index
The cruise lines defend themselves
click on images for full-size:
Half Moon Cay beach (Photo by Alan Walker used with permission of SeaLetter Cruise Magazine)
Half Moon Cay beach (Photo by Alan Walker used with permission of SeaLetter Cruise Magazine)
In defense of their fantasy islands, the cruise lines argue that given the numbers of vacationers, immersion in the real local culture and economy is both impractical and dangerous to the natives.
The combined population of Cat Island's villages is . . . almost exactly the capacity of a Holland America cruise ship. "Bringing nearly [two thousand] people each day to Cat Island would force people to change their culture to fit ours. Right now there is no McDonald's on Cat Island, or even a bank. By developing Half Moon Cay, we can minimize the intrusion into these people's lives and yet provide them with jobs, which includes training them so that everyone from the technical to management staff will be Bahamians." Patron 1998, 93-5
Such Orientalizing arguments might be more convincing if they didn't assume that the numbers of vacationers and the profit of the corporation are givens that must be accommodated, and that the native surely don't want McDonald's.