Airbnb host must pay $5,000 for canceling reservation based on race
latimes.com
latimes.com
This is one sided reporting. First of all Barker accepted the booking knowing who the guest would be, from her name, profile etc.
Then there were frequent polite comms where the booking was changed, renegotiated. Two extra guests were added. Then the guest asked to bring a small dog, and the host said no because they have a pitbull in the house. Guest persisted and eventually the hosts agreed to remove their own dog from the house to accommodate the dog.
Messages on the day of arrival have been withheld by the guest, but relationship broke down and became hostile, with the guest delaying arrival until 2AM-3AM. The host lost patience.
So I think the reason they cancelled is because the guest really did mess them about, but still really stupid to use those words in doing so. Tami Barker had the opportunity to refuse the booking long before, and didn't, then went out of her way to accommodate the guests. Of course, nobody is interested in that.
Assuming that the host inferred the ethnicity of the tenant from their name, that was accessible from the beginning of the interaction, and might have colored some of the reactions to the requests, but not in a directly racist way until the very end.
Yes, if she’d just said, “you’re a pain in the ass, I’m not renting to you”, all would be well. But some people just can’t help themselves, I guess (I’m picturing the host as some letters-to-the-editor crackpot).
If you had a nasty fight with someone, and it ended with that person saying, "Well, it's because you're white (or Indian or whatever you are). That's why," would you immediately assume this person hated everyone of your race? Or would you assume you'd gotten under his skin enough that he reached down into his bag of dirty insults and pulled out anything he could find to hit you with?
It'd be one thing if this host never rented to Asians, or responded to an initial query with a message like, "I don't rent to Asians."
But in this case, it looks like a nasty fight between two women, one of whom picked the wrong (politically sensitive) angle to insult the other on, and the other who decided to play up the victim card and record video of herself crying and make a big sob story, and collect a nice little payday for the trouble.
I'd be very curious to know more about Miss Suh's background. In my experience with these sorts of cases, it is rarely the plaintiff's first rodeo.
That's where I think my responders are missing my point. If this were just some fight between random women on the street, or two close friends, or neighbors, your description would be accurate. It would neither surprise me, nor give me reason to think much about it. This is not, however, just "between two women". It's a business relationship. That makes things a little different, including entire legal frameworks are built around business relationships. AFAIK, no laws exist that dictate my relationships with personal friends.
Suppose a similar conversation, with similar closing comments, took place at work? Still think it's a fight between two women? Would you get upset if someone got marched down to HR for a little re-education?
Look, I get what y'all are saying; I wouldn't rent to her, either, for the good reasons already outlined. But when we ask ourselves who opened this can of worms, the host is standing there with a dirty can opener. Had the host just cancelled, we probably wouldn't be reading about because nearly everyone would be on the side of the host. But the host just had to bring race into it in a fit of temper. Now all those good reasons go out the window. If you can't keep your temper, and keep your mouth under control, maybe being an AirBnb host isn't for you.
Non-racists don't suddenly start making racial comments they don't believe just because they're in a nasty fight.
Racial discrimination doesn't have to be absolute. Saying it can't be discrimination because she didn't reject this guest up-front is nonsensical. When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
> Providing false information on the availability of a property for sale or rental based on a person's protected class status—even if that information is based on the owner’s desires. > Don't say: “There’s no point in your showing the Smith’s house to that Hispanic couple; the Smiths will never sell to them.”
[1] http://realtormag.realtor.org/tool-kit/fair-housing/article/...
I seriously don't know. I want to say yes, but maybe not?
I was thinking about this in another context today. When people piss you off, many people (including myself) want to say things to them that will illicit a negative reaction. Often, offensive words seem like a good choice to accomplish that goal. If telling someone "you're a responsible human being who loves his mother" caused someone to be offended, lots of people would say that when they are angry.
I'm totally on the judges sides in this case, once those words come out of your mouth there is no going back and you should be responsible for them.
I guess I just wonder if there is a relatively easy and sure-fire way to piss people off without being offensive? What's a better way for people to express their anger in a childish way ?
I'll assume we've gone beyond the topic at hand, as I wonder who would wonder how to piss people off as an AirBnB host? :-)
Frankly, I find racial insults to be cheap and unimaginative. Oh, so I'm a $RACIAL_EPITAPH? Well, can't help how I was born. Nice try, though. No points for effort, though. "Maybe you wouldn't have that problem if you'd grow up, learn to accept responsibility, and quit blaming your problems on the actions of others. That failed business? That's wasn't a market problem, an employee problem, that was a you problem."? Oooh, well, that kind of hits close to home.
Never go for the easy insult. Take a few extra moments, find that weak spot, and give that knife a good twist if you're genuinely intending to communicate insult.
http://allowe.com/laughs/book/When%20Insults%20Had%20Class.h...
Some of those are pretty targeted and cut rather close...
I'm under the impression that part of you actually does believe it if you say it. I don't see the mind as one homogeneous thing that requires all thoughts be polarized in the same direction.
Definitely poor behavior on guest's part but if only the host had not sent the last messages referring to "Asians"...
