'Cause everybody hates a tourist'

Most of my blog posts are about mountains and hill environments. I love being out in them, whatever the weather, and get a huge amount of enjoyment and fulfillment. Recently I came across some writing that seemed to draw a distinction between mountaineers and tourists. There was a definite notion of hierarchy, with somehow climbers and mountaineers being the true cognoscenti of the hills, and everyone else being of lesser value, which really rankled.  In my limited experience of climbers and mountaineers, they like nothing better to talk about themselves in relation to the mountain, and have a relatively narrow view of mountainous environments. Their views are no more valid than someone who comes to enjoy the fresh air from the valley floor for a week during their summer holiday: essentially, unless we are one of the very few who earn a living from the hills whilst living in the hills, we are all tourists.  The comments were made in terms of a conversation about the apparent lessening of a literary prize by including non mountaineers in the shortlist, and reducing it to a Bill Byrson-esque award. There are two elements; the change in nature of the prize, which to some degree is splitting hairs, and the other notion, that some visitors to mountain environments are somehow more worthy than others, which I find really alienating, and unwelcome, in a world of increasing division and denigration of otherness.