“Publishers are not liable for honest mistakes...”

A jury has found that The New York Times did not defame Sarah Palin when it published an editorial on 14th June 2017. Palin had sued the newspaper for libel over a sentence in the editorial falsely implying that her campaign had encouraged the 2011 shooting of fellow politician Gabby Giffords: “Before the shooting, Sarah Palin’s political action committee circulated a map of targeted electoral districts that put Ms. Giffords and 19 other Democrats under stylized cross hairs.”

The newspaper had swiftly apologised for the editorial — “We got an important fact wrong, incorrectly linking political incitement and the 2011 shooting of Giffords” — and inserted a clarification into the online version of the article the day after its original publication: “no connection to the shooting was ever established.” The initial libel case ended on 15th February 2022, when a jury concluded that the editorial was not defamatory.

Palin appealed against that verdict, and she was granted a retrial on 28th August last year. Yesterday, the week-long retrial ended with a different jury reaching the same conclusion, that the newspaper did not intentionally defame Palin. After yesterday’s verdict, New York Times spokesperson Danielle Rhoades Ha said: “The decision reaffirms an important tenet of American law: publishers are not liable for honest mistakes.”

The Shattered Worlds: Micro Narratives from the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the Great Steppe

The group exhibition The Shattered Worlds: Micro Narratives from the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the Great Steppe (โลกร้าว เรื่องเล่าขนาดย่อมจากเส้นทางโฮจิมินห์ถึงทุ่งหญ้าสเต็ปป์) opened on 3rd April, and runs until 6th July. The exhibition is split between three venues, though the majority of the pieces are on show at Bangkok Art and Culture Centre.

Chulayarnnon Siriphol’s video triptych No More Hero in His Story, part of his Red Eagle Sangmorakot (อินทรีแดง แสงมรกตะ) installation, features the return of his saffron-robed monk wearing an incongruous motorcycle helmet. The character has previously appeared in Chulayarnnon’s short film Monk and Motorcycle Taxi Rider, and in his segment of the portmanteau film Ten Years Thailand. (Chulayarnnon discussed his depiction of monks in an interview for Thai Cinema Uncensored.)

For his installation The Tower of Bubbles, Thasnai Sethaseree created collages of published texts and photographs related to political violence, which he then painted over, almost — but not quite — obscuring them from view. He has used this technique before, covering newspaper pages with brightly coloured paint in works shown at the Dismantle (ปลด) and Cold War exhibitions. A large slogan painted onto the BACC’s wall, “WHAT YOU DON’T SEE WILL HURT YOU”, makes the point that the historical atrocities overpainted by Thasnai may be hidden from sight, but they still have the potential to reoccur.

Red’s Objects Dialogue

Almost exactly fifteen years ago, on 10th April 2010, the Thai military opened fire on pro-democracy red-shirt protesters in Bangkok. The Museum of Popular History is commemorating the anniversary of the crackdown with an exhibition of red-shirt memorabilia, which opened on 29th March at the Kinjai Contemporary gallery in Bangkok.

The exhibition, Red’s Objects Dialogue (เสื้อตัวนี้สีแดง), runs until 10th April, the date on which the army launched their assault. Red’s Objects Dialogue has been conceived as an interactive exhibition, with visitors encouraged to share any memories of the protests prompted by the items on display (including an impressive collection of hand-clappers, t-shirts, and VCDs).

Red’s Objects Dialogue includes several notorious items that were banned by previous governments: calendars issued in 2016 and 2019 by Thaksin and Yingluck Shinawatra, flip-flops featuring images of Abhisit Vejajjiva and Suthep Thaugsuban, and a Pheu Thai promotional water bowl. The bowl and calendars were previously displayed at the Never Again (หยุด) exhibition in 2019. One of the most intriguing exhibits is a transistor radio (a generic design, sold in Thailand as a Tanin TF-268) which has been rebranded a “RED RADIO”.

The tragic events of 10th April 2010 have also been commemorated in several previous exhibitions: Khonkaen Manifesto (ขอนแก่น แมนิเฟสโต้) and Amnesia in 2019, Future Tense in 2022, and 10 April and Beyond last year. They are also referenced in Pisitakun Kuantalaeng’s album Kongkraphan, Pen-ek Ratanaruang’s short film Two Little Soldiers (สาวสะเมิน), and in the poetry collection ลุกไหม้สิ! ซิการ์ (‘burning cigar!’).

A book commemorating the victims of the massacre, วีรชน 10 เมษา (‘heroes of 10th April’) by Ida Aroonwong and Warisa Kittikhunseree, was published in 2011. There are also plans to publish a book based on visitors’ responses to the artefacts on show at Red’s Objects Dialogue. Like the Museum of Popular History, the National Library of Australia also has an archive of red-shirt ephemera.

Naya Bharat ('new India')

Indian comedian Kunal Kamra is the subject of a police investigation in the state of Maharashtra after he criticised a politician from the region in his stand-up show Naya Bharat (‘new India’). Kamra performed a few satirical songs during the set, and they appeared with karaoke-style subtitles when he uploaded a video of the show to his YouTube channel on 23rd March. He was charged with defamation on the following day.

