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IPFS News Link • Activism

Backdrop of Bangkok bombing: A country sliding into dictatorship

• latimes.com

Jang, a fiery 56-year-old with heavy makeup and purple-streaked hair, is a trained lawyer, beauty product entrepreneur and well-known media pundit, like a Thai cross between Rush Limbaugh and YouTube cosmetics star Michelle Phan.

Between infomercials, she delivers antigovernment screeds vitriolic enough to make the hardiest dissidents blanch — or laugh uncomfortably. On air, she has called Thailand's constitution "backwards," its government "crap," and a former prime minister "dumb as a buffalo."

The diminutive critic's outspokenness has made powerful enemies for her. The Thai military, which took power in a coup last year, has threatened her with exile, arrest and physical violence. It shut down her satellite TV show, "HotTV," and blocked her YouTube channel. She now posts her videos on Facebook.

But without her much larger television audience, she says, the inventory has been collecting dust. It is a constant reminder of her frustration.


www.universityofreason.com/a/29887/KWADzukm