Freedom of expression is a human right

Dear Minds users,

during these period of time you may experience the migration of Thai users to the community. And yes, I'm one of them. :) I'd like to explain what happens and why.

We just struggle to be free from the censorship. In Thailand, censorship means not only media are censored, but people are imprisoned. People who speak their minds (if the government doesn't approve what they say) could face max 5 years imprisonment under the computer crime act the Junta government claims it's used against 'fake news'. Only a question about government's performance, the government interprets as fake news, the person who questions can turn to be a criminal. There are other laws on top like National security act or lèse majesté law (which leads to max 15 years in jail).

Most of the Thai users moving in are from Twitter where it used to be a safe and free platform to express our opinions. But lately, Twitter seems to cooperate with the Thai Junta government. Twitter launched its TwitterThailand official account and the Twitter Thailand account started to lecture in Thai how Thai users should behave on Twitter. They even told Thai users to read twice before tweeting :-/ and better not to tweet anything negative to anyone. Lately they change their privacy policy to share users info with their partners including Thai authorities. That made Thai users lost their confidence in the platform.

We hope that we can speak our minds freely and safely here. However we apologize for any inconvenience caused. And thank you Minds team, @ottman @jack @nick and others, and Minds users for your warm welcome. :-)

#mindsth #Thailand #thaipolitics #Minds