Raid at Villa Rouge

[Guest lvdkeyes]

 

Lester1 and Lvdkeyes, I am completely with Bob and Z909 on this.

Whoa!!! I never said I thought sex or paying for sex was morally wrong or bad.

[Bob]

Bob, even google won't translate your Thai, but I may be better off not knowing.

 

While I probably should have said "dee gwa" (and could have used chan versus pom), it's basically that "the dog loved me more/better...."

[Guest lester1]

To z909

 

I guess that using a phrase like 'morally dubious' is risky because it has little value as the 'limit' it implies is always in the eye of the beholder.

However, you do say, and I paraphrase 'there is nothing whatsoever morally dubious about sex for money providing that both parties are consenting adults'. Thats quite a statement and it would be interesting to see how many on this board would agree with you solidly and without proviso. I dont have enough hours available to write down the numerous examples I can think of of where it might be obviously morally dubious.

I wonder if you would still agree if I changed your words to something else. How about this:-

'there is nothing whatsoever morally dubious about selling someone drugs providing that both parties are consenting adults'

Now please dont go down the road of saying one is illegal and the other isnt.

You then say that in principle, running a restaurant is exactly the same. Well I can agree that you do have similarities. Words such as customer base, supply and demand, profit and loss spring to mind. Advertising, word of mouth, low season. All these apply to all businesses. But thats as far as it goes. You then add that hiring a young man to work as a prostitute is OK because that is a business transaction between consenting adults. ( I think that at this stage in your argument you were still referring to a barowner/boy arrangement rather than a customer/boy one). I'm just amazed that you cannot think of any situation where you could tack on the phrase 'morally dubious'.

 

Now please dont get me wrong. Some of my actions are as morally dubious as the next man's. The point of my initial posting was that some other writers were in my opinion a bit delusional about it all. Please dont get angry if I think you are one of them.

[KhorTose]

Lester1, you've addressed your last message to Z909. Therefore, because I have to go to work now and because I am not the addressee, I will pass on giving you an answer--at this time. I am just going to say your logic has some very serious flaws in it.

[Bob]

However, you do say, and I paraphrase 'there is nothing whatsoever morally dubious about sex for money providing that both parties are consenting adults'. Thats quite a statement and it would be interesting to see how many on this board would agree with you solidly and without proviso.

 

There are always exceptions to every rule and we obviously can't cover every hypothetical situation; however, generally I agree with the statement. I just am not going to get trapped applying morals (yours, mine, the Mormans', or whoever's) to consensual sexual activity.

 

Presuming we're using "morals" to mean what we personally believe is appropriate conduct (versus religions' views of the topic), I can agree that, at least according to my standards, furnishing dangerous drugs (and yaba is one of them) to anybody would offend my beliefs. But I still see no rational or factual basis to insinuate that the bar owners are doing it or condoning it - and that's where this thread was derailed a bit in my view.

[Guest]

I dont have enough hours available to write down the numerous examples I can think of of where it might be obviously morally dubious.

I wonder if you would still agree if I changed your words to something else. How about this:-

'there is nothing whatsoever morally dubious about selling someone drugs providing that both parties are consenting adults'

 

Don't worry, I'm not going to get angry. We can just have a robust but friendly debate.

 

Selling drugs is slightly morally dubious, a it is likely to harm the other party (that's the key difference) & worse still may result in harm to innocent third parties (drug driving etc). However, the buyer is still making his own decision and would probably buy them elsewhere anyway. I would not sell drugs.

 

Paying someone for sex is almost certainly not going to harm the other party, providing one is using a condom. It will not harm any third parties. The fact that one pays for the sex certainly makes no difference.

 

So I am still waiting to hear an explanation of why paying for sex is morally dubious.

 

The fact that hundreds of bible bashers might not agree with me doesn't make it morally wrong.

 

Some of the policies of the chief bible basher ARE morally wrong (e.g. opposing use of condoms). So I'm not going to take moral guidance off these people.

[Gaybutton]

"Selling is legal. Fucking is legal. Why isn't selling fucking legal?" - George Carlin

[Guest lester1]

I think we can go around in circles all day over the morals of this. I will finish by saying to those who think there is nothing wrong for consenting adults to engage in prostitution or drugs to imagine the scenario where a child of theirs, late teens, is suddenly involved in these scenes.

Does this mean that you will sit back and watch, muttering to yourself that they are an adult and can make their own mind up, and that no moral questions are being asked.

Get real guys. You would want to throttle the pimp or dealer who has their claws into your offspring.

[KhorTose]

Get real guys. You would want to throttle the pimp or dealer who has their claws into your offspring.

