Welcome to Thailand—the Land of Smiles, where the smile is often a mask for the rot underneath. Just a year after becoming the poster child for progressive cannabis reform, shops across the country now face the hangman’s noose of political cowardice and moral duplicity. The panic is palpable. The same government that welcomed weed with open arms is now ready to snuff it out, leaving entrepreneurs, patients, and workers twisted in the wind. Oh, but let’s not forget: gambling, prostitution, and corruption still flourish, as long as you know who to pay off.

Let’s slice through the fog. The only thing Thai politicians hate more than the idea of people thinking for themselves is the idea of losing control—and, God forbid, losing their international face. Cannabis was embraced not for medical justice or social progress, but because it was profitable, trendy, and a convenient distraction from Thailand’s spectacular failures in education, justice, and economy. Now, suddenly, morality matters again—but only when voters are watching and rival parties are sharpening their knives.

You clutch your pearls about cannabis ‘corrupting the youth’? Let’s talk hypocrisy:

• Alcohol remains king, fueling road deaths at world-leading rates—and that’s a statistic, not a scare story.
• Pharmaceuticals are sold over-the-counter like candy, subsidizing an addiction crisis nobody dares admit exists.
• Child sex tourism and corruption go quietly ignored, as long as the bribes flow upwards.

Yet you flinch at some weed dispensaries on Sukhumvit?

Dear tourists: Your Instagram-friendly pot shops weren’t here for your spiritual enlightenment. Local owners behind the smiling counter risked everything on the government’s word, only to be hung out to dry at the faintest whiff of conservative outrage. Meanwhile, the greedy elite shake hands in back rooms, deciding which businesses will die and which will survive. The average Thai? Just collateral damage. Again.

Let’s stop lying, to ourselves and the world. This is not about health. It’s not about safety. It’s not even about cannabis. It’s about a ruling class so pathologically obsessed with its image and control that entire industries—and the real, breathing people behind them—are disposable playthings for political theater.

So go ahead and ask yourself: Where does your outrage truly lie? Is it with the weed, or with the system that weaponizes morality only when it suits them? Are you brave enough to demand better, or content to let another generation be crushed beneath a smiling mask?

This article was inspired by the headline: 'Thai cannabis stores fear for their future - bangkokpost.com'.