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It's ugly but it's not "incomprehensible". They got a monarchy. That means something. The monarchy serves as a kind of sacred cultural identity and attacking t

It's ugly but it's not "incomprehensible". They got a monarchy. That means something. The monarchy serves as a kind of sacred cultural identity and attacking the monarchy is like attacking the society itself. Places like England have more evolved monarchies, where saying something against royals won't land someone in jail, but the same sentiment is there. The only way to "dismantle it" is to wait and do it in steps over generations. Even Thailand is doing that now. The royals are largely symbolic and don't exercise direct political power. But there's still a strong cultural attachment.

JRGC 6y ago
the new king is not his father
xenocratus 6y ago
> Even Thailand is doing that now. The royals are largely symbolic and don't exercise direct political power. But there's still a strong cultural attachment. Don't know how biased the Economist is on this, but they've had a number of articles talking about the increasing role of the current king. An example is linked below. https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king-seeks-to-bring-back-absolute-monarchy https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king... https://web.archive.org/web/20210103234100if_/https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king-seeks-to-bring-back-absolute-monarchy https://web.archive.org/web/20210103234100if_/https://www.ec...
- notahacker 6y ago
  Thailand has been technically a constitutional monarchy like the UK since 1932. But the constitutional role of a monarch is a lot bigger in a country which has had more coups than most countries have had elections in the time period since, and everyone involved has tried to claim their legitimacy comes from the monarch
iguy 6y ago
It sounds more like they have a military government, who claim to act in the name of a king. And hence claim that any criticism of them is criticism of him. Against which there are both strong laws (even if these were seldom applied so strongly before?) and a cultural taboo (which otherwise a general appointing himself leader would not command).
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
> Places like England have more evolved monarchies, where saying something against royals won't land someone in jail ... anymore. The last prosecution for that was in 1715 apparently. But it was illegal and probably still is; see also "Sedition". In a lot of countries, Lèse-majesté has only been scrapped from laws in fairly recent history (in part because it conflicts with the freedom of speech / expression codified in a lot of constitutions): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se-majest%C3%A9 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se-majest%C3%A9

JRGC 6y ago

the new king is not his father

xenocratus 6y ago

> Even Thailand is doing that now. The royals are largely symbolic and don't exercise direct political power. But there's still a strong cultural attachment. Don't know how biased the Economist is on this, but they've had a number of articles talking about the increasing role of the current king. An example is linked below. https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king-seeks-to-bring-back-absolute-monarchy https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king... https://web.archive.org/web/20210103234100if_/https://www.economist.com/briefing/2020/10/14/thailands-king-seeks-to-bring-back-absolute-monarchy https://web.archive.org/web/20210103234100if_/https://www.ec...

notahacker 6y ago
Thailand has been technically a constitutional monarchy like the UK since 1932. But the constitutional role of a monarch is a lot bigger in a country which has had more coups than most countries have had elections in the time period since, and everyone involved has tried to claim their legitimacy comes from the monarch

iguy 6y ago

It sounds more like they have a military government, who claim to act in the name of a king. And hence claim that any criticism of them is criticism of him. Against which there are both strong laws (even if these were seldom applied so strongly before?) and a cultural taboo (which otherwise a general appointing himself leader would not command).

Cthulhu_ 6y ago

> Places like England have more evolved monarchies, where saying something against royals won't land someone in jail ... anymore. The last prosecution for that was in 1715 apparently. But it was illegal and probably still is; see also "Sedition". In a lot of countries, Lèse-majesté has only been scrapped from laws in fairly recent history (in part because it conflicts with the freedom of speech / expression codified in a lot of constitutions): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se-majest%C3%A9 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A8se-majest%C3%A9