Rape in Thailand: Stop blaming the

victims

By James Austin-By Saksith Saiyasombut & Siam

Voices Apr 17, 2015
The Thai New Year Festival has come to an end, the streets are eerily quiet, and online
news media is mopping up the aftermath of the festivals more negative impact on
society. This year, arguably, was a stand-out out year for official extremism concerning
safety initiatives, with Thai people being exposed to a very long list of crackdowns
relating to: water-squirting weapons, alcohol consumption, dangerous driving, and
improper dances or performances that do not reflect Thai culture.
In terms of crackdown success there was reason to rejoice; the use of water-squirting
weapons that might cause a victim to feel slightly aggravated was down. However, not
surprisingly, there was still a lot of road accidents and deaths, in fact, in spite of the
rigorous crackdowns, this was one of the worst years on record for traffic accidents and
deaths.

In terms of cultural impropriety, most of which concerns how women dress, or dance,
one cannot be sure how to quantify success. Prior to the beginning of the festival, Sin
Suesuan, the Director of the Thailands Moral Promotion Center, had told the Thai
public that women should dress appropriately during Songkran as inappropriate dress
could result in sexual assault. This is reminiscent of General Prayuth Chan-ochas
comments after the murder of David Miller and Hannah Witheridge in Koh Tao, when
he said wearing bikinis might not be safe on Thailands beaches.
We dont know how many rapes occurred during this years festival. We do know that
Samorn Khlangdet, a 33-year-old Thai woman, was brutalized, and murdered, by
someone who police now say is a serial rapist, in Chiang Mai. To accord the abject
violence of this attack, in any nth of a degree, to a womans failings in dressing
appropriately, is obscene. But one would think, given the above statements by Thai
officials, that the victim was partly to blame.

Samorn Khlangdet, the 33-year-old victim of a brutal rape and murder in Chiang Mai
earlier this week. Image via Chiang Mai City News.

Thailands Ministry of Culture criminalized underboob selfies in March, stating that

offenders could face up to five years in prison for an offense. Such acts are seen as unThai behavior, despite a globally renowned status as a country pervaded with illicit
sexual activity, which is open-air and is prevalent in many of the countys tourist
hotspots; or despite the fact that the majority of newspapers and magazines when you
walk into a convenience store are painted with scantily clad women. Sexuality, the
allure of almost naked women, is Thai, as much as it is global. In fact, toplessness in
Thai provinces was the norm until government ministries outlawed it in the early 20th
century, so saying that nakedness, or near nakedness, does not conform with Thai
traditions is hogwash. If anything, its a purist attitude to dress code.
The ministry tried to create a new culture that was more civilised, and attempted to
obliterate the old culture, said Chiang Mai historian ajarn Vithi Phanichphant on the
subject of toplessness and other Thai norms, in an interview with Citylife magazine.
We might ask if women were raped more frequently in the past, or if modesty has
incurred more sexual violence or perhaps, in a more rational light, that rape is a
mans problem, his own unethical deformity, that unfortunately has been obscured
behind a lot of victim blaming.

This banner appeared on the Thai Ministry of Culture website in 2010.

In an interview with Asian Correspondent, feminist and cultural critic Kaewmala said,
The short phrase sexual assault due to inappropriate clothing is so heavily loaded
with so much of why sexual violence continues to be a serious problem in Thai society.
It shows the blame-the-victim attitude is pervasively held, persistent and deep-rooted,
especially among authorities. Despite the modern, sometimes even risque clothing you
see Thai women wear in mainstream media and social media, at the core Thai society
is still very conservative, if at times schizophrenic. Ultimately Thai women are still held
responsible for their own safety, no matter what.
She asks is it, more effective to at least also restrain the perpetrators from unleashing
their primitive instinct? adding, The flip side of telling women to dress modestly to

protect themselves from harassment and rape is telling the potential molesters and
rapists its not their fault when they harass and rape.
Would the perpetrator of the recent rape and murder in Chiang Mai feel some
mitigation concerning his actions after reading the moral authorities extol their
cultural wisdom relating to alleged female impropriety? Do Thai women feel like they
are caught in some kind of trap, a contradictory compliance that at once compels them
to be attractive, sexy, but at the same time tells them being so is un-Thai and runs
them the risk of being assaulted, or even killed?
Men are attracted to women, and on a daily basis most virile men might see someone
who they would like to enjoy a sexual experience with, oftentimes with a woman who is
sexually attractive due to her physicality, or even what she is wearing. But we expect
this, it is healthy, and normal, but to equate this often non-mutual mental, ephemeral
infatuation, to a reason for enacting a despicable violent act that takes away a womans
freedom and her rights to feel safe, is tantamount to justifying it as a byproduct of
social order. In Thailand women are still seen as the problem for a mans perhaps most
unequivocal failing at being good, and acting ethical in spite of his sometimes
impulsive sexual urges. All rape campaigns should be aimed at men, and their failings
to act in a humane way.
Victim blaming is not a phenomenon present only in Thailand, although in Thailand
perpetrators of the said act arguably seem less aware of their wrongdoing; we know
this, because in spite of the tsunami of criticism that follows matters concerned with
victim blaming, it occurs again, and again. Thai officials often seem to endorse not
Thai traditions, but espouse the primitive nature of the beast.
However, the mindset surrounding victim blaming might be more prevalent than we
think, only criticism and activism may compel people in other countries to watch what
they say. Still, the song remains the same outside of Thailand.
This month Sussex Police in the UK made a public apology after releasing anti-rape
advertising campaigns whose main imperative was on women to stay together on
nights out, rather than on men not succumbing to inhumane acts of sexual violence. In
the same week an anti-rape campaign focused on victim-blaming, This Doesnt Mean
Yes, asked to stop blaming the victims. In an article in the London Evening Standard,
Dr Fiona Vera Gray of the charity, Rape Crisis, which supports the campaign said, We
want to live in a world where perpetrators of rape and sexual assault are held entirely
responsible for their actions, and survivors are believed and supported. A world where
everybody seeks active, embodied and enthusiastic consent as the minimum, and
respects the human rights of women to bodily autonomy and freedom.

This statement, if something similar were released by Thailands officials, or the moral
authority guardians of Thai society, would be a start in accepting how rape has been so
terribly been misjudged in Thailand. It might even prevent Thai soap operas, that are
religiously watched in almost every household from the Bangkok slums to villages
wedged on mountain slopes in the north, to realize that rape victims, in the real
world, dont fall in love with the ones that caused them damage. Where rape in is
concerned, Thailand is due a massive paradigm shift.
RELATED: In Thailand, collective responsibility is the best tribute to rape victims
About the author:
James Austin is a journalist and fiction writer living in Thailand.
Posted by Thavam