Impressions on Violence in Thailand

[Lancelot]

Its been my observation that foreigners with low levels of Thai language skills are often unaware of violence happening within very close proximity to where they live.

I've posted this before, I was once listening to an expat telling me how low crime rates in Thailand are, he was totally unaware of a gang rape which had taken place only a few days earlier less than 200 meters from his front door.

When it comes to violent crimes in close knit communities, Thai people will often not discuss the crime, knowing full well who was the victim, who was the perpetrator and the close knit relationships between those who might overhear the discussion and the perp.

I agree. The Thais usually know what is going on in their neighborhoods- there is always some one watching. And then there are the web cams and cell phone videos on social media.

I'll probably be flamed for this but my personal belief is that when motivated, the Thai police are actually good at solving crimes because they have good criminal informants and links to the community.

[recycler]

I feel much safer here than a big city in America. If a Thai attacks you, it is usually for some reason. Back home, there are a considerable of lowlives that will do it for the "fun" of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liatWFj5COk

Your sense of safety in Thailand probably has a lot to do with perception. In your home country you very well know where to go an where not because you are able to see and hear the signs.

Many foreigners in Thailand are not in touch with Thai society as they are in their home country and miss the signs of danger.

I've experienced the same misplaced feeling of safety the first years living here, later when I learned the language and through my wife, her family and colleagues got much more in contact with society I also learned where the danger is and by now have a much better understanding of where the dangers are.

[thailiketoo]

City girls seem to find out early how to open doors with just a smile. City boys seem to find out how to spot danger early.

I found this to be true in a city or jungle. City boys seemed more aware or less trusting or the first one to sense a change in sounds or whatever.

[Ulysses G.]

I feel much safer here than a big city in America. If a Thai attacks you, it is usually for some reason. Back home, there are a considerable of lowlives that will do it for the "fun" of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liatWFj5COk

Your sense of safety in Thailand probably has a lot to do with perception. In your home country you very well know where to go an where not because you are able to see and hear the signs.

I have been here more than two decades. I speak Thai and I know where to go. My sense of relative safety is because I have seen a lot more people baited and attacked for no reason in my own country than here. Don't get me wrong, Thais can be violent, but it is almost always for a reason. Not so where I come from.

Edited December 20, 2013 by Ulysses G.

[Docno]

Violence is getting worse in many countries, but in Thailand it's worse than anywhere else I've seen.

Just a few examples:

- A Thai soap showing serious violence, a man beating a wife until her face is bleeding at 6.30 PM and many soaps revolving around violence.

- Cartoons for kids from Thailand, Korea and Japan full of violent characters.

- Thai Rath newspaper with the daily dose of people in pools of blood.

- Teenagers engaging in school battles using real or homemade guns resulting in countless shooting incidents in schools and on public transportation.

- Kids of 2 years old hitting and biting each other with the parents and older kids cheering.

- Grown ups exploding out off control over the smallest of incidents leading to serious violence involving knifes, swords and the ever present firearms.

And I can keep going on and on.

Growing wild due to lack of disciplining by parents, at schools and by the police and the legal system.

Violence is Thai culture!

You gotta be kidding me dude. Check out the video. Knock out game

Jon Stewart pretty demolishes the media hype around the so-called knock-out game:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-16-2013/meet-the-knockers

[thailiketoo]

Violence is getting worse in many countries, but in Thailand it's worse than anywhere else I've seen.

Just a few examples:

- A Thai soap showing serious violence, a man beating a wife until her face is bleeding at 6.30 PM and many soaps revolving around violence.

- Cartoons for kids from Thailand, Korea and Japan full of violent characters.

- Thai Rath newspaper with the daily dose of people in pools of blood.

- Teenagers engaging in school battles using real or homemade guns resulting in countless shooting incidents in schools and on public transportation.

- Kids of 2 years old hitting and biting each other with the parents and older kids cheering.

- Grown ups exploding out off control over the smallest of incidents leading to serious violence involving knifes, swords and the ever present firearms.

And I can keep going on and on.

Growing wild due to lack of disciplining by parents, at schools and by the police and the legal system.

Violence is Thai culture!

You gotta be kidding me dude. Check out the video. Knock out game

Jon Stewart pretty demolishes the media hype around the so-called knock-out game:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-16-2013/meet-the-knockers

You do know Jon Stewart is not a real news show? He's a comic and that report was satire he was making fun of police shows and news shows.

