BANGKOK – After reporting on Thailand for 36 years, Roger Snerdley, a foreign correspondent for Asia Weekly, was welcomed by the Bangkok media elite into the Journalists Allowed to Cover Thailand Association (JACTass).
The club’s members, commonly referred to as JACTasses, pride themselves in their near cryptic understanding of the Land of Smiles . “We understand this place,” said Ted Hacker, the club’s president. “A lot of people think they can come in here and figure out what’s going on, but it’s not that easy. Thailand is a mystery that only the members of our special club can really comprehend. And we will ruthlessly criticize those who we say don’t really understand this country.”
To correctly report on Thailand, Hacker said, a journalist must understand that coups are democratic, evidence is not needed to determine guilt, and the richest people in the country are the only people who really care about the poor. Suggestions to the contrary reflect a reporter’s inability to grasp the nuances of the kingdom. “Snerdley was no shoo-in for membership,” Hack said. “Some of his early reporting was downright scandalous.”
Back in 1981, Snerdley wrote a series of investigative pieces that questioned why nobody questioned anything. What he got were only questions about why he didn’t understand Thailand . “I basically just gave up,” Snerdley told NotTheNation in an exclusive interview. “I used to think critically about this place, but then the journalists and academics would all say I didn’t really know what’s going on. So I stopped caring, and now I write whatever doesn’t rock the boat. To tell you the truth, I think I still don’t understand this place – but what do I know.”
