Create a 8 pages page paper that discusses reasons for poverty tourism, its advantages and disadvantages.
Create a 8 pages page paper that discusses reasons for poverty tourism, its advantages and disadvantages. Slums are urban areas that are overpopulated and those residents live in abject poverty and at the center of social ills not commonly found in other places. It is a clear depiction of the social stratification in these countries and which raises the curiosity of many people.
The tour guides for such places have taken the advantage of people’s curiosity to see slums and organized tours to take them and charge them for the experience. The people on the slums, however, benefit minimally or in most cases do not benefit in any way at all from these visits by other people and mostly the white. The slum tourism has raised ethical issues and debates among many humanitarians as it is seen to break many ethical principles and move contrary to the ethical theories, a move that will be discussed in detail below. It is these ethical debates that bring the question of whether slum tourism is ethically acceptable or not.
According to the research by Hanrahan (2013), poverty tourism is becoming a lucrative business because of the influx of people seeking to view how the other half lives. This curiosity is driven by the need to make them feel good or better about their current lives and they can only possibly do that if they view the miserable lives people in slums lead. The individuals feeling guilty about leading extravagant lifestyles or parents of children who want to show them how different life is and how lucky they are the most common customers of these poverty tours around the world. Whether this serves their purpose or fulfills their internal well-being and make them better people in society is yet to be known or researched about.
When documentaries about slums come up in the media stations, the interests of many people are naturally piqued at how these people lead their lives and other even want to experience it while others just want to have a glimpse of it to believe that it is actually true. What results after this is an influx in poverty tourism with many white people being the majority aiming to see it for them to believe. A perfect example of this is the previous two world cup games which were hosted in South Africa and Brazil and which saw an influx of people seeking accommodation in the slums of Soweto and Favera (Robertson, 2012). This is not only for lack of accommodation but curiosity as to how they can live.
