Former Bangkok resident Matt has posted some of the responses from his friends on Facebook directed at Dan Rivers of CNN. Anyone on Facebook with large numbers of Thai friends can probably attest to this. The Thai fenqing in action.

Former Asiaweek correspondent and Bangkok resident Roger Mitton has an op-ed in TodayOnline on the vitroil directed at CNN and to a lesser extent the BBC. Key excerpts:

Now, however, a different kind of unpleasantness has surfaced: An attempt to malign analysts and journalists, particularly the foreign media, by saying they never understood what was going on during the mayhem in Bangkok and thus made a hash of reporting it. It is the old blame-the-messenger routine from those who benefit from the status quo.

Last Friday, Arglit Boonyai, editor of the Bangkok Post’s weekly supplement, Guru, wrote: “The international press is making a complete mess of their reporting of the situation.” Letters in the Bangkok Post that day said the “international media has been so one-sided” and referred to the “childish and misinformed reporting by both the CNN and BBC”.

The well-known novelist and artistic director of the Bangkok Opera, Somtow Sucharitkul, issued a critical piece in his popular blog entitled Don’t Blame Dan Rivers.

Depicting CNN correspondent Dan Rivers as being typical of the foreign press, Somtow wrote: “A lot of people here are astonished and appalled at the level of irresponsibility and inaccuracy shown by such major news sources as CNN.”

Actually, I was a bit astonished and appalled at the level of hateful insults being tossed out by those who ought to know better.
…
And the basis for these intemperate and nastily personal attacks?

It is that foreign reporters, while not openly supportive of the red-shirted protesters, did give credence to their principal gripe that Thailand is run by a privileged elite that cares little for the welfare of poor folk in the hinterlands.

Naturally, people like Somtow and Arglit, and even Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and his colleagues, who are members of the Bangkok bourgoisie, did not like this.

So they responded by saying it was simplistic and belied a lack of understanding of the situation. From there, it was a small step to say the foreign press was irresponsible, inaccurate, and made a hash of its reporting.

But that is preposterous. In fact, the international media was exemplary in its brave and largely unbiased coverage of this apprehended revolution. Regrettably, the same cannot be said of the domestic press and government-controlled radio and TV stations.

As a columnist in Thai Rath wrote: “The Thai media’s coverage of the Red Shirts’ protest has been very disappointing. To get the truth, the Thai public must rely on foreign newspapers and TV broadcasters, such as the BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera.”

So, let’s stop this spiteful hunt for imaginary scapegoats in the foreign press and start taking action.

Then you this absurd situation as reported by The Nation:

Thai media gathered yesterday to find solutions to perceived biased reporting on the political situation in the Kingdom by some of the foreign media

BP: No self-reflection on whether the Thai media are doing a good job. Just attacks directed at the foreign media.

IPS:

Pana Thongmee-arkom of the National Telecommunications Commission say impartiality is almost impossible to achieve. “What matters is that the media offers balanced information. So far, the information that mainly come from the mainstream press is imbalanced and reflects more the views of urban dwellers and not much of the rural people’s opinions,” he told a May discussion.

Asawin Nedpogaeo, dean of communication arts at Dhurakij Pundit University, said: “What’s coming out now in terms of news and opinion is largely influenced by the government because of the strict controls put in place after the violent clashes that happened in the past weeks.”

BP: Different media outlets offer different coverage. One such media organization, Prachatai, has has its website continually blocked by CRES (they continue to change their URLs only for CRES to block the new one).