The lyrics to one song, a parody of the theme to the Bollywood film Dil To Pagal Hai (‘the heart is crazy’), include the word ‘gaddar’ (‘traitor’), in an oblique reference to politician Eknath Shinde. After footage of the performance circulated online, a mob of Shinde’s supporters ransacked The Habitat, the Mumbai studio where Kamra had recorded the live show. A spokesperson for Shinde’s political party Shiv Sena has called for Kamra’s arrest.

The Habitat was also the venue for another controversial comedy last month, when an episode of the podcast India’s Got Latent was recorded there. A guest on the show, Ranveer Allahbadia, asked a contestant: “Would you rather watch your parents have sex every day for the rest of your life, or would you join in once and stop it forever?” The episode was released on YouTube on 10th February, and multiple police complaints were filed against Allahbadia. India’s Supreme Court described Allahbadia’s question as obscene on 18th February, though it stopped short of filing criminal charges against him.

In a similar case in 2021, Ashutosh Dubey, an adviser to India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, filed a legal complaint against comedian Vir Das in relation to a live performance in Washington D.C. Das recited his poem Two Indias at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on 12th November 2021, and uploaded it to YouTube four days later. As he predicted in the words of the poem itself, “I come from an India that will accuse me of airing our dirty laundry”.

Out: How Brexit Got Done and the Tories Were Undone

After All Out War, Fall Out, and No Way Out, Tim Shipman’s final Brexit book, Out: How Brexit Got Done and the Tories Were Undone, was published late last year. His quartet, a definitive account of UK politics since the country voted to leave the EU, tells “the full story of the most explosive period of domestic British politics since the Second World War.”

Out, 900 pages long, is (fortunately) the least Brexity of the four books. Spanning the entire Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Rishi Sunak governments, it has the same insider’s access and all-sides coverage that made Shipman’s previous accounts so unique and compelling.

Shipman argues that, for better or worse, Johnson was “the most consequential figure of the period”, having achieved far more than his predecessor: “Theresa May was defined by the things she failed to do, Boris by the things he did — both excellent and execrable.” In an example from the execrable category, Johnson asked the attorney general not to inform ministers that prorogation of parliament may be illegal: “don’t spook the cabinet by talking about the litigation risk.” Shipman calls this “one of the nadirs of Johnson’s premiership.”

Shipman has consistently reported some of the most remarkable pull quotes in recent British politics. In Out, he quotes an unprecedented confrontation between a prime minister (Johnson: “Are you threatening me?”) and a senior adviser (Dominic Cummings: “Yes, I’m fucking threatening you.”) An even more extraordinary quote comes from Elizabeth II, who joked with her staff after Johnson resigned: “at least I won’t have that idiot organising my funeral now.”

Unsurprisingly, Shipman is dismissive of Johnson’s successor: “Liz Truss need not detain us long here.” He cites several Downing Street staff who describe her as “fucking mental”, and one who calls her “psychologically unfit to be prime minister.” (This recalls Alastair Campbell’s description of Gordon Brown’s “psychological flaws”, quoted in Andrew Rawnsley’s Servants of the People.) A secretary “broke down in tears” after Truss rebuked them for bringing her the wrong type of coffee (like Mugatu in Zoolander).

Before introducing Sunak at a 2024 election campaign event, Johnson asked his aides: “Why am I doing this? This guy’s a fucking cunt.” Shipman’s assessment of Sunak is also critical though, of course, more measured: “the lack of a driving political vision gave him no political cover from failures of delivery.”

The 60th Year

Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Communication Arts will hold two days of film screenings in Bangkok later this week, to celebrate the faculty’s sixtieth anniversary. The 60th Year (สดุดีปีจอ) includes a screening of Breaking the Cycle (อำนาจ ศรัทธา อนาคต) on 27th February, followed by a Q&A with its directors Aekaphong Saransate and Thanakrit Duangmaneeporn. Come and See (เอหิปัสสิโก) will be shown on the next day, followed by a talk by director Nottapon Boonprakob.

Both films are documentaries that challenge established institutions, and both attracted controversy in the process. Charges of sedition were filed against the makers of Breaking the Cycle, as their film — accurately and objectively — described the 2014 coup as undemocratic. When Nottapon submitted Come and See to the censorship board, they explained that they had some reservations about it. Would he mind if they rejected the film, they asked. But the Thai Film Director Association publicised the case online, and — presumably to avoid negative publicity — the censors told Nottapon that they no longer had a problem with the film.

Breaking the Cycle

Breaking the Cycle is a fly-on-the-wall account of the Future Forward party, which was dissolved by the Constitutional Court in 2020. (Future Forward was founded as a progressive alternative to military dictatorship. The party came third in the 2019 election, after a wave of support for its charismatic leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, though he was disqualified as an MP by the Constitutional Court.)

