Wednesday, September 13, 2017

I've already blogged about the end of The Cambodia Daily (here and here).  But if you'll indulge me one more post, Facebook has alerted me to a couple more interesting articles.

This article from The New Yorker was well written enough that it merited me revisiting the topic.

The Devastating Shutdown of the Cambodia Daily

In addition to the politics of the article, it also does a good job of capturing certain aspects of daily life in Cambodia.  I liked the part about arguing with the cab driver about the fare, and the line: "In the end, I gave him ten. I felt ashamed both for caving and for holding out."
...Man, have I been there.  Arguing about trivial sums of money just on principal, because you don't want them to think you're a push-over and you don't want to be taken advantage of just on principal, and then in the end you feel ashamed of yourself both for giving in, and for having argued about it in the first place.

Anyway, the same article alerted me to another link from The Daily Beast:

Trump Attacks the Press, Cambodia Winds Up Collateral Damage

This article shows how Trump's attacks on the press in America let Cambodia think they had the freedom to attack the press in their own country.  (Freedom of the press in Cambodia has always had a complicated relationship to the influence of the international community--see Cambodia's Curse).



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