[Docno]

This is quite possibly a psychological phenomenon, the belief that things are worse now than they were in the past. Nobel prize winning scientist, Daniel Kahneman, calls it the 'availability heuristic': we estimate the frequency of something by how readily we can recall instances of it (and, of course, we recall more instances of murder and rape from this year than from 10 years back). The increase of CCTV cameras and media reporting also has an influence, as the OP suggested. Look, even in the US, gun crime is on the decline while over 50% of the public think it's getting worse (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/07/gun-crime-drops-but-americans-think-its-worse/2139421/). That's the factors I've mentioned at play...

(Now, I'm not claiming that violence in Thai society is decreasing, only that our perceptions are quite often wrong).

[Docno]

Violence is getting worse in many countries, but in Thailand it's worse than anywhere else I've seen.

Just a few examples:

- A Thai soap showing serious violence, a man beating a wife until her face is bleeding at 6.30 PM and many soaps revolving around violence.

- Cartoons for kids from Thailand, Korea and Japan full of violent characters.

- Thai Rath newspaper with the daily dose of people in pools of blood.

- Teenagers engaging in school battles using real or homemade guns resulting in countless shooting incidents in schools and on public transportation.

- Kids of 2 years old hitting and biting each other with the parents and older kids cheering.

- Grown ups exploding out off control over the smallest of incidents leading to serious violence involving knifes, swords and the ever present firearms.

And I can keep going on and on.

Growing wild due to lack of disciplining by parents, at schools and by the police and the legal system.

Violence is Thai culture!

You gotta be kidding me dude. Check out the video. Knock out game

Jon Stewart pretty demolishes the media hype around the so-called knock-out game:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-december-16-2013/meet-the-knockers

You do know Jon Stewart is not a real news show? He's a comic and that report was satire he was making fun of police shows and news shows.

Uhm, yeah, of course I know that. You do realise that satire is often used to make a point?

If you, don't here's what wikipedia has to say (for example): "Satire is a genre of literature, and sometimes graphic and performing arts, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, corporations, and society itself, into improvement.^[1] Although satire is usually meant to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit as a weapon and as a tool to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society."

Edited December 20, 2013 by Docno

[Timwin]

Thailand only has one megacity, when for example another developing country Brazil has 17 cities with population over one million or more. Smaller cities help a lot when it comes to crime solving. The local police pretty much knows the usual suspects in most cases.

[Dannyboy6]

i think a lot of the rubbish shown on Thai soaps makes people think that this is the norm and therefore acceptable.

Pistol whippings, shootings, kidnappings, cops on the take, drug deals, hi-so's in Mercedes above reproach, etc. etc. it's all there in the Thai soaps, impressionable youngsters seem to think it is cool to emulate their heros on tv, and i say that is the root of the problem.

. Thai Soaps and Video Games... Edited December 20, 2013 by Dannyboy6

[ultimate weapon]

It's really really odd that someone would be speaking about violence in thailand when it's the west that glamourizes it. Terminator 2 is a very old movie and it was standard violence for a hollywood movie. How about the rambo movies? All of these are old movies and what about the hip hop songs of today?

What about ppl like chief keef who claims his new album will increase the killing crime spree in his home town of chicago and then try to put a thai equivalent to it?

The violence in western movies is 100x worse and so is the crime in western countries just that these farangs are all blind to it just like how they themselves act when they are racist to thais but take no notice of it but when a thai slights him probably by looking at him wrongly he complains of racism to the skies.

[riceyummm]

This is quite possibly a psychological phenomenon, the belief that things are worse now than they were in the past. Nobel prize winning scientist, Daniel Kahneman, calls it the 'availability heuristic': we estimate the frequency of something by how readily we can recall instances of it (and, of course, we recall more instances of murder and rape from this year than from 10 years back). The increase of CCTV cameras and media reporting also has an influence, as the OP suggested. Look, even in the US, gun crime is on the decline while over 50% of the public think it's getting worse (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/07/gun-crime-drops-but-americans-think-its-worse/2139421/). That's the factors I've mentioned at play...

(Now, I'm not claiming that violence in Thai society is decreasing, only that our perceptions are quite often wrong).

I was thinking the same thing but you said it better than I could have.

You might be interested in reading "The Better Angels Of Our Nature" by Steven Pincker in which he uses records and statistics to prove that humans are today less likely to be victims of violence than ever in history.

By a VERY large factor at that. This is completely contrary to popular opinion.

[Ulysses G.]

Violence is getting worse in many countries, but in Thailand it's worse than anywhere else I've seen.

Just a few examples:

- A Thai soap showing serious violence, a man beating a wife until her face is bleeding at 6.30 PM and many soaps revolving around violence.

- Cartoons for kids from Thailand, Korea and Japan full of violent characters.

- Thai Rath newspaper with the daily dose of people in pools of blood.

