claudiop

Random tweet I just came across: https://x.com/Scaife51/status/1811403266531471842?t=4fdIaowFfaHmYv77no51LQ

That's this place: https://www.reddit.com/r/portugal/comments/1e1c4ky/why_albufeira_is_a_british_colony/

Can you realistically believe that one can live in there without being anti-tourist? That's NOT a one off. That's a very common occurrence in the south coast (both Portugal and Spain). It is not a major city or anything like that. Every city down there is currently like that.

I think it is fair to let the local populations set what they consider to be fair or minor. In other comment thread (https://lemmy.world/comment/11138636) I actually bothered looking up the law and, I don't think that this even considered in criminal law. At least in Portugal there's no "assault" and the equivalent doesn't cover this ; Spain is probably the same.

In Japan it is minor to have a station officer force push you into a train. That could be someone's trigger for past serious trauma.

This is hypothetical, but calling an invasion of personal space and consent a minor annoyance is like saying “oh it’s just a little kiss, come on, give me a kiss”. Sure, a kiss never killed anybody, but we can agree it’s inappropriate to do so without consent right?

One of those is a sexual offense, the other is mostly speech. 5ml of water in the summer heat do not physically affect most people any more than a megaphone would, and this is where law gets muddy. Law doesn't penalize sound waves (below 120db), farts or whatever things that happen without solid-to-solid contact, but the moment there's some physical contact, no matter how light, some people in some jurisdictions go crazy.

If I touch you to grab your attention like "hey buddy, you lost this", I'm technically touching you and that could evoke some weird past trauma, but since the intent is not to cause harm I could never get hooked over that.

I conclude by saying political goals should be completed WITHOUT needing to do that.

Ideally, however neither your thread nor the other thread where I'm talking presented any example on how to solve this without causing bigger troubles. The "people in Barcelona are mean" stereotype is one of the least damaging things they can do to themselves. Quotas & such are terrible for several reasons and ofc that everyone argues that the individual is never responsible for anything they chose to do with their money.

I’m not muttering it. It’s literally assault.

The point I pointed is that the law draws a hard line but reality has no such hard lines. Some ok things fall beyond the line. Some not ok things fall outside. Some common sense helps with that but even that's cultural.

As for "literally assault"; I can read Spanish but heavy legalese is not something I want to bother with reading. I'm simply assuming that it is not all that different from whatever the law is in here, across the border. You don't have conventional "assault" in Portuguese law, you have "offenses to the physical integrity", which can be "simple", "aggravated" or "by negligence". The first two assume intent to physically harm; the last one assumed that you had no intent but were terribly negligent and that led to someone being hurt. (Thats Artigo 143.º if you're into Deepl-checking that)

So, I don't even think that spraying people in water would constitute "assault". Maybe "harassment", you do have that in legalese; however I do believe that harassment needs to be targeted (like to a very finite group of people, not to hundreds of people).

Then you have "disturbances to the public peace", but if that was to be enforced it would affect tourists waaaay more than protestors. This kind of law is generally not enforced in order to just let the tourists be drunk in the middle of the road however they want without facing consequences over it.

So, to begin with, I don't think that anyone here is committing a crime. Your notion of what is a crime is totally up to your society; my society can have a totally different notion.

As a "fun fact", we recently got pseudo-nazis doing public speeches over "claiming back Portugal" and telling everyone that looked tourist to fuck off. That was not only legal but protected and anyone that attempted to mess with these events would be the one committing a crime.

None of those consequences you listed are any individual tourist’s fault.

That kind of logic implies that nobody is responsible for pollution or lack of recycling but governments. You are obviously responsible for your actions. There might be some government shaping them but ideally your conscience would suffice.

For some things you need help from some entity because it is just too hard (like not rewarding companies that put lead in food; silly example but you get it) but simple things like "save water", "recycle", "be nice to whoever is nice to you", "let people exit transit before you go in" are pretty much left for consciousness.

You can decide your next vacation location based on consciousness or you can do so based on ego. "Oh man, Barcelona is cheap and looks sexy in my travel curriculum" is a condemnable attitude.

If the government has failed to regulate these things that’s on them.

Like I already asked you plenty of times; how do you regulate that without plenty of side effects?
Travel tax? You'd be harming businesses as well.

Forbid local housing from being used? Already a limitation in place; but too late; not the licenses have already been issued. (PS: These are the license counts for inner Lisbon (emerald is regular housing used for tourists and blue is proper tourism estate): https://poligrafo.sapo.pt/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/4bcf1c68-a837-45ed-9f83-15c4ed12e549.png)

Have some mandatory prioritization of locals over foreigners? That would be xenophobic.

Dress it up however you want, you are advocating for indiscriminate xenophobic assault and harassment.

