SO I WAS TAKING A BREAK FROM STUDYING AND GOOGLE SAWAN BIENG AND YEAH CAME UPON THIS ARTICLE... THOUGHT I SHARE IT WITH EVERYONE
Rape is a war crime, according to the Geneva Convention. It cannot be used as a weapon during war. Moreover, using rape as conduct to dilute the purity of an opposing nation or ethnic group during wartime is considered a crime against humanity.
Further - if it needs to be mentioned again - rape is a crime punishable with lengthy prison sentences in a court of law in this country.
Yet this criminal act seems to be legal and accepted in the country's most popular night-time TV soap operas. This perpetuation of an inhumane act must end and only the main television networks have the power to do it.
Here the author makes a specific call to Channel 3 and Channel 7 to terminate any future soap dramas containing plot lines that justify rape. The script writers of our television dramas are better than this. They can do more than recycle old storylines written in a backward time when apparently, and unfortunately, men were seen as superior to women and invincible to the application of the law.
I am not going to lie and tell you that I don't enjoy the verbal spat between Teeradej Wongpuapan (Ken) and Ann Thongprasom (Ann) on screen. The exchanges are dramatic and the scenes are excitingly heated every Wednesday and Thursday evening on Channel 3. The lead character is the troubled son of a rich businessman who apparently has not been brought up properly. The father's role is especially craftily acted by veteran actor Dilok Tongwattana. The self-obsessed son attempts to gain the attention of his multi-time married father while trying his best, for the major part of the series, to make his father's new wife jealous of his increasingly intense relationship with the lead female character played by Ann. The plot of Sawan Bieng (Heaven Unwilling) is an old one. It is normal practice among TV drama production companies to recycle famous though perennially used screenplays, with a bit of adaptation.
All that is fine and these soaps draw huge ratings. The drama of Sawan Bieng, however, in the end becomes based on a love that is spawned by the sexual violence between the lead male and female characters. Ken vengefully rapes Ann to get back at her sister who happens to be his dad's new wife. Still, as time passes, Ann falls in love with Ken. He is not prosecuted for his criminal invasion of another person's sexual inviolateness. Worse, soon afterwards he gets away with the act by having the victim come to terms, to "appreciate" what has been done to her. She effectively falls for him as a ridiculous "logical consequence" of the sexual violence perpetrated on her. Such is the storyline of the country's most popular TV drama series at the moment.
The other one, on Channel 7, is about slavery during the latter years of King Rama V's reign. And, guess what, a slave girl's falling in love with her master is the central premise of this very popular remake. It is great that Nang Thas (Female Slave) does not necessarily justify rape; it however posits the possibility of a slave being able to come to "appreciate" her being owned and then being impregnated.
Reflecting on other popular soaps where rape was central to the plot, one would of the top of his head mention Jamleuy Rak (Prisoner of Love). The title already implies that the female lead is so in love with the male lead that she is willing to be treated like a slave by the guy. If you have ever seen this long-time favourite of Thai audiences, the female lead actually, over time, falls in love with the male lead even though he repeatedly rapes her.
Jamleuy Rak not only condones rape; it rationalises the Stockholm Syndrome by arguing that it is appropriate for a victim to fall in love with her captor.
For these to be the highest-rated and most talked-about evening series in this country is for us to accept that our culture enjoys sexual violence and hierarchical dominance over women. This is something I don't think I or the people of this country should accept.
Enough is enough. It is time for a change. Change in this sense does not have to be time-requiring. The entertainment industry is packed with talented writers who can put together some of the most socially-adaptive, humanely-appropriate, as well as mass audience-acceptable screenplays. Why rehash ancient scripts from recycled plots which have all been used before? Why not have storylines that move along with a culture that presumably progresses?
Some say art imitates life, but what if - just what if - life in practice actually imitates art? We, as people working in the media and entertainment industry, owe it to our culturally advancing society to influence the Thai nation in the best ways possible.
There is no conceivable way to comprehend a boy growing up watching his favourite soap and all the while learning from that drama that the best way to get a girl is to hold her captive and rape her. If these soaps don't change, boys will grow up to become men who think and act like the lead characters in Sawan Bieng and Jamleuy Rak.
Moreover, what is a young girl supposed to learn from seeing the female lead in these soaps getting victimised and not taking action to defend herself?
We cannot make rape justifiable by saying that as long as he "loves" her or is willing to "take care" of her everything will come to a fine, agreeable ending.
This is not, as they say, a matter of ruang len len, things that aren't serious. This certainly is not about being overzealous. This is about pre-setting socially relevant values for future generations. If rape is allowed to be justifiable on screen, over the course of time it will become justifiable in real life - if that is not the case already.
