5 ms·

"alien, ignorant, greedy for something you cannot ever have" I find this hugely classist. (Edit: and I'm generally not someone to use that terminology) Most (

"alien, ignorant, greedy for something you cannot ever have" I find this hugely classist. (Edit: and I'm generally not someone to use that terminology) Most (even American) travellers are just trying to see some sights, have a normal and are not particularly rude or problematic. The issue is now that 'everyone' can afford to travel ... it's causing problems. This is a problem of prosperity.

chrispeel 8y ago
"alien, ignorant, greedy for something you cannot ever have" I find this hugely classist. I thought the quote was going more for a "leave-no-trace" approach to interacting w the world. Clean up your physical and digital trash so that it doesn't destroy the experience for others.
CamperBob2 8y ago
It's the zoo problem all over again. Animal-rights advocates frequently argue, not without some justification, that it's unethical and exploitative to capture wild animals and lock them up in cages so that we can gawk at them. So let's follow their advice in a hypothetical sense and get rid of zoos, circuses, even pet stores. Fast-forward a generation or two and let's imagine how that might turn out. The people from which those very organizations draw their membership will have never seen an elephant or a tiger -- or, for the city-dwellers among them, even a deer or a rabbit -- in real life. These are also the same people who vote for Congressional representatives to pass or repeal conservation laws. In this hypothetical future, volunteers from the animal-rights organization will go door-to-door canvassing for votes or petition signatures, just as they do today... except no one will have the faintest idea what they're talking about. The activists will find that they might as well be asking their contributors to save the T-Rexes in Jurassic Park. What's the difference? They're all just pixels on a screen. Tourism works the same way, IMO. It may have harmful aspects, but the effects of completely eliminating it will be worse. And decrying "mass tourism," as Wallace puts it, is nothing but code for "Only a few wealthy people should get to experience this."
- wwweston 8y ago
  > And decrying "mass tourism," as Russell puts it, is nothing but code for "Only a few wealthy people should get to experience this." "Nothing but" is an incorrect over-reduction. Like any high-volume human activity, mass tourism can have real impacts. Concern over those impacts is likely to exist entirely independently of wealth-favoring classism. And whether the experience is limited only to the wealthy depends what mechanism is chosen to limit access. If it's determined by pricing mechanisms responding to demand, then, yep, you're going to largely skew access to the wealthy. If it's determined by assessing the number of visitors that won't destroy the experience, and then handing out access via lottery then the criticism loses some of its power.
  - rorykoehler 8y ago
    Lottery is what they do for hajj in mecca.
Bucephalus355 8y ago
I really appreciate you using the term “classist”. I think that term, and not “racist”, needs to be much more widely applied these days. That being said, I really enjoyed the author’s post. If anything, the people who are going to these places are the social climbing, upwardly mobile middle class, determined to burnish their brand on Instagram. Also the free flow of tourists is a problem that parallels a lot of other things in the world currently. Information, capital, trade, all these things have moved so much and so fast they have loosed control from national government sovereignty that used to regulate them. As the anti-globalization train begins picking up speed, all these will be severely restricted, for better or worse.
- darkerside 8y ago
  > determined to burnish their brand on Instagram Stop projecting, 99% of people do not give a shit about this
  - zoltar 8y ago
    Instagram has 700MM daily actives. The world doesn't have fifty billion people. Who's projecting exactly?
    - darkerside 8y ago
      And is your claim that the vast majority of these users are curating a personal brand, as opposed to simply sharing with friends and family, actual corporate brands maintaining an online presence, or any other use case besides?
  - sonnyblarney 8y ago
    Actually, I read literally in the last few days that a survey indicated 'Instagramability' was the #1 issues for Millenials in their choice of destinations. I think it was the Globe and Mail, sorry I don't have the link. That kind of threw me a little, but I think 'it's a thing'. There are many little tourist spots where 'selfies' are indeed a problem. That said, we've always been taking photos on vacay. So maybe it's just that we can easily click-and-share ...
kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
The same was said of Japanese tourists before they were economically trapped in their own country.
plasticchris 8y ago
Once on a hike I was passed by a man and his wife who commented they had to get somewhere further along to see it. This was along one of my favorite trails.

chrispeel 8y ago

"alien, ignorant, greedy for something you cannot ever have" I find this hugely classist. I thought the quote was going more for a "leave-no-trace" approach to interacting w the world. Clean up your physical and digital trash so that it doesn't destroy the experience for others.

