Their expose on the
Watergate affair made Woodward and Bernstein the most celebrated investigative
journalists on the planet. The military conflicts of the late 20th
and early 21st century have seen another generation of reporters
risking their lives covering stories from the front line. What young journalist
would not want to follow those role models? Finding the story that makes the
world sit up and take notice.
The problem is that
that takes talent, dedication and a commitment to discover the truth. It is so
much easier to latch onto a convenient stereotype and then try to make a few
loosely connected observations support the conclusion you have already made.
Enter Conor Woodman and the team that made Scam City – Bangkok.
It’s only fair to let
you make up your own mind so you can watch it on YouTube. Just click here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nRxvFs3DUg
To save you some time,
I can offer a brief précis. Mr Woodman discovered that –
1.
If you
hook up with a Bangkok local and ask him to find a bar in the city where you
will definitely be ripped off, he will be able to locate such a bar.
2.
The very
shabbily dressed guy outside the temple holding bags of bird food may want a
token contribution, should you accept one of those bags.
3.
There is a
jewellery store owner who pays taxi drivers commission to bring tourists to his
store. If you speak fast enough you may be able to get a driver to say “Yes”
when you suggest the owner may hurt him.
4.
Some beautiful
24 year old Thai girls may not be 100% true to their 65 year old foreign
“boyfriends”, who are hoping that in exchange for a couple of thousand dollars
a month they will sit in a darkened room, coming out only to shag them
senseless on the foreigners next visit.
Mr Woodman, you have no
more chance of winning a Pulitzer Prize for this piece of drivel than you had
of winning a BAFTA for your uncredited performance as a police constable in a
cop show back in 2002.
The production team
was desperate to portray Thailand as a dangerous, venal and immoral country and
did all they could to find some evidence to support the premise. This isn’t journalism;
it’s small minded racist bigotry. The message is “Stay at home in cosy little
England/USA/Australia where those nasty foreigners cannot get you”.
The “show”, as the
presenter called it opens with Mr Woodman’s local ex-pat guide, a man called
Jim. We are encouraged to believe that they choose a bar at random from the
thousands in Bangkok. Jim carefully selects the one type of bar which is
renowned for its scams, an upstairs “ping pong” show in Patpong. The bar plays
its part by delivering a hugely inflated bill. Most Thailand regulars will know that the
correct response is to smile say there has been some mistake and offer a
reasonable payment. This will be declined, at which point the regular will
smile again and say, “no problem, we call tourist police”. The bar owner will
then make a compromise. Perhaps Jim did not do that because, in spite of his
grasp of the language; he had not been in Thailand long, or maybe he just wanted
to pick a fight for the cameras. I wonder.
The scenes purporting
to show devious bar girls conning poor unsuspecting foreigners out of a monthly
cash payment were lame beyond belief. This was a so-called “investigative”
reporter feigning horror that the girls were pretending to be someone they are
not in return for cash. I suspect the irony was lost on him. If you want to see
many beautiful women, bolstering the egos of westerners they would not normally
look at, in return for cash, try googling something like “Footballers Wives and
Girlfriends”. “Same same” as they say in Thailand.
The “jewellery scam”
scenes were the true nadir of the piece. Apparently a New Yorker was unable to
sell the jewellery he bought in Thailand at a profit, once he got back to New
York. Try that with the gems you buy in your own country. We were expected to be shocked that a store-owner
might pay commission to people that route business to his shop. The drivers who
work for him were provocatively described as a “gang”. Thai people frequently
say “Yes”, when confronted with a foreigner speaking quickly. Handy for a lazy
reporter, who wants to elicit an eye-catching revelation. The tuk tuk driver
who agreed to be interviewed was smiling broadly as he agreed that the store-owner
might kill him.
Unfortunately, the writer seems to be either specifically extremely biased against Connor Woodman, or he feels that every single tourist, be it their umpteenth time or the first, will know exactly what to do to not get ripped off. I don't know what scams go on in the various tourist destinations, but I would like to be aware. Therefore, information such as is presented in Scam City is very helpful, even though it might portray in a bad light a place which is close to the author's heart.
ReplyDeleteI would just like to add that I live in India, and while I am fiercely proud of my heritage and culture, I would still warn every tourist coming to my country to be on their guard, and help them with every bit of information I can.
All this is, of course, simply my opinion. Others are quite free to disagree.
Aditya,
DeleteThank you for taking the time to reply to my blog. I agree with you completely that people should be made aware of the pitfalls of travelling in foreign countries and that is exactly why I wrote the piece. I was not biased against Connor Woodman when I started to watch the film, I was most certainly biased against him by the time I had finished. I think he is an idiot and I tried to contact him to say as much. He did not reply.