The writer is a news analyst.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/240408_News/24Apr2008_news20.php
Rape is a war crime, according to the Geneva Convention. It cannot be used as a weapon during war. Moreover, using rape as conduct to dilute the purity of an opposing nation or ethnic group during wartime is considered a crime against humanity.
Further - if it needs to be mentioned again - rape is a crime punishable with lengthy prison sentences in a court of law in this country.
Yet this criminal act seems to be legal and accepted in the country's most popular night-time TV soap operas. This perpetuation of an inhumane act must end and only the main television networks have the power to do it.
Here the author makes a specific call to Channel 3 and Channel 7 to terminate any future soap dramas containing plot lines that justify rape. The script writers of our television dramas are better than this. They can do more than recycle old storylines written in a backward time when apparently, and unfortunately, men were seen as superior to women and invincible to the application of the law.
I am not going to lie and tell you that I don't enjoy the verbal spat between Teeradej Wongpuapan (Ken) and Ann Thongprasom (Ann) on screen. The exchanges are dramatic and the scenes are excitingly heated every Wednesday and Thursday evening on Channel 3. The lead character is the troubled son of a rich businessman who apparently has not been brought up properly. The father's role is especially craftily acted by veteran actor Dilok Tongwattana. The self-obsessed son attempts to gain the attention of his multi-time married father while trying his best, for the major part of the series, to make his father's new wife jealous of his increasingly intense relationship with the lead female character played by Ann. The plot of Sawan Bieng (Heaven Unwilling) is an old one. It is normal practice among TV drama production companies to recycle famous though perennially used screenplays, with a bit of adaptation.
All that is fine and these soaps draw huge ratings. The drama of Sawan Bieng, however, in the end becomes based on a love that is spawned by the sexual violence between the lead male and female characters. Ken vengefully rapes Ann to get back at her sister who happens to be his dad's new wife. Still, as time passes, Ann falls in love with Ken. He is not prosecuted for his criminal invasion of another person's sexual inviolateness. Worse, soon afterwards he gets away with the act by having the victim come to terms, to "appreciate" what has been done to her. She effectively falls for him as a ridiculous "logical consequence" of the sexual violence perpetrated on her. Such is the storyline of the country's most popular TV drama series at the moment.
The other one, on Channel 7, is about slavery during the latter years of King Rama V's reign. And, guess what, a slave girl's falling in love with her master is the central premise of this very popular remake. It is great that Nang Thas (Female Slave) does not necessarily justify rape; it however posits the possibility of a slave being able to come to "appreciate" her being owned and then being impregnated.
Reflecting on other popular soaps where rape was central to the plot, one would of the top of his head mention Jamleuy Rak (Prisoner of Love). The title already implies that the female lead is so in love with the male lead that she is willing to be treated like a slave by the guy. If you have ever seen this long-time favourite of Thai audiences, the female lead actually, over time, falls in love with the male lead even though he repeatedly rapes her.
Jamleuy Rak not only condones rape; it rationalises the Stockholm Syndrome by arguing that it is appropriate for a victim to fall in love with her captor.
For these to be the highest-rated and most talked-about evening series in this country is for us to accept that our culture enjoys sexual violence and hierarchical dominance over women. This is something I don't think I or the people of this country should accept.
Enough is enough. It is time for a change. Change in this sense does not have to be time-requiring. The entertainment industry is packed with talented writers who can put together some of the most socially-adaptive, humanely-appropriate, as well as mass audience-acceptable screenplays. Why rehash ancient scripts from recycled plots which have all been used before? Why not have storylines that move along with a culture that presumably progresses?
Some say art imitates life, but what if - just what if - life in practice actually imitates art? We, as people working in the media and entertainment industry, owe it to our culturally advancing society to influence the Thai nation in the best ways possible.
There is no conceivable way to comprehend a boy growing up watching his favourite soap and all the while learning from that drama that the best way to get a girl is to hold her captive and rape her. If these soaps don't change, boys will grow up to become men who think and act like the lead characters in Sawan Bieng and Jamleuy Rak.
Moreover, what is a young girl supposed to learn from seeing the female lead in these soaps getting victimised and not taking action to defend herself?
We cannot make rape justifiable by saying that as long as he "loves" her or is willing to "take care" of her everything will come to a fine, agreeable ending.
This is not, as they say, a matter of ruang len len, things that aren't serious. This certainly is not about being overzealous. This is about pre-setting socially relevant values for future generations. If rape is allowed to be justifiable on screen, over the course of time it will become justifiable in real life - if that is not the case already.
The writer is a news analyst.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/240408_News/24Apr2008_news20.php
