Red shirt rally in Bangkok
The entire Rajprasong Intersection turned red Saturday afternoon with thousands of red-shirt people occupying the roads to commemorate two years after the killings of their peers by troops.
The red-shirt people started blocking the Rajprasong Intersection since 5 am to set up a stage facing the Rajdamri Road towards Pratunam area.
By 9 am, they started occupying the Rajdamri Road in front of the stage. By noon, the entire Rajdamri Road in front of CentralWorld shopping mall was occupied up to the Pratunam Intersection.
The two roadsides were also occupied with vendors selling foods, drinks and souvenirs, which are political symbols.
Police have been deployed to keep security around the rally site with no violent incident reported so far. (Nation)
Bangkok Pet Expo
I went to the Bangkok Pet Expo today. It's been running for most of the week and it finishes tomorrow. It was pretty cool. As you can probably imagine, there were loads of cute animals. There were big dogs, small dogs, dogs that looked like Lassie, dogs that looked like Beethoven; there were fluffy cats and tiny hedgehogs, colourful birds and humungous rabbits.
It looked like a nightmare for the cleaners as the dogs generally went about their business on the carpets. Other than that, it was a good show. I had fun.
Memories
Rest in peace, Donna Summer.
The day the Internet smacked Manny Pacquiao
The Internet came alive this week as stories began to circulate about Manny Pacquiao saying gay men should be "put to death". The news was all over Twitter as fans and detractors of the Pacman voiced their disgust at the Filipino boxer's outrageous views.
It all started with a story about Pacquiao on Examiner.com, which quoted the boxer as saying things like, "God only expects man and woman to be together and to be legally married, only if they so are in love with each other." But it was this curious paragraph that delivered what many thought would be the knockout blow to Pacquiao's public image:
Pacquiao's directive for Obama calls societies to fear God and not to promote sin, inclusive of same-sex marriage and cohabitation, notwithstanding what Leviticus 20:13 has been pointing all along: “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.”
The passage was in quote marks and slap bang in the middle of the story. It looked like Pacquiao had quoted a passage from the Bible to support his views and USA Today was quick to tie up its gloves and come out swinging:
Pacquiao… invoked Old Testament, and recited Leviticus 20:13, saying: "If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads."
Then yesterday, Dennis Romero from LA Weekly had a pop in a blog post:
Manny Pacquiao, who lives and trains in Los Angeles, is probably in deep shit in this liberal city of brotherly love.
That's because the boxing champion said that gay men "must be put to death."
Today, the author of the Examiner article, Granville Ampong, clarified what Pacquiao said, or didn't say, as the case turned out to be:
In his article, Weir (USA Today) said "Pacquiao also invoked Old Testament, and recited Leviticus 20:13… That, Pacquiao never said nor recited, nor invoked and nor did he ever refer to such context.
Global Post journo Patrick Winn summed up the fallout:
Given that Pacquiao is an elected Philippine official, as well as a lieutenant colonel in the US-allied Philippine Army, his convictions merit more scrutiny than most wayward statements spilling out of athletes' mouths.
Also deserving of scrutiny? Overeager journalists and online echo chambers.
If Ampong's writing was sloppy. Weir's and Romero's was shambolic.
Ben Anderson at the FCCT
I'm a little bit excited. Benedict Anderson, whose work formed a large part of my postgrad studies at SOAS last year, will be speaking in Bangkok at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand (FCCT) on June 7. "Rhetoric and Dissent: Where to next for Thailand's lèse majesté law?" will likely be as rowdy and packed a house as I've ever seen at the FCCT, but I'm excited to hear what Anderson has to say.
Also speaking will be David Streckfuss, Nation journo Pravit Rojanaphruk and some guy called Andrew Marshall, whose appearance via Skype we may never hear the end of. We have Lisa Gardener to thank for putting the event together.
Be there or be square.