That is just like throttling your wife's lover instead of your wife. No, I would throttle my son--not the dealer. One of the main things wrong I see in America is this tendency not to take responsibility for our own lives. Blame it on the dealer, my parents, the genetic make-up that makes me drink or do drugs, etc. I found my son doing drugs, I'd kill the little bastard, because that would not be the way I raised him. By the way, drug addiction is a symptom of another problem. Only one commonly used illegal drug by itself leads to addiction. Don't believe me? Please read this definitive study by Dr Robins of Washington University that showed that while over 43% of the Vietnam Veterans who served in Vietnam used Heroin and Opium in Vietnam 88% of them quit cold turkey upon return to the USA and the 12% who did not quit used drugs prior to Vietnam and had personality defects prior to Vietnam. I am sorry but I do not buy any of your arguments, and I am not deluding myself. Are you sure you are not deluding yourself?

 

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3403100470.html

[Bob]

One of the main things wrong I see in America is this tendency not to take responsibility for our own lives.

 

Amen, KT....although I don't think the US has any monopoly on it. Ever since the early 1990's, it seems everybody has an excuse for everything. Yea, Judge, I shot the guy but I watched too many violent video games or my grandmother beat me when I was a child. I couldn't help myself. I'm not that kind of person. I only got mad for a minute or two.

I shouldn't have drank that much (or smoked that much crack cocaine).

 

Just once, I'd like to see somebody come into court, stand up straight, and say: Yes, Judge, I did it. I fucked up. Sorry. [i probably wouldn't gag when I hear the name Bernie Madoff if he had chosen to publicly say something like that]

[Guest joseph44]

Just a little bit of reverse logic there....and it doesn't pass the muster test. Let's get right down to it - are you saying that the bar owners/management are assisting staff in using drugs? If so, what scintilla of evidence do you have to support that?

 

We normally don't make charges of conduct like that (especially criminal conduct) without some basis for the statement. And answering the question with a question (such as "what proof do you have that they are not doing it?") is rather foreign logic in my view. For example, I have no proof that the bar owners are not requiring each employee to have sex with soi dogs. Yet, without some basis to say it, I'd be a fool for claiming it might be true.

 

I just post my post again, Bob, and please this time: Read it properly!

So stating that it is ridiculus to say that the bar-management is drugging the boys is as ridiculus as stating that it is not happening.

[Bob]

I just post my post again, Bob, and please this time: Read it properly!

So stating that it is ridiculus to say that the bar-management is drugging the boys is as ridiculus as stating that it is not happening.

 

I read just fine. It's the logic that defies, well, logic.

[Gaybutton]

I'm with Bob on this one. It's difficult for me to consider an argument of this kind, based on nothing but pure speculation, as a valid argument. There is simply no evidence that bars are drugging their employees. Even if they were, from what is being said the boys would all have to be drinking out of the same container. Many do drink from that "community water bucket." Many also don't. What about them? I'll repeat that I have drunk from those buckets too and I wasn't drugged. Now I understand that things in Thailand can be quite different for farang, but drugs? Also, why would the bars do it? The bar boys have no problem doing their thing and they don't need drugs to convince them.

 

I also see no comparison to condoning drug use to prostitution. Legal or not, drug use is clearly harmful to anyone who is a user. When it comes to prostitution, what's the harmful part? The possibility of STDs is there, of course, but I don't see that as comparable to drug use.

 

When you start talking about the morality of prostitution, whose morality? I think everyone reading this is fully aware that Thai concepts of morality surrounding this issue are quite different from Western concepts of morality.

 

The argument that parents would not accept 'consenting adults' as grounds for approval when it come to prostitution and/or drug use. If I was a parent, I certainly wouldn't like it. Then again, I doubt my child would tell me.

 

"When you stop telling your parents everything, a whole new world opens up."

- Lee Marvin, 'Paint Your Wagon'

[Guest]

OK. I don't really want to get into this but I have talked to many boys who have told me that some bars and mamasans do supply them with drugs on a regular basis. I don't think this is the norm at most bars but I have heard this time and time again and do not think it is far fetched. Most that hire a boy on a few occasions will not get the same answer as I have but I know this to be true in many cases. I don't think the idea if that far fetched. I do not think it is the norm. I just know that it does happen from time to time.

 

I am not referring to the bar in question in this raid. I am referring to no bar in particular. I just do know that it has happened in the past and is still part of a nightly occurrence at some bars.

[Guest Astrrro]

that some bars and mamasans do supply them with drugs on a regular basis.

 

Makes sense that the mamasans who are more sophisticated than the boys would move into drug dealing. And the boys that are their best customers would be the mamasan's favorites.

 

It's also natural that if some of the boys dabble in drugs that others will follow, a bit of peer pressure. The boys are away from home for the first time in their lives and just like going to college will go a bit wild without parental supervision.

 

And drugs seem to go hand in hand with prostitution, with hookers using as much drugs as they can afford by turning tricks. Although the intention is to send money home, how disciplined are most 20 year olds?

[Guest jomtien]

OK. I don't really want to get into this but I have talked to many boys who have told me that some bars and mamasans do supply them with drugs on a regular basis. I don't think this is the norm at most bars but I have heard this time and time again and do not think it is far fetched. Most that hire a boy on a few occasions will not get the same answer as I have but I know this to be true in many cases. I don't think the idea if that far fetched. I do not think it is the norm. I just know that it does happen from time to time.

