Hey everyone. Today is part 2 of my bio on the Royal Thai Police. Last time we talked about the pros of the Thai Police. If you haven’t read part 1, then I suggest going back to check it out first before continuing on with part 2. As I said in part 1, as a liberty-lover and voluntaryist/agorist, I am not a fan of cops anywhere in the world, but some are worse to live with than others. I am mostly comparing the Thai police to American police because that is what I have had personal experience with. I went over some of the reasons I think Thai police are easier to live with in part 1, but here are a few of the many bad things about Thai police, and really all police in general. Enjoy!
Cons
1.) They are cops. There is nearly nothing as loathsome as a cop. Governments could do no oppressing without their order followers. People tend to focus on the Hitlers and Stalins and Maos. Yeah, they are all pieces of human shit, but they could not have done anything without their order followers. Thai police are no different. They do the dirty work of the ruling class, and harass, steal-from, coerce, kidnap, and murder people for mostly victim-less crimes. I think this quote by Larken Rose sums it up best for me.
2.) You aren’t getting your stolen shit back. There are really only a few real crimes, and those include theft, rape, assault, and murder. Besides those four, and maybe some variations of them, everything else is a victim-less “crime”. Thai police are not very good at rectifying or solving real crimes, especially if the guilty person has money. They won’t find your stolen ipad. They won’t charge the person who attacked you with assault, even if they find them, especially if that person is in any position within the government or has a lot of money. If you are murdered by a poor person they might actually do something, or if a story goes viral and is embarrassing for them, but otherwise they will make a bit of a show of effort without actually doing anything.
3.) They scapegoat to save face. There have been multiple cases in the last couple of years where either the Thai cops couldn’t solve a murder or another actual crime with a victim, or they knew who did it, but the guilty person was rich or important in the mafia or government, same thing really. In these kinds of situations the Thai police tend to find a poor person, usually an immigrant from Burma or Cambodia, to charge with the crime. A recent example on the island of Koh Tao really showcases this quality of the Thai police. You can read about this story in greater detail here, but long story short, 2 British backpackers were brutally murdered and their bodies were left on a secluded beach on the island of Koh Tao. After an “investigation” the police brought in two young Burmese men and found them guilty of the crime. Nearly every person, Thai or foreign, that I have spoken to doesn’t believe these men are guilty of the crime, but in order to save face from embarrassment and make it look as if they are doing their job the Thai police brought in these men because they knew they would be easy marks as they were poor and here illegally. These two innocent men lost the appeal as well and are supposed to receive capital punishment. Do not expect justice in Thailand.
Here are the two men being paraded around for a photo op. Everything is a show in Thailand.
4.) They are openly corrupt. Now I know I kind of put this as a positive on my previous post, but that was really only in regards to me own life because I don’t commit any real crimes that harm other human-beings. The only “crimes” I am “guilty” of are victim-less crimes like driving without a license or without a helmet, but in Thailand these are not the only “crimes” that you can buy your way out of. Another very recent case shows the truth of this. The heir to Red Bull, Vorayuth "Boss" Yoovidhya, hit and killed a cop with his car and ran. He is now out of the country, but the accident happened back in 2012. The Thai police had plenty of time before he left the country to bring him in, but surprise surprise, they did not. Had the person involved in the hit-and-run death of a Thai cop been you or me or a person not worth billions, we would probably have received a Clinton-style “suicide”. They have since issued a warrant for his arrest and revoked his passport, but the man is a billionaire and already out of the country, he isn’t coming back to face the charges and the police know it. The warrant and the revoking of the passport are hollow gestures just to placate public sentiment. Personally, I could care less about the death of a cop. Karma is a bitch. When your career is based on punishing, robbing, harassing, kidnapping, and murdering peaceful people for mostly victim-less crimes for the state and to enrich yourself using your monopoly on power, your life is not worth much in my book, but it does bother me that had that been me or any other person worth less monetarily killing that cop, we would be fucked.
The scene of the crash.
This is the only repercussion that he received. A little Wai and then you are on your way. Different set of rules for the rich in Thailand.
I’m going to wrap up this post now. I could go on pretty much all day talking about the reason cops are bad, but I am going to limit it to just the ones listed above. I will also note that I do prefer the Thai police over the police in my own country, America. The major reason for this that the Thai police do mostly leave you the hell alone, as mentioned in part 1. They aren’t gung ho like American cops, who want to be involved in every aspect of our lives and try to dominate and escalate every altercation they insert themselves into. You are also much much less likely to be murdered by a Thai cop than an American cop. As has been obvious since the proliferation of video recordings of police encounters the last few years thanks to smart phones. Thank you all for reading. I hope you have a better idea of what the Thai police are like and how they compare to police in America and other police forces around the world. I’ll be continuing my series of posts about life in Thailand next time. Let me know what you think in the comments and if you found this informative, upvotes are much appreciated. Until next time!