Slashdot Mirror
Thailand Sues YouTube
eldavojohn writes "Thailand is hitting YouTube with charges of lese majeste (up to 15 years in prison) regarding the recent videos on YouTube showing the king next to feet, something extremely offensive in Thailand. 'Since the first clip, more new videos mocking the king have appeared on YouTube, including pictures of the monarch that had been digitally altered to make him resemble a monkey. Thailand's 79-year-old king, almost universally adored by Thais, is the world's longest-reigning monarch, and one of the few who is still protected by tough laws that prohibit any insult against the royal family.'"
If he's universally adored, then why are people making fun of him on the Internet?
Or is he universally adored in Thailand because it's illegal not to?
(Damn, I wish I could have people thrown in prison for making fun of me on the Internet. Wow.)
I've upped my standards, so up yours.
While there may be laws in Thailand against such pictures, there are none in most of the rest of the world. King or not, you cannot regulate the entire network. Perhaps by law, YouTube must remove such offending pictures in their Thailand based servers, but if anyone, I mean ANYONE thinks they can regulate the entire Internet... they are in for a surprise.
In fact, since this story has come out in the open now, you are sure to see even more pictures of the king in all sorts of not-so-pleasant-for-him ways.
I guess they have to try until they learn....
Queue the viral news stories with funny pictures of the king in 3... 2... 1..
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Get the fuck over it. Seriously.
He is a KING. A KING. He should be able to deal with (oh horror) FEET!. I am aware of the cultural implications (I am friends with a few people from Thailand), but I expect people to be able to get over jackasses giving them the finger. I expect more of a guy who is a king.
The laws are lame. Tough shit Thailand.
They only have a chance of that if YouTube has servers in Thailand
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
Maybe there is a relationship between this universal adoration and the tough laws that prevent Thais from expressing opinions to the contrary.
Prosperity is only an instrument to be used, not a deity to be worshipped. Calvin Coolidge
Imagine this for the British Royals! Teh horror! What would the yellow press do?
... or better off.
No more Duke of Ears jokes, no more Hakenkreuz-Harry, no "why can't Camilla ride a horse" jokes... the world would be poorer
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
A few people post an insult, they show it to their friends, they all get a laugh. You find this horribly offensive, what do you do?
A) While the number aware of the offending material is still few, you can choose to just let it go.
Or...
B) You sue one of the largest Internet entities around, assuring that your embarrassment will achieve far reaching exposure previously impossible. People who don't even know where your country is (i.e. Americans ) will mock you and, if you're real lucky, late night TV hosts will broadcast the images so that even those who don't know YouTube from BoobTube can share in your mortification.
You choose B? Really? Good luck with that.
You assume the law was made to protect the sensitive feelings of Thais. It was probably enacted because of the same stupid reason we have flag burning laws - people are so brainwashed in "patriotism" they don't pause to consider what the law being passed really means to their rights.
I was taught (and it never hurts to repeat this) that the Bill of Rights was written "to protect the minority from the majority". We can be thankful for the Bill of Rights - if we can keep fascists in our goverment (and sadly ignorant supports of same) from whittling them away. The Thai people might consider this, too.
I can appreciate the need to respect other cultures. I wouldn't want someone's stinky feet anywhere near my face, but I don't find it necessarily offensive. However, people need to realize that the rest of the world doesn't necessarily doesn't hold the same beliefs as they do. This should be especially clear when someone is on the internet.
Some group of people may be offended by feet, porkchops, pentagrams or santa claus but they can't possibly expect other people to share these feelings. So to lash out against the rest of the world because a person is incapable of taking something in stride, or at least jumping to another website to me just demonstrates poor coping skills.
If the majority of the world found something offensive and problematic, then I could see justification for having something banned. And actually, if they want to ban this stuff within their own country, well, they're free to do so. But to sue YouTube is ridiculous. And I don't want to find one day that my own freedoms are being limited in an attempt to avoid offending some minority group.
Without question, everyone deserves to be treated fairly. However that equality means that inevitably someone is going to be offended from time to time. It's either this or we start banning anything and everything to ensure no one is offended.
As far as im concerned, they have the right to do that too.
