The Thai soap opera “Mia Jum Pen”, which caused controversy for its depiction of rape, is under fire once again. This time it involves a scene in which a female character, dressed in a Japanese style school uniform, seduces the male lead.
The scene sparked a new round of negative reaction on Twitter, pushing the hashtag #BanMiaJumPen (#แบนเมียจำเป็น) to the top once again.
Most of the tweets condemned the producers for sexualising school uniforms and the TV channel for allowing such scenes to be broadcast. Twitter users also commented on how often young students across Thailand become victims of sexual abuse.
“There are many students who have been sexually harassed in real life, but the media uses school uniforms like this? [The producers] should be ashamed of themselves” said one Twitter user.
Another user said “So many young girls are traumatized by being sexually harassed, only because they wear school uniforms. The scriptwriters and the director don’t seem to understand that what they’re showing to the viewers is disgusting. Stop making this type of soap opera!”
The scene was also uploaded to YouTube, where the comments weren’t as negative as those on Twitter, with most of them complimenting the female character’s acting skills and how “cute” and “funny” she was in that scene.
Previously, the soap opera sparked online outrage for depicting the rape of a female character, causing #NoMoreRapeOnScreen (#ข่มขืนผ่านจอพอกันที) and #BanMiaJumPen (#แบนเมียจำเป็น) to top the trending hashtag list on Twitter. Many users criticised the drama for reinforcing rape culture in Thailand. Some users went as far as to call for the TV channel to cancel the broadcast of the soap opera.
