Posted: 2/27/2020 | February 27th, 2020
If you’re like me, you associate travel with positive emotions: the feeling of the sun on your shoulders halfway around the world, of breaking bread with people from cultures different than your own, and the inner joy of making your way across unknown lands safely.
Travel improves our lives, broadens our horizons, and helps us understand the world we inhabit.
Yet these are experiences few humans will ever have.
As widespread as it has become in recent years, travel is still a privilege afforded only to a few.
That is especially true of war zones, where residents are more concerned about living through the day than seeing the wonders of the world. Things we take for granted — the ability to turn on a tap and get drinkable water, to flick a switch and get light, to walk to the store and find food on the shelves — are rare or absent for those suffering through such conflicts.
While there many places in the world that are like that, today I want to talk about one in particular: Syria.
Lately, I’ve seen a number of folks visit Syria as tourists. When asked why, they usually talk about trying to highlight the good people in the country and how such places aren’t “just what you see in the media.”
And while both of those things are almost always true, I don’t think one should visit conflict zones as a tourist — whether you’re a writer, blogger, or everyday Joe or Jane. I think it’s reckless and shows a complete lack of empathy and respect for the people suffering through the horrors of war. It’s self-centered. It doesn’t actually help in any real way. It usually creates a distorted picture of the situation. It’s a misuse of Western privilege.
No one doubts there are wonderful people and places in Syria. In fact, one of my greatest travel regrets is not having visited Syria before the conflict, because friends waxed poetic about how the hospitality and openness of the locals were second to none.
And the media is always more “doom and gloom” than the reality on the ground.
But that doesn’t change the fact that there is a continuing war going on in Syria where millions continue to be displaced and dying. While bloggers or tourists are there taking pictures, hundreds of thousands are freezing.
The country has been in a civil war for close to nine years. Over 400,000 civilians have been killed (some estimates put that number as high as 585,000). That’s more than the entire population of places such as Iceland, Belize, the Bahamas, or Malta.
On top of that, over 13 million people have been displaced — with half of those being forced to leave the country entirely. And many can never return due to retaliation from government forces against them or their families.
And while ISIS has been pushed back, they still have control of some areas, and thanks to Trump, there is also now an influx of both Turkish and Russian troops. (And that’s only causing more chaos.)
As millions suffer through ongoing war, chemical attacks, and displacement, visiting as a tourist and having a fun time is a horrifying idea to me. It makes those who go seem more concerned with their ego than the plight of the country. “Well, I just really want to see the country, so fuck those who are suffering!”
War zones are not tourist attractions. Bombed buildings that used to be filled with life are not backdrops for Instagram shots.
While millions suffer and die just hours away or are displaced and cannot return home, bloggers or tourists shouldn’t be frolicking in the places where they used to live and laugh and spend time with their children, snapping pictures and having fun while giving lip service about how it’s sad to see what is happening to the country. That to me seems like a major disconnect.
If someone wants to go there and report as a journalist to educate the world and try to mobilize action to stop the conflict, that’s one thing.
But I’ve yet to see one person who wasn’t an actual journalist from the mainstream news media do that. Instead, I hear talk about how “complicated” the situation is, how things are being rebuilt, and how everyone is happy and things are safe, whitewashing the war crimes of President Assad. If you follow these accounts, you get the impression the worst is behind the country. (It’s not. And the fighting in Idlib is getting incredibly worse, with children being greatly affected.)
But that’s because these bloggers are (a) in government-controlled territory and (b) likely talking to Assad supporters or those too afraid to speak out.
Then there’s willful ignorance. Take the example of Drew Binsky. I’ve never met him, though I do enjoy his videos. And I’m sure he’s a well-intentioned guy. But he went to Syria and, when challenged about this for the same reasons I’m bringing up, said, and I quote:
I know that Syria has been in a constant state of war for nearly a decade and I choose not to make that a focus. Why? It’s a lose-lose for me, because A) it’s a touchy subject and B) I don’t know much about the war and politics in general. In fact, I can’t even tell you a thing about American politics cuz I don’t really care! I’ve spent the last 8 years on the road and I’ve purposely separated myself from any politics because I choose to spend my time doing other things that make me happy. I guess the bottom line here is that more eyeballs on my videos means more haters, and we all know that haters are gonna hate!
Apparently, people who bring up the notion that maybe going to a war zone is not a good idea are haters. And here he admits to not knowing much about the war or caring too much about the subject.
How can you visit a country torn by war and not want to learn more about it?
How can you have a platform and seek to educate people and not talk about the conflict? It’s a pretty important thing!
And he’s not the only one who has done this, just the most well known. There have been many others. (It would be hard to link to them all, but they are easy to find via a Google or Instagram search.)
