
Airbnb’s ban of Nazis in Charlottesville sets an important standard - rbanffy
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2017/08/airbnb_s_ban_of_nazis_in_charlottesville_sets_an_important_standard_for.html
======
mberning
This is just ridiculous and will do nothing but ratchet up tensions. Now
Airbnb is going to be the arbiter of who is a nazi and who isn't? What if a
person is merely "alt-right"? What about "alt-light"? Or what if some other
marginalized group comes and complains about giving quarter to black
supremacists or non-white supremacists? They are out there. And many showed up
in Charlottesville. I can't even imagine the cost of running such a program
both in terms of manpower, engineering, and PR blowback. Of course it is their
business to do what they want, but I don't think it is very smart or
sustainable.

~~~
willstrafach
If you disagree, that is one thing, but regarding cost: I am willing to bet
that a very large number of folks would be 100% OK doing business with a
company who refuses to do business with Nazis.

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stmfreak
If it becomes okay to exclude people because of their beliefs, we may feel
that sanity has prevailed and a sense of victory. However, the loss of freedom
can become perverted in time and AirBnB just set a precedent for deciding
which beliefs are not allowed.

When they come for you and your soon-to-be-declared radical beliefs, remember
how proud you were today.

~~~
edanm
Nazism is today considered by almost everyone a _very radical belief_ , far
more radical than almost anything else being commonly discussed in politics.

Nazism is not a case of "right vs. left", "republican vs. democrat", etc. It's
not a case where it's an almost 50/50 split, but because the left has more
power over media/tech, then the right's views are considered fringe and are
"punished".

This is a case where almost everyone agrees that these views are completely
outside of standard discourse. Don't conflate this with the common (and IMO
somewhat valid) view that a lot of what's been happening lately is
"repression" of the right by the left.

------
rsj_hn
You may not view this as a first amendment issue, but it's certainly a housing
discrimination issue. Many localities have laws preventing housing
discrimination based on political belief -- for example, D.C.

You can expect that if stuff like this starts happening more often, other
jurisdictions will also respond.

In general, "I am free to not rent my property to a certain undesirable
element" has a pretty ugly history, as most societies don't view housing as
just another optional consumption good.

~~~
flunhat
What about "I am free not to rent my property to those who want me killed and
my kind ethnically cleansed"?

~~~
rsj_hn
It's the bigots who are most fearful. People also wouldn't rent to african
americans because they were afraid of their daughters being raped, etc.

You know, renting your property is not an existential struggle and not
everyone who reads Breitbart wants to have you and yours ethnically cleansed.
There are laws to protect you, and you really don't need to be helping out the
police with your fears.

~~~
flunhat
Nazis, as a matter of written ideology, espouse ethnic cleansing. African
Americans do not. I cannot believe I am having this debate, and on HN of all
places. Has the world gone insane?

~~~
alexknvl
But who do you trust to decide that someone is a Nazi? Should it be Slate,
some government bureaucracy, you personally, AirBnB? What if someone labels
you a Nazi?

Should we just throw them into water and see if they float? Or administer a
"are you a Nazi" test on a polygraph?

EDIT: This is a problem of the current political climate where words have lost
their meaning. A lot of people even remotely right of center have been called
a Nazi or "alt-right" or "white-supremacist".

~~~
yongjik
> Should we just throw them into water and see if they float? Or administer a
> "are you a Nazi" test on a polygraph?

How about good old fashioned, "Is that a fucking swastika your friend is
carrying over his shoulder?"

[https://twitter.com/AndyBCampbell/status/896385942495285248](https://twitter.com/AndyBCampbell/status/896385942495285248)

------
noamhacker
> those who are members of the Airbnb community accept people regardless of
> their race, religion, national origin, ethnicity, disability, sex, gender
> identity, sexual orientation, or age.

When you are trusting someone to host you in their home, or trusting someone
to stay in your home, it is important to have safety policies. For example,
AirBnB's policies are related to fire safety, theft/vandalism, and fraud. This
is simply one other policy to make both guests and hosts feel safe using the
platform.

\- [https://www.airbnb.ca/standards](https://www.airbnb.ca/standards)

------
debatem1
2017: the year when "I don't support Nazis" became a controversial political
statement in the United States of America.

