Sustainability Bites

There is no such thing as a free lunch

tourism

Revenge tourism – may the force be with you (cause it sure ain’t with Planet Earth)

Revenge tourism – may the force be with you (cause it sure ain’t with Planet Earth)

“Travel is a force for good!” So reads the slogan of one of the world’s biggest tourism operations. But ‘good’ for who? Definitely good for individual travelers who are revitalized through exposure to amazing new places, people and experiences. Good for the global economy? Undoubtedly yes, but good for the planet itself? Not so much. And in the spaces between these tourism ‘goods’ and ‘bads’ we hear the seductive siren song of BAU (business as usual) and maybe begin to appreciate just how forceful BAU can be.

Postcards from hell – cognitive dissonance in the face of a disastrous holiday

Postcards from hell – cognitive dissonance in the face of a disastrous holiday

Frequently, it seems, the greatest exposure to climate disruption we witness in mainstream media is where it interrupts our holidays. To help us avoid the inconvenient truth of existential collapse, we distract ourselves with the trivial and the inconsequential, or give up and join in the orgy of misinformation and conspiracy thinking. You can run (deny and/or delay or maybe retreat to your favourite holiday idyll) but you can’t hide.

Last chance to see

Last chance to see

If society was to really to engage with the sustainability of tourism in an uncertain future then maybe we should be talking about how we can protect the many environmental and cultural values of our top tourism destinations in a way that doesn’t involve travelling to see them.