search citypaper.net
  

					Also this issue: Eyes Wide -Bruce Schimmel Conglomovision -Bernie Sanders Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor

July 5-11, 2002

pretzel logic

Fit to be Thai-ed

by Howard Altman

By Monday morning, the e-mails from Thailand were streaming in, hundreds and hundreds, most of them angrily protesting the ad for Saint Jack’s bar and restaurant appearing in this newspaper that depicted Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej as a bling-bling hipster.

"Fuck you, your mother, your dad, your wife and all your family with the elephant's cock," wrote one particularly incensed individual.

"FUCK SHERRY LEVIN AND I WISH BIN LADEN BOMB Saint Jack's restaurant," wrote another, referring to the bar's manager.

"I felt sad for your people they died at WTC, now I think Bin Laden has done the right thing," another wrote.

"I will tell you how much bad feeling that Thai people feel," one man explained. "It's like if I dig your beloved parents body from the grave. And I kick them like toys then I drag them through the very long road. Finally, I leave your parent's body for dogs and the dogs might not eat them cuz they are so terrible ... can you take it if it's just my ŒJoke' ha?!"

Not all the missives were quite so eloquent. One contained nothing but the word "fuck" 28,056 times.

Someone claiming to be a member of something called "Pattaya's doctor group" wrote, "I will kill all Americans that enter all hospital in Pattaya." The U.S. Department of State is investigating.

Not all the e-mails were so vitriolic. Many were well-reasoned, urging City Paper and Saint Jack's to reconsider running the ad.

"You may not go to jail or be punished, but you are certainly hated by all Thais who know about this," wrote Araya Gerabun. "We do not hate you because you published the ad, but because you didn't try to understand other people's hearts."

Gerabun's letter summed up the feelings of many: that the United States is arrogant and uncaring.

"Mrs. Sherry Levin and Mr. Howard Altman are totally ignorant," wrote Wichai Hanittinan. "They are disrespecting the cultures of the others and blind to learn the differences. Freedom with consciousness is enlightenment. Freedom with ignorance is absolutely asshole."

It is absolutely amazing how far a chance encounter over a hamburger can go.

About two weeks ago City Paper senior writer Daryl Gale was eating lunch at Saint Jack's when Levin handed him a letter, from Royal Thai Consul General Voravee Wirasamban -- who also sent letters to Gov. Mark Schweiker and Mayor John Street -- complaining about the now-infamous ad. With Gale too busy working on other stories, I volunteered to make the requisite phone calls, which led me to Wirasamban's assistant, Boonsom Watanapanee, who threatened to cut off relations with the U.S. if we didn't stop running the ad and I didn't apologize, in writing, to the king. Her comments came at a time when the Thai-Burma border dispute was heating up because Burma's state-run newspaper had made fun of the Thai monarchy.

Even before my column about the flap was published, I was interviewed by KYW-TV. Then the column was picked up by Jim Romenesko's all-important MediaNews (www.poynter.org/medianews), and pretty soon I was doing interviews with the Philadelphia Daily News, Associated Press, CBS Radio News and the BBC. By Tuesday, the story had appeared in all three of Thailand's major English-language papers, as well as CNN, MSNBC, the London Guardian, Newsday, the New York Post, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, the Las Vegas Sun and even the Inky. On Monday, The Straits Times of Singapore reported that "Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra on Monday joined a chorus of protests" against Saint Jack's. "Mr. Thaksin said that his government has requested the U.S. government's help in having the advertisement withdrawn. But he acknowledged that U.S. laws have little powers to do so."

The Thai prime minister is right about that.

A State Department official, who did not want to be quoted by name, confirmed that the U.S. had received a letter from the Thai government on June 28 -- which the AP characterized as a formal letter of protest. But the official had nothing whatsoever to say about whether the ad should run.

The same holds true for the governor.

"Essentially, what [the governor] said was that he was well aware of the long-standing relationship between the U.S. and the Thai government that has really paid off for Pennsylvania," said Dave LaTorre, Schweiker's spokesman. "He went on to say that his administration had nothing to do with the ad and apologized if His Excellency and the consulate took any umbrage with the advertisement."

Frank Keel, the mayor's spokesman, said Street has been too busy to reply to the Thais.

"The mayor receives thousands of letters a day," Keel said. "It is not that we are disrespecting his concern, but the mayor is trying to do things like procure $75 million in school funding. I am sure he will get to [Wirasamban's letter] soon and address it in some way."

The mayor may not have had time, but Mjenzi Traylor, assistant director of commerce for the city, contacted Levin a few days ago at the behest of the Thai government in an effort to smooth things over, according to Levin.

It may all be moot.

Illustrating how crazy this has become, I received a call from the AP Tuesday morning. Its Bangkok bureau was reporting that the Thai foreign ministry had issued a statement announcing that the ad was no more -- something I already knew from Levin but that hadn't yet been announced in the City Paper.

"The ad hasn't run for a couple of weeks," she said, adding that the controversy hasn't affected her business one way or the other. "I still don't find this offensive. But why antagonize people?"