Doc67 wrote: ↑Wed Aug 12, 2020 10:07 am There are some very brave people speaking out, I am full of admiration for their courage.

Username Taken wrote: ↑Wed Aug 12, 2020 1:43 pm How it will play out, I expect, is with the military firing upon unarmed student protestors. Isn't that the way Thailand always deals with these things.

Thai protesters have broken a long-standing taboo, risking lengthy jail terms to criticise the king, after weeks of student-led pro-democracy rallies that have swept across the country.

Over recent weeks, high school and university students have targeted the government of prime minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha, calling for its dissolution and for democratic reforms. Now, some protesters have begun openly criticising the country’s wealthy and powerful monarchy.

......Matthew Wheeler, a senior analyst for the International Crisis Group, said the protest movement had now “crossed the Rubicon”.

The government is in a difficult position, he added, because any move to quash protests could lead to “a backlash that intensifies debate about the role of the monarchy and erodes the legitimacy of the government”.

There was also a risk of vigilantism and violence against activists, added Wheeler.

hunter8 wrote: ↑Wed Aug 12, 2020 3:27 pm Pure comedy of how all this was triggered by a flu. But Thais are a lazy bunch: I expected something like this to start happening three months earlier. I guess it’s buddhism. The difference to before is now they can upload videos for the world to see and everyone is a reporter. Until they cut off internet.

The protests were initially triggered by the dissolution of the pro-democracy Future Forward Party (FFP) in late February 2020. The protests were held exclusively in academia grounds and were brought to a halt by the COVID-19 pandemic due to academia shutdown order. The protests erupted again on 18 July as a demonstration organized under Free Youth (Thai: เยาวชนปลดแอก; RTGS: yaowachon plot aek) at the Democracy Monument in Bangkok, gathering approximately 2,500 protesters. Three demands were given to the government: the resignation of the cabinet, the dissolution of parliament, and drafting of a new constitution. The July protests were triggered by the impact of COVID-19 pandemic and enforcement of the Emergency Decree.

BANGKOK -- Student protests have been growing in Bangkok with demonstrators openly calling for a change of government, a proper debate on the role of the monarchy and constitutional reforms. There have also recently been smaller protests in over 45 of the kingdom's 76 provinces.

Following a demonstration on Monday at Thammasat University, students had planned to stage an afternoon protest in Lumpini Park in the heart of Bangkok on Wednesday -- a public holiday marking Queen Mother Sirikit's birthday that is celebrated nationally as Mother's Day.

The event was called off the night before, organizers implied to deny suspected fifth-columnists an opportunity to cause disruption.

An even bigger protest is, however, planned for Sunday at Democracy Monument near the administrative heart of the capital.