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Is There A Such Thing As 'Travel Addiction?'

October 28, 2009 at 1:09 PM | by Omri | 3 Comments

Discouraging young adults from traveling is apparently becoming kind of a thing, isn't it? Last time it was predatory safety companies trying to convince single women that traveling alone will get them raped and killed, but his time it's a Huffington Post travel consultant giving kids a Don't Let It Happen To You lecture; "It" in this case being an airport-heavy lifestyle that takes them away from The Really Important Things In Life.

The article oozes with awkwardness, from artificially opaque jumbled writing to moments of forced bluntness, and phrases like "a tip of the fedora" (because if you're going to speak to the young hipsters, it's important to be ironic!). There's some corporate branding going on behind the scenes—the author is a Travel Website "punk marketing" specialist and the CEO of the "only independent PR firms that’s actually fun to work with"—but that's an issue better left for another time. We'll even concede that the article has some valuable moments, reminding its audience to keep petulant "pay attention to me" travel demands to a minimum because no one cares.

There's a dangerous underlying hostility to travel, though, that runs through the entire piece. It's not much more sophisticated than "kids these days are just so crazy and naughty and they never appreciate real life" tsk tsk'ing. It even has soccer mom phrases like "Ms. BlackBerry or Sir iPhone." But it's more than enough to raise our ire:

This is the nation with no path but thousands of flight paths. We are on a treadmill -- there is no road to speak of. And do we get anywhere if all we do is run?... To hear college kids fly home instead of grabbing a bus or a car is to know no one is teaching about journey. If you start young with incessant flying for kicks, in the end you never learn to enjoy anything. A trip is a few hours of "existing" while we can't play with our PDA! There is no pride felt while bobbing your head toward a lap-held device while someone talks in your direction. Like most sane people, I long for conversations with no participation by Ms. BlackBerry or Sir iPhone. Those times are few between. Airport to airport existence nets fewer meaningful moments with anyone (except when you're naughty).

In addition to being unnecessarily obnoxious, this article has things exactly backwards. The point isn't to ramp down your airport existence, let alone your wanderlust. Airports are how we get to really exciting places really quickly, which social science—plus everything we know about being human—says is the healthiest thing you can do. The goal is to travel as much as you can with the best gear that you can afford so you can maximize travel and keep up with your friendships and responsibilities.

This nonsense about how you should stay close to home because that's where you keep the Things That Matter will leave your passport unstamped and your horizons unbroadened. Thanks but no thanks, HuffPost.

[Photo: chuckp / Flickr]

Related Stories:
· Travel Addiction: The Newest Affliction of a Troubled Nation [YYY]
· Travel Gear [Jaunted]
· Airports [Jaunted]

3 Comments

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  1. egw

    Jaunted Editor

    I strongly feel

    that this piece is a viral marketing campaign for that new George Clooney movie where he is constantly on the road. I saw a trailer for it and instead of nodding my head when they got to the "But if you travel, you never have a life!" part, I just sighed.
    October 28, 2009 at 2:13 PM
    #Permalink

  1. juliana

    Jaunted Contributing Editor

    This is funny

    It sounds like the HuffPo author is more annoyed that "young people" have iPhones and Blackberries and don't pay attention to him than he is about their travel habits. but that's another issue. Obviously, young kids should be traveling more at their age when they have the freedom to do so. My biggest fear now is that I will have to wait until I am 75 to do half the stuff on my travel wish list. And by then, I'll be...old. As for flying rather than taking a bus or a road trip home from college for the holidays, it's partly because of the times we live in. LCCs have more routes open and make flying more do-able, not to mention more convenient. If you have the choice of a 6-hour bus ride or an hour flight, what would you prefer?
    October 28, 2009 at 2:18 PM
    #Permalink

  1. juliana

    Jaunted Contributing Editor

    Ditto

    Ellen, I completely agree with you. This is just good-old fashioned George Clooney movie marketing. I can't believe I didn't see it right away!
    October 28, 2009 at 2:22 PM
    #Permalink

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