Aussies divided after bikini-clad tourists jumped into rice paddy to help local farmers in Bali: ‘Disrespectful and careless’
- Bikini-clad tourists spotted ‘helping’ Balinese rice farmers
- Travelers are seen in the mud helping to plant seeds.
Australians have been divided after bikini-clad tourists were filmed jumping into a rice paddy to help farmers with their crops in Bali.
The images were uploaded to the Instagram page, Bali Living, and showed tourists ankle-deep in mud as they helped with farm work.
Half a dozen women are seen lending a hand as they pose for photos with locals, leaving social media users wondering if they were helping or hindering.
Bikini-clad tourists have been filmed jumping into rice fields in Bali to help farmers plant seeds, prompting a mixed reaction online.
Footage shows locals and tourists alike laughing with the farmers who seem happy and unconcerned with further assistance.
The popular tourist destination has previously seen people try to get their five minutes of fame online by faking farm work.
Therefore, pessimistic social media users expressed their discontent with travelers disrupting the work of locals.
“Beyond disrespectful in making content from disadvantaged people as support,” one person wrote.
“All for the gram, disrespectful and careless,” added another.
“Reminds me of that viral bikini girl who got backlash looking at a rice farmer with a post about being thankful.” They didn’t learn their lesson now that they make the same content as always,” commented a third.
“Poor working people from developing countries who are treated as a prop for those wealthy influential tourists.”
The comment refers to a 2019 post by tourist Natalie Schlater, who uploaded a photo of herself in a bikini overlooking a rice field in Canggu, comparing her life to that of a rice picker in Bali.
“Thinking about how different my life is from the man who picks in the rice field every morning,” the Instagram user wrote alongside the photo.
Looking deep into the distance, he seemed to be watching as a man was hard at work collecting rice in the background.
Half a dozen women are filmed planting seeds while posing for pictures with the Balinese, leaving people wondering if they are helping or just getting in the way.
Many brought up the case of Natalie Schlater, who uploaded a photo of herself in a bikini looking out over a rice field in Canggu comparing her life to that of a Bali rice picker.
“He’s the epitome of the social media generation,” one commented, while another sarcastically wrote an alternate caption for the image: “I just think about how I’m so popular and rich and this guy is a rice farmer.”
However, other users said that the bikini-clad girls were helping the farmers and it seemed that the workers were happy to be there.
One person wrote: ‘I think it doesn’t bother them, there is also laughter in the background, it’s the locals who take photos with them too, not the foreigners.’
“They’re not creating content, none of them are taking a picture,” added another.
‘What happen? At least they are helping,” commented a third.