 

I am not referring to the bar in question in this raid. I am referring to no bar in particular. I just do know that it has happened in the past and is still part of a nightly occurrence at some bars.

 

 

Are you saying that the bars in question are FORCING the drugs on boys? That would be quite different than supplying them if asked.

[Guest lvdkeyes]

My guess, and only a guess, is that if a mamasan offers a boy drugs he is probably afraid not to take it for fear of upsetting the mamasan.

[Gaybutton]

Are you saying that the bars in question are FORCING the drugs on boys? That would be quite different than supplying them if asked.

That's my question too. It's one thing if mama-san is their ya ba connection. That's a far cry from spiking their community water container without their consent or knowledge.

[Bob]

There's a big difference from the "bars", their owners, and their lower employees.

 

We all know (I hope anyway) that a fair number of the bar boys are using drugs (and, specifically, yaba). I've known a mamasan who sold yaba occasionally to some of the boys in the bar (but, in that case, I also know that the owner doesn't know that this is occuring - I know this as many of them in that bar have been friends for a decade or so).

If the owner of that particular bar knew what I knew, he'd surely discharge the mamasan (as he's discharged boys before for violating his "no drugs on premises" policy).

 

GT indicates that some of the "bars" do supply the drugs and I wonder if he would advise if, in those cases, the owners are involved. I'm sure it can happen but, as a rule, it'd be hard for me to believe that most of the owners are dumb enough to get involved with handling, supplying, or selling the drugs themselves.

 

The wide-spread use of yaba and other illicit drugs is a problem throughout Thai society and certainly not limited to prostitution enterprises. I'm personally aware that the drug use is rampant at two well-known universities but it's certainly not the professors or administrative people that are condoning or promoting that use (although it's probably likely that some teachers and even some administrators probably occasionally use drugs themeselves - as it's all over the place). My guess is the same problem exists at most other universities and colleges (but I only personally know about the two places).

 

I've known a cop or two here in Michigan who have sold the stuff (one of them belonged to a multi-county narcotics squad!). But I also know that their superiors knew nothing about it (well, except in one case where one cop was arrested by his own boss and later received a substantial prison sentence mainly because he was a cop in the first place).

And I'd guess that there are Thai cops involved in the drug trade too.

 

My guess is there likely are even some older falang who dabble occasionally with yaba. But, by and large, as in most societies, the heavier drug use revolves around those in their teens and twenties. Thailand is likely no different.

[Guest Mark7711]

In a conversation I had with a major bar owner a couple of weeks ago, we touched upon drugs and yaba, and he said that the drug problem was endemic amongst bar boys and he had a constant battle to try and keep his bar 'clean'.

 

It's a battle that I feel cannot be won at least in the short/medium term, but we all need to be aware of it. There is a 'dark side' to the fancy neon lights that visitors and many expats choose to ignore.

 

Bar owners have an obligation under Thai law to take appropriate measures that there employs are not taking drugs on or off the premises, which means you have to prove you have been regularly testing your own staff and provide a written proof and dated recipe for Meth test kits,

[Bob]

Bar owners have an obligation under Thai law to take appropriate measures that there employs are not taking drugs on or off the premises, which means you have to prove you have been regularly testing your own staff and provide a written proof and dated recipe for Meth test kits,

 

Mark (no obligation to answer unless you feel like it), do you regularly test your staff and, if so, what's the cost to do that and what do you do if the first test is positive?

[Guest lvdkeyes]

I would be very interested to know the answers to these questions since I suggested this a few days ago and I was summarily dismissed.

[Guest Mark7711]

Mark (no obligation to answer unless you feel like it), do you regularly test your staff and, if so, what's the cost to do that and what do you do if the first test is positive?

 

 

The staffs are randomly tested 10 per month test kits cost 100bht each. I also leave a box open on the side for the boys to help themselves some worry if they take Viagra or other medication it may show positive so they check themselves.

At the time they are checked they sign a consent form if they fail they leave the bar at that time they can come back for a recheck after 7 days if they wish some boys will not sign that they failed the test so they can not come back to work in the bar even for a retest.

 

Mark

[Guest lvdkeyes]

So it is not cost prohibitive as stated by some posters. It is more the ethical practice of some bar owners vs. the unethical ones. Just as I suspected.

[Guest]

So it is not cost prohibitive as stated by some posters. It is more the ethical practice of some bar owners vs. the unethical ones. Just as I suspected.

 

What Mark does is commendable. I love it and I'll go to his bar more just for that post.

 

But, lvdkeyes, he said that 10 are randomly tested per month. That costs 1k a month. Not a big deal IMHO. But, if they tested every boy it would be a different story and the costs would add it. If they have 50 plus employees in the bar (gogo, doormen, waiters, etc) that would be 5k. That would be quiet a bit of drinks to sell just to cover the cost of this test.

 

Again, I don't have a problem with the test. My only problem is making the bar pay for it. Or, fining the bar if someone fails.