The point I was trying to make is that he manufactured situations to create the documentary. You have seen the film. Is it your impression that the opening scene in a Thai bar is typical of what one might experience? Nothing could be further from the truth but that is the impression he tried to create. Also the way he and his friend tried to extricate themselves from the situation was confrontational and aggressive - this is categorically not how to deal with Thai people. My point is that the documentary is not a helpful guide to anything, it is sensationalist garbage.
A man was killed in a fight in a Thai bar only last week, because he got himself into an unnecessary argument and, allegedly, tried to fight his way out of it. Anyone watching the documentary might think aggression is the way to deal with a disagreement in Thailand. It is not.
I would welcome any film which genuinely depicted the many ways one can get into trouble in any country, my argument is that this is not one of those films. That is not because I look at Thailand though rose tinted glasses, my books are about how westerners make fools of themselves in Thailand and how locals are happy to help them.
My issue with Connor Woodman is that his film tells you nothing worth knowing, but with a little effort he could have delivered a helpful and sensible documentary.
To quote your own words - this is of course simply my opinion.
Matt Carrell
Matt I agree with you 100 percent. I just watched the Mexico city episode and am absolutely astounded by this crap. I have spent a good while in Mexico city, thus my reason for choosing to watch this episode. I won't dedicate near the time that you have in detailing what is wrong with this moronic drivel. Suffice to say that if you go looking for trouble; trouble you will find, although Mr. Woodman couldn't even accomplish that.
ReplyDeleteMichael, I've not seen the others in the series, I couldn't bear watch after the Thai one. Shame - they could be very useful with a little effort.
DeleteThe irony of Scam City is that the show scams the viewer from a neutral and fair portrayal of the cities it selects.
ReplyDeleteThe show is highly sensationalized, which makes for irresponsible journalism. A responsible journalist and documentarist should approach an issue with a hypothesis and then test the hypothesis neutrally. However, Scam City bends over backwards to find the scammer and the ugly aspects of the city. Of course they're going to find ugliness in back alley brothels and three card monty scams in flea markets. This is nothing new. Your average fanny-pack wearing tourist is not going to go to these places. Anybody could find an element of scamming in any city, in any country.
Further, the style in which the show was filmed was dark and seedy, supporting my argument that the show clearly has an agenda: to instill fear in the viewer and persuade him to stay home instead. Simply irresponsible and far from the truth.
It is true that the show has some merit to some scams such as the recurring scam in Prague streets where a hot dog vendor short changes the buyer. But instead of instilling fear in the viewer, Mr. Woodman should give the viewer constructive feedback to make him a smarter traveler.
In conclusion, I agree with Mr. Carrell that the show is not worth the watch. The plot had so much potential and then it dropped the ball. For the reasons above I cannot recommend this show, especially for those who have not traveled much and are not able to form their own opinion based on their own traveler experiences.
There are definitely staged scenes in this project. In the Buenos Aires episode he gets a meeting with a group of folks at the center of a currency counterfeiting ring. That = false. No way that would happen.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with your point of view. If people want to know all about a place, good and bad, they can find it in most guidebooks however the scam are not well publicized. This show is called scam city and it does what it is suppose too, highlight the various scams. Many travels are naive and wear rose colored glasses but that is not reality and they should know to be cautious where ever they travel, regardless of country as each has its good and it's bad. I believe this show let's people know they need to be careful when they travel to a different location, especially when there is a different culture.
ReplyDeleteI agree completely - people should be aware of the pitfalls of travelling to foreign lands - my point is that this is a particularly unhelpful film. The bar confrontation is all but staged. It pretends that this is common practice in Thai bars and nothing could be further from the truth. The journalist claims that his companion knows the city. If that was true he would not have behaved as he did - his conduct was guaranteed to spark a reaction. If the reporter had wanted to produce a helpful piece for travellers he would have said the following - be respectful, keep smiling, offer a token payment and walk out with confidence. What he actually wanted was to sensationalise the situation and pretend that Thailand is a dangerous country - hence the way he and his friend conducted themselves in the film. If you want helpful advice - this film isn't it.