The film begins in 2014 with Thanathorn’s determination to end the vicious cycle of military coups that has characterised Thailand’s modern political history. This mission gives the film its title, and Future Forward co-founder Piyabutr Saengkanokkul asks: “Why is Thailand stuck in this cycle of coups?” The documentary benefits from its extensive access to every senior figure within Future Forward. The directors were even able to film Thanathorn as he reacted to the guilty verdicts being delivered by the Constitutional Court.

The documentary ends with the caption “THE CYCLE CONTINUES”, which is sadly accurate: Future Forward’s successor, Move Forward, was dissolved by the Constitutional Court last year despite winning the 2023 election. The movement’s third incarnation, the People’s Party, will need a landslide victory in the next election to challenge the current pro-military coalition led by Pheu Thai.

Breaking the Cycle went on general release last year. It was later shown at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, as part of the Lost and Longing (แด่วันคืนที่สูญหาย) season. It was also screened at A.E.Y. Space in Songkla, and at the Bangsaen Film Festival at Burapha University. It was part of the Hits Me Movies... One More Time programme at House Samyan in Bangkok, and it was screened last week at Thammasat University.

Come and See

Come and See examines the practices of the Wat Phra Dhammakaya temple complex (in Pathum Thani province, near Bangkok) and its former abbot, Dhammajayo, who has long been suspected of money laundering. (Dhammakaya is a Buddhist sect recognised by the Sangha Supreme Council, though it closely resembles a cult. Come and See interviews both current devotees and disaffected former members of the organisation.)

The Dhammakaya complex itself is only twenty years old, and its design is inherently cinematic. The enormous Cetiya temple resembles a golden UFO, and temple ceremonies are conducted on an epic scale, with tens of thousands of monks and worshippers arranged with geometric precision. The temple cooperated with Nottapon, though his access was limited. Come and See doesn’t investigate the allegations against Dhammajayo, though it does provide extensive coverage of the 2016 DSI raid on the temple and Dhammajayo’s subsequent disappearance.

One of the film’s interviewees, a Buddhist scholar, hits the nail on the head when he argues that the long-running Dhammakaya scandal is not an anomaly; rather, Dhammakaya is simply a more extreme version of contemporary Thai Buddhism, which has become increasingly capitalist. Come and See also hints at the institutional corruption and hidden networks of influence that characterise the modern Thai state.

The Critics

Yesterday, a female news anchor was questioned by police on charges of defamation and violation of the Computer Crime Act, following a legal complaint by a lawyer representing former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Her home was searched by more than a dozen police officers, though she has not yet been arrested.

The online news organisation The Critics published a video on 3rd January reporting on an opinion poll in which Thaksin had been voted the world’s worst leader. (The video is still online, on the Thai Move Institute’s YouTube channel.) The anchor told police that she was not the journalist who wrote the story, and had merely been reading from a script.

The news report (which is essentially clickbait) refers to a survey on the website The Top Tens. Thaksin is indeed currently listed there as the worst leader in the history of the world, with Adolf Hitler in second place, though the voting has been manipulated by Thai netizens. (Thaksin’s entry has more than 6,000 vitriolic comments, from people who apparently believe that he was worse than genocidal dictators such as Hitler.)

There are equally hyperbolic comparisons between Thaksin and Hitler in two documentaries by Ing K. In the fourth episode of her Bangkok Joyride (บางกอกจอยไรด์) series, a protester describes Thaksin as “worse than Hitler”. This echoes a quote from Ing’s Citizen Juling (พลเมืองจูหลิง): “We talk of Hitler... But villagers, all citizens nowadays fear PM Thaksin 10 times more.” (These examples are discussed in Thai Cinema Uncensored.)

During Thaksin’s premiership, he was notorious for his use of lawsuits to intimidate his critics. Pimpaka Towira’s documentary The Truth Be Told (ความจริงพูดได้), for example, examined the charges filed by Thaksin’s Shin Corp. against media campaigner Supinya Klangnarong after she was interviewed by the Thai Post (ไทยโพสต์) newspaper on 16th July 2003. (The Thai Post was also named in the writ. This case is also covered in Thai Cinema Uncensored.)

Supinya had alleged that Shin Corp. benefitted from the policies of Thaksin’s government, and therefore that his ownership of the company represented a conflict of interest. Her book about the lawsuit, พูดความจริง (‘speak the truth’), was published in 2007, after the case was dismissed.

Can’t Stop Won’t Stop

Warat Bureephakdee’s Crazy Soft Power Love will be shown this evening at Rx Cafe in Chiang Mai. The screening is part of the Can’t Stop Won’t Stop (ไปให้สุด หยุดไม่อยู่) arts festival, which is raising awareness of the political crisis in Myanmar since the violent coup that took place there in 2021. (The festival’s Burmese title is မဆုတ်တမ်း မရပ်တမ်း.) The event began yesterday, and runs until the end of this month.

This will be Crazy Soft Power Love’s third screening this week, and its second screening today. It will also be shown in Korat this afternoon, as part of the With Love and White festival, and it was shown at เทศกาลถนนศิลปะ ครั้งที่ 22 (‘the 22nd street art festival’) in Khon Kaen on 16th February.

