October 6, 1976: The Thammasaat University massacre
'Anatomy of Time' a Thai drama about love and horror
In the Thai drama 'Anatomy of Time', director Jakrawal Nilthamrong intertwines love with horror. Showing moments from the past and present non-chronologically, the film opens with a serene yet shocking scene of an old woman cutting a bullet out of a dead man's leg.
Jit Phumisak, poet, intellectual and revolutionary
Jit Phumisak (Thai: จิตร ภูมิศักดิ์, pronounced chit phoe:míesàk, also known as Chit Phumisak) graduated from the Faculty of Art, Chulalongkorn University and soon joined the Communist Party. He was a writer and poet who, like many, fled to the jungle to escape persecution. On May 5, 1966, he was arrested in Ban Nong Kung, near Sakon Nakhorn, and immediately executed.
The fight against communism in Thailand between the years 1949 and 1980 was accompanied by many human rights violations, executions, killings, prison sentences and exiles. A shining and little known example is the 'Red Drum' murders in Phatthalung (southern Thailand) where an estimated 3.000 people were gruesomely killed. That is what this story by Tino Kuis is about.
'The song of the falcon', a short story by Makut Onrüdi
The falcon does not belong in a cage; the son not in the army. The 70s remind us of Thammasat, communists and murders. A protest story.
The phuyaibaan is afraid of communists. But it is still used today to frighten the Thai people.
Help, communists! How about that?
Last December 7, the pro-democracy group Free Youth unveiled a new logo: Restart Thailand. The image was a red background with stylistically the letters RT on it. This immediately caused quite a stir, the design looked suspiciously like a hammer and sickle. In short: communism!
Karl Marx and the Buddha, how radical Thai thinkers try to reconcile both views. Radical Thai thinkers were not averse to Marxist ideas, while most did not want to abandon Buddhism. How did they manage that? A brief consideration.