Making a noose for your own neck

Why do Thai-Farang relationships fail? Who is to blame?

Some commentators and websites will have you believe that the Thai person is to blame. Either the Thai entered the relationship with deceitful intentions, just has a promiscuous nature or is simply incapable of adopting to Western attitudes and lifestyles.

More discerning commentators, however, often observe that in reality the one who shows very poor and unacceptable behaviour in a Thai-Farang relationship is in fact the Farang. The Thai wife often finds sympathy from people at large for the way in which she tolerates and suffers under this behaviour for extended periods.

I believe this latter explanation is the most credible in terms of understanding why many relationships fail. But why do some Farangs turn out like this? Is a great proportion of Farangs who marry Thais just insensitive by nature? Have they just married Thais because no Western women will put up with them?

This may be true in some cases, but I also think there are certain factors within many Thai-Farang relationships that may push the Farang towards such behaviour.

Firstly, many Farangs marry Thai women who originate from impoverished regions, such as Isarn. This means that the Thai-Farang relationship is often established on the basis of total social and financial inequality between the sexes. The Farang has all the money and superior status.

Another thing that skews the balance of power within the relationship is the fact that a Thai woman relocating to a Western country is often left at the mercy of whether the Farang intends to continue the relationship. If the Farang breaks off the relationship within the first few years of her resettlement she will often lose her rights to stay in her adoptive country and will have to go back to Thailand.

For Thai-Farang couples residing in Thailand the Farang may feel even more empowered as he does not really have many legal responsibilities in case he wants to discontinue the relationship/marriage. Furthermore, the Farang will feel a sense of superiority due to the fact that a great number of Thai women are looking for Farang husbands/partners. The laws of supply and demand put the Farang in an extremely advantageous position when residing in Thailand as he will often feel flattered by the amount of attention he gets from other Thai women. This may lead to him paying less respect to each individual female.

The fact that a Farang often has an overwhelming sense of his own worth within a relationship can become a cause of its downfall. Bu there are other factors that exacerbate this.

When reading the works of Pira Sudham, the foremost author on Isarn, you are struck by the way the Isarn people have "learnt" to live with their downtrodden status. "The force of Karma" has made these hard-working peasant folk accept great injustices. Its a constant theme of his books how Isarn people are incapable of confronting authority and standing up for themselves. If they get oppressed or mistreated they react with resignation or may even take out their anger in irrational or self-harming ways.

My wife's family is from Isarn although she herself grew up in Sukhothai. I am often struck by the way she and her family will tolerate bad behaviour from me as well as other Farangs. I guess I am accustomed to Western relationships where some sort of equilibrium is established by confrontations where each side stands up for itself. Consequently, the relationship stays healthy because of this continual play against each other - a give and take situation.

This, I believe, is the cause of why many Thai-Farang relationships fail.

It is extremely difficult to maintain a healthy relationship if you do not have this balance of power - of different wills being contested. If everything is "up to the Farang" then over time the Farang may begin to abuse his power or become contemptuous of the appeasing nature of his Thai partner.

I think this is part of human nature and especially so when trying to mix cultures as different as Western and Thai. It requires a great amount of decency and innate inner morals on the part of the Farang in order for him to not just lapse into bad behaviour or abuse his advantageous position.

I believe it is often down to the Farang how he deals with the imbalance of power in his relationship. Does he become a jerk who just enjoys getting away with disrespecting his wife and the freedom this brings? Or does he find that balance within himself that can gradually allow his wife to become more empowered or self-confident? Does he allow a true balance of power to establish itself over time or does he abuse his momentary power and thus create a noose for his own neck?