Poll litmus test
Re: "Learning crisis", (PostBag, 30) & "Future will be decided in classrooms", (BP, Jan 26).
Burin Kantabutra makes a timely suggestion for voters ahead of the Feb 8 election. What could usefully be added is that there is, in fact, a clear and simple litmus test.
Which parties support knowledge over legally enforced ignorance? Which value truth-seeking and truth-speaking over the legal suppression of facts?
Which respect the right of people to determine, through open discussion, the form and substance of the laws that govern their own nation -- and which would continue to deny citizens that most basic democratic right?
That same litmus test applies even more sharply to everyday bread-and-butter issues.
Modern Thai history shows a strong and consistent correlation over many decades between the suppression of free speech and deep structural inequality -- in the distribution of wealth, the persistence of corruption, the stark disparity in education standards between the children of the conservative elite and those of farmers, and the enduring poverty faced by millions trapped in farming, waiting, factory work and other low-paying jobs, if they are fortunate enough to have work at all.
It is often claimed the relationship between daily economic hardship and legally enforced silence is merely coincidental.
Coup-makers and their apologists have long insisted as much.
Yet such a claim cannot be substantiated -- because doing so would require the respectful, peaceful, honest and open dialogue that remains criminalised under Thai law.
So yes, as Khun Burin advises, voters should support parties that stand for education, understanding, knowledge, economic justice and legal justice in daily life as they go to cast their ballots in the poll.
It is striking how closely those principles align with the small number of parties that favour genuine ethical governance over a legally imposed imitation of "good ethics".
