New Mandala

6 responses so far ↓

• 1 jonfernquest // Feb 11, 2008 at 1:17 pm

  “…48.9 per cent of respondents also see sexual relationships as normal and about personal rights,…”

  This says nothing about “premarital sex” or “popularity.”

  Given that the students are from Assumption, they might be admiring Pope Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae encyclical or perhaps the survey taker was?

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanae_Vitae

  The converse: 51% see sexual relationships as abnormal (?) or coerced (by their parents through marriage?). Should have just given respondents a real life situation and see how they would respont. More meaningful.

• 2 Land of Snarls // Feb 12, 2008 at 2:01 am

  Jonfernquest: ‘Given that the students are from Assumption’ : it doesn’t actually state that. The age is given as 12 to 19, so it’s most unlikely. (No offence intended, I think you may have read it & responded a little hastily. I’m a great fan of your work in Bkk Post - one of the few good things aimed at developing critical thinking, using the media as it should be.)

  I’m surprised, from what I know of Thailand, that the figure is so low. (Perhaps the surveys were made by nuns, & put the kids off.) Less than 50% of glandular youth say they will have it off in what is an extremely promiscuous and predatory society (but only behind the scenes) on a day promoted (thanks to the Yanks, but EAGERLY taken up by the local traders) as a lovefest.

  St V’s Day is very Thai in Thailand. Red roses are given out massively, even indiscriminately, in workplaces and social environments. They are accompanied by SIGNED cards ( a significant departure from the Western tradition, where the idea is to have the recipient guessing who might have sent the bouquet or card)Heterosexual males give roses to their male colleagues and friends, without any implication of sexual attraction - it’s completely acceptable.

  ‘ “It’s worrying because 48.9 per cent of respondents also see sexual relationships as normal and about personal rights,” said Noppadon Kannika of Assumption University….’ Yes, that is a worryingly low figure. And I must congratulate Kh Noppadon for taking this public stance against right-wing Roman Catholic tight-arsedness, since his employers are one of Bkk’s main promoters of Opus Dei.

• 3 HRK // Feb 12, 2008 at 3:18 am

  I find these data highly worrying. It is rather strange that half of the young population find sexual relations not normal! What about other natural activities like eating, sleeping etc.? Is this an indicator for the spreading of psychotic disorders among students? Fortunately, the sample was limited to Bangkok. This might explain quite a few of current dynamics in Bangkok like elections etc. Perhaps the farmers are more down to earth with regards to natural matters even though they voted for PPP.

• 4 Srithanonchai // Feb 12, 2008 at 3:23 pm

  Maybe, the problem lies with “Ajarn” Noppadon and his limited expertise in constructing meaningful questionnaires.

• 5 jonfernquest // Feb 12, 2008 at 5:14 pm

  “And I must congratulate Kh Noppadon for taking this public stance against right-wing Roman Catholic tight-arsedness, since his employers are one of Bkk’s main promoters of Opus Dei.”

  Thanks for that background information which really is more interesting than the survey numbers.

  My gripe is with overuse of surveys. In depth interviews bring out the issues better IMHO.

  Surveys usually raise so many methodological questions themselves, like what people are thinking when they read the questions and what the results actually mean.

  With breakdowns so close to 50% you could almost get the same answer flipping a coin, i.e. respondents might not even be reading the question but instead picking an answer at random like they sometimes obviously do on tests.

  At the university I taught at all you had to do was measure the relative size of the condom section of stores at the foot of campus, with a tape measure for instance (something I thought of doing many times after being surprised by its size), and compare that with the relative size of the paper and pencil section. This seems like pretty hard evidence.

• 6 Land of Snarls // Feb 13, 2008 at 3:30 am

  Frankly, I don’t think these ’surveys’ from Assumption can be taken seriously. One sees reports of them periodically, and the only interesting thing is the (usually) ridiculous interpretation given by the academics, if we can use the term loosely, who design them. As in the current case. I suspect they are part of Assumption’s PR programme, aimed at getting them into the press, & playing on middle-class fears about the disintegration of (the entirely false construction of) Thai morality.

  I saw one about 3 years ago, for instance on ‘gigs.’ It suggested that the average number of gigs per respondent (males & females between the ages of about 14 and 28 ) was 7. A gig is an intimate & affectionate friend who is an alternative to one’s ‘official’ partner. One may have sex with him/her, but not necessarily. Although it is quite usual for one’s other friends to know of the existence of the gig, it is hidden from the partner. All hell breaks loose when a partner finds out. (I once saw a tertiary student pushed into a khlong by his outraged girl-friend over this issue. I was told that she also had a gig or 2.) My colleagues & I felt the figure of 7 was rather excessive, even given that we are constantly amazed at how promiscuous the kids are, when they seem, on the surface, to have such committed relationships.

  The most amazing thing about all this to me is not the degree of promiscuity, which is not limited to the age-group in the ‘gig’ survey. It’s the degree to which middle-class Thai people, vast numbers of whom have gigs & patronise male & female sex workers, ritually pretend to be shocked about such things when they become public, as if they had no idea they were going on. It seems to be all part of the elaborate charade that is social behaviour here. It is indeed fascinating.

  For example, I am looking forward to the new War Against Drugs (already boastfully foreshadowed by the wonderful new PM - he’ll have it sorted in 90 days), when everyone will be pretending that it is not an outrage that the cops, who ‘can do anything’ have gone out and perpetrated their Final Solution on thousands of victims with complete impunity yet again. They will no doubt be pretending, as they are still doing re. the last one, that it couldn’t have been the cops who were going around in hit squads; they were simply criminals, drug dealers, with short haircuts and access to supplies of police-issue ammunition. Well, of course the victims were drug dealers, everyone knows that. Even criminals who are silencing their gang-members make silly mistakes about who their gang-members are, & kill children & lottery-winners who seem to be ‘unusually rich.’And so what if a few of the killers really were police officers - the karmic value of murdering a drug dealer is equivalent to that of squashing a mosquito. A senior magician-monk has said it.

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