Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Thailand and whether or not it is soft on drug crime. I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Meth, not weed, sent Italian man over edge at Pattaya Hotel. Quoting directly: "Police said a man who blamed marijuana smoking for his viral rampage at a Pattaya Hotel actually was high on crystal methamphetamines. He (Name redacted here) He told police he had been smoking marijuana all day - acclaim backed up by many packets of cannabis found in the room - and became paranoid, hearing voices and feeling like people were watching him. A urine test, however, proved it was "ya ice", not ganja, that pushed him over the edge. Admitting to smoking cannabis, of course, won't get you in trouble, as it has been decriminalized." (Actually I know these are semantic points but it is not decriminalized, it is just legal. It is no longer illegal so it is therefore legal.) Quoting further: "But testing positive for meth - a Class 1 narcotic - carries stiff criminal penalties." 

Yeah, it's not going to be pleasant and on top of it this wasn't a situation where this person was caught with it for example but they were caught and they were being low key, they were being mild mannered. I imagine this person is probably not facing great prospects when it comes to dealing with the Thai Criminal Court and there is a strong likelihood I imagine that you are going to see incarceration associated with this behavior and with this charge, with the culmination being deportation from the Kingdom thereafter. Again Thailand, notwithstanding the fact that we have had this sea change if you will with regard to Cannabis here in Thailand, Thailand is clearly hard, hard core if you will when it comes to drug crime, hard drugs, what I would call hard drugs: methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin, opioids, these kind of things; Thailand is not messing around with that. And as we have discussed in other videos, and I have discussed out there in the sort of "blogosphere" of the world or the ether of the internet as I call it, I said it before and I will say it again, there were quotes, we quoted them on this channel from I believe it was Minister of Justice at the time, who basically said: "Look we'd really like to not focus any resources on Cannabis because we don't do that as a priority, I mean basically it doesn't kill anybody so it's just not something we view as being necessary to be on the high priority list." In fact I think it even came up in that same interview that they said we would like to use the resources, the tax revenue that could be garnered from Cannabis to go after these harder drugs to go after, interdiction of these serious narcotics that quite honestly plague society here. I am completely in favour of this by the way. I am not a guy who is particularly soft on drugs. Now I don't think Cannabis should be viewed as a drug, I think "controlled herb" as is the current term of art for that here, is the correct appellation, is the correct name for that and dealing with it accordingly. Regulate it obviously, you don't want kids to have anything to do with it; regulate it like alcohol in my opinion. It's a better way to do it.

That being said, when it comes to hard drugs like methamphetamine, Thailand is not messing around. This is not a place to come if you want to engage in that activity because it could lead to a situation where you are sitting in a Thai prison and I am here to tell you that's not a place you want to be.