I think trips like these to war zones or repressive regimes are further examples of the lack of ethics in the online travel industry, as well as “look at me” vs. “learn from me” writing that puts the reader second to the influencer’s own ego. Rather than using this visit as a teachable moment to expand people’s knowledge, educate, and talk about a dire situation, they visit without thinking about that deeper impact.
But against the backdrop of war, egos must wait.
A visit to government-controlled territory during an ongoing conflict is simply playing into the propaganda that says that the news is exaggerating the plight of the people. What gassing by the Assad regime? What war crimes? What factionalism? There’s nothing to see here, right?
Many of the Syrians I spoke to had even fewer kind words for those who go there. They talked of those who visit now as “taking joy in others’ misery,” whitewashing Assad’s crimes, and Western privilege. This quote from Zaina Erhaim, an exiled Syrian journalist, sums up what I heard from Syrians I spoke with:
Besides the active war going on and tens of civilians being killed on a daily basis, beside whitewashing Assad as [someone] who has brought life and security back, using their privileged background [to get] released if stopped at checkpoints, above all that, to cross to our home where half of us are forbidden from going to, as we are forced into displacement and in exile, to walk above our memories and wounds in order to get some extra views, is inhuman.
Their blogs step on our trauma as they take smiling pictures in our streets, with our destroyed homes and favorite restaurants in the background, while we are prevented from going back to because we simply did our work and protested for basic rights.
I think travel boycotts are dumb. People are not their governments. But when war is happening and millions are dying and displaced, our desire to travel must wait. When Syria and these other countries are done fighting and need to be rebuilt, tourism dollars are a wonderful way to help make that happen.
Take Afghanistan or Iraq. While turmoil still exists there, these countries are trying to pick up the pieces and rebuild. There are new governments, and the society is trying to move past the conflict. There’s a functioning economy and civil society. Now is the time to visit those places.
But Syria? There is still an active conflict with other nations rolling tanks through part of the country. (Turkey and Russia are in conflict there, and Israel recently sent missiles into Damascus). Wait until the conflict is over, people aren’t dying and starving in the streets, and there is (hopefully) some sort of brokered truce or long-lasting cease-fire.
That’s when people will need our tourism dollars.
If you want to help those in Syria, lobby governments to try to find a way to end the conflict. Give to aid organizations like these:
- Tight Knit Syria
- Doctors Without Borders
- International Rescue Committee
- Basmeh Zeitooneh
- Save the Children
- Islamic Relief USA
- Tahirih Justice Center
- Project Amal ou Salem
But don’t go visit. Don’t give Assad his propaganda wins. Don’t make people think everything is fine and the world should move on. Don’t go to a place where so much suffering is going on just because you want to see it. It’s just the wrong thing to do.
Travel enriches the mind and expands the soul.
But it loses its charm when a place that is still shattered like glass and those around you are mired in a conflict without end.
Book Your Trip: Logistical Tips and Tricks
Book Your Flight
Find a cheap flight by using Skyscanner or Momondo. They are my two favorite search engines because they search websites and airlines around the globe so you always know no stone is left unturned.
Book Your Accommodation
You can book your hostel with Hostelworld. If you want to stay somewhere other than a hostel, use Booking.com as they consistently return the cheapest rates for guesthouses and cheap hotels.
Don’t Forget Travel Insurance
Travel insurance will protect you against illness, injury, theft, and cancellations. It’s comprehensive protection in case anything goes wrong. I never go on a trip without it as I’ve had to use it many times in the past. I’ve been using World Nomads for ten years. My favorite companies that offer the best service and value are:
- World Nomads (for everyone below 70)
- Insure My Trip (for those over 70)
- Medjet (for additional repatriation coverage)
Need to book your trip?
Check out my resource page for the best companies to use when you travel. I list all the ones I use when I travel. The are the best in class and you can’t go wrong using them on your trip.
Jeff
Thank you for this article! I recently saw a few different influencers visit Syria and I was blown away by the idea. It is similar with the sponsored trips taking place in North Korea (maybe 2-3 years ago) and Saudi Arabia (recently). It just speaks of seeking views and engagement, not respect, understanding or education.
Glad to see someone speak out about this!
Agnes
“Haters are gonna hate????” I am dumbstruck, truly.
Winston Smith
I can’t stand these moralistic opinion pieces. You don’t want to go to Syria, that’s entirely ok, but others are free to make their own choices and deal with the morality of it without “shaming”. To then go on and recommend Iraq and Afghanistan as viable tourist destinations seems absurd (or perhaps that’s because America has “sanitized” the latter, but didn’t manage it with the former)?
Suzana
While I see your point, I do believe that if people want to go to see first hand what is going on, maybe to in fact experience the pain for themselves, understand better they should be entitled to do so.
