Famed Thai hospitality shows signs of strain.

BANGKOK: Long one of the most open and accommodating destinations for tourists and businesspeople in Asia, the well-advertised "land of smiles" is showing signs of a subtle frown directed toward foreigners.

Over the past seven months, successive Thai governments have passed measures scrutinizing land purchases by non-Thais and clamping down on long-stay retirees and expatriate workers who lack proper visas. In January, the cabinet passed a sweeping bill that tightens restrictions on foreign companies, a measure that awaits final approval.

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One such person was John Mark Karr, the American who falsely confessed to the 1996 killing of JonBenet Ramsey, a Colorado schoolgirl, and was living in Bangkok as an English teacher. Karr's apprehension last August in Bangkok buttressed Thailand's image as a magnet for creeps and perverts.

"I hate them. There are so many of those in Thailand," said Yupa Boontaworn, a 22-year-old university student, when asked about people like Karr. Tourism is good for the Thai economy, she said, but the government should move more aggressively against pedophiles and sex tourists.

As a tourist destination, Thailand shares much in common with the Netherlands: a hands-off government and the veneer of a tolerant society, but a surprisingly conservative core. In some ways, anti-foreign feelings in Thailand arise from the clash between the permissive Thailand of skimpily clad bar girls twirling around poles and the more traditional side of the country, where women are too shy even to wear a swimsuit on a beach. Today, that veneer of tolerance, while still intact, is chipping.

"Foreigners shouldn't be able to do anything they please in Thailand," said Samree Ardsuan, 68, a retired civil servant. If someone led a demonstration protesting foreign ownership of companies, Samree said, he would definitely join in.

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I admire Thailand for having the courage to stand up to foreign capital and keep their ground for themselves. And I think Thai authorities have a right and indeed a duty to rout out visa over-stayers and other kinds of illegal immigrants.

On the issue of sex tourism, I think the country could survive quite well without it, -however a lot of poor families who are dependant on income from this source might suffer if it were eliminated overnight without an alternative income. Thailand has a big financial division between the middle class and the poor. The poor are exploited in many ways, prostitution among them. Re sex tourism, its simply a case of supply and demand from both perspectives of customers and the girls. Men go to Thailand because of the multitude of girls offering cheap sex and the girls from the poverty stricken areas up north go to places like Pattaya and Bangkok because the sex tourists are there and the family need the money.

How to break that cycle if Thailand wants to clean up its tourist destination image?
One way is to close down the venues that act as a conduit for prostitution. Close down the Go-Gos and the bars? Not as simple as it sounds, but Thailand's sex industry could be severely compromised and taken out of public view for the most part if there was a serious government will. But the industry would still survive and indeed thrive outside of public view.
Trouble is that the more the sex tourism industry goes underground the less regulated it becomes. Greater oppertunity for the Mafia to become the main regulating body rather than the Police. Less health checks. More underage girls. More drugs, more crime in general. Thats not going to be good for anyone.

The other way to reduce the scale of the sex tourism industry in Thailand is to provide alternative employment opportunities for the poor underclass who provide the vast majority of the countries prostitutes. Every country has prostitution. But Thailand's in a relatively unique position of having a good, modern tourist infrastructure (in places such as Pattaya) and a huge underclass of poverty stricken peasants for whom sex-tourism/prostitution is the only real oppertunity for a better life. Such a proposal to remove the supply of girls with no other choice but prostitution can not be achieved over night simply by passing some heavy handed piece of legislation.

Sex tourism and prostitution are not going to disappear in Thailand until the social inequities of the country are addressed. And since the poor underclass hold the largest voting bloc in a democratic Thailand, it is actually democracy and the pressure the poor are able to put on politicians to improve their lot in life, that is the only real way to dry up Thailand's sex-tourism industry.

It is indeed ironic that current military government that basically represents only the interests of the Thai elite ruling class is currently making noises about attacking the sex-tourism industry. Unless the rulers of today start to understand the fundamental driving forces behind the sex- industry they will simply drive the industry more towards underground Mafia control and all the problems that go along with that.

As we know prostitution is illegal in Thailand. It is well known that the industry has been regulated by corrupt payments to local Police. The Police dont generally run the prostitution industry, but they do control it and keep it reasonably orderly and peaceful. If the local police are taken out of the equation in a major crackdown, it is certain that organized crime syndicates will move in and take control and regulation of the industry. Prices will go up, bribes will become bigger and the whole industry will take on a much greater criminal aspect.

So basically its a choice between democracy and corruption. Under the peasant regime, I think it will be increased corruption.

I don't think the cops would be too pleased at closing down the bars etc. No more protection $$$$$$$$.

Geeez, they even own the "Thermae"

True!