Crazy Soft Power Love is a satire on the government’s soft power strategy, culminating in a Songkran water fight that escalates into a brawl, intercut with footage from the 6th October 1976 massacre at Thammasat University. It was previously shown at Wildtype 2024, at the fourth Amazing Stoner Movie Fest (มหัศจรรย์หนังผี ครั้งที่ 4), and at last year’s Short Film Marathon (หนังสั้นมาราธอน).

Wattanapume Laisuwanchai’s video The Body Craves Impact as Love Bursts (ร่างกายอยากปะทะ เพราะรักมันปะทุ) will be shown at Rx Cafe tomorrow, also as part of the Can’t Stop Won’t Stop festival. In Wattanapume’s film, images of a man and woman are shown facing each other, yet separated. The project was made in solidarity with the rapper Elevenfinger, who is serving a prison sentence for possession of ping-pong bombs used in anti-government protests. The video ends dramatically with flashing images and footage of fireworks, filmed at Thalugaz protests in 2021.

The Body Craves Impact as Love Bursts was first shown as a video installation at the Procession of Dystopia exhibition last year. It was also screened at The 7th Bangkok Experimental Film Festival (เทศกาลหนังทดลองกรุงเทพฯ ครั้งที่ 7).

With Love and White

Warat Bureephakdee’s Crazy Soft Power Love will be shown tomorrow at Boonwattana School in Korat, as part of the one-day With Love and White festival of short films. This will be its second screening this week, as it was also shown at เทศกาลถนนศิลปะ ครั้งที่ 22 (‘the 22nd street art festival’) in Khon Kaen on 16th February.

Crazy Soft Power Love is a satire on the government’s soft power strategy, culminating in a Songkran water fight that escalates into a brawl, intercut with footage from the 6th October 1976 massacre at Thammasat University. It was previously shown at Wildtype 2024, at the fourth Amazing Stoner Movie Fest (มหัศจรรย์หนังผี ครั้งที่ 4), and at last year’s Short Film Marathon (หนังสั้นมาราธอน).

ภาพสุดท้ายบนผืนผ้า สงครามเย็นไม่เคยจากไปไหน(‘the final images on cloth’)

Chulayarnnon Siriphol’s Birth of Golden Snail (กำเนิดหอยทากทอง) will be shown in Chiang Mai on 1st March as part of The Golden Snail Series (วัฒนธรรม​หอยทากทอง), a programme of five short films by the artist that feature his golden snail motif, followed by a Q&A with Chulayarnnon. (The five films were also shown last month, at A.E.Y. Space in Songkla and Lorem Ipsum in Hat Yai.)

The Golden Snail Series is the final event in the three-day ภาพสุดท้ายบนผืนผ้า สงครามเย็นไม่เคยจากไปไหน (‘the final images on cloth: the Cold War never goes away’) film festival, which begins on 27th February. The festival — organised by Dude, Movie — explores the continuing legacy of the Cold War, and will be held outdoors at Suan Anya. The films shown will be the last ones to be projected onto the venue’s cloth screen, which will soon be replaced with a more substantial screen.

Birth of Golden Snail was banned from the Thailand Biennale in 2018, and had its first public screening at the following year’s 30th Singapore International Film Festival. Its Thai premiere was at the 23rd Thai Short Film and Video Festival (เทศกาลภาพยนตร์สั้น ครั้งที่ 23), and it was shown last year at Infringes. Chulayarnnon discussed the film in an interview for Thai Cinema Uncensored.

The other short films in The Golden Snail Series programme are Golden Spiral (โกลเด้น สไปรัล), The Internationale (แองเตอร์นาซิอองนาล), ANG48 (เอเอ็นจี48), and How to Explain “Monument to the Fourth International” to the Dead Golden Snail (เรารักภูมิพลังวัฒนธรรมละมุนละม่อมนุ่มนิ่ม). Golden Spiral was first shown at Ghost:2561. ANG48 was first shown at Shadow Dancing, and later at Wildtype 2023, ใช้แล้ว ใช้อยู่ ใช้ต่อ (‘I’ve used it, I’m using it, I’ll keep using it’), The 27th Thai Short Film and Video Festival (เทศกาลภาพยนตร์สั้น ครั้งที่ 27), and the Short Film Marathon 27 (หนังสั้นมาราธอน 27).

The Day the Sky Trembled

Nutchanon Pairoj, a founder member of the United Front of Thammasat and Demonstration protest group, has been found guilty of lèse-majesté and sentenced to two years in prison. He was originally found not guilty by the Thanyaburi Provincial Court on 8th November 2023, though that verdict was overturned today by the Court of Appeal.

Nutchanon was one of several people in a truck that was stopped by police in Pathum Thani on 19th September 2020. They were en route to Thammasat University, intending to distribute copies of the booklet The Day the Sky Trembled (ปรากฏการณ์สะท้านฟ้า 10 สิงหา) to protesters gathered at the university. Police confiscated 45,080 copies of the booklet, and detained the occupants of the truck, though ultimately only Nutchanon was charged.

