The sky is falling!
The sky is falling!

Geeze. You’d think the demise of gay gogo bars in Thailand was imminent listening to the soothsayers who regularly post on the gay Thailand message boards. The end of the world is coming! Or at least the end of the gay gogo bar world in Thailand is. And has been now for several years. It seems whenever things get slow on one of the boards – or someone just needs a bit of recognition – a thread pops up predicting the end of the gogo bar business as we know it, thanks to on-line dating (Gay Romeo, CamFrog, Adam, etal.), high prices (for those who can’t afford ten bucks for a night out on the town), or the sudden influx of younger touri (because of the mistaken belief than if you are young and handsome you’ll always get it for free in Thailand).

Those threads always get a lively response. Everyone wants to offer their two cents. And all too often the responses are in total agreement, mirroring the other posters’ thoughts. You’d think the story of Chicken Little hadn’t been around for a century or more. You’d think, at the very least, there’d be some originality offered from a group of gay men. I thought we were supposed to be the creative ones?

I guess the hysterical, mistaken belief that disaster is imminent makes good copy. There’s always a rush to claim top spot of those warning of calamity. And yet, nothing really ever changes. The most recent thread claiming the sky is falling laid blame at the feet of massage parlors. This particular thread was concerned that the gogo bars in Pattaya would soon be shutting their doors as has happened in Bangkok. I’d venture to guess that poster hit it right. I’m sure just as many of the bars in Pattaya will close up as have in Bangkok, which is I believe one. Forget that the two styles of businesses have happily existed side by side for decades. Forget that bars and rub and tug shops have both been equally as popular among their aficionados for years.

The sky is falling!
The sky is falling!

Thank the gods and it’s about time. The gay commercial sex scene in Thailand is not coming to an end; it may evolve as it always has, but it will always be there. What may disappear – and for some none too soon – are the very vehicle used to predict the end of the bar world: the gay Thailand message boards. They’re getting a bit boring. There are fewer posters these days, and many of those tend to post to more than one board. At least those that haven’t been banned by the majority of boards.

Readership is down too; too many boards, too many other outlets. Ting Tong could disappear tomorrow and no one would notice for a least a month. Baht Stop is so inbreed with hydras you have to suspect true membership hovers around six, and only half of them would miss their home on the internet; the others too drunk to notice and would continue to post for weeks after the board went off-line. But it would be sad to see that board go under: where else can you find reference to anti-semitism on any and every topic about Thailand?

SGT is suffering through the same doldrums it tends to enter every year around this time. New owner, same old shit: a desperate few rushing to derail every thread with their own brand of wit. Then a not as frequent poster, like Boo Boo, steps in to bitch about the bitch fests, never seeming to realize his contribution is of the same ilk. Even though someone always takes the time to point that out to him. What SGT has going for it, though, is a large number of visitors. That too is something that seldom changes and that granddaddy of boards will undoubtedly out last the others.

But probably not for long. Unless the new owner figures out how to get the old moderator to make a positive change. There has been an attempt since ownership changed hands to get rid of the insistent bitch threads that never add anything to the conversation. Kinda, sorta. Depends on who is bitching, who they called a name, and what side of the bed the moderator fell out of that morning. Unfortunately when your goal is to rid your board of crap and you fail to replace it with threads of substance you end up with zilch. For SGT, that means dropping 70% of its content leaving 30%, all threads of no interest to anyone. Might be better to commit to being a board of just bitchfests and call it a day.

At one time SGT, though it has always been a bloody arena, attracted posters who actually had something to say about Thailand. Many shared tales of their travels. Often there were posts full of information about the country. You don’t see that anymore. Constructive posters have given up. New visitors take one look and wisely make a quick exit. If all you are interested in is a small group of social misfits flinging witty barbs that lack wit at each other, there are other sites out there that do it better.

