Tourism plays a significant role in the global economy, but its impact on culture is a subject of debate. Some people think that tourism aimed at boosting the economy will damage culture but others believe the opposite, that tourism is solely a good way to preserve a culture. This essay will discuss the pros and cons of tourism.
On one hand, there are few disadvantages. Firstly, when advertising about the region to attract more visitors, many tourism promoters will exaggerate aspects of the culture to make it seem more unique. While this may initially attract many travelers, it can have significant negative consequences. Visitors may be disappointed when their experiences do not match the exaggerated advertisements. As a result, they will pass this information to others, and the image of this region will be ruined. The destination must accommodate a large number of visitors, which causes significant damage to the environment. Tourists throw trash into beaches, rivers and lakes, which pollute water and make marine creatures die. Many attractions in the region are symbols of the culture that will deteriorate and even collapse, which represents a loss of cultural heritage, because they have to stand an overwhelming weight. In addition, locals will have to change to adapt to requests from visitors. This is a significant and gradual loss. For example, a church is a worship place where we worship God and need to be quiet and polite but when tourism increases, the church becomes an attraction and has to be open. As a result, the quiet atmosphere disappears because there are some tourists who speak out loud and dress in clothes which are not suitable.
On the other hand, tourism brings a lot of advantages for protecting culture. Firstly, tourism helps boost economic opportunities. When tourism emerges in a location, it requires a lot of people to meet its criteria. One of these is to create many job opportunities for residents and promote the image of these places. They should take advantage of this by welcoming visitors, which creates revenues for themselves. In addition, when locals have permanent jobs in their home land, they continue to stay and preserve their culture. Sometimes, they have to combine their culture and other things such as technology and media to convey the image of culture to other people, which is considered a technological way to protect their culture instead of documents and photographs manually in physical albums. In some cases, these albums get lost and their next generations are hardly exposed to. Moreover, when the region is famous for their culture, UNESCO will recognize and have some protections for this culture. For example, when visiting Hoi An in Vietnam, visitors once try My Quang Noodle. Now My Quang has been recognized as a national intangible cultural heritage. Tourism not only plays a role in preserving cultural heritage, but it also contributes to its development, both mentally and physically.
In conclusion, while tourism can sometimes lead to the exploitation and distortion of culture, it also provides crucial economic benefits and helps preserve cultural heritage by raising awareness and securing protection. On balance, I believe the advantages of tourism in protecting culture outweigh the disadvantages, provided that efforts are made to minimize its negative impacts.