It’s alright to pick prospective roommates based on their cheeriness, cleanliness or even Game of Thrones nerdiness—just like we can choose whom we want to spend the night with or invite over for dinner.
But when it comes to picking someone to rent your place on Airbnb, those criteria could actually get you accused of racism.
La
st week, following numerous complaints by renters on the home-sharing platform who said they had been denied rentals because of the color of their skin, Airbnb unveiled its new roadmap to fight discrimination. The complaints were fueled in part by a Harvard Business School study that found that African-American guests on Airbnb were 16% less likely to be accepted than identical guests with distinctly white names. More recently, in a report commissioned by a former civil rights lawyer and ACLU veteran, the company admitted that it has a racism “problem” that it was too slow to address.
In response, Airbnb is now promising to: work to promote diversity within its workforce; encourage the use of the “instant booking” feature (allowing guests to book without prior host approval or screening); reduce the prominence of pictures on guests’ profiles in favor of more “objective,” reputation-enhancing information; expand anti-bias training for staff members; and provide emergency accommodation to anyone who’s been discriminated against.
But here’s the potential complication with Airbnb’s new policies: While racism is still pervasive in our culture, it’d be a stretch to claim that every time a guest who self-identifies as black is denied a room, he or she is a victim of racial discrimination. And the company has yet to explain how it plans to account for that.
There are a flurry of reasons why hosts might want to reject a booking: They might not be tech-savvy and may have mistakenly left a date open on their calendar before realizing they can’t rent their space that day. Or they might simply be waiting for a more attractive offer from someone who would rent their space for several nights, or a week, as opposed to one night. Traveling during peak time or in a popular neighborhood can also affect the availability of properties.
Thankfully, as a black woman, I have never personally experienced real or perceived racial discrimination on Airbnb. No one has ever said to me me, “Sorry, darling, your caramel skin tone clashes with my taupe wallpaper. The room is not available anymore. Best of luck with the hunt.” But I have been in the opposite position—that of having to decide whom I should let into the privacy of my home for a few days, and on what ground.
My friend and classmate here at Kellogg had a hateful and racist encounter with an @Airbnb host. pic.twitter.com/rFHlwqy5sQ
— Shani C. Taylor (@shanictaylor) May 31, 2016
One day, I accidentally activated the “Instant Book” feature and less than 2 hours later received a booking confirmation from someone I had not been able to screen. The message from my prospective guest was riddled with grammatical errors, his picture was blurry, and he had only had one positive review. But I was determined to fight off my own biases—I had hosted other people in the past using Instant Book who turned out to be perfectly respectable guests—and went ahead with the booking anyway.
Until one of my friends pointed out that the guy hinted in his message that he only wanted the room to spend the night with his Tinder date, away from the “routine” of his family home (he actually lived in Brooklyn, a couple of blocks away from my apartment). My house is not a sex hotel, thanks. After consulting with my roommates, we cancelled his request and refunded him.
This person happened, just like me, to be black.
I wonder how Airbnb’s new guidelines would have “rated” that.
One of the sections in the new report on Airbnb, conducted by civil rights lawyer Laura Murphy, states:
“While a host might articulate lawful and legitimate reasons for turning down a potential guest, it may cause that member of that community to feel unwelcome and excluded (…) Hosts who demonstrate a pattern of rejecting guests from a protected class (even while articulating legitimate reasons) undermine the strength of our community by making potential guests feel unwelcome and Airbnb may suspend hosts who have demonstrated such a pattern from the Airbnb platform.”
This clause is probably the most problematic part of the report. Nowhere does it indicate clearly how Airbnb intends to identify a “pattern” of rejection based on subjective criteria such as sex or race, if the justification provided by a host for rejecting a guest (e.g. schedule conflict) does not clearly reflect discriminatory intent.
Airbnb did not immediately respond to my request for comment seeking elaboration on how its new policies will address potential complications like this.
It is already illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender or religion in the lodging industry, under the Fair Housing Act of 1968 and Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. There is only one exception to this rule, the “Mrs. Murphy Boarding House” exception, which says that a person renting close quarters (private accommodation with five rooms or less ) has a right to free association with only people he or she prefers to share that space with. But it does not apply to race.
It goes without saying that hosts shouldn’t be able to pick guests based on race or religious affiliation. But jumping to the conclusion that caution or even poor time management are evidence of outright racism is pushing sophistry an inch too far.
How long will a host be suspended from the platform if he or she is found to have rejected guests ‘one too many times,’ and how will these discrimination claims be handled? All that of, apparently, remains to be seen.
One thing is sure: Given the magnitude of the anti-racism crackdown, Airbnb is going to need a strong Bias Response Team.
Follow me on Twitter @nahema_marchal