The Thailand part of that board’s name would lead you to believe the discussions would have to do with Thailand. That’s its draw. If Thailand is even mentioned in a thread these days, it’s an excuse someone used to post an attack on their least favorite fellow poster. The only informative posts are advertisements for a few small bars in Pattaya. If that board’s content was a first time visitors introduction to Thailand, they’d cancel their trip and head elsewhere instead.

When SGT had posts of substance, there was a lively participation across the board, an active membership joined in daily. Today, if you are lucky and drop in between Beachball’s visits, more than half of the front page of fifty threads will be covered by the same posters. Hit it when the Bitch has made his daily dropping and that number shrinks to less than a dozen. As heavily trafficked as SGT is, that so few bother to post should tell you a major problem exists. That the average age of posters is above 65, should clue you in that the board’s future is doubtful. If the board attracted new posters it would be different, but the new posters it attracts are old posters registering under new names back yet again to sling some more shit.

Double, double, toil and trouble.
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Something wicked this way comes

But it could be worse. The board could be filled with pedo posts like Jabba the Butt’s little corner of the cyber world. Ya gotta feel sorry for Jabba, he didn’t build a better mouse trap when he started his board a year ago, he only provided a new place for the rats to play. Jabba recently decided to ban future pedo posts, a move he should be commended for. Well, had he wiped all such posts from his board he would have been in line for a hearty pat on the back. But then that move would have wiped a quarter of existing threads in one fell swoop, so the old pedo threads remain and can still be posted to.

Once you’ve bypassed all the bar announcements, many of which appear on SGT, there’s not a lot left on Jabba’s board. Which pretty well sums up the life of expats in Pattaya. After running down the list of pedo posts, posts about naked boys, and posts about the sex acts posters would like boys to perform, when you hit the thread ‘Why do Farang Commit Suicide in Pattaya?!!!!’, the answer is pretty obvious. A better question is: Is it actually physically possible to wash my mind out with soap?

I love the self righteous who claim Pattaya is so much better these days and is being cleaned up from all the kiddie porn and pedo bars while ignoring that everyone knows if you are looking for young boys you just need to head to Sunee Plaza. Jabba’s board frequently has threads about offing guys that require careful study of id’s to make sure they are of legal age. Because offing a guy too young would be wrong. That the guy you off looks about 12, never enters the discussion. As long as he is of age, no problem. That’s a fine line that only is valid to those who’d like to see those laws disappear anyway.

Seriously, if the guy you are attracted to looks too young to be taking back to your room, he is. Regardless of his legal age. You should slink back under whatever rock you crawled out from. But instead denizens of Thailand’s sleaziest town meet up for a cheap buffet put on to attract the lowest of life forms. As one poster recently put it, “the reason I like Pattaya is that it is the only place in Thailand you can go and hang out with people like us.”

Well, no. Thai prisons hold a lot of people like you too.

The new owner of SGT, who is so proud of his purchase that he refuses to divulge the handle he posts under, has been busy making changes to his board. The most obvious is in look; a new layout has been selected. A good move, it was about time for an update, and now when you mindlessly click through the message boards you can tell whether you landed on SGT or Jabba’s board. In case the pedo posts, or lack thereof, were not enough. Some sub-forums have been changed too, and at the bottom of each thread’s page a list of related posts is displayed. It’s interesting to note how many topics have been discussed before in the past. Over and over again. I don’t know that the sky is falling, but there sure are a few big fat clouds hovering that have been in existence for years.

The sky is falling!
The sky is falling!

Well, yeah, it really is! At least for a lucky few. Seems that regular posters on the gay Thailand message boards are all potential chickens, lined up and ready to have their heads chopped off. This morning Jabba and SGT joined hips to post a joint communique that they have decided to work iron fist and iron fist to rid their respective boards of those who abuse their rules. Huh. No more gobbledygook from LMTU? Nope, seems he’s still there. No more flooding or wishes that other posters die slow horrible deaths from Beachball? Nope, still there. Thai Dye died for posting pix of little kids? Nope, still there.