The Day the Sky Trembled — so notorious that it has become known simply as ‘the red booklet’ — contains transcripts of speeches given by UFTD protest leaders at Thammasat on 10th August 2020. Nutchanon is not quoted in the booklet, though today’s judgement convicted him of knowingly attempting to distribute material that contravened the lèse-majesté law.

เทศกาลถนนศิลปะ ครั้งที่ 22(‘the 22nd street art festival’)

Warat Bureephakdee’s short film Crazy Soft Power Love will be shown today at เทศกาลถนนศิลปะ ครั้งที่ 22 (‘the 22nd street art festival’) organised by Art Lane. The outdoor screening will take place at Khon Kaen University’s Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts. The event began on Valentine’s Day and finishes today.

Crazy Soft Power Love is a satire on the government’s soft power strategy, culminating in a Songkran water fight that escalates into a brawl, intercut with footage from the 6th October 1976 massacre at Thammasat University. It was previously shown at Wildtype 2024, at the fourth Amazing Stoner Movie Fest (มหัศจรรย์หนังผี ครั้งที่ 4), and at last year’s Short Film Marathon (หนังสั้นมาราธอน).

30 Years of ‘Democrazy’

One way that artists satirise Thai politics is by punning on the Thai word for democracy itself. The earliest and most common example is ‘democrazy’, highlighting the craziness of the Thai political system, which dates back thirty years. Since then, there have been more than a dozen other Thai puns on ‘democracy’.

Democrazy

The band Heavy Mod released their album Democrazy on cassette and CD in 1995. (Its Thai title was ประชาธิปไตย, which translates simply as ‘democracy’.) Democrazy was also the title of a single by another band, Dogwhine, from their EP Dog of God, released on CD in 2019. The animated music video for the song features the folding chair and hanging corpse from an infamous Neal Ulevich photograph. Democrazy (ประชาธิปไทย) is also the title of a 2020 painting by Luck Maisalee.

The fashion brand Russian Roulette designed a Demo-crazy t-shirt in 2023. Bangkok Democrazy was the strapline of the 4th Bangkok Experimental Film Festival, which took place in 2004. Democrazy Theatre Studio was founded by Pavinee Samakkabutr and Thanapol Virulhakul in 2008, and the edgy Bangkok performance venue closed down in 2019.

Thunsita Yanuprom and Sarun Channiam directed the short film Democrazy.mov in 2019. In the film, a cellphone signal is jammed by a 44GHz frequency, in reference to article 44 of the interim constitution, which granted absolute power to the leaders of the 2014 coup.

Demockrazy

Duangporn Pakavirojkul directed the short film Demockrazy (ประชาทิปตาย) in 2007. The film was an immediate reaction to the 2006 coup: set in a classroom, an authoritarian teacher symbolises the coup leaders. Its title is a clever double pun on ‘crazy’ and ‘mockery’.

Demoncrazy

Ready Myth Demoncrazy was a retrospective exhibition of art by Panya Vijinthanasarn, held in 2018. Similarly, the fashion brand Plus One designed a Demo(n)cracy hat in 2023.

Dreamocracy

Parit Wacharasindhu’s book Dreamocracy (ประชาธิปไตยไม่ใช่ฝัน) was published in 2022. Parit is a People’s Party MP, and his book is a personal manifesto proposing solutions to the country’s social and economic problems.

Drunkmocracy

Warat Bureephakdee directed the short film Drunkmocracy (สุราธิปไตย) in 2023. A documentary on Thai alcohol laws, it was released online as part of the ไทยถาม (‘Thailand questions’) series by Thai Rath (ไทยรัฐ).

ประชาฉิปตาย

The song title ประชาฉิปตาย translates as ‘democracy dies’, in a particularly effective Thai-language pun. (‘Democracy’ and ‘die-ocracy’ are near-homophones in Thai.) The track is featured on the Heavy Mod album Democrazy, and it’s similar to Die mo cracy, a slogan on a t-shirt sold by the band Speech Odd last year.

Paradoxocracy

Pen-ek Ratanaruang and Pasakorn Pramoolwong’s documentary Paradoxocracy (ประชาธิป'ไทย) was released in 2013. (Pen-ek discussed the film at length in Thai Cinema Uncensored.)

‘Happy-ocracy’

Ing K.’s film Shakespeare Must Die (เชคสเปียร์ต้องตาย) includes a satirical parody of authoritarian propaganda: “Dear Leader brings happy-ocracy!” The line turned out to be a remarkably prescient prediction, as coup leader Prayut Chan-o-cha released a propaganda song titled Returning Happiness to the Thai Kingdom (คืนความสุขให้ประเทศไทย) in 2014. (Ing discussed the film in Thai Cinema Uncensored.)

PrachathipaType

The design studio PrachathipaType was founded in 2020, and its name translates as ‘democratic typography’. The anonymous designer behind PrachathipaType also created a new typeface, PrachathipaTape (ประชาธิปะเทป), for Rap Against Dictatorship’s music video Homeland (บ้านเกิดเมืองนอน).

