Setting bad examples

re: "A barbaric misstep" (BP, Editorial, January 1, 2020)

Dear editor,

In responding to the reckless reaction from the Justice Minister to the call for harsher punishments, a popular and understandable knee jerk reaction given what Thai society has been made for many decades, the editor covers the relevant points well in "A barbaric misstep" (BP, Editorial, January 1). If rape could easily be eradicated by draconian legal measures or other violence, it would already be long solved.

As the editorial realizes, the cultural background of society sets the daily example that moulds us: it is the environment in which we humans both function and learn what behaviour is and is not acceptable to achieve our determined ends. But humans are not stupid: as the low violent crime rates in countries like Japan show, even truly graphic, violent media does not increase crime rates; even the very young can tell fiction from reality. In Thailand, the daily reality is that violence is taught by the Prime Minister and his ilk as a means to fulfilling lusts for power. That is the example that every coup has taught for many decades. Money by any means is the real lesson taught when the rich are admired with no concern for how they came to be rich. Abuse is taught by hi-so types as a means to ego indulgence when they are seen to be above justice, often with the connivance of corrupt law and institutions made up for that purpose.

The government MP who suggested forced castration, and the Justice Minister who is happy to go along with it merely because it sates a popular lust, are exacerbating the cultural example that sees vicious violence in response to a desire as an appropriate way to act.

 Felix Qui

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The above letter to the editor is the text as submitted by Felix Qui to the Bangkok Post.

The text as edited was published in PostBag on January 3, 2019, under the title "Setting bad examples" at https://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/postbag/1827794/setting-bad-examples