I’m not a blogger, or a journalist, I’m a digital nomad working remotely and personally I wouldn’t choose that, but others might. There are many ways and many reasons to travel. Some want to take the risk, let them. I love your pieces but this one is a bit judgmental. Besides even in the middle of a storm there are day to day lives happening. In the middle of a war, people help each other. If someone wants to go there and report on a few good things and ignore the bad, maybe the world needs more of that.
Anna
Thank you for sharing this! I had to stop following Drew a couple years ago after he blew off a similar critique about visiting North Korea. It’s good to see travel bloggers like you who are responsible about where they go.
Kat
I stopped following him a few years back when he proclaimed Egypt didn’t seem safe on his one night stay in the country just to get that passport stamp and stand on a poor camel’s back.
Eric
Thank you for writing this, Matt. As long-term travelers, considering the politics and ethics of where we go is crucial to protecting our reputation in the world. I think a lot of content creators are drawn to the clicks that visiting a controversial location will contribute to their blogs or Youtube channel, but you’re right — just because someone doesn’t show the broken glass in their video, doesn’t mean it isn’t there.
As tourists and travelers, our dollars have power. As a community, we need to make sure we’re using our cash to support countries that care for their people, not regimes.
Lannie
As an aid worker in Afghanistan, yes. Just yes.
Riana Ang-Canning
Thank you so much for writing this! I follow one travel blogger on Instagram who was in Syria recently and the impression I got was that everything is fine, they are open for tourists, it’s safe, etc. And that is such a distorted reality of the country and completing ignoring the on-going conflict. I was disgusted reading Drew’s comment above. What a horrifically privileged and ignorant thing to say! To not care about politics isn’t a cool decision, it’s a privilege. Many people can’t ignore politics because it affects their daily life. Thank you for this post, for speaking your truth and standing up to this. It’s so important to have another voice in this conversation.
Kara
Wow! I love how you just put a little dig in about Russian and Turkish troops being present because of Trump, but you just leave out the part that without Obama’s Iran Deal there wouldn’t even be an ISIS! If you are going to talk politics and link to news articles, it would be awesome if you actually linked to an objective news source, instead of one that is openly left or right. As a longtime reader, I am pretty disappointed by this article, even if you make a few good points.
Paul
There are a lot of reasons why ISIS came into being, but that Obama’s Iran Deal was one of them is rather absurd. I challenge you to draw a straight line between the two. Even people who are vehemently opposed to that deal can’t do it
Morris Murphy
Thank you for sharing this! I tjink I gave have a break in following Drew a couple of years ago after he blew off a similar critique about visiting North Korea. It’s good to see travel bloggers like you who are responsible about where they go. Once again thank you for this publication keep it up
Adam LaPlate
This is probably one of my favorite travel articles recently. I do think it is good to know, and remember that not all of these disturbed countries are ‘bad’; like you said, we know good people are there. But, to simply treat it like a zoo and just watch while living lavishly behind the scenes seems disrespectful.
I have seen some influences and media peoples going over and “visiting” but only to promote action for their fundraiser or for support actions.
Thank you for bringing this to light, you have many more visitors to this page than I could simply impact by my own rambling word of mouth.
Jackie
The zoo analogy is perfect.
Kendrick
I usually enjoy your blog post and I’m even part of your Superstar Blogging online course. But I’d have to disagree with this finger-wagging article.
If people want to travel to the safe parts of Syria like Damascus, then there’s nothing wrong with that. Enjoy the country and meet the friendly locals while avoiding politics.
I used to dislike Drew Binskey’s contents as well but his new ones have been awesome. I’m now a regular follower just in 2019. His adventures to many nations that you’d discourage people from travelling to were eye-opening (like Somalia, Libya, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Central African Republic, etc). At the very least, I admire his bravery for travelling to these nations.
Kevin
There is no “avoiding politics” — not in travel and not in anything else.
Actions are political and choosing to make a profit off the tragic events of a war-torn country is low. It’s unethical and unprofessional — especially if you have no clue what is happening in the country.
Sam
Well said! Since when is Matt the travel police? Tourism can help a lot of people and businesses who have been severely affected by the cruel actions of Syria. You can enjoy a beautiful country while also strongly disagreeing with the treatment of its people. What a joke this article was, but maybe that’s what he was aiming for to get more clicks. Got me! You’re welcome!
NomadicMatt
Well, it is my website and I do share my opinions on a variety of topics here. You don’t have to agree and I’m not looking for 100% of people to agree but whether you agree or disagree, isn’t going to change the fact I will continue sharing my opinions! Been doing it since 2008 and don’t plan to stop soon! I’ve never once called myself “the travel police.”
