Sunday 3 April 2011

Guilt Trips

Dea Birkett (yes, her) clearly feels under some pressure:
I'm booking a family break abroad. We want somewhere to chill out and do very little indeed. It's a rare treat being able to idle.
Really? I’d have thought it was a pre-requisite for a ‘writer and broadcaster on social issues’...
But I'm struggling to get a package that doesn't demand I spend as much time doing good as having fun.
Are you? I can’t see why, I can find thousands of them with the click of a mouse.
I can go "travelling" or book an "adventure", "experience" or even "mission", as if we were all about to pull on pith helmets and set out to convert the heathen. But sun 'n' sand holidays when a family can flop out together are becoming harder and harder to stamp up on your passport.
I really don't think the people stamping them care, love. So why should you?
Holiday companies are now pandering to this new wave of foreign travel anxiety. First there was carbon offsetting; now there's conscience offsetting. We have to pay a price for selfishly indulging in pure relaxation while on annual leave.
Hey, it's what people like you want, isn't it?
A holiday can't just be enjoyable. It also has to be educational.
Rather like museums. Hmmm, who do we know that has dealing with museums?
Why are we no longer allowed a fortnight of fun? Instead of repackaging holidays as self-sacrificing travel, we should celebrate our ability to break out from routine, spreading our towel out the sunlounger and reading a romcom novel on our Kindle.
That, Dea, is what countless thousands of normal families will be doing this year, and their friends will not be looking down their nose at them or secretly judging them.

If your friends will, well, perhaps that says a bit about the circles you move in, doesn't it?

16 comments:

The King of Wrong said...

The main thing that's been shocking me with holidays is the amount of tax on flights these days... it's damn near the cost of a third leg of the round-trip!

Mjolinir said...

With 'worthy holidays' - I admit to having reservations as to the ratio of lasting benefit to the recipients, and to the consciences of those who have briefly impinged on their lives & communities.

Katabasis said...

What is wrong with these people?!

Ranter said...

She's lucky she can afford a holiday this year! It seems only the priviliged chattering classes and chav-scum can. Laydees anjennelmen I give you MAXINE COCKS (yes!!)
http://www.thisiskent.co.uk/news/Air-rage-passenger-avoids-prison-term/article-3396189-detail/article.html

Sue said...

Tell her to look up a holiday to the Costa del Sol. Nothing to do here but laze about.

Mind you, easyjet and self catering in Fuengirola probably isn't on her list of "requirements".

She must be looking on one of those hoity toity up ya bum colonic irrigation socialist holiday sites.

Captain Haddock said...

"Why are we no longer allowed a fortnight of fun? Instead of repackaging holidays as self-sacrificing travel, we should celebrate our ability to break out from routine, spreading our towel out the sunlounger and reading a romcom novel on our Kindle" ...

So go to feckin' Blackpool, you silly tart .. Then you won't need to worry your stupid head about your "carbon footprint" .. And you'll have an enormous "adventure" making sure the local low-lifes don't nick your sodding Kindle ..

Fun in the Sun said...

"Why are we no longer allowed a fortnight of fun?"

I would imagine it's not allowed because you joined with the ecoloons, lefties, tree-huggers and other assorted malcontents who were never satisfied, never happy.

Cometh the time to cut loose and just relax, the world presses in once more. But... if you can't get your kicks out of your your knicks, what can you do?

WV= ousili = Rural Yorkshire muesli

blueknight said...

Sounds as if she has a greenhouse gas creating, carbon footprint making, capitalist extravaganza booked and she is trying to justify it.
Florida Disney perhaps?

Captain Haddock said...

These breast-beating, hand-wringing, champagne-socialists are all the same ..

Complete wastes of genetic material ..

A pox on all their houses & offspring ..

Sen. C.R.O'Blene said...

Why can't she go somewhere far away, where they eat people?

Problem solved!

JuliaM said...

" Laydees anjennelmen I give you MAXINE COCKS (yes!!)"

Oh, you can just bet she has 'MAX COCKS' tattooed somewhere on her anatomy...

"...the ecoloons, lefties, tree-huggers and other assorted malcontents who were never satisfied, never happy."

Spot on!

"Why can't she go somewhere far away, where they eat people?"

She looks pretty indigestible to me.

Ian B said...

Just imagine I wrote one of my usual rants here about puritanism, calvinism and the like, because you know, that's what the Progressives really are, etc etc.

Rob said...

Summary of article:

Me me me me me me me me I'm superior to you me me me me

Etc

Rob said...

She could go to Libya

RAB said...

Gulp! You never know, she may even be a Tory! ;-)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1373025/We-dont-want-people-Sheffield-having-cheap-holidays-What-Old-Etonian-Tory-minister-told-Boris.html

staybryte said...

I do have to ask, what exactly is wrong with people like this?

Well, maybe there's nothing wrong, after all, bitching about how hard life is as an "activist" or whatever is a pretty lucrative line.

WV

"Chirvoin" a French Baronet engaged in a fist fight with a foreign swine in a novel by John Buchan.