‘ประชาธิปตู่’

Yuthlert Sippapak’s film Nednary (อวสานเนตรนารี) features a pun on Prayut’s nickname, Tu. When a boy scout, with the same nickname as Prayut, is asked what type of democracy he wants, he replies: “ประชาธิปตู่” (‘Tu-ocracy’). (Yuthlert discussed the film in Thai Cinema Uncensored.) The period of undemocratic military government led by Prayut between 2014 and 2023 is known as ‘Prayutocracy’.

‘Thaksinocracy’

Thaksinocracy (ทักษิณาธิปไตย) describes the populist politics of Thaksin Shinawatra, prime minister from 2001 to 2006. (A slight variation, สู่ทักษิณาธิปไตย, was translated as Thaksinomics, the title of a book by Rangsan Thanapornpun published in 2005.)

‘Kukritocracy’

Kukritocracy, a term coined by Tamara Loos, describes the cultural role of royalist author Kukrit Pramoj during the Cold War. Loos will give a presentation titled Kukritocracy at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison, on 21st February, as part of their Friday Forum series. (I gave a Friday Forum presentation in 2021.)

‘Premocracy’

Premocracy (เปรมาธิปไตย) describes the period of quasi-democracy from 1980 to 1988, when Prem Tinsulanonda led the government as an appointed prime minister. เปรมาธิปไตย is also the title of a book by Adinan Phromphananjal, published in 2020.

‘Coupocracy’

In her book Dictatorship on Trial, released last year, Tyrell Haberkorn coined the term ‘coupocracy’ to describe the period covering the 2006 and 2014 coups.

‘Dancemocracy’

The new book Made in Thailand includes Anna Lawattanatrakul’s essay Dancemocracy as Political Expression in the 2020 Thai Pro-democracy Movement, a reference to the Dancemocracy (คณะราษแดนซ์) troupe of pro-democracy dancers and protesters. (Made in Thailand, edited by Viriya Sawangchot, also includes an interview with Pisitakun Kuantalaeng, who discusses his album Absolute Coup.)

Resonance of Revolt

Chiang Mai University’s Faculty of Social Sciences will show a programme of provocative political documentaries as part of their ดูหนังกับสังวิท (‘watch movies with Social Sciences’) season. The event, Resonance of Revolt, will take place on 19th and 26th February, and includes Uruphong Raksasad’s Paradox Democracy and Vichart Somkaew’s Contemporary Thai Political Trilogy (ไตรภาคการเมืองร่วมสมัยไทย).

Paradox Democracy documents the recent student protest movement, and features clips from rally speeches by Arnon Nampa and other protest leaders, intercut with extracts from The Revolutionist (คือผู้อภิวัฒน์), a play about Pridi Banomyong staged by the Crescent Moon theatre group in 2020. The film’s working title was Paradox October, and it includes footage shot at the 6th October 1976 commemorative exhibition at Thammasat University in 2020.

Contemporary Thai Political Trilogy is a portmanteau project combining three of Vichart’s recent short films: Cremation Ceremony (ประวัติย่อของบางสิ่งที่หายไป), 112 News from Heaven, and The Letter from Silence (จดหมายจากความเงียบ). The anthology’s structure reflects three eras of modern Thai politics: 1932–1957 (the establishment of democratic institutions), 1957–1992 (prolonged military dictatorship), and 1992 to the present day (liberal reforms, followed by political polarisation).

Paradox Democracy was previously shown at The 28th Thai Short Film and Video Festival (เทศกาลภาพยนตร์สั้น ครั้งที่ 28) in Salaya. Contemporary Thai Political Trilogy was shown last year as part of ซิเนมากลางนา (‘cinema in the middle of a rice field’), a rural outdoor screening held in a rice field in Phayao. Previous ดูหนังกับสังวิท screenings have included Ing K.’s Dog God (คนกราบหมา) and Shakespeare Must Die (เชคสเปียร์ต้องตาย).

“The biggest scandal in broadcasting history...”

Donald Trump filed a lawsuit against CBS on 31st October last year, accusing the TV network of misleading voters in the runup to the US presidential election. The lawsuit highlighted a discrepancy between two versions of an interview with former vice president Kamala Harris, and it sought an extraordinary $10 billion in damages.

Harris was interviewed by CBS News correspondent Bill Whitaker, and clips from the interview were aired on Face the Nation on 5th October 2024. A longer version of the interview was broadcast on 60 Minutes on the following day. Harris was asked about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and the lawsuit notes that “Kamala replies to Whitaker with her typical word salad” in the Face the Nation clip, while she “appears to reply to Whitaker with a completely different, more succinct answer” on 60 Minutes.

The Face the Nation clip shows Harris answering the question by saying: “Well, Bill, the work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by or a result of many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region.” In the 60 Minutes segment, her answer is: “We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end.”

The lawsuit argued that the 60 Minutes interview was edited to make Harris appear more coherent. With his characteristic hyperbole, at a rally on 23rd October 2024 Trump said: “I think it’s the biggest scandal in broadcasting history.” Today, CBS released a full transcript of the interview — something that Trump’s lawsuit had called for — which reveals that the Face the Nation clip was the first half of her answer to the question, and the 60 Minutes version was the second half of her answer to the same question.

