5 hours ago, captpkapoor said:

While this may be true of a lot of (even educated) Thais, in my almost 50 years of work in various countries as well as working alongside various nationalities, I can honestly say that I've come across many Western (even educated !) people with very poor knowledge of international geography, history, cultures, languages and origins. The average newspaper is full of extremely local news, with barely a page devoted to international news - and that's for those who even bother to read a paper. 

Nowadays you do not need newspapers any more to be informed.

 

14 hours ago, AlfonsV said:

Nowadays you do not need newspapers any more to be informed.

 

Even more confusion without proper newspapers and fewer tv channels. 

I do agree that mainstream media can and often does reflect the views of the owner (read large industrial house/ media company/ host country), by reading a diverse and eclectic mix, one does get a better idea of the world at large. There are a lot of op-ed pages in good newspapers and their online websites. For example, The Economist. 

Anyway: my point was not so much about whether reading newspapers is good or not. I'm just saying that a lot of educated Westerners ALSO have not been educated sufficiently about the history, geography, cultures, languages, origins etc etc of the world.  

On 6/11/2023 at 1:41 AM, BritManToo said:

Back to the OP,

The same applies to history.

History is just part of it and one that I have indentified through various conversations.  The problem will I'm sure, apply to education in general.

On 6/10/2023 at 9:50 AM, LittleBear57 said:

When teaching it was amazing how many times the kids didn't show for a lesson. Asking why reasons were, Gone to Temple. Not finished scouting lesson. Have to visit nurse. Not back from swimming lesson. This was the whole class.

We used to have a similar problem, mainly hungover farang teaches to turning up to work Monday morning. Interestingly, never had this problem with the non-native speakers. Our kids are almost always in class. 

On 6/10/2023 at 3:09 AM, mikesil said:

I'm an MIT graduate and spent 50 years working in electronics and computers.  My wife and kids think I'm not smart enough to be the village idiot.  They set out one day to buy a computer --- spent a huge amount on an old, outdated, used computer.  About a year later, when the shortcomings were obvious even to them, they bought another one, this time new.  Then the new one had to go back for various fixes and upgrades, none of which really worked.  I was informed the other day, that it's time for a new computer.

 

Any suggestion that I be consulted before the purchase is always met with the universal response:  "you just don't understand Thailand".

 

I guess I don't.

 

Reminds me of the Thail girlfriend in England whom I bought a car for.  She was working in a restaurant, living away when I visited her.

Car brakes were metal against metal and barely stopped, yet she was determined to go down the motorway to work each day as car still "worked".

I had to take the keys and carefully drive it 50 meters to a brake place, I was very embarressed presenting the car in that state.

On 6/10/2023 at 2:12 PM, sabai-dee-man said:

When my wife first moved to the UK in the early 2000s, she discovered The History Channel. Not only was she glued to it, but very often I'd see her crying when it came to event regarding Burma and Thailand. She went on to run a local ex-armed forces social club, and became engrossed in western history, particularly WWII as my grandad was a D-Day veteran, and most of the club members were ex-WWII RAF. They're not all dumbarses... sometimes they just need to be shown the way.

 

Reminds me of a Thai girl I knew who was a solicitor in UK.  Came from a Hi-So family in Bangkok.

She was interested in world event and kept up with the news.  She got quite angry at Thais in general with their lack of desire to know anything outside of Thailand and embarressed by this too.

Most of the responses here are spot-on. I don't think there's any point in trying to identify the many root causes of ignorance, arrogance or the blasé approach to wisdom, knowledge, logic and the poor communication skills that Thais accept. They are raised to be like that. Nothing that you nor I might do will change that.

Young Thais don’t know who the Beatles  are or the Rolling Stones are believe it or not