Quote by Don DeLillo

To be a tourist is to escape accountability. Errors and failings don't cling to you the way they do back home. You're able to drift across continents and languages, suspending the operation of sound thought. Tourism is the march of stupidity. You're expected to be stupid. The entire mechanism of the host country is geared to travelers acting stupidly. You walk around dazed, squinting into fold-out maps. You don't know how to talk to people, how to get anywhere, what the money means, what time it is, what to eat or how to eat it. Being stupid is the pattern, the level and the norm. You can exist on this level for weeks and months without reprimand or dire consequence. Together with thousands, you are granted immunities and broad freedoms. You are an army of fools, wearing bright polyesters, riding camels, taking pictures of each other, haggard, dysenteric, thirsty. There is nothing to think about but the next shapeless event.

Summary

This quote reflects on the nature of tourism and the freedom it provides. It suggests that being a tourist allows one to escape responsibility and consequences, as errors and failings do not easily stick to them. The quote argues that the tourism industry expects and facilitates the ignorance of travelers, who wander aimlessly, relying on maps and displaying a lack of knowledge about their surroundings. The tourist is portrayed as being free to exist in a state of stupidity, largely unaware and unconcerned about the practicalities of daily life.