I've lived in both Portugal and Barcelona (for one month but it was a thing), in both cases before the tourism boom. The people in both places were everything but xenophobic; they both used to be very welcoming. The thing is not xenophobia as the attitude would be the exact same if the problem was to arise from the same country (if the numbers were enough).

You can't simply become homeless and jobless while staying welcoming; esp when, not all but plenty of, tourists treat us as inferior. They consider us to have less rights than they do because "they paid". That's a real rhetoric you get to experience.

Have these two recent reddit posts (deepl them) as a first hand experience that's not even trying to be xenophobic but cannot not be: Guy from Azores: https://www.reddit.com/r/portugal/comments/1dy6t3f/odeio_turistas/

Foreigner that was shocked at the fact that we look like a British colony: https://www.reddit.com/r/portugal/comments/1e1c4ky/why_albufeira_is_a_british_colony/

Roadblocking is not entrapping or touching (even with a toy)

Yes, they are not. One of them leads to annoyances, the other leads to people losing their jobs or missing their connections. Everything is a matter of cost-benefit. If a major annoyance once might do country-wide changes, then that's maybe worth doing.

I would, at best, classify this as a minor annoyance. I understand this to be a largely cultural thing. I personally don't care much if people interact with me that way. I wouldn't even call it a rare thing; it happens a lot outside of protests.

that of surrounding/hounding/bothering individuals, as this can intimidate them

That's... the entire point? Those fellas want to create this idea that tourists are not welcome without actually harming them. That's precisely the goal. If that's the idea you got out of this then the protest just worked.

and disrespect their consent/bodily autonomy

Ehhh, big meh. There are waaaaay worse experiences in that regard in a "tourist's life". For example you have this "mandatory tourist thing" to do in Lisbon which is to ride the tram 28. You can hardly find an online picture of what it actually looks but it basically is equivalent to putting 15 clowns in a mini. The kind of crammed where people get troubles breathing. Barcelona has their equivalents as well.

Tourists aren't supposed to feel their bodily autonomy harmed from this; they are supposed to feel that they're not welcome.

normalizing this stuff makes it easier for more hatful people to get away with it in the future

Of course that hate-twats will try to capitalize on every opportunity to erode freedoms, however, in my opinion, there are quuuuuuuuuuuuite a few steps between this particular event and that scenario.

Quite some southern cities even have this without the protests. It is very common for people to attach water misters to buildings. Those spray people passing them without asking for any consent. Just so happens that they feel great during the hot days.

Barcelona DOES have a unique reputation for these anti-tourist groups.

The literal exact same thing happens in every other alike place. We have the same in Lisbon.

The pieces of information foreigners get do not necessarily match the local truths.

As an example: I do volunteering at a kind-of-food-bank. It is obviously free to do. However, if you try to look that up in the internet, every single result will lead you to the idea that you need to have a guide or whatever reason to pay in order to do volunteering in here. The English information is HIGHLY distorted to hit foreigners. It is 100% unreliable. Do not attempt to look up for things about southern European countries in English. Most things that can somehow be capitalized on are lies or deceptive.

assaulting

Keep muttering that word. Whatever.
Their Rickshaws and boats are fucking the air as well. Can I also say I'm being assaulted? I'm objectively being harmed.

Plenty of people over here are considering way less nice things that spraying water. You have some actual assault going on in places (as in, punching tourists in the face) and vandalism to drive them off, but yeah, let's pretend that the 5ml of water are the real harm.

strangers who have done nothing

Knowingly going to a country suffering from overtourism? Going for AirBnbs instead of hotels? Blocking locals from being able to go to work because whatever route they pick looks scenic? Not bothering to learn like three words or whatever to be able to say hello or goodbye?

That's a "I'm going to throw 500kg of glass in the general bin" kind of done nothing. They know they're being asses to the locals. Is it legal? Yes. It is also legal not to recycle.

They're dehumanizing us because "they paid" but 30 seconds of slight moisture is the real crime.

The 200€ of flights (which has plenty of negative externalities), 100€ for the AirBnb (which not only was someone's eviction but also likely dodged taxes), 100€ for random food (which likely dodged taxes) and 100€ in some random tourist trap (which many times dodge taxes). Those crimes do not count because they were intermediated by someone else? The thousands who get trespassing tourists? The littered nature? No, those do not count; what really counts is the bloody water.

The bulk of the tourism money doesn't come from the 90% of clueless asses filling the streets. Comes from the rich ones. But if the law was such that it only allowed the rich to come it would also be bad. So, like I asked you before, what's the actual solution? Just pretending that nothing is happening?

And FYI, every single one of these countries has not-that-far-places that are more than pleased to see tourist activity. You have like ecovillages & such where you get to participate, appreciate nature and do rural tourism, all while enjoying the Mediterranean weather they came for. But no, people really must take the 1000000000th picture of the Sagrada Familia so that their travel-ego fills up. And yet you think that we should have empathy over that? Housing and jobs disappearing because random twats want to take pictures. Oh noes, the moisture. Right...

