The King Is Dead
The King is Dead!
Long Live the King.
The King of Thailand just passed. He was eighty-eight and has been sitting on the throne since 1946 making him the longest serving monarch in the world. I guess it is now up to Elizabeth to best his record. He was a good king and very much beloved by the Thai people. It is difficult to imagine having a focal point in a society like a monarch for 70+ years. Very few Thais lived before him, making him all they have ever known. Much of the world knows something we don't. They know how to have institutions that unite societies rather than divide them. America has no equivalent. In sport it is the World Cup. A once every four year tournament that is made up of national teams. In America we think only of our regional favorites. Go Cowboys... love you Gamecocks! The Olympics is the only thing that comes close and for the most part it is a tournament of individuals. Names we don't really know until they poke their head up and win a medal for hurling. In most of the world when the national team plays life stops. Every tv, every radio is tuned to the match. Life comes to a halt.
The institution of monarchy is another unifier. Only a limited group of nations know or have touch with this however, even those nations that have resigned monarchy to the textbooks still cling to the heirs of their respective dynasties. They follow their lives as if they still sit on the throne. In Thailand the king has an almost God like status. Pictures are everywhere. Every house, along the roads and in businesses. Everyday I return to a neighborhood with an enormous portrait of the king fastened to the front gate.
The final unifier of a society is tradition. Deep cultural unifiers that cut through opinions and bond with commonality. It could be dance, music or song, dress or language. Each one has it's own bond for the nation. Americans are an amalgamation of identities and even cultural tradition is often lost to pockets of communities.
In this time of politics the deep fractures in American society are ripped open and raw meat is exposed. Some might celebrate the fact that we are a nation where this can occur. I tend to see it as a frightening road that at any moment could lead into an abyss. There was a time in America when we were taught that our cultural unifiers were supposed to be community and a belief in the ideals of freedom of expression. Of compassion and leadership in the world. Today even these notions seem to have vanished in a climate of hate and fear.
Thailand certainly has its faults. One is that I can't even feel free to express them here. At the same time I can't help but admire a culture that above all else can unify in the belief that one man truly represented their beliefs. For this I admire you Thailand and I lament the fact that my own nation seems to be unified in nothing but disrespect and fear.
Long Live the King.
The King of Thailand just passed. He was eighty-eight and has been sitting on the throne since 1946 making him the longest serving monarch in the world. I guess it is now up to Elizabeth to best his record. He was a good king and very much beloved by the Thai people. It is difficult to imagine having a focal point in a society like a monarch for 70+ years. Very few Thais lived before him, making him all they have ever known. Much of the world knows something we don't. They know how to have institutions that unite societies rather than divide them. America has no equivalent. In sport it is the World Cup. A once every four year tournament that is made up of national teams. In America we think only of our regional favorites. Go Cowboys... love you Gamecocks! The Olympics is the only thing that comes close and for the most part it is a tournament of individuals. Names we don't really know until they poke their head up and win a medal for hurling. In most of the world when the national team plays life stops. Every tv, every radio is tuned to the match. Life comes to a halt.
The institution of monarchy is another unifier. Only a limited group of nations know or have touch with this however, even those nations that have resigned monarchy to the textbooks still cling to the heirs of their respective dynasties. They follow their lives as if they still sit on the throne. In Thailand the king has an almost God like status. Pictures are everywhere. Every house, along the roads and in businesses. Everyday I return to a neighborhood with an enormous portrait of the king fastened to the front gate.
The final unifier of a society is tradition. Deep cultural unifiers that cut through opinions and bond with commonality. It could be dance, music or song, dress or language. Each one has it's own bond for the nation. Americans are an amalgamation of identities and even cultural tradition is often lost to pockets of communities.
In this time of politics the deep fractures in American society are ripped open and raw meat is exposed. Some might celebrate the fact that we are a nation where this can occur. I tend to see it as a frightening road that at any moment could lead into an abyss. There was a time in America when we were taught that our cultural unifiers were supposed to be community and a belief in the ideals of freedom of expression. Of compassion and leadership in the world. Today even these notions seem to have vanished in a climate of hate and fear.
Thailand certainly has its faults. One is that I can't even feel free to express them here. At the same time I can't help but admire a culture that above all else can unify in the belief that one man truly represented their beliefs. For this I admire you Thailand and I lament the fact that my own nation seems to be unified in nothing but disrespect and fear.
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