateful, ugly practice that has no place in a country that cares at all about respect for human rights and human beings.
White entrance / Colored entrance
Foreigner entrance / Thai entrance

There is no difference in the racism that is the underlying catalyst for creating discriminatory policies such as these.  The policies are based of fear, loathing, and hate. 

There is one big difference.  African Americans in the USA had been there as long or longer than their fellow-citizens of European heritage.  In Thailand, it is "foreign nationals" being targeted. 

 

That is not to dismiss Thai nationalism, which is very real - but is also their primary defense against being overrun and controlled by foreign-powers.  Sadly, the Chinese are buying off enough of the higher-ups to achieve the colonialism Thailand avoided for so long. 

 

As well, the moneyed elite seems to be actively-working to suppress the rise of a larger middle-class, deflection from which can be achieved by attacking "the foreigners  - just as attacking the "coloreds" with segregation worked to that end in the USA 50 years ago.

21 hours ago, johng said:

What colours do they have? Alpine blue, Burgundy, Flamingo pink?

2 minutes ago, bluesofa said:

Flamingo pink?

I've seen a few lobster coloured "dirty farangs"  around Pattaya/Jomtien.

Love to know how we all react to the first bus load of Chinese that are encountered behaving in the same fashion they did previously! Is that going to be called discrimination ,self preservation or payback?

On 4/28/2020 at 10:34 AM, JWRC said:

Does it really matter, I don't view this as discrimination, they are not to know if you live here or are stuck here and are just being cautious, which is their right.

Do they know if the locals have been working abroad or not?

13 minutes ago, johng said:

I've seen a few lobster coloured "dirty farangs"  around Pattaya/Jomtien.

That must be at the free buffet?

Ah, the soft bigotry of low expectations!

 

"These poor locals don't have the intelligence or mental wherewithall to realize that not all foreigners are white, nor are any foreigners any greater risk than Thais!"  so it is OK for them to be ignorant. 

It's one of the annoying traits you experiencing living here.  But the good things outweigh the bad!

22 hours ago, Jingthing said:

I tried to enter without a mask and a staff member ran out horrified but did thankfully offer me a free mask.

You did better than a young, hi so looking Thai lady at the Talad Lotus out here in Issan. She was refused entry and had to pay for the mask.