Don’t tell me about your trip to Southeast Asia | Hacker News Reader

Don’t tell me about your trip to Southeast Asia

medium.com

23 pointsallenleee16 comments

So it's ok to buy an amazingly cheap fast-fashion dress or other stuff produced by near-subsistence labor in these countries, or have them do your payroll, transcribe your insurance applications, etc in BPO farms, but not to actually visit them in person.

If you're male. Or especially, male and white.

I see.

The sentiment of the article is not that there is anything wrong as a white male going to visit these countries. Its how westerners behave while they are over there and the way they interact with locals. By all means go visit in person, just take the time to learn a bit about their culture. People seem to treat SE Asia like its a giant amusement park and not a group of countries where large population live every day.

The sentiment is exactly that white males shouldn't visit these places - or at least she doesn't want to hear about it, it says so in the very title.

And she's quite pointedly attempting to paint any such visit or presence as sex tourism.

If her point had been direct, to decry tourists (white or not, male or not, heterosexual or not) getting sex "on the cheap" in impoverished nations, we might agree. But then we'd also have to decry the way corporations and financial capitalism gets other forms of labor and resources on the cheap in impoverished nations, and a whole lot of other arguments. Sex is not some magic pixie dust, to be bestowed by royal fairies, after all; it's just another thing people do.

She does seem to make two separate points which is perhaps the flaw in this article. On one hand she is pointing to the economic disparity the locals face compared to the Western Tourists, but at the same time she cannot seem to help herself from commenting on the "sexual tourism" that as she points out has "been on her mind".

"To boast of cutting corners in countries where human beings depend on literal dollars, table scraps of your hourly income, to feed their families for entire weeks holds no repute for me." <This is the point I was arguing and I can see her point of view. (I also have no problem with financial capitalism and corporations seeking out cheaper labor and resources as long as it is humane).

However to broadbrush all White Western Males in Asia as individuals on a Sex Holiday goes too far.

"To boast of cutting corners in countries where human beings depend on literal dollars, table scraps of your hourly income, to feed their families for entire weeks holds no repute for me."

The thing is that capitalism does indeed thrive on cutting corners in these kinds of situations, albeit often indirectly, by selecting the most "cost effective" supplier, building the factory in low-tax, or low-labor-protection states, and so on.

It's no different when Nike, or even the more enlightened conglomerates, do it than when an individual privileged white male imperialist tourist does it. It's just more personal, rather than systematic, perhaps.

But I suspect the systematic pressure is much more damaging than disrespectful tourists. And since when have tourists been known to be respectful anyway, in SEA or anywhere.

I agree with you, but i can understand her point of view. Her coworkers are mostly male, so most of the braggart she talk to are probably male too, and this skew her view. This is not a skin color or gender issue, this is a cultural/civilisation issue. Most of the westerner tourists going to SE Asia are acting in a weird way, it doesn't matter if they are sexual tourists, backpackers or others. Respectfull, non-arrogant westerners are not that easy to find in SE Asia.

This is unrelated but i think USA focus on gender and skin color for every subject is unhealthy. Yes, you have some issues related to those caracteristics, but you are forgetting about class and/or culture discrimination.

It's the first time I used "flag" on HN. It's quite difficult to understand the conclusion of the article among racist remarks and anti-white-male sentiment.

I'm British and been in and around Asia about 18 months now. I agree with the article's sentiment. I might even take it a step further to say that such tourism is a metaphor for the West's relationship with Asia. I'm currently in China where the majority of my, and I suspect your, material possessions where manafactured. It is such an alien culture to me yet it is fundamental to how I live my daily life no matter where I reside. This disparity reminds me of the article's distaste for Westerners mindlessly enjoying SE Asia. Perhaps in a way it's as if the entirety of the West is having a "holiday" in China?

There certainly are a huge number of westerners who go visit Asia and treat it like its Epcot Center in Disney World like a zoo that exists for their pleasure. These are real working cities with distinct and ancient cultures that should be respected. Too many westerners take advantage of the genuine hospitality offered by locals and never take the time to educate themselves, instead spending the whole time partying.

I spent a few months working as a tour guide in Vietnam and you are absolutely correct about the difference in economic conditions of the local and the western white men that come. In the job I had which was a mix of educated western backpackers along with locals, for some reason the westerners automatically got paid more than the locals, despite them working twice as hard. For us, the job was a fun break/opportunity during a stay in SouthEast Asia. For the locals it was means to support their family. I will say they did their jobs every day with a huge smile on their face and happy as anyone I've met in any part of the world.

Pretty tasteless of the author to headline the post with a picture of sex tourists when talking about regular tourists and expats. I'd like to see some evidence of the "long-talked-about sexual appetite for women of color" given that most people marry somebody of their race. I will make sure to not cross her path, yikes.

Though difficult, one thing you can do is stop buying things from companies that rely on the aforementioned exploitative labor practices.

Free speech. If you don't like it, doesn't mean everyone should stop talking about it.

Which he didn't, the title is "don't tell me".

>white man who makes $100s/day at Facebook bragging about frugality at the expense of a Filipina living on cents.

(Ignoring the idiotic racism), what is this even supposed to mean? Does she prefer that the Facebook employee go to Australia instead so the Filipina gets nothing?

>from an industry that seems to have a professional appetite for white men (~88% male, ~70% white to be exact)

Funny how that 'professional appetite' matches the graduates from universities.

I don't think that is the point of article. Point is one should not brag about it like one is so rich.

If you are so rich go to Ibiza. Spend 100$ for entry to Ibiza club, and 500$ on two drinks. Hook up with gold diggers that would laugh at 100$ k/year salary. That is something to brag about. But really rich people don't brag about such stuff. Description from article is about poor mindset, which does not change when you get big salary.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com