This signboard was prominently displayed at the Churchgate rail terminal in Mumbai, India, my hometown. I passed it nearly every day when commuting to college, and it has guided my life ever since.
If leaders learn to live in peace, so will their people. This applies to “leaders” everywhere—be they of countries, communities, organizations, corporations, or even families and households.
Today, evil leaders are again on the rise, promoting jingoism, ethnocentricism, nationalism, extremism, fear, and civilizational supremacy.
I have termed it “The Other Global Warming.”
Its consequences will be just as lethal as traditional Global Warming.
Despite being at the forefront of an “Industry of Peace,” Travel & Tourism leaders chose to stay within their comfort zones by avoiding any discussion of this latest “Hate Pandemic.”
That’s like doing nothing about a virus-driven pandemic, even though the warning signs are omnipresent.
In 2025, the Travel & Tourism industry will mark 30 years since a conference of global hoteliers convened in Tel Aviv, Israel, under this theme:
They heard an Israeli Prime Minister, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, speak eloquently about his vision for a just and durable peace in the Holy Land. This peace will eventually see the region brimming with pilgrims and tourists.
Just 48 hours later, the Jewish Prime Minister was shot dead by one of his own, a Jewish extremist fanatic.
His dreams died with him. The results are plain to see today.
The shocked and grieving hoteliers promised to see the Prime Minister’s visions through to fruition. It did not happen.
The Holy Land has been on a downward spiral of violence ever since.
On a positive front, 2025 will also mark the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Today, the entire Mekong River region is at peace. It is a land of open borders, crisscrossed by transportation networks, travel, and tourism.
A decades-long war ended when the American people discovered they were being lied to by their leaders. Travel & Tourism can learn from both anniversaries.
When the guns fall silent, travel & tourism are primary beneficiaries.
There is ALWAYS a Path to Peace. The masses do not want to fight if the leaders do not.
Thus, the masses have to make sure that the leaders do not.
There are hundreds of ways of doing that — expose their lies, denounce their hate speech, stop their funding, vote them out, and monitor the vested-interest lobby groups and the military-industrial complex.
Give the “Other Global Warming” the same level of attention as the traditional “Global Warming.”
After that, water will find its level. All leaders claim to have the welfare of the “Future Generation” at heart.
