“It turns us into the worst version of ourselves while convincing us that we’re at our best.”
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Yeah, I definitely disagree with the premise. Meeting and spending time with people of different backgrounds and cultures can help build empathy(something we sorely need more of in this world). Yes, there will be people who will just go from place to place, seeing the “thing you’re supposed to see”, but I don’t think it’s that common. The author mentioned something about how people wouldn’t just walk around in their home towns, but they would when they are traveling. That’s part of the experience, really. Just taking in the surrounds of a novel place, with people bustling around… it’s a completely different world, and yet, it’s still kind of the same. We are all humans, and things like travel can help hammer that home.
I feel like this is an article that tells me more about the author’s mind than it does about the thesis topic.
The introductory concept—that people who travel treat it as a virtue—rings false immediately to me. Everyone I know, myself included, treats leisure travel as a luxury to be enjoyed, not a virtuous activity to be lorded over others. Most people I know do roughly the same thing in travel destinations as they do at home, whether that’s museums, hiking, golfing, or sight-seeing.
Ultimately, the whole argument seems to be that “travel doesn’t improve you as a person the way you think it does” which is not an argument against traveling so much as an argument against inaccurate self-perception.
Agreed fully with everybody else here - this piece seems to be aimed a very narrow group of people. Specifically, people who travel to be seen and find themselves.
My inherent goal of travel is not to be transformed by the trip, it is to explore and learn about a new place. I find myself transformed by my experiences and gain new respect for different cultures. Traveling is just as transformative as any other experience we can do.
Not sure I agree with this, but anyway, here’s the article. Mainly I just really hate flying on airplanes.✈️👎🤢
Below is my impression of the article, but it doesn’t seem genuinely worthwhile to discuss. Instead, what would you propose as an alternative to planes? Do you think the sacrifice in connectivity from boat travel is worth it? What about potential all electric and fuel cell planes?
Anyway, on the article:
Maybe it’s true for people who travel to a place that is set up exactly like their home but more expensive. But this just feels inflammatory and absurd.
This line also jumps out at me:
Socrates and Immanuel Kant—arguably the two greatest philosophers of all time—voted with their feet, rarely leaving their respective home towns of Athens and Königsberg
What does this mean? That the philosophers actively railed against travel, or just that they… didn’t? This sounds like taking a position on behalf of these philosophers over something absurdly unrelated to their general philosophical claims. And whether they made the claim or not, phrasing it this way immediately loses credibility on the author’s behalf for me. What did they have to say about travel? If they said something, the author should have included it. If they said nothing, that is so wildly dishonest and straw grasping that I can’t help but laugh at the article.
Then we get to this quote from Fernando Pessoa
I abhor new ways of life and unfamiliar places. . . . The idea of travelling nauseates me. . . . Ah, let those who don’t exist travel! . . . Travel is for those who cannot feel. . . . Only extreme poverty of the imagination justifies having to move around to feel.
There are so many assumptions about travelers that it boggles the mind. What of nomads? What of traveling philosophers? What of houseless peoples who are forced to travel? What of everyone who doesn’t do literally all the touristy things?
And, although people like to talk about their travels, few of us like to listen to them.
What? Of course people love to hear about new places, this is an absurd claim. No I don’t care about a hotel resort, but I love to hear about someone bushwacking in south america, guided or not.
They get into this little quip that summarizes their argument nicely: “O.K., but what did you do there?” This should show pretty blatantly why this is absurd. People do all sorts of things in these places. Asking literally the first question a normal human should ask in a conversation is not an argument, it’s just contrarian.
I wont do more blow by blows, this whole article is just a lot of nothing to feel superior to people. Click farming rage bait that could’ve been written by a highschooler that ultimately says nothing of value. So you don’t want to travel, cool, don’t. Sure, some people travel in a very vapid way, that’s true, but that’s not the only way people travel, nor would I hazard it’s even the majority. Traveling to new places and meeting people from different cultures can do so so much to help people understand how we’re all just people, and to help forestall notions of unfounded superiority. This article, expectedly, feels wholly unworldly in its conclusions.
Disagree with the premise, but I get the feeling we’ll start to see more of this sort of thing come out as more and more people reach “i will never travel” levels of poverty.