- Teenagers engaging in school battles using real or homemade guns resulting in countless shooting incidents in schools and on public transportation.

- Kids of 2 years old hitting and biting each other with the parents and older kids cheering.

- Grown ups exploding out off control over the smallest of incidents leading to serious violence involving knifes, swords and the ever present firearms.

And I can keep going on and on.

Growing wild due to lack of disciplining by parents, at schools and by the police and the legal system.

Violence is Thai culture!

You gotta be kidding me dude. Check out the video. Knock out game

Jon Stewart pretty demolishes the media hype around the so-called knock-out game:

Jon Stewart purposely misses the point in the name of humor. Black youths are attacking people for no reason at all and have killed some of them. Who cares what they call it?

Thais might assault someone over money or for revenge, but not simply for the heck of it.

Edited December 20, 2013 by Ulysses G.

[LawrenceN]

i remember when you get the most dangerous countries to live in ratings. I think it was based on the number of murders per capita. I beleive that back in the 80s or 90s that the US and new York in particular was the most dangerious country and city to live in respetivly.

it did not mean then as it does not mean now that those people are more dangerous, just that more desperate people around, more skilled desepearte people around, more people around that can exploit locals behabviour nd make money from it at low risk to selves.

wrt the op I think the prevalence of video record on mobiles has a lot to do with this, the government feels if the plebs can record any goings on then they ought to be able to do the same thing to the plebs

Don't forget that a lot of that violence in the 80s and 90s was related to drug wars. Stay away from drugs and your chances improve. Don't mean to preach, just talking about your likelihood of being a crime victim.

[jackr]

Yep, more violent/brazen (everywhere is, the internet and movies hasn't helped), but of course things get much wider coverage nowadays too. What doesn't help here specifically is the Buddhism concept of rebirth, i.e. doesn't matter what one does or whether you die even as you'll get another bash anyway until you have one sound enough to be released into nirvana.

[kikoman]

In my experience as I live in a rural village where violence does not exist, I do go to Nakhon Sawan a lot and at least once a year to Bangkok and Pattaya..

I think you are correct the cameras are all over, as in the Boston bombing how quickly the bombers were ID-ed by looking over the tapes from security cameras. Prior to leaving the state I was driving on a empty New Mexico highway as I came over a rise a police car pulled me over and gave me a speeding ticket. I said how are you going to prove I was speeding and he pointed to an airplane overhead that was taping my speeding, "busted".

Also I watch many acts of police brutality and abuse of power in the states on You-tube that were taken by witnesses. I just began reading the Bangkok Post again and yes there is crime in Thailand, I have not seen so much as a street fight since leaving Pattaya. I am glad I do not live in the city!

Cheers

That must be some kind of village you live in ,Whats it called heaven?Do you read the local Thai media outlets where you live?I seem to remember my ex Thai wife who comes from isaan telling me stories about Thai men from one village having a fight with men from another village about a land dispute it was an alcohol induced fight with machetes and fire arms.

Only in 2012 when still married we where invited by close family in Buriram provence because one of the sons was going to be ordained as a monk but a few local drunks wanted to have a go at me because i was a farang and not welcome.

Rape,murder, wife beating etc .... seems to be a daily occurence in said part of the country .You dont get out much do you?

It is quite obvious I do not come from where you live named "Hell" or maybe it is just the hated you carry around in your heart. You are making value judgement on what your ex- wife told you, and some Thai wanted to have a go at you, so the all of Thailand must be violent.

Yet you feel you have a right to question my "real experience" of living in rural Thailand because it is not in agreement with the Thai haters that state violence is part of the Thai culture. You are entitled to your own opinion and I am entitled to express the truth as I know it and have lived it.

I have not as much seen a fist fight in 8 years in my village (that you named Heaven), quite different then the 5 drive-by death by shootings, that happened when I visited the old country 2 years ago.

For the first six years I was here I drank a lot with the locals, never was there a disagreement no matter how drunk they where, versus the Falang's in Pattaya that get a couple of drinks in their gut an\d think they are the meanest mother in the world, I do watch all the fights in Pattaya on you tube a very nice place to have moved away from.

Why would you choose to live by choice in a country so violent, when you have "Heaven" from the place you left, to live in the "Hell" I left, to live in the village you call "Heaven".

Cheers

[kikoman]

In my experience as I live in a rural village where violence does not exist, I do go to Nakhon Sawan a lot and at least once a year to Bangkok and Pattaya..

I think you are correct the cameras are all over, as in the Boston bombing how quickly the bombers were ID-ed by looking over the tapes from security cameras. Prior to leaving the state I was driving on a empty New Mexico highway as I came over a rise a police car pulled me over and gave me a speeding ticket. I said how are you going to prove I was speeding and he pointed to an airplane overhead that was taping my speeding, "busted".

