UnNews:Thai man jailed for photoshopping

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3 April 2009

Whatever you do, don't edit this picture!

A Thai citizen has been sentenced to 10 years in jail for violating strict laws for insulting the monarchy (that you always must insult via crude jokes that no one ever remembers).

A court in Bangkok said Suwicha Thakho, 34, digitally altered images of King Bhumibol Adulyadej and his family and posted them on the internet. Hardly a crime, if you ask me.

The court did say the pictures were changed so that the family was holing up signs saying "Anarchy is the new Monarchy", but local media claimed the signs said "Thailand is the new America".

Thai officials say more than 5,000 websites have been blocked in the past year for insulting the monarchy. Hopefully, Uncyclopedia will not be one of them.

Thailand's royal family is sheltered from public debate by some of the world's most stringent "lèse-majesté" laws, as the police and army try to suppress what they fear is a rising tide of anti-monarchy sentiment—

"IT’S A CONSPIRACY! THEY WANT TO SUPRESS THE TRUTH! WE MUST REBEL! WE MUST FIGHT! THEY CAN'T HIDE OUR CRIES FOREV—"*GAG!*

—One political activist was jailed for six thousand years in November for an anti-monarchy speech she made just a stone's throw from the old royal palace last July, which claimed the king was having an affair with the First Lady.

Several other people are awaiting trial for replacing the flag of Thailand outside the palace with the Queen's bra.

But, in February the king showed an uncharacteristic stroke of good humor when he pardoned Australian writer Harry Nicolaides, who was sentenced to three years in jail for insulting the crown prince in a little-known book by depicting what a date between the prince and his as-of-yet nonexistent girlfriend would look like..

The batty 81-year-old king also pardoned a Swiss man who was given a 10-year sentence two years ago for attempting to make his portrait less ugly. It didn't work.

Sources

• "Thai man is arrested for being funny." BBCNews, April 3, 2009