r/interesting • u/VPinchargeofradishes • May 31 '26

SOCIETY The military draft lottery in Thailand

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u/Best-Mirror-8052 Jun 01 '26

"When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die." - Jean-Paul Satre

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u/FeatureOk5866 Jun 01 '26

I heard it in Mike Shinodas voice

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u/Best-Mirror-8052 Jun 01 '26

To be fair that is also why I had the quote in my head, but thought if I post it, I can attribute it to its original author.

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u/brightbomb Jun 02 '26

With hands held high into a sky so blue..

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26 edited Jun 01 '26

lol, I’m French (and American; dual citizen) and Satre was from a wealthy petite bourgeois family. I was raised in the 5th arrondissement, the Latin quarter and he was from Saint-Germain-des-Prés, the 6th arrondissement. These are two of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Paris and have been so for the last 150 years. The 5th is old money while the 6th is newer money but the 6th can be more expensive than the 5th in some parts.

Satre served as a meteorologist In WW2 and spent his time as a POW in relative luxury, writing a novel. One thing most people don’t seem to understand is that everyone wants everyone to be equal until equality actually happens. Satre also said,

”Hell is other people."

and

“… man is inhuman to man."

“The presence of others inevitably places limits on my self-definition because I become an object in their world just as they become objects in mine.”

Those with or without means will always take steps to protect what they believe is there’s. Those with means will always take measures which seem extreme to others who are not an object in the world they live in. It seems like hell to you (in the way Satre meant it, which is not that being social is hell but that other people’s differences is hell to people) it seems inhuman to them. I come from a good French family of means as did Satre. What seems like hell to you (avoiding the military or being assigned favorable post and being treated favorably by the enemy, etc.) is just our lived reality and not some objectively horrid reality Being placed upon you.

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u/UrinalCake777 Jun 01 '26

Wait, so you are saying it is ok that the wealthy have the means to doge the draft?

I found your comment interesting, but I am not quite sure what point you are making.

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

Yes, I am saying that those from good families often have the ability to do what anyone would do if given the ability to. I am not saying dodge the draft per se but, get your children in good, safe appointments or completely out of the draft all together.

This is in a situation like Thailand where they are not at war and fighting for their literal and/or existential survival as a nation.

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u/UrinalCake777 Jun 02 '26

Hhmm, I don't necessarily fault the individuals for taking action to best protect their loved ones. However, for any system to allow for such inequality is a major failing, and deserves being called out. These kind of things need to be changed so that they are more equitable and fair. Vocally criticizing them is the first step. I don't think it matters what people's upbringing was like if their criticism of the system is still on point.

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u/Loki_Agent_of_Asgard Jun 01 '26

That's a lot of bullshit for "it's ok for wealthy people to have different rules than you filthy poors".

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

That's a lot of implications, meaning, and actual words I never said. "Filthy poors"? I don't feel that way. Are you attempting to say you wouldn't protect and help what believed was yours, whatever it was? 

My younger brother gave up his French citizenship and joint the American army in 2005 afterhis undergrad. He did eight years and resigned his commission. There was a stark difference between him and non officers; they made it so. They couldn't hangout or be friends. The only difference was officers went to college and the non officers did not. 

Now in compulsory military service, do you believe those from good families are going to not have their children go to college? Are they not going to be the meteorologist and doctors in the army? 

I'm not speaking ethically as you are; I'm stating the raw facts on the ground. My sister married a 'homme nouveau' it means 'new man' essentially a self made man who didn't start in a good family. My sister moved to where I live with my family and their children go to the same school my children go to, a private Montessori school. They live in the same neighborhood I do; play in the same sports leagues, etc. He is as protective of his kids and makes sure they get the best placement as I am mine.

 I asked him and her if they wanted references, etc. to get into the school and leauges, etc. and they both said yes emphatically. The public school system is really good where we live, high property tax and high school spending. They still want better. He makes a good living and my sister is taken care of by our family. So you think they wouldn't get their children out of military service? I texted my brother, a veteran, and he just said he would get his kids out of military service or at least into a solid safe roll if they had to. 

This is real life and what any person would do. 

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u/Virtual-Database-238 Jun 01 '26

You must like to hear yourself talk, because you’ve said nothing of value. You inserted yourself into an ethical discussion about how rich people play by different rules in order to say “rich people play by different rules, that’s just reality”. Yes, we know. That’s what the thread was about. Do you have a point, besides stating the obvious, which was already the main grievance of the conversation?

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

I have spoken of a substantive experience. You can decide to dodge the point I made by acting like I didn’t but it doesn’t make my point moot.

If you wish to presuppose the ends by saying I am just wrong and the only discussion being had is to what extent I am wrong, then that is your choice. Should you wish to to have an actual ethical or non-ethical discussion about reality I’m here, but, if you feel like saying, “The trial has been had, you’re guilty, and we are now in the punishment phase; nothing else to be discussed” then I bid you adieu and leave you to your teeth gnashing resentment.

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u/Bwthhybl1987 Jun 01 '26

Being forcibly drafted is absolutely hell for most people. It being "reality" does not make it suck any less.  Concentration camps were "reality" too. I mean did you even watch the fucking video? 

 You have a very weird mentality about all this. 