Valerie
Excellent article. It’s given me a perspective I haven’t thought about. It’s so important to maintain empathy and respect for the people living there and suffering, understanding how it feels from their point of view to see tourists who can leave the hell-hole and go back to their safe countries while they have no way out. These tourists may be well-intentioned but are not understanding how it is perceived by the very people they may be wanting to help. That intentional curiosity to find out how it seems from the other’s perspective, and willingness to honor it, is so essential to responsible travel. Thanks so much for writing this.
Jackie
Thank you for this, I think it’s an important reminder in an age of increasingly affordable travel for a lot of people (“l’ll go because I can!”) and the competitive world of social media presence. I can’t imagine visiting a place without researching or caring about the history, and ensuring that the whole picture is portrayed if I share about it. That’s the best way to use such privilege- to be a voice for the oppressed, not another link in the chain of suffering.
Paul
I appreciate the sentiment here, and this writer has every right to put his opinion out there. That being said, I’ve been following the war since day 1, and I have some things to say that are missing from this narrative. The article says:
“If you follow these accounts, you get the impression the worst is behind the country. But that’s because these bloggers are (a) in government-controlled territory and (b) likely talking to Assad supporters or those too afraid to speak out.”
1. The only territories that are NOT in government control are
a) Idlib, which is in the control of Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, a terrorist organization that used to be called Jabhat Al-Nusra, an Al-Qaeda offshoot. Don’t let the media fool you into thinking that these guys are somehow more benevolent than big bad ISIS, which everyone was afraid of… they aren’t, and if there is a shade of difference it’s only in degrees.
b) parts of the failed Rojava (Kurdish north-eastern part) that actually recently made a deal with the Assad government because they acknowledged they would rather be with him than at the mercy of Turkey who would ethnically cleanse them, or worse, and
c) small random pockets that the US keeps saying it needs to be in “because of ISIS” despite the caliphate being dead.
In other words, the only place that a tourist can go safely (relatively speaking), is in fact, government territory. That goes a long way into realizing that Assad always was the “least-bad” option here since you won’t get your head chopped off for being anything other than a Sunni.
Think about it… are you gonna boycott the Philipines, not go to Manila, because Duterte is a thug? Are you gonna cancel that trip to Yosemite National Park because Trump is a closet racist?
2. “likely talking to Assad supporters” – that means that these people actually exist, and have existed, since the beginning of the war. At some point you need to acknowledge that people who support Assad make up a significant chunk of the population. Are their voices not relevant, simply because the Syrians in exile (who almost all supported the revolution), through their various organizations, declared it as so?
I remember the war being painted as Alawites vs. everyone else when in reality, the Syrian army was always majority Sunni. And after all the desertions, and the military setbacks and tens of thousands of military deaths, when it looked like Assad was going to lose, the Syrian army STILL had people in it that remained loyal… was that out of fear? Were all these people members of the Ba’ath party? Of course not… there was some other type of loyalty that people in the West simply cannot fathom.
Going to a place like Syria, just because you want likes on your pics, is cynical and privileged, you’re right, but a lot of people also travel because they want to put money into the economy, help the local people out, and learn about the culture in the process. Let’s face facts: Assad has won the civil war, and the people that remain in Syria are desperate to have some normalcy return to their lives, including making some money running businesses that cater to travelers.
DustyJ
I’m shocked and disgusted at the idea of people popping gleefully into an active warzone on holiday to go and have a look at what a war looks like! It never even occurred to me that anyone would be so callous!
Honestly, have people no empathy? That’s like wandering around Bergen-Belsen in 1944 taking happy-snaps, or going on a coach tour across 1848 Ireland drinking champers on the bus and watching people die from the potato blight.
Would you do that? Would any normal person do that? Clearly, some people would do that, and then post their photos of starving Irish children on their Instagram.
Hana
Thank you for writing this. I have been seeing these blogs and thinking the same.
I agree with some of the comments above. It can be really challenging deciding which countries you are comfortable visiting in order to support the people but not the government but war-torn Syria seems like an obvious one one to avoid.
Sarah
Drew is an idiot – that isn’t news. If you’re going to go to somewhere like Syria, Pakistan, Iran, North Korea, Myanmar, Venezuela etc – then you have a responsibility to read up ahead of time and learn about the situation, so you can make an informed decision. Syria is however a bit of a challenging one – there are certainly some parts of Syria which are not safe to visit but travelers have been going to Syrian Kurdistan pretty much without interruption for the last few years. What Drew did was not new, as he would have you believe. Visiting Syrian Kurdistan in my opinion is a good thing – it helps bring tourist dollars into the economy, promotes cross-cultural exchange and this area has been safe for a long time. I do get your point here Matt, but not all of Syria is a warzone.