Anyone who objectively looks at the situation would conclude that Suh was a spoiled entitled brat who exploited this situation. It's disgusting how she used her crocodile tears to exploit the media and the people.
I really don't see how you conclude that. Barker approve the deal then reneged with racist language. What makes Suh entitled or spoiled? If Barker didn't like the deal she had plenty of time to cancel or just say no upfront.
> If Barker didn't like the deal she had plenty of time to cancel or just say no upfront.
She did cancel it. After Suh kept changing the terms. The deal was for 2 people. Then Suh added a few more people. Then added a few more dogs.
Sure, the racist language wasn't called for but Suh was in the wrong.
This is the third time I'm posting this excerpt:
"When Suh later asked if it was OK to bring two friends and two dogs along, Barker said it was fine but the group would need to pay an additional $50 a night, according to screenshots of their text messages." https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jul/13/airbnb-ca...
according to screenshots of their text messages
I don't see a spoiled brat. Why is it so hard to believe that Suh wasn't in the wrong?
> Messages on the day of arrival have been withheld by the guest, but relationship broke down and became hostile, with the guest delaying arrival until 2AM-3AM. The host lost patience.
This is the part that I find most ambiguous -- notably one of the final exchanges in the video
> If you think 4 people and 2 dogs [and] getting a room [for] $50 a night on big bear mountain during the busiest weekend of the year ..... You are insanely high
It was pretty clear from the earlier messages that the extra two guests were an _additional_ $50/night -- was there an attempt to renegotiate to a total rate of $50/night?
[1] https://www.everipedia.com/tami-barker-airbnb-host/
[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2017/04/07/o...
Also:
> The woman, Dyne Suh, a UCLA law student...
That's like picking a fight with someone and they turn out to be an amateur MMA fighter.
-----
Side-note, does this ruling say anything about AirBnB's legal situation by declaring an AirBnB as a "place of public accommodation"?
I'm not a social scientist but I'd bet good money that someone who is ignorantly informed by their personal experiences like that will probably not find great value in something abstract like a class.
Also is the purpose to prevent further illegal discrimination or change her viewpoint? If it's to prevent further illegal discrimination, a larger punitive fine will hammer that point in. If it's to change her viewpoint, being racist is not illegal in the US, at least not yet.
Actually, I think the forced class makes the situation worse. My life experiences tells me classes and other attempts at "re-education" only hardens the attitudes for hatred and discrimination.
For a person to change their racism/homophobia, it requires interaction with another human that triggers an emotional component. For example, a person who despises gays has a child grow up to be gay which changes their mind. Or a somebody who hates blacks later ends up stuck in the front line of a war with other blacks watching each others' backs and it eliminates (or lessens) the prejudice.
It doesn't mean that positive human interactions will always "cure" everyone but it seems to be more effective than classes.
Classes are more useful for cultural/etiquette topics (e.g. how to hold business cards with 2 hands in Japan).
Really, though, how does one actually "deprogram" someone with opinions like this? Can it actually be done?
Casual racists are a toxic population whose opinions and behaviors in favor of said racism bring no value to society. How on earth do we eliminate it?
I used to think that the steamroller of progress and information would gradually eliminate racism and sexism and denial of science and logic as older generations died out, but the rise of the next generation of racists and MRAs and flat earthers seems to be a fairly strong counterpoint to that.
I fear for the future of humanity.
It's the same story, over and over.
Which begs the question: can we ever achieve a society that is both multicultural and welcoming to all races? All the science suggests no; we can either have our cake, or eat it. We must choose.
[1] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9477.2012....
[2] http://esr.oxfordjournals.org/content/21/4/311.short
[3] http://sf.oxfordjournals.org/content/93/3/1211.abstract
[4] http://cos.sagepub.com/content/53/2/120.abstract
[5] http://esr.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/08/20/esr.j...
[6] http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....
[7] http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4939-1705-1_1...
[8] http://spq.sagepub.com/content/78/4/324.short
[9] http://sf.oxfordjournals.org/content/92/1/249
[10] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/juaf.12015/abstra...
[11] http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X14...
[12] http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X14...
[13] https://www.jstor.org/stable/425106?seq=1#page_scan_tab_cont...
[14] http://www.scirp.org/reference/ReferencesPapers.aspx?Referen...
[15] http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886912...
[16] https://www.nber.org/papers/w21079
[17] http://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2013/study-asks-is-a-better-wor...
[18] http://www.ifs.org.uk/uploads/publications/wps/WP201530.pdf
[19] http://emilkirkegaard.dk/en/wp-content/uploads/School-Choice...
Let's see some proper citations that actual prove your ridiculous claim instead of just dumping a bunch of links and saying that this proves your pseudo scientific claim. No wonder you made a throwaway.
I don't want you to think that I'm saying this is as simple as "blame Trump". It's not that simple. But it seems related to me.
It used to be that you could be a bigot like this and so long as you didn't make it public, loud, obvious, no one really cared that much. No one liked it, but no one cared. Now we're in a time when America has elected a President who is pretty openly bigoted in a number of ways.