I’m not sure who got the axe, or why their transgressions were considered to be so much worse than those I just mentioned, but even if it had been Beachball who lost his right to continue his fantasy life on-line, I’d have to ask how anyone could justify a decision to punish for past errors, errors that were previously allowed. Seems to be if the problem was that large the fault should be laid at the feet of the moderators, not individual posters.

Smiles recently posted that banning members or erasing posts should use a board’s posting guidelines as the sole justification for such decisions. The idea that a set of rules should be promulgated and then offenders dealt with evidently is too novelle of an idea for the message board owners. Instead, on both boards, those who ignore posted rules are allowed to continue on their merry way while others face the axe for violating . . . who knows what? I can’t disagree that both boards were in dire need of being cleaned up, but there is a civilized way of going about it. Leaving those decisions to arbitrary and capricious judgment calls – especially when the mods have previously shown to lack judgement – is a surefire way of driving yet another nail into the message board coffin.

The joint communique posted today was a beautiful example of abuse in itself. That the two boards posted the exact message would lead you to believe the language used was carefully selected. That’d be carefully selected to be obtuse. The message harps about ‘abuse’ and even goes as far as to state “We are making it clear such abuse will no longer be tolerated by either forum.” But fails to mention what that abuse entails. So much for clarity. Possibly it means making a post on Mondays? Who knows?

Regular posters may wonder just which rules are suddenly being defended. Well, keep on wondering. Both boards have mutually agreed to lock the topic announcing their new policy. Neither intends on answering members’ questions or providing clarity to a poorly worded policy statement. But they have agreed to work together to determine which posters are “disregarding board rules, abusing others, causing harm to businesses . . .” But wait! There’s more! Members will also be banned “for any reasons with which we agree.”

Nice. Sounds like a plan: pull any reason out of your ass and ban one of your site’s contributors without warning and without previously stating the specific offenses that could cause such an action. Forget the nail, sounds like we’ve moved directly to selecting flowers for the top of the casket.

While not one of the nameless who no longer exists in the gay Thailand message board world, one member’s demise has already occurred. Kevin Quill, one of the board’s slate of original posters has decided to call it quits. He posted a short “See Ya!” message this morning, noting his decision was due to “sensible comments [being] deleted and a free reign for silliness.”

It’s amazing that any organization whose existence relies on the participation of its members would disregard those members in determining its future mode of existence. The ‘It’s My Way Or The Highway’ approach has never been a successful one. Nor will it be this time. But then maybe that’s a good thing.

I always assumed the gay Thailand message boards were where the majority of Thai loving visitors clicked to when in need of a bit of information or a few pleasant memories of their favorite vacation spot. I always assumed the majority of those surfers, after a quick visit, ignored Baht Stop’s ridiculous attempt to be political, Ting and Tong’s ridiculous attempt at being porn, Jabba’s pedo world of the iron fist, and checked in on SGT hoping the occasional thread of interest would appear. Maybe it was so in the past, but with SGT emulating Jabba’s idea of what a message board should be, those visitors will click elsewhere in the future. Except for Beachball. He’ll soon find, like in real life, he only has himself to play with.

That’s a hell of a lot of internet surfers who should be catered to through the message boards. But while the gay gogo bars – predicted to all be headed to a bloody end – change with the times, the message boards staunchly hold to draconian forms of operation, their dictatorial attitude a turn-off to those who are used to the uncensored flow of ideas that make the internet what it is today. They rely on a form of existence that has slowly eroded as better forms of on-line interaction have evolved.

It seems the older we get the less change holds an attraction. So the gay Thailand message boards stagnate, refuse to evolve with the times, and slowly dwindle as their posters age, die off, get banned, flee in disgust, or become too infirm to post (not that mental infirmity has ever stopped some from contributing with a regularity that they could only dream of in other facets of their lives).

The sky is falling!
The sky is Falling!

Yup. It is. And it’s falling on the world of the gay Thailand message boards much quicker than anyone could have predicted.