481–490 of 512 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
GGP is responding to my own anecdote, about my own friend who runs a small neighborhood restaurant that is now overrun with tourists. I don't think I misinterpreted the response.
So you disagree that popular restaurants have long lines regardless of foreign tourists?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am giving/defending my opinion , in an effort to convince. It doesn't have to be yours. > What's wrong with tourism, seeing Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto? I just spent several paragraphs answering that question. TL;DR: a few days/weeks of lightweight entertainment for you does real damage to the places you visit. The ethical traveler should strive for something better than photos. > I don't get more than 2 weeks vacation whe…
> TL;DR: a few days/weeks of lightweight entertainment for you does real damage to the places you visit. That's a bizarre take. Beyond bad, just plain weird. > It's not a high bar. Visiting friends or doing a specific activity (rock climbing! diving! fishing! sports! cooking! meditation retreat! make art! take a class! gain a skill!) would be a perfectly ethical reason to travel somewhere, in my humble opinion That's…
But since I didn't explain it explicitly, the principle is that while all travel is damaging, you can thoughtfully pick activities which:
1) Will help offset that damage (e.g. volunteering)
2) Require that you be in a place (e.g. seeing family / friends), or
3) Otherwise spread out your impact and/or engage with locals on a more authentic level -- even the horrible, very bad, "extremely artificial and damaging" yoga retreat (lol, come on) will put you in a small minority of travelers, many of whom will be locals themselves.
Despite your repeated mischaracterizations of my argument, it doesn't have to be expensive, and perfect is not the enemy of the good. It doesn't take much more than creativity and effort to do better with your travel.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> TL;DR: a few days/weeks of lightweight entertainment for you does real damage to the places you visit. That's a bizarre take. Beyond bad, just plain weird. > It's not a high bar. Visiting friends or doing a specific activity (rock climbing! diving! fishing! sports! cooking! meditation retreat! make art! take a class! gain a skill!) would be a perfectly ethical reason to travel somewhere, in my humble opinion That's…
You balked at the idea of volunteerism, but then I gave you less...demanding...versions, and you criticize them as being imperfect. It's clear that I'm not going to convince you, and you keep cherry-picking the most expensive / burdensome examples I provide, so I'm done replying after this. But since I didn't explain it explicitly , the principle is that while all travel is damaging , you can thoughtfully pick activi…
Your "yoga retreat" is the worst of the Eat Pray Love kind of tourism, I cannot believe what I'm reading. It's artificial as fuck, please don't suggest it ever again.
I also do not want to visit friends and family, that's a different activity entirely!
You mischaracterize all sightseeing tourism as "damaging" and the equivalent of TikTok and Mario Kart tours, yet complain that I am mischaracterizing you.
Wow. The sense of entitled gatekeeping I'm getting from you is off the charts.
I have to follow your very strict and arbitrary standards -- you, who by your own admission have lived in "several tourist hotspots" (making you a bigger part of the problem than me) -- because... somehow my visiting several interesting parts of the world where I know nobody is "damaging"?
Wow. That's rich.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do what Japan desperately wants people to do, and visit any of the 95% of the country that isn’t Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Fuji, or Nara.
Why do they advertise those cities then? No such thing as "Japan", there are multiple interests. And what for those who haven't seen Tokyo, Kyoto, etc with their own eyes. Should they NOT visit then? Why not?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's unethical to do tourism in Barcelona? What's so "clear cut"?
The locals really don't want tourists to be there.
Do these locals ever go on vacation to other parts of the planet?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Those signs have nothing to do with protecting culture. Most of the time, they are simply a naive defense against dealing with a population often doesn't speak Japanese very well.
There's no prohibition against requiring customers to be able to speak Japanese, and this works very well as a tourist filter.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know about the Ramen place (I can't believe that they wouldn't take cash?), but I agree with you that more places are doing this kind of "two markets" stuff -- it's even becoming official, in that now there's officially sanctioned "foreigner pricing" for certain temples, shrines, and parks. There's also Google Maps and Yelp vs. Japan's local version (pretty much any review on the former two are useless, and h…
I think it's worse than that. I'm starting to think that there may not really be an ethical way to be a tourist in a foreign country. Especially coming from a high cost of living area to a lower one. Just being there puts you in economic competition with the locals. You can spend more on everything than everyone else and that raises their costs too. Especially housing and food. Those fancy resorts take all the prime…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anyone who's ever worked in customer support will tell you that dealing with customer regularly sucks balls, even worse if they're foreign and don't know the local language, customs and etiquette so they annoy you and your local patrons while thinking they're entitled to because "we spend money here and support your economy", or even more worse if they're foreign and also intoxicated or acting up for the camera (soci…
I am in Spain (where people, imho wrongfully, think tourism is ruining everything) and I dont see the issue; my wife and myself make enough in the summer to not have anything to do the rest of the year. I have IT businesses which I scale back to run the pub in summer for 3 month. I don't really care about whatever they do as long as it is not fighting: the more drunk and loud they are, especially guys with girls, the…
Do you have any self reflection to see why this is a problem for other citizens who aren't making bank from tourism 3 months per year and actually need to work 12 months a year but also have to deal with the issues tourism ads for them: higher rents, higher prices, extra traffic, extra noise at night from your drunken patrons, crowds, pickpockets, scammers, etc?
You arguments is just "over tourism is not a nation/city problem because it's making me rich". You can't make this up. I couldn't be as oblivious about it if I tried.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anyone who's ever worked in customer support will tell you that dealing with customer regularly sucks balls, even worse if they're foreign and don't know the local language, customs and etiquette so they annoy you and your local patrons while thinking they're entitled to because "we spend money here and support your economy", or even more worse if they're foreign and also intoxicated or acting up for the camera (soci…
Which is why it's better to not have any customers. And not make any money, because dealing with taxes sucks balls, too. Best, really, is not to be alive, because otherwise you'll need to deal with illness, hunger, sadness and stuff.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I find it amusing when Japan wants to be a homogenous society everybody respects their right to have that opinion. But when a european country voices the same wish, everybody loses their mind.
I wouldn't go so far as to say everybody respects it. Some people, maybe. Ultimately, it's the same underlying xenophobia and racism you find everywhere else. It's easier for people to like people who are like them and harder for them to like people who are not like them. In my opinion, people don't talk about how well America integrates other cultures enough. It's one of our defining strengths, even still.
>Ultimately, it's the same underlying xenophobia and racism you find everywhere else. It's easier for people to like people who are like them and harder for them to like people who are not like them.
Yes and this is completely normal human behavior, and in my opinion should not be completely outright demonized. I suspect one of the many reasons why europe is the way it is today in regards to this topic, is because we have repressed these natural tribal tendencies. And just to stir the pot; I wonder how welcoming and nice many of the e.g. majority muslim countries would to the non-arabs & non-muslims if they were to mass migrate to said countries. I think they would very much exercise and impose their 'xenophobia' upon these foreigners in certainly more tougher ways.