Not being able to solve the problem 100% doesn't mean they shouldn't try to do anything.
(Now, maybe they have done a bunch of stuff, I don't know, but it seems like there's still a problem)
Not being able to solve the problem 100% doesn't mean they shouldn't try to do anything.
(Now, maybe they have done a bunch of stuff, I don't know, but it seems like there's still a problem)
An email reminder won't work. Someone who is uncomfortable having a particular ethnic group will not be swayed by an email reminder not to be racist.
Furthermore, unless racism is widespread in a particular area, it may not be possible to identify racists with statistical analysis and threaten racist hosts with banning. I can imagine this working in a relatively racist place where >5% of hosts refuse service for a particular (and relatively common) ethnicity but it's likely rare enough in most parts of the U.S. to avoid reliable detection without false positives.
There's plenty Airbnb can do to ensure their hosts aren't racists. They have complete oversight of the booking process. They can detect racist rejection patterns and investigate.
Airbnb owns 0% of the houses put up for rent on their platform.
I think there's a marked difference in attitude between the companies towards a problem they both face and just because Facebook or Big Company X ignore stuff like this doesn't mean it's ok for everyone to ignore it. A change in attitude alone is progress on these fronts and we should hold more of these companies accountable so that they at least try to do something. It's not their responsibility to eliminate racism, but I believe it is their responsibility to try to understand how and why something like this manifests on their platform and try to take steps to curb it.
It's not an easy problem by any means, but try is the key word here. More companies taking well-intentioned steps like this leads to learnings that can be shared across our industry.
[1] https://blog.nextdoor.com/2016/01/27/our-commitment-to-end-r...
[2] https://blog.nextdoor.com/2016/04/12/improvements-to-how-our...
[3] https://blog.nextdoor.com/2016/04/26/continued-improvements-...
Since they monetize by taking a share of transactions, they are a lot more like an involved participant in the transaction than an uninterested messenger.
Using some simple logic, it would be quite easy to detect signs of racial bias during booking.
Ending racism is a complex and perhaps ultimately unsolvable problem, but mitigating it's effects is something we can and should do.