Draft-Dodging Thai Ladyboys Get Last Laugh

April 10, 2013

Many gleeful ladyboys showed up at Banglamung City Hall to be declared exempt from military conscription. Thai men over age 21 are required to register for at least one military draft before age 30. Draftees are picked by a lottery, but Thai law exempts ladyboys.

PATTAYA – April 9, 2013 [PDN]; at 2:30 p.m., Banglamung City Hall was chosen as the site to enlist military forces to be conscripted for the Army and Navy. The season of military conscription had come, and all the men from Banglamung who had reached age 21 came to register, both straight men and ladyboys.

The draft lottery was held on April 9-10 for the 2 sub- districts of Banglamung and Nongprue. The chairman was Lt. Col. Peerapan Chuea-asa, commander of squad 2.

The scene was very lively, with a lot of Thai males and transgender women, and also their relatives. Transgenders who had been surgically transformed into females were all exempted from military service, because their altered gender was not the same as their birth gender. So they were all delighted.