It’s common practice for TV networks to edit extended interviews for reasons of timing, using different clips and soundbites for various platforms or shows. Nevertheless, The New York Times reported on 30th January that Paramount, CBS’s parent company, was negotiating an out-of-court settlement with Trump. Similarly, ABC News settled a Trump defamation lawsuit in December last year, despite having a strong legal case.

Trump was successfully sued for libel by E. Jean Carroll. However, Trump’s own libel suits — filed previously against Bill Maher, Timothy L. O’Brien, Michael Wolff, Bob Woodward, The New York Times, and CNN — have all been unsuccessful.

Flowers in the Rain:The Untold Story of The Move

Jim McCarthy covers the history of the 1960s psychedelic rock band The Move in his new book Flowers in the Rain: The Untold Story of The Move, including the libel case brought against the band by former UK prime minister Harold Wilson in 1967. To promote their single Flowers in the Rain, the band’s manager Tony Secunda commissioned Neil Smith to draw a caricature of Wilson in bed with his secretary, Marcia Williams, implying that they were having an affair. Secunda sent copies of the drawing on 500 postcards to newspapers, magazines, and radio stations, though the stunt quickly backfired when Wilson sued for defamation. Wilson won the case on 11th October 1967, and was awarded all royalties from the single in perpetuity (which he donated to charity).

Significantly, McCarthy’s book — an exhaustive history of the band — includes an illustration of the postcard, which is perhaps the first time it has appeared in print in more than fifty years. (It was previously reproduced on p. 22 of the very first issue of Rolling Stone, on 9th November 1967.) McCarthy’s book was published in November 2024, and less than two months later, the postcard was also reproduced in The Oldie magazine’s January issue (no. 447, p. 62). Being a US magazine, Rolling Stone wasn’t affected by UK libel law, and as Wilson and Williams are both now deceased, there is no longer a restriction on publication of the postcard in the UK.

Re/Place

Wittawat Tongkeaw’s exhibition Re/Place opened at VS Gallery in Bangkok on 30th January, and runs until 6th April (extended from the original closing date of 30th March). As in the artist’s other recent exhibitions, he uses colours and numbers as coded references to Thai politics. The Re/Place paintings are also a fusion of his earlier landscape paintings and his increasing shift towards geometric abstraction, as each piece is an existing work with new overpainting.

Wittawat has worked consistently with the colour blue, in his 841.594 exhibition and his Imagining Law-abiding Citizens portrait series. (The colour has a symbolic meaning, derived from the Thai flag.) Two paintings in the Re/Place exhibition — Orange and Blue and Blue Dots — depict contrasts between blue and orange, with orange dominating, and orange is the colour of the progressive People’s Party, which called for reform of the lèse-majesté law.

Similarly, Wittawat has painted dramatic sunsets in which blue skies give way to bright orange sunlight, shown at the Mango Art Festival 2024. The Re/Place exhibition features another of these sunset paintings, Fire in the Sky, to which Wittawat has added quotations from monarchy-reform campaigner Arnon Nampa’s letters from prison. He has also added quotes from Arnon’s letters to a second painting, Blue Wave.

One of the works with the most extensive overpainting is Blues Square, which is now entirely blue. In the centre, Wittawat has added a drawing of Arnon by the campaigner’s daughter, a reminder that political prisoners are separated from their families. Wittawat previously painted a portrait of Arnon, Captain Justice (ทนายอานนท์), which had a blue background in reference both to the Thai flag and to the colour’s idiomatic meaning (sadness). That double meaning is repeated in the title Blues Square.

The Blues Square canvas measures 112cm², like Wittawat’s geometric abstraction series shown in the Symphony of Colours group exhibition at M Contemporary in Bangkok last year. Also, the Re/Place catalogue is being sold for ฿112, and these amounts are not coincidental, as lèse-majesté is article 112 of the Thai criminal code.

Another painting in the Re/Place exhibition features a different colour and number: army green and thirteen, both in reference to the thirteen successful military coups in Thai political history. Thirteen Green Lines uses vertical stripes of varying thickness to indicate the relative timespans of each coup.

Nineteen Degree, like Blues Square, has been entirely overpainted: the original portrait underneath has been replaced by an intentionally uncontroversial view of the Champs-Élysées in Paris. Nineteen Degree is displayed in such a way that both the front and back of the canvas can be seen, in a continuation of that painting’s exhibition history.

At a previous exhibition, The L/Royal Monument (นิ/ราษฎร์), Nineteen Degree’s canvas was shown facing the wall, leaving only its reverse on display. (At that time, the portrait had not yet been overpainted with the Parisian scene.) Nineteen Degree is the work’s third title: the original portrait was titled พระเกียรติคุณ กว้างใหญ่ไพศาล (‘his honour spread far and wide’), and at The L/Royal Monument the visible reverse of the canvas was titled The Masterpiece (มาสเตอร์พีซ).

