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The Commercialization Of Air In Into Thin Air By Jon Krakauer

466 Words2 Pages

In the book Into Thin Air by John Krakauer, a novel in which climbers try to ascend the mountain of Everest and the challenges they face. This novel expedition doesn't turn out too well because there were many casualties. There are many deaths because they are inexperienced and don't have the right knowledge.To help them with the inexperienced climbers the guides hire sherpas. Who are people who live up on the mountain and take them up the mountain and set up the ropes? The sherpas are almost forced to take them up the mountain. The commercialization of Everest is negatively impacting the Sherpas, this conveys the exploitation and the racism towards the Sherpas as shown in Krauker's book Into thin Air. Others like to argue that the sherpas gain far …show more content…

It helps with their schools,roads,hospitals and is the only method of making money. Its also the only source of income, so they use the money to buy all their supplies. Even though this helps them greatly, it doesn't benefit them enough to lose their life. Sherpas are always in danger when climbing the mountain. A quote from the Ethics of Summit article is “Sherpas make up a third of all Everest deaths, and a significant number of these continue to be avoidable tragedies caused by human agency” (Depali Rai 1). The sherpas make up most of the deaths on the mountain because of the agencies they work for, forcing them to take up climbers who are inexperienced. These are easily avoidable by not letting anyone get a permit to climb the mountain. These inexperienced climbers also depend on the sherpas for everything. The sherpas take up all their stuff,set up the ropes and bring them back down. Due to the conditions they have to work in, it causes the sherpa death rate to rise by a lot. Something new that the sherpas have to start doing is go on top of the mountain and go retrieve dead bodies. This is idiotic since they are risking multiple peoples lives to retrieve a dead

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Many of them are inexperienced and would undoubtedly never make it to the top without a guide. The one unifying characteristic shared by all of the climbers is that they have money—enough to shell out $65,000 a piece for their shot at the top. Krakauer spends long chapters giving his best, most educated guesses about why climbers made certain decisions, and what happened to the people who disappeared. This is an exercise that must result in major frustration, as no one can be entirely sure what took place. Many mistakes later, Krakauer manages to piece together an outline of what happened to whom and when during the climb, but the questions he struggles with in almost every situation are "why" and "how".

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Money plays a gigantic part in the economy with Everest. “By 1996 Hall was charging $65,000 a head…” (pg.36). To guides, gross amounts of money paid, Sherpa’s at the base of the mountain went from a small village with no wheels to having the children wearing baseball caps and American branded shirts. This even allowed anyone who could pay, could climb the mountain, even if guides had to drag them up the mountain. There wasn’t as much lack of trust due to the types of people, but their skill level.

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After being subjected to the many risky features, climbers continue to ascend Everest. Many question why clients would ever want to climb with such risks, but they say the need is too strong. They ignore their logical thoughts about turning back, and are adamant about reaching the top. Clients shouldn’t continue climbing Everest if there is a risk of death.

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Krakauer explains how following the discovery of Everest as the highest mountain in the world, the journey to the top would take the lives of 24 men, the efforts of 15 expeditions and the passage of 101 years before someone would finally reach the summit. This demonstrates how all though the expedition to the top was not easy, and would require the lives of many men, people would not stop trying because that is human nature. Not all people climb Mt. Everest in their lifetime, but most people, if not all, work hard to achieve something or be successful. Whether that success may be in their professional life, their personal life, or anything else, Mt. Everest can symbolize all of it. It symbolizes a journey to success and relates to the theme of humans natural drive and passion to pursue what they want.

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