There's a good question there about cause vs effect. Did people being more openly bigoted lead to Trump being elected, or did the President being pretty bigoted lead to people feeling more comfortable with their closed-minded beliefs? Or maybe there's a mutual cause to both things. But it sure does seem related.
Conservatively considering 45% to 48% of the registered Voters voted for Trump, what %age of those voters think like this? => “I will not allow this country to be told what to do by foreigners.”
Alarming.
Be wary of thinking "48% of America" => "I will not allow this country to be told what to do by foreigners". It's not that different than thinking any Democrat will go off on you for assuming their gender. What I find more alarming is the percentage of people who really feel like they're reasonable and half of the country is their enemy on both sides.
He has demonstrated a stunning immunity to logic and willingness to harm American interests. He ignores open dialog. He and his who can't be talked to (which are most I have talked to) are the enemy. They represent and embrace ignorance and want a kind of backwards thinking and social order that only makes sense in the myopic view. They are anti-science while using tools made by and for science to communicate and often see no hypocrisy in any of this. They are the reason we have terms like "post-truth".
They often can't be reasoned with. They often seem will to deploy violence. They are doing real harm. How are they not the enemy?
You... do understand that many conservatives think exactly that of liberals and that's what I think is more dangerous than either one alone, right?
There's certainly some individuals in the gov't that hold and voice racist views, but while that's pretty gross, and a good reason to vote against them, it isn't really relevant here. If the woman had just said "I hate Asians", she wouldn't have been subject to any legal troubles (though she'd hopefully received a good dollup of social opprobrium). So again, I don't really see any double standard.
Sex/gender is included.
If your host sent you a text message after canceling saying "I hate men, that's why I'm canceling you" I bet you'd find a lawyer who could take the case.
If it was a roommate request, then it is viewed differently. If the property was at most 3 units and the landlord lives there, then the landlord cannot advertise that they will discriminate on gender but the landlord is allowed to. (Who said that the laws had to make sense?)
I don't like the mentality that leads to this kind of confused legal situation. But if I squint sideways and pretend that I don't have a brain, I can kinda see how someone could have thought this a good idea.
Top comments on this thread:
> Stupid of the host to act like that
> The host deserves a larger fine for her stupidity alone. She told the women who reserved straight up that she "wouldn't rent to an Asian."
> I think people should be able to discriminate for anything they want when letting others into their home whether it's a business related visit or not.
> I wonder if this whole thing really happened or was completely made up.
I think people see her picture and know instantly that they would never have to deal with this kind of shit. Whereas a picture of my shaved head might not be very reassuring.
Personally, 5K seems too light a settlement considering the circumstances.
While there are logical fallacies, like the implications asians can't be racist, they are the kinds of fallacies renters might use.
Agreed. It looks like the Judge slapped just an extra 1K on top of the mandatory minimum.
> The minimum penalty under California’s civil rights laws prohibiting discrimination in places of public accommodation is $4,000 for each offense, the agency said.
I realize this can come across as racist, but I just experienced too much of this crap that I no longer want to ruin a vacation over it.
I also make sure to include both my picture (I'm Asian) and my wife's (she's white) because there were it's just easier to be flat out rejected than to have to suffer through "malicious compliance." Especially now that we have kids, I really don't want to put them through that.
However I think that people should be punished for explicitly commenting on protected classes in a hateful or angry manner in business related situations.
edit: Though the article doesn't mention it, I suppose the land lord could also own more properties than what the exemptions allow for.
edit: 2 extra friends.
> "if you think 4 people and 2 dogs are getting a room for $50 a night on big bear mountain during the busiest weekend of the year...you are insanely high".
They didn't put all the text messages in the video.
I think she was just stupid enough to make those remarks and I hope she is being punished for that. Otherwise, this is wrong.
It is also entirely possible the racist person did this intentionally to maximize the inconvenience to the renter. There are hundred other ways to explain this. Some racist and some not racist, but dropping phrases as overtly racist as hers has a way of sounding truthful in situation like this.
Which "words" are we talking about? Had she avoided saying "one word: Asian", this would not have been a story.
I'm sure someone will try to argue that "foreigners" isn't racist because race and country of origin are different, but the intent is obvious enough.
If you check out her FB profile, you can see that she is supporting many violent terrorist/anarchist movements such as anti-capitalism, BLM etc.
Not saying it could not have happened, but what a funny coincidence...
Well, reading TFA, given that there seems to be evidence and a legal ruling involved, chances are likely that this incident wasn't "completely made up." But obviously you didn't create a green account simply to cast aspersions on Dyn Suh's character, and you must have read the article first, so clearly you know that "the whole thing really happened." Unless you're accusing the LA Times, the California government, Tami Barker and her attorney of all collaborating to manufacture this story, but that would be absurd.
I also don't see evidence of support for "many violent terrorist/anarchist movements" on her FB account, although she does have a BLM sticker on her mortarboard in her banner. Of course, that alone isn't evidence of support for violence or terrorism, so I have to assume you know her personally and have supporting evidence of Mrs. Suh's radical sympathies, and have chosen to post anonymously out of fear for your personal safety, which is brave of you.
However, I don't understand what "coincidence" you could be referring to, or why you find it "funny." Perhaps you could elaborate?