Collapsing Clouds Form Stars

Som Supaparinya’s exhibition Collapsing Clouds Form Stars (ฝุ่นถล่มเป็นดาว) opened on 30th January at Gallery VER in Bangkok. It was originally scheduled to close on 22nd March, though it has now been extended until 26th April. (A catalogue will be published soon, featuring essays by Philippa Lovatt.) The centrepiece, after which the exhibition is named, is an installation of 279 ribbons, each of which contains a quotation from Thai political history.

These quotes include the notorious monk Kittivuddho Bhikku’s justification for the killing of Communists, a comment that set the stage for the 6th October 1976 massacre. Other ribbons feature lyrics by Rap Against Dictatorship, among many other examples. The quotes have also been translated into Morse code, which is played over a PA system for the duration of the exhibition.

The use of Morse code, which renders the quotations unintelligible, echoes an earlier piece of sound art by the same artist, Speeches of the Unheard. For this project, an episode of the podcast series Die Erde Spricht (‘the earth is speaking’), Som used computer software to turn extracts from political speeches into birdsong. The speeches included one given by red-shirt leader Nattawut Saikua on 30th December 2007, and one by Arnon Nampa on 16th September 2020.

The exhibition also includes Banned Books, an installation consisting of five books, banned by previous Thai governments, tightly wrapped in more ribbons. The books are: แลไปข้างหน้า (‘looking into the future’), ด้วยเลือดและชีวิต (‘the one-eyed elephant and the elephant genie’), The Real Face of Thai Feudalism Today (โฉมหน้าศักดินาไทย), นิราศหนองคาย (‘poem of Nong Khai’), and ทรัพย์ศาสตร์ (‘economics’, Thailand’s first textbook on that subject).

The book Dissident Citizen (ราษฎรกำแหง) also used Morse code to conceal a political message. Several previous exhibitions — including The Grandmaster (สนทนากับปรมาจารย์), Derivatives and Integrals (อนุพันธ์ และปริพันธ์), The L/Royal Monument (นิ/ราษฎร์), and Unforgetting History — have also featured banned books. Sarakadee (สำรคดี) magazine (vol. 22, no. 260) published an extensive article on the history of book censorship, and the journal Underground Buleteen (no. 8) printed a list of books banned between 1932 and 1985.

Doc Talk 02Breaking the Cycle

Doc Club’s Doc Talk series of discussions with documentary filmmakers began at Doc Club and Pub last year with a screening of Breaking the Cycle (อำนาจ ศรัทธา อนาคต) and a Q&A with its directors Aekaphong Saransate and Thanakrit Duangmaneeporn. This year, Doc Club launched a new Doc Talk series at Thammasat University, and Doc Talk 02 will also feature Breaking the Cycle, followed by a discussion with Aekaphong.

The film is a fly-on-the-wall account of the Future Forward party, which was dissolved by the Constitutional Court in 2020. It will be screened at Thammasat’s College of Innovation on 21st February, which is the fifth anniversary of the court’s verdict. (Future Forward was founded as a progressive alternative to military dictatorship. The party came third in the 2019 election, after a wave of support for its charismatic leader, Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, though he was disqualified as an MP by the Constitutional Court.)

Breaking the Cycle begins in 2014 with Thanathorn’s determination to end the vicious cycle of military coups that has characterised Thailand’s modern political history. This mission gives the film its title, and Future Forward co-founder Piyabutr Saengkanokkul asks: “Why is Thailand stuck in this cycle of coups?” The documentary benefits from its extensive access to every senior figure within Future Forward. The directors were even able to film Thanathorn as he reacted to the guilty verdicts being delivered by the Constitutional Court.

The film ends with the caption “THE CYCLE CONTINUES”, which is sadly accurate: Future Forward’s successor, Move Forward, was dissolved by the Constitutional Court last year despite winning the 2023 election. The movement’s third incarnation, the People’s Party, will need a landslide victory in the next election to challenge the current pro-military coalition led by Pheu Thai.

Breaking the Cycle went on general release last year. It was later shown at the Thai Film Archive in Salaya, as part of the Lost and Longing (แด่วันคืนที่สูญหาย) season. It was also screened at A.E.Y. Space in Songkla, and at the Bangsaen Film Festival at Burapha University. It was part of the Hits Me Movies... One More Time programme at House Samyan in Bangkok.

The Bibi Files

Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, is on trial for corruption, and videos of his police interviews were leaked to filmmaker Alex Gibney. This footage, filmed in Netanyahu’s office while he was being questioned under caution, is included in Alexis Bloom’s documentary The Bibi Files, which was released last year.

Netanyahu applied for an injunction at the Jerusalem District Court on 9th September 2024, hours before the film was due to be screened at the Toronto International Film Festival in Canada. The injunction was denied, and the screening went ahead, though the film cannot legally be shown in Israel, as Israeli law prohibits the publication of police interview recordings.

The Bibi Files reveals Netanyahu and his wife Sara’s extraordinary sense of entitlement, as they at first deny receiving bribes and later attempt to justify the luxury gifts they were given. The PM is seen performatively banging his fist on his desk, calling prosecution witnesses liars — “What a liar!”, he says at one point, in English — and even quoting The Godfather: “Keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer.”