CamperBob2 8y ago

It's the zoo problem all over again. Animal-rights advocates frequently argue, not without some justification, that it's unethical and exploitative to capture wild animals and lock them up in cages so that we can gawk at them. So let's follow their advice in a hypothetical sense and get rid of zoos, circuses, even pet stores. Fast-forward a generation or two and let's imagine how that might turn out. The people from which those very organizations draw their membership will have never seen an elephant or a tiger -- or, for the city-dwellers among them, even a deer or a rabbit -- in real life. These are also the same people who vote for Congressional representatives to pass or repeal conservation laws. In this hypothetical future, volunteers from the animal-rights organization will go door-to-door canvassing for votes or petition signatures, just as they do today... except no one will have the faintest idea what they're talking about. The activists will find that they might as well be asking their contributors to save the T-Rexes in Jurassic Park. What's the difference? They're all just pixels on a screen. Tourism works the same way, IMO. It may have harmful aspects, but the effects of completely eliminating it will be worse. And decrying "mass tourism," as Wallace puts it, is nothing but code for "Only a few wealthy people should get to experience this."

wwweston 8y ago
> And decrying "mass tourism," as Russell puts it, is nothing but code for "Only a few wealthy people should get to experience this." "Nothing but" is an incorrect over-reduction. Like any high-volume human activity, mass tourism can have real impacts. Concern over those impacts is likely to exist entirely independently of wealth-favoring classism. And whether the experience is limited only to the wealthy depends what mechanism is chosen to limit access. If it's determined by pricing mechanisms responding to demand, then, yep, you're going to largely skew access to the wealthy. If it's determined by assessing the number of visitors that won't destroy the experience, and then handing out access via lottery then the criticism loses some of its power.
- rorykoehler 8y ago
  Lottery is what they do for hajj in mecca.

Bucephalus355 8y ago

I really appreciate you using the term “classist”. I think that term, and not “racist”, needs to be much more widely applied these days. That being said, I really enjoyed the author’s post. If anything, the people who are going to these places are the social climbing, upwardly mobile middle class, determined to burnish their brand on Instagram. Also the free flow of tourists is a problem that parallels a lot of other things in the world currently. Information, capital, trade, all these things have moved so much and so fast they have loosed control from national government sovereignty that used to regulate them. As the anti-globalization train begins picking up speed, all these will be severely restricted, for better or worse.

darkerside 8y ago
> determined to burnish their brand on Instagram Stop projecting, 99% of people do not give a shit about this
- zoltar 8y ago
  Instagram has 700MM daily actives. The world doesn't have fifty billion people. Who's projecting exactly?
  - darkerside 8y ago
    And is your claim that the vast majority of these users are curating a personal brand, as opposed to simply sharing with friends and family, actual corporate brands maintaining an online presence, or any other use case besides?
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  Actually, I read literally in the last few days that a survey indicated 'Instagramability' was the #1 issues for Millenials in their choice of destinations. I think it was the Globe and Mail, sorry I don't have the link. That kind of threw me a little, but I think 'it's a thing'. There are many little tourist spots where 'selfies' are indeed a problem. That said, we've always been taking photos on vacay. So maybe it's just that we can easily click-and-share ...

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

The same was said of Japanese tourists before they were economically trapped in their own country.

plasticchris 8y ago

Once on a hike I was passed by a man and his wife who commented they had to get somewhere further along to see it. This was along one of my favorite trails.