DeleteI am having a difficult time understanding you are not seeing Scam City as what it is. Just an inside look at scams that happen in real life that you should watch out for.I think it took them some time to find a bar that would scam them, because someone with common sense would understand that not all places are corrupt. That's how Tv shows work. They try over and over again until they find what they need. At no point did I think that he was trying to tell the viewers to stay home and not travel or that they would be scammed at every corner. Instead I watch this and took it as things I should look out for if I ever traveled to those countries. Situations to be careful about and pretty much to be cautious when traveling abroad. He used the word gang but I didn't think it meant mafia, instead something like organized group. I haven't had the pleasure of traveling to Thailand but I can see by the show that people who don't understand english well commonly only answer with Yes and Ok. That does not only apply to this episode. I think your view of the show is biased and is also trying to portray the show in negative light. Most people don't know about the scams and the potential bad sides you can come across when you travel. This is a show that is just saying to viewers, "Hey, everything isn't perfect and here are some things to watch out for. Not everyone will encounter this but be careful so you don't get stuck in tricky situations"
ReplyDeleteThanks for your reply. It's interesting that you are unhappy with my post because - you say - it is "biased and trying to portray the show in a negative light." That is precisely my criticism of the show. I fully accept that people should be warned about the pitfalls of travelling to certain places - but this programme does not do that. One example - The scene in the bar was manufactured - and tried to suggest that behaviour is typical of Thai bars. Woodman claims to have been accompanied by someone who knows the city - yet they provoked the confrontation. If they wanted to be helpful - they would have explained that the Patpong area of Bangkok has a small number of "upstairs" bars - that offer explicit sex shows. They are to be avoided. If you find yourself in such a bar or in any bar where the bill has been inflated - you do not use any form of aggression - you smile - explain breezily that there has been a regrettable confusion over your bill then hand over the sum you expect to have paid. You then walk slowly to the door. If they try to insist - you explain that your brother works for the Tourist police and you would be happy to call him to help get this unfortunate misunderstanding resolved. They will back off. Problem solved. This is my point. The documentary is unhelpful - it's biased and it tries to create drama where none exists. So - in my reply - you have some helpful, authentic advice on how to avoid a problem - this documentary had none. If you want to avoid problems in Thailand - learn a little about the culture - a few words of the language and treat the locals with respect and politeness.
DeleteLatindreams, I think you hit the nail on the head. I've only been to Canada and loved it. So, it's good to know that if I travel ANYWHERE else, as a tourist, I need to be careful, concious of my surroundings, and not naive about the honesty of people who know I'm a tourist. I think it's a great show and wish there were more episodes .
ReplyDeletePlease see my reply to the post you liked. If you want helpful advice on how to avoid problems in Thailand - I really don't believe that documentary is the place to look. It portrays a country that I do not recognise.
DeleteYou totally missed the point. I don't think anyone with moderate intelligence would assume that the episode portrays all of Thialand. It represents what CAN happen if you aren't careful. I thought it was quite obvious that he had to look pretty hard to find trouble. The point is, if you aren't careful, you could end up I that situation. You shouldn't go to another country unless you understand what goes on and what to avoid.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with the post is simple - it is a piece of fiction. I've explained why the bar scene is a fabrication. The scene where he tried to suggest the motor cycle riders are in fear of their life - is just a lie. That's not how it works. The bird seed scene is laughable - he's a poor guy asking for a bit of help. It's a form of dignified begging - yet Woodman tried to turn it into a scam. The flaw in your logic is this - you say you shouldn't go to a country unless you understand what goes on and what to avoid. My point is that this documentary does not help you. It's ill researched trash. Some people will go to Thailand and think they learned something useful from this - and inside two days they will realise they haven't. That is my point.
DeleteIf there's nothing to learn, then it's just TV, if there is something to learn then you've learned something. If you can't see that there is always something to learn, then you are a pompous know it all. Judging a whole show based on one episode that you are completely biased against because it wasn't your experience is ignorant. Begging is a form of scam. It sounds like you would like people to believe you are more worldly than you are. You didn't say anywhere that you went every single place in Thailand. Your experience is not necessarily that of everyone else's and scam city doesn't make that claim. The point you seem to be unable to grasp is to be cautious when going somewhere you are not familiar with. Keep your eyes and ears open to what's going on around you and be cautious of strangers and the situations they may put you in. I live in America and have been scammed plenty of times locally, that doesn't mean I think that's how all America is. Intelligent people understand these things and don't make rash assumptions the way you do. It just sounds like you have a personal grudge against the show for ignorant reasons. Do some research before you spout nonsense, makes you sound stupid.
ReplyDeleteMy replies to you were polite and reasoned - but you have chosen to be abusive. I had already guessed that you are American and you lecture me on the needs of the international traveller - yet you have only ever visited Canada. That is frankly hilarious. You've never even crossed the ocean. It doesn't surprise me that you have "been scammed plenty of times' because you can watch garbage like this and think it's good advice. as for research - I have spent about four of the last ten years in Thailand. You - have watched a documentary. Others can decide who sounds stupid.
DeleteAnd yet, I still understand more about being overseas and in other countries than you. Being scammed is nothing to be ashamed of, only an inconsiderate jerk would make someone feel stupid for getting scammed. It happens to the best of us, the point is to learn and move on. The uneducated often try to make everyone else feel bad, but you can't help who you are. I am extremely polite. It's called condescending. Read a book.
ReplyDelete