'like' or 'dont like' doesnt come in to play here. Its all about rights, not preferences.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
a. Do the right thing and denounce the law as unfair and unjust, telling your supporters not to be so overzealous, or
b. Silently accept the law, and reap the benefits of being able to "forgive" people for insulting you by pardoning them. Fools think you're a hero for being so generous.
Robbing someone of 15 years of their life and then giving it back isn't generous, it's cruelty. The people are foolish enough to support it, and the king does nothing about it.
"No one likes working in a hamster wheel, and your shop smells of cedar shavings from here." - TaleSpinner
Then you wouldn't mind if someone calls you girlfriend a slut...
Shakespeare poems - infinite monkeys with infinite time.Computer tech support - a few trained ones working from 9 to 5.
What happened to respecting other peoples cultures and religious beliefs anyway?
They are *tolerated* not respected.
This is as it should be.
As in "Wow, you believe in some idiotic shit. Oh well, whatever floats your boat" as opposed to "OMFG you believe in the divinity of the taco?!? I'm never eating at Taco Bell again out of respect for your stupid
Do people think Google officials should be sent to Thailand on extradition the way Australia sent alleged copyright criminals to the United States? Is this the same situation, or is it fundamentally different?
Ok, I am going to respond to this obvious troll because somehow it god modded way up (shame on you mods). Australian law is anagolous to the US law that the extradited suspect was charged under (what he was charged with is illegal in both countries). However, in this case the US has no law even remoltely resembling the Thai law.
Apple meet orange.
People may want to stop and think for a moment. It's not all black and white.
A user on YouTube has created some commentary that has to be the most intelligent thing I've heard on the situation up until now:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vnz7lwh0pCM
parasight.de
must... stay... awake...
Just have all ~5,680 google employees take a day off to thinking about how wrong it was to insult the venerable king his holiness, it amounts to about 15 years of time.
Unless, of course, children might see it - then all bets are off.
Proud neuron in the Slashdot hivemind since 2002.
http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/07/05/07/0144241.shtml
Any different?
And all you need to have your point of view is an ignorance of the facts of the case and a deep seated belief that any government you don't like is a lapdog for Bush.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Could you explain the link again between TFA and childprostitution in Thailand? I know demagogic emo-appeal is always a good way to get attention on slashdot, but going from possible censorship on youtube to your 'people-selling-their-kids' paragraph is somewhat of a stretch.
In fact, it has nothing to do with it.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
I've never been to Thailand, but I have been to Denmark. And in Denmark the Queen is indeed "universally loved" by her subjects. You never hear a bad word about her or the Danish royal family except occasional gossip about who's sleeping with whom.
The difference is that Denmark is a liberal democracy and Thailand is a vicious military dictatorship. And no, it wasn't much of a "democracy" before the coup either. The Queen of Denmark would never consider jailing someone for insulting her, nor would the parliament pass such a law.
The Thai people are simply WRONG, as in immoral or evil. Google/YouTube should not cooperate with Thailand, nor should the US Government.
You have to wonder why a "universally loved king" has need of tough laws to prevent people from insulting him.
Get the fuck over it. Seriously.
The laws are lame. Tough shit Thailand.
No, tough shit *you*. Thailand is enjoying something called sovereignty: the power to rule itself as a country. If they want to make a law banning showing the king next to feet- that's their goddamn right.
If they're happy, then there's no real problem. I'm guessing you're a "fellow" American. I wish people like you would stop giving our country a bad reputation as being full of arrogant, bossy idiots who want to tell everyone how to do things.
Please help metamoderate.
Thailand's 79-year-old king, almost universally adored by Thais...one of the few who is still protected by tough laws that prohibit any insult against the royal family.
Ok, if there are laws that prohibit insults against the royal family (like sending people to jail for 15 years), the king will be universally adored.
No Sigs!
That person uses emotional arguments and then says that freedom of speech is a privilege. Freedom of speech is an inalienable right, not a privilege. Sure, with rights comes responsibility (don't libel, slander, threaten or *physically* endanger someone with your words). Anything short of that is perfectly alright. His other arguments about how great Thailand is or his advice that we should be good representatives of the United States are irrelevant to the question of freedom of speech.