`what Is It With The Thai Media

[Harcourt]

Excellent questions MF.

[mysterybkk]

slightly off topic here but it is still somewhat relevant as this ties in with the compensation issue:

a few years ago my younger brother was involved in an accident at a mini golf course where he fell into a spot light and had massive injuries to his leg, severed tendons among other things. as we were rushing him to the hospital the management demanded that we pay for the broken lamp and were making a huge fuss about it.

this whole compensation thing seems to be a very thai response, they seem to want compensation for any little thing. i found it grossly insensitive that they demanded money while my brother was bleeding profusely. just out of curiosity, has something similar happened to anyone else? has anyone experienced compensation demands in inappropriate circumstances?

Yeah, it is relevant Mystery because many responses here are based on disgust at the demand for compensation.

Your example is very pertinant: for the sake of this discussion, lets say the mini-golf management were not responsible for your brother's accident in any way. And lets say that your brother made some choices that resulted in an accident.

A lamp was broken.

Should he pay for the damage that he created?

Let's say he wasn't bleeding....many would say that he should pay.

If you agree that he should pay if he was not hurt, why should he not pay if he was hurt?

How is his injury, in realistic terms, relevant to whether or not he should pay?

(if I wanted to really play the devil's advocate here I might ask who pays to clean up the bloody mess he left behind...it's his blood, he left it there, it's unhygienic, it needs to be cleaned... )

People tend to mix emotive arguments with pragmatic ones....I do too....but I wonder if I should. Why is the mini-golf business left to pay for someone else's damages?

If someone came to a party at your house and got out of control and smashed a window....would you expect him to pay?.....but if he cut his wrist in smashing the window, does that let the hooligan off?

I suspect you are going to say that if demands for payment are valid, then the demands should be made at a more appropriate time....

When is the appropriate time when the culprit is leaving the premises, never to be seen again?

Come to that, WHY is it more appropriate to ask for payment later (or not at all)? (looking for logic here, not emotion)

i totally get what you are saying. however, in this case it was entirely the management's responsibility since a large floodlight was placed on the ground in an area that was promoted for the use of children. long story short, we paid and eventually got the money back from the owner (farang) who said it was very inappropriate behavior on behalf of the management.

just throwing out a thought here, but could compensation demands in this country be tied in with losing face?

[bonobo]

slightly off topic here but it is still somewhat relevant as this ties in with the compensation issue:

a few years ago my younger brother was involved in an accident at a mini golf course where he fell into a spot light and had massive injuries to his leg, severed tendons among other things. as we were rushing him to the hospital the management demanded that we pay for the broken lamp and were making a huge fuss about it.

this whole compensation thing seems to be a very thai response, they seem to want compensation for any little thing. i found it grossly insensitive that they demanded money while my brother was bleeding profusely. just out of curiosity, has something similar happened to anyone else? has anyone experienced compensation demands in inappropriate circumstances?

Yeah, it is relevant Mystery because many responses here are based on disgust at the demand for compensation.

Your example is very pertinant: for the sake of this discussion, lets say the mini-golf management were not responsible for your brother's accident in any way. And lets say that your brother made some choices that resulted in an accident.

A lamp was broken.

Should he pay for the damage that he created?

Let's say he wasn't bleeding....many would say that he should pay.

If you agree that he should pay if he was not hurt, why should he not pay if he was hurt?

How is his injury, in realistic terms, relevant to whether or not he should pay?

(if I wanted to really play the devil's advocate here I might ask who pays to clean up the bloody mess he left behind...it's his blood, he left it there, it's unhygienic, it needs to be cleaned... )

People tend to mix emotive arguments with pragmatic ones....I do too....but I wonder if I should. Why is the mini-golf business left to pay for someone else's damages?

If someone came to a party at your house and got out of control and smashed a window....would you expect him to pay?.....but if he cut his wrist in smashing the window, does that let the hooligan off?

I suspect you are going to say that if demands for payment are valid, then the demands should be made at a more appropriate time....

When is the appropriate time when the culprit is leaving the premises, never to be seen again?

Come to that, WHY is it more appropriate to ask for payment later (or not at all)? (looking for logic here, not emotion)

 You raise some valid questions, but sometimes, the situation does alter the appropriateness of a demand for compensation.

I own a house in North Carolina which I rent out.  One Mothers' Day, my renter, a 30's something woman, shot herself in the head with a shotgun in her bedroom.  She was discovered about a week later.  It took well over a month to clean , repair, and re-paint the room, and as she was late on her rent, I was basically out two months rent and a couple hundred dollars in bills.  My property management company told me I could go to the woman's parents to get paid out of the woman's tiny estate, and legally, yes, I could have done that.  But how could anyone go up to a woman's parents and essentially say, "I am sorry your daughter was so miserable that she killed heself, and, by-the-way, you owe me $1,000?"  I simply chose to swallow the loss.

I don't belieive in karma per se, but the concept has some merit.  What is legal and what is right are not always the same thing.

[Harcourt]

You raise some valid questions, but sometimes, the situation does alter the appropriateness of a demand for compensation.

I own a house in North Carolina which I rent out. One Mothers' Day, my renter, a 30's something woman, shot herself in the head with a shotgun in her bedroom. She was discovered about a week later. It took well over a month to clean , repair, and re-paint the room, and as she was late on her rent, I was basically out two months rent and a couple hundred dollars in bills. My property management company told me I could go to the woman's parents to get paid out of the woman's tiny estate, and legally, yes, I could have done that. But how could anyone go up to a woman's parents and essentially say, "I am sorry your daughter was so miserable that she killed heself, and, by-the-way, you owe me $1,000?" I simply chose to swallow the loss.

I don't belieive in karma per se, but the concept has some merit. What is legal and what is right are not always the same thing.

I'm with you. What's legal and what's right are indeed different. I would probably not consider trying to get the tenant's estate to pay in those circumstances too.

What's more, I have a 13 year old son....I can't bear to contemplate something happening to him... and if I did lash out at a cameraman, (and I would have at that water-park, I'm sure....but perhaps not with a spanner, and perhaps just confiscating the camera...who knows), I am pretty sure that I would face the consequences of my actions.

Someone once tried to molest my (then) 9 year old daughter. I beat him bloody....but I had to face the law afterwards, and I did with my head held high.....BUT I HAD TO FACE THE LAW NONETHELESS....The arresting officer was very apologetic because he understood....but he had to take me in, and I accepted it.

There was a case in Australia recently where a father beat the cr @ p out of a guy that had molested his child....beat him BADLY....the father was jailed for that beating....2 years I think he got.

I think why I am being devil's advocate here is because of the VITRIOLIC, nasty responses here that seem to outweigh the crime of the cameraman.

(edited because of the "at" in cr*p)

Edited July 16, 2009 by Harcourt