The recent East-West Center event to honour the Thai king (previously reported on New Mandala here) has motivated an article titled “An unnecessary honor” by Tom Plate. Available originally at UCLA’s AsiaMedia, it has now been published at The Seattle Times (under the headline “Event fit for a king serves up pad thai and pointlessness”) and The Japan Times (“Redundant royal honors provoke wonder”). The article pulls no punches in its analysis of the palace role in Thailand’s September 2006 coup. It also has some pretty harsh words for the East-West Center along the way. Thank to Mike for drawing it to my attention.
In one part of the article, Tom Plate writes:
[Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn's] flowery speech, read to a bored audience word for word, praising her father’s many countless deeds, was preceded by an amazingly boring video on the good king’s many good deeds. It was a weird scene. When the princess entered the ballroom, the guests (many paying a pretty price for the honor of attending the gala dinner) had to rise, after having been admonished by the authorities of the East-West Center as to what would be viewed was acceptable behavior in the presence of the princess.
And he finishes with:
The East-West Center is, one supposes, entitled to honor almost anyone it wants. But as one left the hall, one had to wonder why King Bhumibol’s handlers felt compelled to organize such an unnecessary and questionable event as this. Why go out of your way to honor a king who allegedly is so wonderful he doesn’t need any more honors? One had to wonder.
New Mandala readers may also be interested to know that Plate’s article has already sparked a discussion on Lonely Planet’s Thorn Tree. I expect that is just the beginning.
6 responses so far ↓
1 Grasshopper // Mar 10, 2008 at 4:49 pm
The Diaries of Tom Plate, now playing near you alongside the squeaks of a very small violin played by a mouse in a sari. I can see why he only references English language papers in his personal work history. Thoroughly demagogic of him. A writer for expats.
This article seemed fairly myopic and more of a personal complaint. If personal complaints are insights I should start a blog and call it ‘listen to me!, live my way or I shall …’ The ‘…’ would be the preface for each blog post. Tom Plate’s would be ‘listen to me! I go to functions where I am bored and empty. I then translate these feelings into articles!!!’
2 jonfernquest // Mar 10, 2008 at 11:13 pm
I would use the words “rambling” and “stream of thought” to describe this op-ed piece by Tom Plate, not “informative” or “factual.”
If all the good things that have resulted from the long-term relation between Thailand and the East-West Center as well as the University of Hawaii over what must be several decades were thoroughly documented and only one google query away from Tom Plate, maybe his op-ed piece would be different.
3 Bangkok Pundit // Mar 11, 2008 at 12:16 am
I found this excerpt “thoroughly divisive”:
“But even so, somehow the whole event left a taste in the mouth that one doesn’t ordinarily associate with things Thai. Democracy is not the one-size fits all formula for all, and as mentioned, the elected Thaksin was no second coming of Thomas Jefferson. But removed as the prime minister had been by the force of arms, the East-West Center’s bow to the king seemed odd. One rests happily when American nonprofits honor geniuses or freedom fighters or even the otherwise disenfranchised. But kings — or queens for that matter — would seem to need no honorific welfare from American nonprofits. Generally, they can get along just fine on their own, especially those with the power to eject elected governments.”
4 Dog Lover // Mar 13, 2008 at 10:35 pm
jonfernquest continues to say that there are all manner of good things that come to pass frfom EWC-Thailand connections. But that is not the point of Plate’s piece. He says that too. He asks other questions. Plate does well to ask these questions of EWC and of the royalists. Let’s see more of this questioning in the mainstream media.
5 khon ngai ngai // Mar 14, 2008 at 3:47 pm
I found Plate’s comments shallow and cursory. Nevertheless, he has indeed pointed out in earnest the same things many in New Mandala feel, i.e, the well rehearsed allusions to the anachronism of the royal Thai institution that so repulses some (if not many) NM contributors. But those of us exposed daily to the devoted nightly news segment on Thai TV between 8PM to 830PM have developed calloused ears to save us from the “boredom of flowery speeches” and take for granted the propaganda value of these reminders of the royals’ countless (good) deeds that we don’t even consider whether they do have and will continue to have that enduring effect on the intended subjects to possess securely the belief that the emperor does indeed wear clothes.
I do find in particular the tone of Plate’s comments haughty and condescending, in this passage:
“One rests happily when American nonprofits honor geniuses or freedom fighters or even the otherwise disenfranchised. But kings — or queens for that matter — would seem to need no honorific welfare from American nonprofits. Generally, they can get along just fine on their own, especially those with the power to eject elected governments.”
I do not pretend to know the real truth whether HM “has the power to eject elected governments” nor justify in the least these allegations. If they are true, anything that runs against democratic principles should be condemned. But it is not for Plate to take the moral high ground and criticize the “honorific welfare” when in his very own society, its own leaders run a government whose “democratic institutions” continue to be upheld blindly (& affirmed) by its people even when they are involved in bloody and illegal wars of occupation and subverting anyone else who is not with them in their grand policy for hegemonic control of the world.
Unfortunately, Thailand doesn’t have the resources (e.g. influential Thai newpapers, blogs, intelligence services) to counter negative propaganda against its revered institutions. It doesn’t cost much to generate a counteraction against someone who had the gall to call the US a “useless friend”. It takes only finding and suborning the “right” disaffected people and with sophisticated planning pull off something that would appear to fit everbody’s purposes and most of all, come out with clean hands. Although these statements may strike as conspiracist, so be it until someday when the evidence is unearthed.
I secretly imagine having Plate the recipient of Samak’s vulgar retort that his writing is indicative of a toe sized brain (never mind that the Prime Minister gets more international exposure as a Neanderthal), or to be in the receiving end of Thai berserk rage (for his insult of HM) screaming, “you murdering bunker buster terrorist bombers, baby killers, leave us alone”!
6 Dog Lover // Mar 17, 2008 at 5:15 am
I read the Japan Times version and Plate makes good points that need to be made every time this king gets another of these awards (some of them created for him). Each time a foreign organisation makes this king an award, they ignore his complicity in the 2006 coup, his regular support for authoritarian and military government in Thailand. By honouring him, they burnish his image. Well done Tom Plate on calling out the posterior polishers.
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