Porns illegal in Thailand

[Lunchtime O'Booze]

One of the reasons for reading these boards, apart from finding some good restaurants, is to catch up on things that you really need to know about Thailand if you spend holidays there regularly like I do.

On the board called Fart-Stop (I can't claim that title-it belongs to Wowpow but it deserves it ) I notice they have a thread about porn cds for sale on Jomtien beach. Everyone who answered the poor sod has had a go at the poster , including the moderator and including someone from this board and
no-one has answered the guy's question correctly.

possession of pornography is illegal in Thailand. The big difference to other countries is that they don't make distinctions about ages and it's just all classed as one crime. Its all illegal. However if you were caught with underage stuff and maybe got deported you could find yourself in trouble in your home country.

I picked up the Fart Stop title somewhere that I can't remember - it's an age thing.

There seem to be differences of opinion about porn ownership. Selling porn is definitely illegal. Owning it, even with underage porn, seems not according to the Judge in the Utopia case. However, I hear that there have been cases where Police have fined porn owners.

[Hmmm]

This recent three-part paper by a farang legal academic at Chiang Mai University indicates that Thai law in relation to pornography contains a provision only against TRADE in pornography.

http://www.thailawforum.com/articles/in ... ailaw.html (http://www.thailawforum.com/articles/indecency-challenge-thailaw.html)

He discusses this in the context of internet pornography, which the law is ill-equipped to deal with.

Also, the Thai penal code does not provide any definition of what material actually reaches the standard of being pornographic - "the standard of obscenity is contained in the characteristic of being ugly, indecent and shameful", which is open to the judges' interpretation. This would presumably explain the farcical suggestion in the Utopia case that the 'Thai Guys' magazine was pornographic.

Finally, according to a recent review of international laws, Thailand has no laws against possession of child pornography.
http://www.icmec.org/missingkids/servle ... ageId=2338 (http://www.icmec.org/missingkids/servlet/NewsEventServlet?LanguageCountry=en_X1&PageId=2338)

[Lunchtime O'Booze]

I can always make a mistake. Especially after a long lunch :clown: .

I suppose many laws in Thailand have a cash element to them.