~~~
rsj_hn
It became controversial about the time that everyone who questioned
affirmative action or didn't vote for Hillary Clinton was labelled a white
supremacist or a Nazi. Suddenly the whole nation is filled with Nazis.

It's like the day after the election, half the population started engaging in
WW2 cosplay.

There are more Rastafarians in America then there are actual Nazis, and I'd
wager very few people in this rally even know the definition of a Nazi, let
alone are one.

~~~
flunhat
Oh, come off it. You're creating a strawman - there's plenty of room for
political debate around specific issues. And I don't think people who didn't
vote for HRC are Nazis are anything like that.

You know what I think? I think you don't actually care about free speech. A
Nazi (a real, card-carrying Nazi) drove a car through a group of leftist
protestors and killed an innocent young woman. He took away, by force, her
right to freedom of expression.

But I notice you haven't voiced any concern about that - you only care about
freedom of speech to the extent that it's used to protect Nazis (and those who
associate with them). But when it comes to protecting the free speech of
protestors who disagree? All of a sudden, your deep concern is nowhere to be
found. Give me a break.

~~~
alexknvl
Even if you do not think that, your fellow humans do. If you put power into
their hands to decide who should hang, a lot of innocent people will.

What you are talking about is completely orthogonal to the first amendment.
_Everyone_ has a right to speech and _everyone_ is protected from vehicular
assault & murder by law. I hope that everyone on Hacker News condemns that act
of violence.

Could you please point to the source of your claim that he was a "card-
carrying Nazi"?

~~~
flunhat
Photos of James Alex Fields before he drove his car through the crowd have him
among the Vanguard America group, which (according to Wikipedia) is an
American white nationalist group. His high school friends and teacher also say
that he had a deep obsession with Nazis. So that makes him a card carrying
Nazi in my eyes. There's also more evidence of his ideology if you just google
his name.

------
Overtonwindow
I don't know if this does a lot of good for Airbnb, aside from good publicity.
Hate groups will go underground. They will still use Airbnb, but they'll hide
their activities more.

~~~
pm24601
And how is this a bad thing? Allowing hate groups "above ground" normalizes
their behavior. They should be underground.

~~~
masonic
That strategy worked _so well_ in 1930s Europe (not _just_ Germany).

Extremist views are hard to fight when they are safely hidden away. Like any
infection, it's best to expose them to the light of day. It's more effective
to point and laugh than to throw projectiles and yell. (Had that strategy been
employed in 1923, there would have been no _Mein Kampf_.)

~~~
irishasaurus
Riiiiiiight, that's why underground groups on the far left like anarchists and
communists were so successful in Poland, Spain, Greece and elsewhere. The far
right was normalized and that's how they grew their ranks. It was the editor
that published Mein Kampf as well as Hitler. It was the Italian media and the
futurists that helped Mussolini gain power. This isn't about censorship, this
is about how fascists can co-opt the democratic process and rise to power.

How fascism was covered by the media
[http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-journalists-
covere...](http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-journalists-covered-rise-
mussolini-hitler-180961407/)

The myth of political correctness [https://thinkprogress.org/the-phony-debate-
about-political-c...](https://thinkprogress.org/the-phony-debate-about-
political-correctness-f81da03b3bdb/)

What normalization looks like today
[https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/normalization-lesson-
mun...](https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/normalization-lesson-munich-post/)

------
ams6110
I don't have a problem with Airbnb doing this, they are a private business and
should be able to decide how they operate and who they will and won't serve.

However I can't help but think that the reactions would be quite different if
they had banned people attending a Sharia rally.

~~~
dsr_
I've never heard of a "Sharia Rally". Can you point to one that happened in
the United States?

~~~
submersiveblue
AirBnB operates globally.

------
alistproducer2
This is a slippery slope I'm happy to walk on. Reasonable people can agree
that no safe harbor should exist for Nazis.

~~~
zhemao
Yes, the 1st amendment protects freedom of association. That is, the freedom
of private entities to not do business with Nazis.

~~~
imron
Does that same freedom exist for private entities that don't want to bake
cakes for gay couples?

The problem with limiting freedoms to certain groups is that you have little
to no control over who gets to decide which groups are acceptable.

Today it might be a group you don't like. One election later and it might be a
group that you are a part off.

