Thread: Thailands Cyberspace sexplosion

Cyberspace sexplosion
Experts worry over corruption of Thai youth

Activists and experts are applauding the axing of a telephone-sex service but remain concerned about sex-related material available to children and adolescents online, in multimedia and elsewhere.
And research shows girls in Bangkok are three times more sexually active than those living in rural areas, thanks to the availability of pornography and other sexually charged matter.
In addition there are warnings that the country's underworld of prostitution is moving into cyberspace and gearing up to corrupt children and the innocent.

Amornwich Nakhonthap of the monitoring group Childwatch said children were at great risk of being exposed to immoral content.

Mirror Foundation missing-persons and anti-trafficking centre's Eaklak Loomchomahke was appalled that telephone numbers were being made available for "sex services that can harm our kids".
A telephone-sex service was available at a 1-900 number for as long as a year before the government stepped in this month and pulled the plug.
The service claimed to be a chat line for lonely hearts but quickly evolved into a hard-core sex line.
Activists claim a similar service was to blame for the abduction and rape of a 14-year-old girl last year. At the time the Information and Communications Technology Ministry promised a crackdown on these services.
"This was one obvious case confirming our long speculation that these services are related to many missing children and teens," Eaklak said.
"Our centre has spent years investigating, and we have found at least 10 cases, with proof, where children have gone missing as a result of these services. We have passed our findings to the proper authorities," he said.
Two weeks later police raided the Ratchadaphisek Road offices of sex-call service Thai Televoice. There, two men and 14 women students were arrested.
"We spent tens of thousands of baht calling the service to finally convince one of the girls to go out with one of our people, which we are using as evidence," Eaklak said.

Following the Televoice raid TOT terminated the company's lines and ordered another 12 similar services to change the services they offered. Televoice was fined Bt3 million for breach of contract.
Dozens of 1-900 numbers remain in service, and many offer "chat" with "operators".
"We are trying to set new standards for society, and the state infrastructure must not be used to assist sex-related trade," Eaklak asserted.
But there is now a heated debate over the action against sex lines.
Supporters say there is a demand for these services and instead of encouraging sexual abuse they reduce sex-related crimes. These numbers make a lot of money for the government, too, they say, and are a source of employment for cash-strapped university students as well.
Last year turnover of audio-text services was Bt237 million, of which chat lines made Bt42 million. TOT earned Bt52 million from the services.

Yet Mahidol University Institute for Population and Social Research expert Orathai Rhucharoenporntpanich said: "Reality must be faced that attitudes towards sex, and the behaviour of people, are changing, becoming more liberal and following Western ideas, especially in urban areas like Bangkok."
Communications technology is a key factor behind this change, she said. Sex lines are the tip of the iceberg only, she added.
Orathai has published her study "Sex and the City in Bangkok". It reveals a changing face of metropolitan society and culture due to rapid development. One of those changes is its "sex culture".
"Liberal-thinking city people are leading to phenomena like single females in Bangkok being 1.2 times more sexually active than those in other big cities and 3.3 times higher than women in rural areas. This does not include growing signs of later marriage and more divorce," she explained.
"We are living in a changing sex-and-relationship culture," she added.

Chulalongkorn University scholar Sompong Jitradab said there were three types of sex-line client, adventure-seekers, the lonely and the sick.

Public Health Ministry spokesman Thaweesilp Witsanuyothin said not all sex-line clients were psychologically ill and some of them were sexually stimulated by a voice.
One girl arrested in the Televoice raid asked: "Should I work as a sex-line operator or at a late-night drinking place where there is prostitution?"
"Personally, I have no problem with sex-line services for adults. It may reduce crime. It generates income for students," Orathai said.
But Eaklak asked: "How do we bar kids from becoming customers?"
"There will be a psychological impact on these girls if they have to sit there and talk 'dirty' again and again," Amornwich warned.
Eaklak reiterated that at least 10 missing or murdered children in the past five years had been linked to sex lines. "After weighing the benefits and the losses, termination of the services must be the answer."

Yet other forms of electronic sex are more worrisome, activists and experts told The Nation.
Of greatest concern are web cameras, online chat, the distribution of pornographic material and online dating.
"The use of cyber technology today among kids and adolescents is serving the sex trade. It is the abuse of advanced technology by the dark side of human nature," Sompong said.
"Our kids are good at converting a normal service online into some form of sex trade," he explained.
"The online world will be the new era of prostitution. It is the evolution of prostitution. There is massive demand, enormous supply at low cost and convenient access; escaping detection or arrest is easy," Sompong explained.
"We cannot figure out the best way to deal with it properly," Orathai added.
Childwatch's Amornwich suggested a force of "culture cops" to police cyberspace and other landscapes of smut. It should be fully funded and staffed. "It might take time and will certainly be politically sensitive," he admitted.
Eaklak saw little hope, though, "based on our experience with the authorities".
"It is the classic problem of the Thai bureaucracy. It is limited by layers of authority and lack of funds and staff."

The Culture, Information and Communications Technology and Social Development and Human Security ministries each have their own laws and are protective of them.
"Mind set is another of problem. They are like old men denying the world is changing," Orathai added.
Sompong said the solution was in the root of the evil, "the misconception of self-esteem among kids and adolescents".
"As long as women still believe their only value is in their faces and their breasts, not their minds or inner selves, the problem of the sex business, online or elsewhere, will never be solved."


Kamol Sukin
The Nation