The worst of poverty tourism is when it is done impersonally without recognition of the inescapable circumstances of others. Do see how real people live and work, connect with them to their faces. Recount your difficult escape from a low-income origin.
But: don’t think that you are one of them and able to advocate as a representative if you aren’t, a la Pulp’s Common People.
We should encourage resilience, but be sympathetic about its absence. Everyone should choose to learn to shake off a punch to the face, but that doesn’t negate the real trauma of someone getting assaulted who didn’t have that lesson.
> But: don’t think that you are one of them and able to advocate as a representative
I don't see how the author did that. He advocated a change of mindset by dialing to an extremely different situation to solve his own issues/or other people with the same issues, not that the situation is great or perfect.
I don't see where he advocated for it. For what it's worth, his effort in the warehouse is already more than 99% of more privileged folks who has never needed to do that. I fail to see why this is being criticized.
The comments criticizing him as patronizing is in turn incredibly patronizing of the warehouse workers themselves, the irony.
But: don’t think that you are one of them and able to advocate as a representative if you aren’t, a la Pulp’s Common People.
We should encourage resilience, but be sympathetic about its absence. Everyone should choose to learn to shake off a punch to the face, but that doesn’t negate the real trauma of someone getting assaulted who didn’t have that lesson.