‘Status-conscious, arrogant, greedy, dishonest and uncaring‘ – that sounds like my fellow countrymen, and I’m not Thai.
(I’m sure if my fellow countrymen were asked, many would agree about the population generally, though few would admit they have those traits personally – I will admit to personally being all five at various different times, but think only one applies to me all the time)

They also describe humans generally, Thai’s are human, so what’s the point?

‘…yet Thais stereotype Indians as dishonest, Laotians as being stupid‘

In that one sentence you have shown how sterotyping nations is what’s really stupid.

There is no point singling out Thais if everyone possesses the same attributes is there? Thailand has plenty of flaws, but I am not sure who you think you are that you can pass judgement over a large swathe of the Thai population.

For all your talk rationality its evident you possess very little when assessing Thailand and its people.

I will let you wrestle with what I meant with the veil for ignorance observation, I think its pretty self evident myself. If you wish to be pedantic about the way I have phrased the statement then may point out I did not said that stereotyping is a substitute for ignorance, nor should it be. Which is in fact what I implied in my observation. So I cannot see the point of your little word game.

Personally I think you owe Joy an apology, I cant see anything silly about what she said and how she said it, but I see much silliness on your part.

If a person makes silly comments, it is pointless to say they have previously made some intelligent ones. No? Otherwise one is simply being personal.

@Longway:
It is you that miss the point that the attributes *do* describe Thais. If they describe others as well, then fine but that does not invalidate the points I made about Thais.

A defence in court that a robber is less culpable just because there are other robbers would probably not carry much weight. Rightly.

“Stereotyping is just a veil for ignorance.” What does this mean? In linguistics it is called a nominalisation – usually used to appeal to emotions where the rational case is weak.

“[ignorance] serves a purpose in many situations.” Really? Perhaps it does in Thailand.

@Hobby: Please see above.

Simon

Tom: Are you suggesting those characteristics are exclusively Thai?

I would be interested to hear your stereotype(statistics) for a few other countries – lets start with each SE Asian country, as well as USA, UK, Australia & China.
After that is done, why not move on to each European country individually, then Africa and the Latin American countries.

Will any of those 5 traits will be repeated?

The traits you describe are especially obvious in developing countries, as there is a lack of education and maturity and the rule of law is usually very lax,

I find Thailand fairly middling in terms of its greed, corruption and vindictiveness on a global footing.

Stereotyping is just a veil for ignorance, it serves a purpose in many situations, but there is nothing particuarly clever nor attractive (though it can be funny in the right circumstances) about using this ugly episode as an opportunity to vent your hatred.

I see you and OAH in the same light as I would see any Thai resorting to lazy stereotypes to pass high handed judgements about a peoples’ worth: Very childish.

If I am reading your posts correctly you seem to be saying:

1. Nations cannot be stereotyped. And yet Thais stereotype Indians as dishonest, Laotians as being stupid (not without its irony really), and, it seems, Rohingyans as being fair game for being towed out to sea and left to die. It does seem that you people do it so often yourselves and yet when you are the target of justified stereotypes you complain bitterly; one of the less attractive traits of Thais. You might like to reflect on what exactly makes a stereotype. In many cases, it is simply an aggregate of people having similar experiences. Better to change the experiences if you wish to change the reputation you have. Did you seriously never hear of the 5 Ki’s that Thais use to describe their own people? Ki-ooat (boastful), Ki-kong (cheating), Ki-kiat (lazy), Ki-itcha (covetous) and Li-lohp (grasping). This is what Thai culture says about Thais.

2. But you then go on to say that there is some truth in it all. Does the expression “you want to have your cake and eat it” mean anything at all to you? Or is it that you just want to pick and choose which bits are acceptable to your self-image?

3. You go on to repeat the oft-told fiction that foreigners don’t understand the complexity of Thai society and politics. It is true that many Thais like to see themselves as having a complex cultural system and an equally complex and inscrutable political system, but I have bad news for you. There is nothing particularly complex about Thai culture and politics. The culture is based on fear and a feudal class system, and the politics are based on corruption, vendettas and greed. Have a look at your own newspapers and see the way your politicians, bureaucrats, judiciary, armed forces and police behave and then see if you get any inkling as to why stereotypes of Thais exist. What’s not to understand?

I could certainly debate with you on this but instead I will give you a link to some extracts of a paper by a Thai psychologist who does much better than I could ever do in describing at length what I for one believe are the many issues that Thais have to address before they will be taken seriously in mature company. I am sure that reading it carefully will make you a much better commentator on Thai character – perhaps a little more objective and a little less emotional as well. I believe you will find ample evidence in there to support the perceptions of posters in here that Thais are status-conscious, arrogant, greedy, dishonest and uncaring of those in lower social strata. Nicely supported and documented by one of your own people.

http://studyinthailand.org/study_abroad_thailand_university/Thai_society_values.html

Oh, and by the way, there is often very little difference between stereotypes and statistics. In practice, stereotypes are just statistics we don’t like very much and want to ignore.

Tom