Fakery and quakery

The military dictatorship’s recent claims about “fake news” have been taken up by their bossy and yellow-hued acolytes in the Ministry of Public Health

An AP report says the MOPH has announced the launch of a trial period for a smartphone app called Media Watch “that will allow users to flag media content they find ‘inappropriate’ so it can be forwarded to government authorities.”

The snitch app will “help guard, observe, investigate and support the process of having safe and positive media to benefit our youth, families and society in general…”. The MOPH seems to be into quackery.

This appears one more step in making lese majeste snitching even easier for the cyber vigilantes. It will also allow pro-junta anti-democrats to report any critical commentary on the military regime.

(As an aside, PPT has noticed intense blocking in recent days. Interestingly, the heaviest censorship of PPT is now on our posts about the regime rather than anything we post on lese majeste or the monarchy. It seems that the censors are less interested in the monarchy.)

We can’t help wondering if wags won’t use the app to report the junta’s mouthpieces who regularly concoct the information they release.

For example, The Nation reports that junta spokesman Lt-General Sansern Kaewkamnerd was assigned to denigrate one of the anti-coal protest leaders who was, for a time, out of communication with his family.

He decided that a personal attack was the “news” to be manufactured. Sansern referred to “a man who ran away with a woman.” He said:

There was one key protester named Mustarseedeen Waba. There is a photo of him being escorted by police or military officers that is being circulated online, saying that he has not returned home yet…. I’ve asked the 4th Army Area commander and provincial police commander. Neither of the authorities said that they had caught him.

He then added that Mustarseedeen’s disappearance probably involved a tryst with a woman who wasn’t his wife.

Sansern was heavily criticized. His response was junta-esque: “We need to speak the truth today. The government always talks rationally…”.

That’s another lie. “Government spokesman” seems to mean “official liar.” Or maybe he’s the regime clown.