The King of Thailand is Caught Up in One of the All Time Revenge Porn Schemes Involving His Top Sidepiece and 1,400 Photos
I'll confess that my knowledge of royal affairs in Thailand begins and ends with that time the Irish Rose took control of the clicker and watched a PBS performance of "The King & I." At least it did, until now.
In case you've ever wondered how, in 2020, more than 100 years after World War I and Russia's Bolshevik Revolution made most of the world's monarchies things of the past, we still have royal families who actually get to rule their nations like actual kings of old based merely on their bloodlines, this story might help explain it. Or explain why these monarchs refuse to give up power and modernize their systems of government.
Source - The eccentric billionaire King of Thailand has a number of problems on his gilded plate right now.
The German government has expressed concern that he is illegally governing his country from a hotel in the Bavarian Alps, where he has spent much of the year living accompanied by a retinue of 20 women. Demonstrations at home demanding democratic reforms of the country and his power are gathering intensity.
And now his mistress has been targeted by an apparent nude photo leak.
Some 1,400 selfies, many of them sexually explicit, have allegedly been stolen from Sineenat ‘Koi’ Wongvajirapakdi, 35, and sent to anti-monarchy activists, in what appears to be a very modern twist on the age-old rituals of court rivalry and intrigue.
Koi was released from detention earlier this year after spending ten months at a correctional facility. She had been accused of feuding with the queen, but has now been declared “untainted” and restored to her role as 68-year old King Maha Vajiralongkorn’s official consort.
The alleged nude photos were sent earlier this year to the prominent British commentator on Thai affairs, Andrew MacGregor Marshall, and to Pavin Chachavalpongpun, a Thai academic who lives in Japan and who faces criminal prosecution in Thailand for his criticism of the monarchy. ...
Marshall told The Daily Beast that in August—around the time Koi was being welcomed back into the royal household—he received a letter, sent to an address where he no longer lives, containing an SD card. The letter had what he assumes to be “a fake return address” which corresponded with the HQ of the German intelligence services in Berlin.
“There were 1400 photographs from four different iPhones. Some of them were very intimate photos.
“I made the decision not to publish them. They had obviously been sent to me without her consent, but also I just saw this is as a factional palace game. ...
“From the timing of the whole thing it was clearly an attempt to sabotage her return to court,” Marshall said.
“In any royal court you get factional fighting. It is a notorious element of palace life. When you are a monarch with a wife and queen and you appoint consort, it is a recipe for vicious infighting.”
We can all agree that revenge porn is a nasty business and nobody deserves to have their massive collection of private nudie pictures sent to journalists and activists who are trying to put you out of business.
But that said, holy moly, what a life! King Maha Vajiralongkorn, you old honeydripper! Most rulers who are seeing the end of their decadent reign threatened by a mass uprising from an angry public hole up behind their palace walls. Or crack down against their subjects, curtailing freedom and rounding up dissents. This old smoothie just heads to the Bavarian Alps to ride out the storm getting serviced by 20 women right under his queen's nose and gives his Bottom Girl an official title. He basically forces his wife's hand and creating a situation where the two have practically no choice but to cat fight for his attention.
That's why Thailand still has a king. I mean, would you like walk away from that kind of power? If that were me walking in his crown, I'd burn the whole kingdom to the ground before I let somebody else take over. I mean, what am I supposed to do, just get a job? Name me another profession where I get my 68-year-old johnson serviced by a harem of women in an Alpine ski resort and stick the sucker taxpayers to foot the bill?
So while I'm sorry for Sineenat ‘Koi’ Wongvajirapakdi that she had her privacy violated like that, in the grand scheme of things it might just be a hazard of the job when you're the official Chief Consort of the King. And it sounds like there are worse gigs to have.