I am seeing a lot of pushback against what is popularly called “voluntourism”. Critics believe that the week-long trips are just opportunities for vapid, quilt-ridden white Americans to take pictures with brown children and pay penance for their privileged lives.
Calling the experience “completely transformative,” local 22-year-old Angela Fisher told reporters Tuesday that her six-day visit to the rural Malawian village of Neno has completely changed her profile picture on Facebook. “As soon as I walked into that dusty, remote town and the smiling children started coming up to me, I just knew my Facebook profile photo would change forever,”
The Onion – 6-Day Visit To Rural African Village Completely Changes Woman’s Facebook Profile Picture
http://www.theonion.com/articles/6day-visit-to-rural-african-village-completely-cha,35083/
“VOLUNTOURISM IS ULTIMATELY ABOUT the fulfillment of the volunteers themselves, not necessarily what they bring to the communities they visit. In fact, medical volunteerism often breaks down existing local health systems. In Ghana, I realized that local people weren’t purchasing health insurance, since they knew there would be free foreign health care and medications available every few months. This left them vulnerable in the intervening times, not to mention when the organization would leave the community.”
Pacific Standard – #InstagrammingAfrica: The Narcissism of Global Voluntourism
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/health-and-behavior/instagrammingafrica-narcissism-global-voluntourism-83838/#.U6mytSTzSPx.facebook
“After six years of working in and traveling through a number of different countries where white people are in the numerical minority, I’ve come to realize that there is one place being white is not only a hindrance, but negative — most of the developing world.”
pippabiddle.com – The Problem With Little White Girls (and Boys): Why I Stopped Being A Voluntourist
https://medium.com/race-class/b84d4011d17e
I admit that I laughed at the Onion article and I have shared stories of misinformed and misguided volunteers who have crossed my path and said some pretty ridiculous or horrific things. Ex: During preparations to open the children’s home in Villa, one volunteer was asking me about the selection process; which kids would the children’s home be given from the state-run facility he had visited in San Pedro Sula. I was explaining how it works to the best of my knowledge and he clarified, “yea but, like how do you make sure they don’t give you retards or something”. I took a moment to compose myself and decide which way to take this conversation. I decided to go easy on him and just responded saying that if we were sent kids with special needs then we would do whatever was necessary for their particular needs. Now why, you might ask, would I let him off the hook? Well I had already seen changes in this young man. He was your stereotypical frat boy with nautical shorts and aviators who seemed to come for the 18 year-old drinking age more than the kids. The only thing is that he came a week with very few registrants and was part of a group of only 6 people. This smaller group forced him to interact more with the locals and I saw the wheel turning. I witnessed him discover poverty for the first time, I heard his reflections about the kids who had touched his heart, I watched him voraciously read a book on sex trafficking and overall have his foundations shaken. Clearly he still had a whole lot more learning to do but I can guarantee that this one-week experience had an effect on this young man’s outlook on life.
You may be screaming at the screen, “but these trips are meant to help people in impoverished countries, not the volunteers!” Well I in fact think that helping to change the volunteer is the foundation of any real long-term global change.
First, it should be paramount to any NGO to guarantee that these week-long trips are not doing damage to the community and that the money raised is used to fund long-term, substantive projects. I think there are organizations that do this; that give the volunteer a cursory look but behind the scenes are making lasting investments in the community. If you want to expose those organizations that are not doing this, that would be a very helpful for people looking for a short term volunteer experience.
Second, no country, nationality or culture operates in a vacuum. The real damage is done long before a volunteer travels to a ‘developing country’. That jargon in and of itself is an indication of our global ignorance. We call countries developing and developed as if some have reached nirvana and others are just slower on the path to riches and stability. When in fact I think that is a misrepresentation of our world order. The ‘developed world’ stays that way by keeping the ‘developing world’ in it’s place. I have talked before about how the mechanisms of our global economy depend on having poorer countries that make our cheap goods and buy our expensive exports. That’s a very quick way of describing what is a very complicated system but during my time in Honduras I see it’s also a very accurate description. International and local organizations fight, scrape and push to change these vicious cycles of violence and poverty….and there are success stories, oh my there are…BUT eventually those pushing for positive change always encounter the counter current pushing for the comfortable status quo. The current mechanisms work for those in power and they often don’t see it in their personal interests to change them.
So I say we do indeed need to help the volunteer and sometimes the richer and more vapid the better. They are the privileged people who will be inheriting their parent’s corporate and political power. I would prefer that they have a better understanding of global poverty and the effects of their actions and policies around the world. Sure I hope every volunteer researches the organization they will volunteer with and asks all the questions they can to learn as much as possible. I hope that volunteers of all cultures and races participate with the purest of intentions to help because it shouldn’t be about white people saving the “others”. It should be about all people in positions of privilege considering drastic life-style changes that they can make at home that could have lasting global impacts. But in the end I’ve decided that spending my time judging, picking apart and disparaging the volunteer is a waste of my time. I can’t see their intentions; I can’t see their heart. All I can do is make sure mine stay as pure as possible.
hashtaghondy 
I’m sure my intention on my first trip to Honduras in the 1980’s was to “do something”–to learn and I’m sure to help, although I was more equipped to learn. My university called it a “Winter Term in Mission,” but the director of the program was clear that the “mission” was to educate the privileged university students about poverty and other cultures. I think you hit the nail on the head when you focus on the need to educate volunteers and ourselves about poverty, privilege, power and impact. Keep on teaching, Kelly. Opening doors to insight and understanding can make a difference in individuals lives and on a larger scale.
I love your heart, Kelly. I totally agree with you in that mission trips are about so much more than reaching out to those in poverty. I have witnessed first hand a heart reaching out and changing by the interaction with those less fortunate. I truly believe one heart and mind changed on a short term mission trip may be the very one to lead a crusade to change the impoverished conditions, travesties or perhaps the political corruption that hold people back from being all they were created to be.
One thing voluntourists need to remember is that all people have brains and are intelligent. The American way it not always the best way or the only correct way to do something. Be respectful of others, their way of life, and their ideas, even if you THINK they are sub-par. You just might learn something!