And what I asked you was what they should do instead given that Catalonia will always be a minority.

The last minority in Spain that was veeeeery unhappy started a diplomat space program. Is that the way?

I also pointed out that this pacific-ish way of manifestation (cmon, this is not hard assaulting; more like attention grabbing) has done wonders for some movements in the past. Modern Netherlands were reborn out of people roadblocking "innocent people trying to go to work or trying to enjoy their off days" with bicycle protests.

I propose turning that group back from a mob, into a protest, and getting in the government’s face.

Has happened, hundreds of times. Zero effect. Governments couldn't love anything more but free money that comes independently of the well being of their citizens. Dutch disease 2.0. Plus, the Madrid government isn't exactly known for attending Catalonia's needs. For some reason they tried to declare independence 9999 times in these last decades.

The folks inside should instead take the issue up with whoever put the sign on the door, and work to take that down.

Well, having a reputation for being annoying towards tourists is a sign by itself. And put yourself in the shoes of those fellas. What can they realistically do if the democratic process doesn't cut? Should they just abandon their land?

Downplay it all you want but it’s still assault

Words aren't black and white things. The cashier not issuing a receipt is financial fraud but we're talking about gum; they dodged 5 cents in taxes.

Especially when acid attacks are not unheard of

I personally haven't heard of those one single time, but even if they were a thing every now and then, are we going to assume that anyone spraying a few ml of water might be throwing acid just bcuz? The point of these protests is to raise attention to the problem, not to harm tourists. If someone goes that "extra mile", throw them behind bars, this instead of assuming that the thousand others might be trying to seriously injuring someone when they're, very likely, doing something that goes away after 2 minutes in the local weather.

It is not a secret that a few cities across southern Europe very pissy about the treatment they're getting. I'm not into victim blaming, but it is strange to think of these tourists as surprised when they got confronted with some sort of protests or message of disdain. In Portugal those are all over the place. From graffiti to protests. And sure, most of those do not involve any sort of physical touch with the tourists, however, if I was a tourist I'd be way madder at some of the protests I see over here than over taking a minuscule spray of water and those you wouldn't qualify as "assault" only as "speech".

It doesn't justify assaulting (albeit calling 3ml of water in the Mediterranean summer an assault is a bit of a stretch), but that was not the only thing you said. You were isolating Barcelona as a special case. I simply said that it is not isolated at all, that every popular region along the entire Mediterranean coast is suffering from the same.

London's situation is bad but 1) 6 times more population dilutes tourism way better 2) London's tourism is "going there, taking pictures, famous Harry Potter things, giant ferry wheel, bye" instead of "I like this weather and everything is cheap; I think I'll stay here for as long as my visa allows" 3) the richer you are the least affected you get as tourists can't compete with you all that easily 4) London has that other phenomena, which is not quite tourism, called mass immigration, and the last time I've heard about citizen actions towards the problem they were following the "we no longer want to participate in anything with out neighbors" path which is IMHO a bit more extreme than just being mad en masse with a relatively harmless protest.

From a political standpoint, Madrid is an oppressive mess. Catalonia is in the podium for the most productive region and this is killing it slowly (as it did with Portugal and parts of other countries). You can't quite say the same about London. In London you might end up living far from the city center but your economic woes do not come from the thousands of immigrants nor the tourists all around.

There are plenty of legal things that are condemnable.

Going to a place that you know upfront that is suffering like this, where you know that you're contributing a teeny bitsy to get someone homeless, jobless and cultureless might be legal but it isn't moral.

One might argue that most tourists do not know that. They simply look up some "top 17 best places to go in summer 2024" and off they go. They think that they are going to ride in a lovely tram through lovely streets and then some paradisiac beach when reality is smelling sweaty butts through crowds all the way.

But how to you convince dumb tourists to be smart and moral tourists when there are plenty of good places they can go to that aren't overcrowding (even in these same countries)? I personally dunno. And since you think that individuals should not be concerned then you probably prefer some other route.

We can have quotas, but then you get gentrification. Whoever is the richest gets in and the others do not.That's also terrible. Plus you'd get a black market with illegal renting due to market pressures.

What solution do you propose exactly?

That's Algarve for you. It just straight away stopped having Portuguese people. The entire south coast of Portugal is now a British colony.

Except the retirees, people only go there in the summer so, by May, "business" owners need to hire like 50k persons willing to do crap jobs and by September they all get fired. Ofc that people aren't really willing to do that so we get the added bonus of bosses going to journals to complain that "there isn't a shortage of jobs, it is the Portuguese that do not want to work". What a dream job, to live in a cardboard box to appease Brits looking for the cheapest nice-place.

Whatever happened there that was Portuguese is no more.