Clubhouse is an invite-only and audio chat-based application launched in April 2020. While many use the voice-based platform to listen to and discuss topics ranging from technology to music, culture and lifestyles, many Thai youths are using the application to discuss politics including taboo topics suppressed in the country.
Gergpoom Intapuriya, an international student in Queensland, is among those Thai youths.
“Seventy per cent of my Clubhouse usage is to chat about Thai politics,” he tells SBS Thai.
“Most popular topics for us are about politics. For example, as soon as a parliament sitting to debate the Thai Constitution amendment adjourned, someone started a chat room in Clubhouse to discuss what had happened in the parliament.
“Another example is a young Thai politician, Parit Itim Wacharasindhu, who often started a chat room for people to discuss hot political topics while he acted as a moderator.”
Gergpoom says that political taboo topics suppressed in Thailand are often talked about in Clubhouse too.
Clubhouse is an invite-only and audio chat-based application increasingly used by some young Thais to discuss sensitive political topics. Source: Getty Images/ Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto
“An obvious taboo topic are subjects under Section 112 (of the Thai Criminal Code). The topics related to the monarchy. Whenever Pavin Chachavalpongpun, a Thai academic in exile, starts a chat room about these topics, there usually are many people listening and joining the discussions.”
He finds Clubhouse attractive for providing cyber two-way conversations in real-time.
“On Facebook, it is text-based communication and it is not real-time. In Clubhouse, a moderator of a chat room will select some guest speakers and some audiences to speak so that they can have an online conversation or an online debate in real-time.”
On a Friday night last month, SBS Thai witnessed a virtual discussion on the Clubhouse platform on the rollout of the COVID vaccine in Thailand with an audience of around 8,000 users worldwide.
Gergpoom Intapuriya who says 70% of his Clubhouse usage is to chat about Thai politics. Source: Supplied by Gergpoom Intapuriya
In the cyber chat room, Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Public Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul was heard defending the Thai government which had been accused of inefficiency resulting in delays to the COVID vaccine rollout. Meanwhile, banned opposition politician Thanathorn Juanroongruankit questioned the deputy prime minister about the assignment of Siam Bioscience Company owned by the Crown Property Bureau to manufacture some AstraZeneca vaccines for Thailand.
Pro-democracy protesters take cover as police fire tear gas and water cannon at a demonstration against a charter amendment at Parliament Bangkok, 17 Nov 2020. Source: AAP
Clubhouse: Finding an alternative space
Dr Aim Sinpeng, an expert on digital media and political participation in Southeast Asia at the University of Sydney, observes that using social media to discuss politics or to form political mobilisation is a new phenomenon in Thailand.
She says it was accelerated last year by several massive youth protests on the streets of Bangkok against the Thai government calling for a reform of the Thai monarchy. And those using social media for politics are primarily those under the age of 30.
Thai government’s intervention on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other digital platforms in recent years has turned some Thais to Clubhouse. The exclusive and voice-only platform has gained popularity among Thai youths, as well as people from China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, who are searching to an alternative online channel to speak about sensitive political topics freely.
Thai youths in an anti-government protest at Sanam Luang Ground in Bangkok. Source: SBS Thai/ Chada Somboonphol
“I don’t think it is about Clubhouse,” Dr Aim says.
“It is about finding an alternative space for people to discuss politically sensitive topics, which is a commonplace in Asia. It is because Asia has the largest number of social media users in the world but it also has the highest number of state repression on freedom of internet and freedom of digital media, where governments constantly intervene to try to limit the ability of regular people to discuss political topics freely.”
The appeal of Clubhouse for many people speaking about sensitive political topics is the sense of privacy. But she says this issue also raises a question.
Clubhouse creates an environment that you will feel like you are in a club and you are talking in groups.
“Maybe people feel inclined to speak about sensitive issues because they think it is just a voice and you have to be invited to be in the group. But a lot of experts said that the privacy setting on this app, if any, is not much higher at all when compared to more mainstream social media sights like Twitter or Facebook but it just gives out the appearance that there is better privacy.”
Clubhouse asks users not to record any conversations and debates on its platform without permission from the speakers. But there are incidents where some debates were recorded secretly and later put on YouTube.
Dr Aim Sinpeng, an expert on digital media and political participation in Southeast Asia at the University of Sydney. Source: Supplied by Dr Aim Sinpeng
Given the Thai government’s history of attempting to limit or censor conversations on some particularly sensitive topics on Facebook, Twitter or YouTube, Clubhouse might be its next battleground.
“Governments usually intervene when they are legally allowed to do so in order to make sure that every social media user follows the law,” Dr Aim says.
“The real question is “Is the law fair? And fair to whom?” That is a tricky question because most cyber legislation in a number of countries around the world are trying to balance two things; maximizing freedom of speech and allowing states to protect national interests, particularly national security. But often they clash. You can’t really maximize both. It often comes at a cost of either freedom of speech or national security.”
Thai King Maha Vajiralongkorn Bodindradebayavarangkun (centre-L) and Thai Queen Suthida greet royalists in Bangkok, Thailand, 14 November 2020. Source: AAP
“Although the requests by the government are supported by Thai law, the social media companies do not always comply. For some cases they do, for other cases they don’t. It’s not always black and white."
Power of social media
But given that giant social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter seem to be able to cherry-pick when to cooperate with governments, it’s not surprising that Dr Aim sees them on top of the food chain.
“The three main actors, when you look at digital relations, are governments, users, and platforms companies. At the moment the platform companies have the most power to negotiate what terms they want to operate by and what kind of changes they want to make. They never ask us ‘can we change these on our platform?’ They just do it.”
Sometimes social media companies will listen to users where their markets are big and user movements are strong. But it’s not the case in Thailand. 
Digital rights
Some common social media applications. Source: Getty Images
“In countries like Thailand, we are very weak when it comes to digital rights. Size-wise we are a big market. But we are not so important that social media companies are too afraid to lose us. Also, because we don’t have strong digital rights lobby groups, we don’t have strong digital right grass-root groups, we don’t really have a way to negotiate for better protection of users on social media or on the internet in general.”
Whether online movements can lead to real impacts in the offline world or not, Dr Aim insists that it really can and the online and offline worlds are now interconnected.
“We might be wondering why all these Thai high school or primary school students came out to protest on the streets. But actually, they have been complaining about particular issues online for years. I think understanding the digital cultures, the languages used and some of the key important conversations of particular groups like young people and what they do online helps us understand the physical world better and the kind of environment we are living in.”
Gergpoom, the young Thai international student in Queensland, agrees.
A mass protest by young Thais in 2020, partly organised through social media. Source: SBS Thai/Chada Sommboonphol
“The online world can create real impacts to the real world, particularly nowadays. It will even become more influential in the future because online platforms will become the main media for the new generations. It will have more influence than television or radio in the past because it can spread information rapidly. In fact, the protests by Thai youths demanding democracy partly stem from an online political mobilisation before we actually came out on the streets,” he says.
He also notes that an underlying cause contributing to current political conflict in Thailand is the widening gap between Thai youths and the older generation.
But he believes listening to each other is an important step to alleviate the hostility.
“I personally think that Thai society still lacks acceptance of different opinions. We are still lacking having conversations to try to understand each other better. Not just the older generation who don’t try to understand the new generation.
“But the new generation doesn’t try to understand the older generation either. It’s not a compromise but it is an acceptance of different views.”
