Voluntourism Sucks: How To ACTUALLY Give Back

Voluntourism is a huge industry, grossing 2 billion dollars from 1.6 million volunteers annually. As a money-making industry, voluntourism primarily benefits the customers, young and privileged Americans or Europeans looking to pad their resumes and brush up on a foreign language. For the children and other individuals exposed, voluntourism creates a rotating door of strangers who come in and provide temporary empathy and support and then leave them with a problematic void larger than that which already existed. Voluntourism may seem innocent and mundane enough, just a form of misplaced kindness, but it has serious social repercussions and is essentially modern day imperialism, the latest incarnation of the same white guilt that led to colonialism and missionaries.

[Photo via @barbiesavior]