[pataagusata]

I remember this kind of subject from quite a long time ago.

Unlike where i come from, you seldom meet 'straight in your face confrontationists.

How Jimmy is perceiving Thais is quite common amongst newbies to Thailand. For sure, if some of the local people back home in Farangland said some of the things that 'Thais often say especially about ones skin-colour' it would be deemed very negative.

But here, the Thais like to have a fun and a joke and not at all as serious as the newbie to Thailand may think. Look at slap-stick comedy in Thailand, Thais just love having a good laugh about stereotypes: we have the dark-skinned Isarn maid with her dark-complexion and bad accented Thai, completely over the top ladyboys falling over chairs, loud-mouthed 'Somtum' vendors and even usually respected folks such as Policeman/Policewoman, HI-SO women and politicias are the brunt of a decent laugh.

One of my fave programs is called 'Sapha Joke' a general laugh performed by puupets about well-known Thai politicians etc...

The Thais have a different mentality in this regard as found in the west. It's just for fun and there is nothing vicious in it. Go to see any slap-stick comedy show in Thailand and us foreigners get a fair-share of stick too!

In my opinion "No, Thais aren't really that racist".

Let me give you an example - now, i have been to Laos quite a few times. Folks from that country are also the brunt of many Thai jokes but when i have said to my friends "I'm going to Laos next week" theyve replied "I'd like to go too, my friend said Luang Prabang is a beautiful place" etc.... I have told a couple of friends in Suphan that i may go to Cambodia in April. Same again.

Thais have a dig and a bit of a laugh but it is nothing like some of the discrimination that plaques western countries.

I watched a movie on VCD last week called 'Yam Yasothon' a very popular comedy last year about two girls and two guys from Yasothon province in the north-east. This movie has every stereotype of north-eastern people imaginable but the leading actors and actresses are all from that part of Thailand too!! To them they see it as 'all a bit of fun'. In fact i remember reading a Farang writer cursing the movie as 'quite obviously racist'. But again, he was only comparing this to what would and is acceptable in the west.