Also I watch many acts of police brutality and abuse of power in the states on You-tube that were taken by witnesses. I just began reading the Bangkok Post again and yes there is crime in Thailand, I have not seen so much as a street fight since leaving Pattaya. I am glad I do not live in the city!

Cheers

That must be some kind of village you live in ,Whats it called heaven?Do you read the local Thai media outlets where you live?I seem to remember my ex Thai wife who comes from isaan telling me stories about Thai men from one village having a fight with men from another village about a land dispute it was an alcohol induced fight with machetes and fire arms.

Only in 2012 when still married we where invited by close family in Buriram provence because one of the sons was going to be ordained as a monk but a few local drunks wanted to have a go at me because i was a farang and not welcome.

Rape,murder, wife beating etc .... seems to be a daily occurence in said part of the country .You dont get out much do you?

Yup, "kikoman does not get out much, because he is on this forum defending thais 16 hours / day.

What is this the forth or fifth one liner you have left in regards to my pass posts?

If you have something to say to me, "man up" and say it, as I noticed we locked horns on a past post,

For a poster that claims I defends every thing Thai and spend hours on TV, which indicates you have something you want desperately to say to me, Man up and Say it!

Cheers

[Docno]

This is quite possibly a psychological phenomenon, the belief that things are worse now than they were in the past. Nobel prize winning scientist, Daniel Kahneman, calls it the 'availability heuristic': we estimate the frequency of something by how readily we can recall instances of it (and, of course, we recall more instances of murder and rape from this year than from 10 years back). The increase of CCTV cameras and media reporting also has an influence, as the OP suggested. Look, even in the US, gun crime is on the decline while over 50% of the public think it's getting worse (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/07/gun-crime-drops-but-americans-think-its-worse/2139421/). That's the factors I've mentioned at play...

(Now, I'm not claiming that violence in Thai society is decreasing, only that our perceptions are quite often wrong).

I was thinking the same thing but you said it better than I could have.

You might be interested in reading "The Better Angels Of Our Nature" by Steven Pincker in which he uses records and statistics to prove that humans are today less likely to be victims of violence than ever in history.

By a VERY large factor at that. This is completely contrary to popular opinion.

Thanks for the reminder! I have a couple of Pinker's other books, but I'd forgotten about that one. I buy most of my books now as ebooks using the kobo app on iPad... I'll put that into my 'to-read' list.

That said, I just read an excellent book called Savage Continent about Europe in the months and few years that followed the defeat of the Nazis. The death and destruction did not stop with the end of the war ... some places actually witnessed whole new levels of barbarity. Stuff I was never really aware of. So while I agree with Pinker--he certainly knows a lot more about these things than me--there have been some definite back-steps in our progress over the last 100 years.

[Beet]

I just posted this in another thread, but it is probably more at home in this one:

It really comes down to a life-time of cultural emotional repression, ego pampered by birth, massive inferiority complexes, complete social unaccountability and responsibility from one's actions, and inability to associate effect from cause.

Add alcohol and the mind of a young, spoiled, adolscent that cannot get his own way for the first time in his life, in front of others. Result: A deadly explosion of rage, a life-time's worth.

A sad society and people.

I showed some recent news reports to my mother the last time she was over... a customer shooting up a chicken vendor because he was refused extra sauce, people shot and killed for flashing their headlights/for not moving out of the way when flashed, a nursing college in Buriram being attacked by a gang of Machete wielding thugs hired by the director of a rivel nursing college! etc etc. She literally couldn't believe it.

[LennyW]

I just posted this in another thread, but it is probably more at home in this one:

It really comes down to a life-time of cultural emotional repression, ego pampered by birth, massive inferiority complexes, complete social unaccountability and responsibility from one's actions, and inability to associate effect from cause.

Add alcohol and the mind of a young, spoiled, adolscent that cannot get his own way for the first time in his life, in front of others. Result: A deadly explosion of rage, a life-time's worth.

A sad society and people.

I showed some recent news reports to my mother the last time she was over... a customer shooting up a chicken vendor because he was refused extra sauce, people shot and killed for flashing their headlights/for not moving out of the way when flashed, a nursing college in Buriram being attacked by a gang of Machete wielding thugs hired by the director of a rivel nursing college! etc etc. She literally couldn't believe it.

I hate to quote a cliche, but i think this time it is truly deserving, "best you go home", your mother will look after you and protect you from this "sad society and people".

[Briggsy]

I must have missed the one about the nursing college!