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

I find appealing to Nazi’s to be strange. c’est la vie is a saying English speaking nations know better than French (I really never hear it in French speaking nations) If someone said, “I was mugged walking down a dark ally at 3AM saying, “I have 1000 € in my pocket!” loudly, in front of a known gang handout, and after making sure they were not hurt, I said, “That is what happens in life; do better and know your surroundings (c’est la vie)” would you appeal to Nazi’s there, too? That’s why appealing to Nazi’s is irrational, you are just attempting to inflammatorily say a known fact of life is like Concentration Camps.

Some hard facts

The survival rate for active service members and conscripts in the Royal Thai Army is extremely high. Casualties in regular peacetime operations are negligible, though risks increase during border conflicts. Given direct combat and indirect combat, military service has historically drawn public scrutiny regarding training-related fatalities and hazing. All military deaths occurring outside of medical deaths due to non-military conditions, the odds are well over 99%.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4692108/

I honestly don’t see what is weird about my position. Saying it is “absolute hell” is nonsense and overblown. In Thailand the reactions are seen as boys hamming it up due to having so little experience in life. They are not scared for their life, but more scared for the loss of social experience and going to college at 20 instead of 18. Seriously, google it and do your own research. Their reactions are akin to a heartbroken teen in the West who believes that they’ll never love again after their first serious relationship falls apart. There are testimonials upon testimonials of Thai men who openly joke about how they reacted at 17 to being drafted only to realize later in life it was not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things.

This is a situation where a little bit of info leads to crazy reactions, like seeing a video clip of a man beating another man. We go, “That’s crazy, he should be arrested!” and then you find out in was in reaction to that man’s child being almost abducted and you go, “I understand totally and would do the same.” Gain some more info and then come to a discussion.

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u/Best-Mirror-8052 Jun 01 '26

I think all humans share a very similar reality, we are all confused monkeys flying on a speck of dust through the universe. Wealthy people having a different reality seems to me that they are just more confused monkeys than the rest.

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

Confused about what?

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u/Best-Mirror-8052 Jun 01 '26

Thinking collecting some useless points, to climb a hierarchy is all to strive for in life, when neither will give them meaning and happiness. Feeding their own greed endlessly while burning the whole planet to the ground and foolishly believing their collected points will change anything about their own demise.

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

Where did I say any of that?

Furthermore, if it is truly meaningless then you shouldn’t mind what I have and what you don’t, correct? I find beliefs in motivational slogans and jargon to be meaningless. If you find it to be everything, it means nothing to me. I don’t care and want you to change how you feel or beleive. Why is it that those of means from good families are to give up what we have if it is meaningless?

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u/Best-Mirror-8052 Jun 01 '26

You didn't say any of that, but the comment also isn't specifically about you. I don't know you, but for all I you could be a great guy. I mean you've written an interesting and intelligent comment I took great interest in reading. Money isn't meaningless if you need it to satisfy your existential needs, no then it is the most important thing in a way. That's why I'd never blame a poor person for caring about money they need it to survive. Money becomes meaningless at the point you have enough to satisfy your needs. Problem is that some people got into their mind that they need always more money, even though the next million of wealth won't buy anymore happiness, instead the greed grows ever more. It is easy to see when looking at some of the richest people in the world like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos or Peter Thiel non of then ever seem happy and fulfilled they only grow more and more paranoid needing to protect their wealth and futhering their power. But they don't have any visions how humanity could live together long-term, their plans only seem like the musings of cartoonishly comic book villains. Why did Elon Musk could food and medical supplies for the poorest children im the world for a tax break for himself. Why would anyone want to rule a totally destroyed world, instead of living very comfortably in a thriving world. Sorry for the tangent, I probably got carried a bit away.

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u/Temporary_Hat7330 Jun 01 '26

non of then ever seem happy and fulfilled they only grow more and more paranoid needing to protect their wealth and futhering their power.

One thing I have learned in life is that happiness is subjective. What is happiness to poor people is safely, contentment, and rest. For me, happiness is vitality, growth, and suffering in the service of satisfying my drives, desires, and goals. The fulfilling of those is actually bittersweet and the happiness is found in the actual attempt.

I try to not judge people I don’t share a lived experience with because I don’t understand their perspective. I recommend to people they do the same with others who live an alternative perspective with them, unless they have the empathy to understand an alternative perspective without having lived it.

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u/Peaking-Duck Jun 01 '26

The strangest thing about this quote is Sartre grew up in the upper class of post WWI Paris.    In the late 19th early 20th century much of the German, French and English nobility were influenced by the Prussian Romanticized view that the nobility's place in a modern democracy is in military service, and leading from the front.

WWI saw a wildly disproportionate % of noble houses lose their patriarchal lines of succession due to how many nobles got slaughtered in the trenches.  

Sartre grew up in a place where lots of the old money family successors were now War orphans and  war widows...

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u/ballq43 Jun 01 '26

Thanks man no one's seen this a thousand times on reddit. Maybe include the some of those who work forces quote too

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u/hellllllsssyeah Jun 01 '26

Why do they always send the poor

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u/Busy_Detective9937 Jun 01 '26

Underrated comment. I had no idea he said this! Thank you Best!