[seajae]

have to agree, my wife has told me several times that she no longer feels safe when she leaves the house. Her friend was killed when travelling from Bangkok into the country when someone shot the car driver to cause them to crash so they could rob the bodies, this happens a lot outside the main cities. My wife will not drive of a night in the country due to it, rocks on the road etc to cause crashes are very common. One of the things she was happy about when we mnarried was that she could travel safely again with me as single women are simply not safe. The amount of guns you see around is disturbing, I had one waved at me because I bipped the horn at a car stopped in the middle of an intersection talking to someone on the side of the road and couldnt get passed him when we had the green light, unfortunately some thais are just too easily prone to violence and there does not seem to be any sort of attempt to stop it. I actually think carrying guns/knives make these idiots feel like a man, they suffer from small man(dick) syndrome and want to prove how "tough" they are.

[Beet]

I just posted this in another thread, but it is probably more at home in this one:

It really comes down to a life-time of cultural emotional repression, ego pampered by birth, massive inferiority complexes, complete social unaccountability and responsibility from one's actions, and inability to associate effect from cause.

Add alcohol and the mind of a young, spoiled, adolscent that cannot get his own way for the first time in his life, in front of others. Result: A deadly explosion of rage, a life-time's worth.

A sad society and people.

I showed some recent news reports to my mother the last time she was over... a customer shooting up a chicken vendor because he was refused extra sauce, people shot and killed for flashing their headlights/for not moving out of the way when flashed, a nursing college in Buriram being attacked by a gang of Machete wielding thugs hired by the director of a rivel nursing college! etc etc. She literally couldn't believe it.

I hate to quote a cliche, but i think this time it is truly deserving, "best you go home", your mother will look after you and protect you from this "sad society and people".

No need. I don't live within Thai 'society' and have minimal contact with Thais (basically only when they are serving me.)

Edited December 21, 2013 by Beet

[Beet]

A fair fight in this part of the World:

[mgjackson69]

i think a lot of the rubbish shown on Thai soaps makes people think that this is the norm and therefore acceptable.

Pistol whippings, shootings, kidnappings, cops on the take, drug deals, hi-so's in Mercedes above reproach, etc. etc. it's all there in the Thai soaps, impressionable youngsters seem to think it is cool to emulate their heros on tv, and i say that is the root of the problem.

Judging from the number of young Thais (mostly girls) you see emulating the so-called movie stars, talking rudely and LOUD, and making the same exaggerated facial expressions, I would say television definitely has an effect on the behavior.

Sent from my Xoom using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[thailiketoo]

A fair fight in this part of the World:

Your photo was from 2010 in Cambodia where the story was," Mob killings are not uncommon in rural Cambodia, where police are often seen as corrupt and villagers take justice into their own hands."

This is not a Cambodian forum. The guys getting beat up were motorcycle thieves.

[Beet]

I must have missed the one about the nursing college!

Three teenagers were shot by a security guard when a group of teens armed with swords and machetes stormed a nursing aide training school yesterday, police say.

A group of 10 men yesterday carried out a daring attack against Kan Boriban School's director Watcharapol Thongsiri and other employees in downtown Buri Ram's Muang district.

Watcharapol said he believed a rival may be behind the drama, as he was attacked in July last year in a similar daytime raid by two men on a motorbike. At that time, he sustained a knife wound that required 100 stitches.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/625321-one-killed-in-buriram-school-attack/

Edited December 21, 2013 by Beet

[GuestHouse]

Its a mute point whether real Thai women copy the characters in Thai TV soaps or the characters in Thai TV soaps are based on real Thai women.

[FiftyTwo]

Its a mute point whether real Thai women copy the characters in Thai TV soaps or the characters in Thai TV soaps are based on real Thai women.

moot point

[soomak]

There is violence in Thailand; however, I fee my personal safety is most at risk simply riding my motorcycle. I have been forced off the road a couple of times by drivers in my lane. Usually they are passing another vehicle and maybe they didn't see me or, most likely, they simply don't care.

I also see drivers, usually motorbike drivers, texting and updating their Facebook accounts while driving. Oh my Buddha do I ever give those folks a wide berth

Back on topic, I have lived in Thailand for 10+ years and do not recall hearing about violent car jackings or Thais walking into schools and murdering people.

As other posters have observed, the world in general seems to be more violent, but then reporting of crime/violence has increased dramatically.

Actually, as other posters have said, the world is getting safer. All violent crimes are on the decrease, if you check on a global scale.

In the west, the chances of a person dying of a violence are less than 1 percent, the lowest rate ever.

In Thailand, violent crimes are more common than any western country (with the US being the closest), but better than most developing countries. (someone posted a link before me, check that out)