That is why you need to defend the principle, even if you don't like the
specifics of what you are defending, and is why, for example, the ACLU is
defending Milo: [https://www.aclu.org/blog/speak-freely/how-could-you-
represe...](https://www.aclu.org/blog/speak-freely/how-could-you-represent-
someone-milo-yiannopoulos)

~~~
zhemao
> Does that same freedom exist for private entities that don't want to bake
> cakes for gay couples?

I think sexuality should be a protected class. I do not think neo-Nazis or
White supremacists should be a protected class. But in the case of the wedding
cake, I think it would be fine for bakers, caterers, or photographers to
refuse to work at a gay wedding, an event they consider immoral. If a customer
happened to be a neo-Nazi and was booking a vacation stay, I doubt AirBnB
would have cared. It was the fact that they were using the service to book
accommodations for the rally that caused the company to cancel their booking.

> That is why you need to defend the principle, even if you don't like the
> specifics of what you are defending, and is why, for example, the ACLU is
> defending Milo

The ACLU is defending Milo from government suppression of his speech. I agree
with the principle they are defending. This is not the same as a private
entity deciding not to do business with him. The ACLU will not, for instance,
help him sue Simon & Schuster for cancelling his book deal.

------
the_common_man
If something is just like outright "wrong", why not make laws? It feels more
correct to handle things at that level instead of relying on tech companies.

Edit: [https://www.quora.com/Is-it-legal-in-USA-to-wave-a-Nazi-
flag](https://www.quora.com/Is-it-legal-in-USA-to-wave-a-Nazi-flag)

~~~
danso
Laws like those have been created and courts have struck them down based on
the Constitution.

~~~
hackinthebochs
Then maybe we shouldn't accept unaccountable entities having the power of
extradjudicial punishment.

~~~
flunhat
Repeat after me: private companies can regulate their platforms as they see
fit, as long as they do not discriminate using the following criteria (which
are enshrined in law):

Race

Color

Religion

National origin

Age

Sex

Pregnancy

Citizenship

Familial status

Disability status

Genetic information

If you want to add or remove a class, change the law. But political ideology
is not, and should not be, a protected class. Private companies can decide if
they want Nazis on their platforms, and this one doesn't. Take your
libertarian fantasies elsewhere.

~~~
Jach
Political ideology is rather highly hereditary, and if democracy benefits from
a plurality of views, can you give a good reason why it shouldn't be
protected? Especially when religion is?

~~~
danso
The reasons for why religion was explicitly protected in the First Amendment
have some historical and political complexities. But I don't believe the
reasoning, at the time the Constitution was written, nor today, had anything
to do with hereditary probability.

But ignoring historical reasons and realities, the contemporary moral argument
for why religion deserves more protection than political ideology is because
political ideology can be expressed (and protected) through participating in
the political process. Whereas being a member of a religion is not seen as
necessarily a political activity, especially in religions that do not engage
in the political process.

------
Boothroid
The problem is that this type of action plays into a narrative of an organised
conspiracy. Surely we are better to satirise their beliefs? I'm reminded of
the Blues Brothers :)

~~~
danso
Satire and resistance aren't mutually exclusive. But relying on satire as a
response is easier done from a position of safety and distance. People who are
in the thick of it probably don't feel they're in that position.

~~~
Boothroid
Let's be honest though, the Antifa protestors don't seem to have helped the
situation greatly.

~~~
danso
There's a spectrum between not-protesting and being part of Antifa.

------
pm24601
Everyone:

1\. First amendment only applies to government actions.

2\. Established case law that businesses offering a public service are not
allowed to discriminate based on a protected class. (Hate groups are NOT
protected).

3\. Businesses are allowed to refuse service if it impacts their ability to
serve all their customers (for example, you show up at the coffee house
without clothes)

4\. AirBnB has entered into consent agreements with California Fair Housing
and Employment Department with regards to the landlords discriminating against
guests.

5\. AirBnB has a ToS that specifies the conditions imposed on guests.

AirBnB is quite correct from a business perspective to cancel the
reservations.

Thought experiment if they didn't:

A landlord renting a house is Jewish or any other group that is hated by the
"Unite the Right" and gets their house trashed.

... this puts AirBnB in what kind of legal situation.

I don't like speculation based on hypotheticals. Unfortunately, the car attack
in Charlotte proves my point.

------
denkmoon
Sets a bad precedent. What if this were an Arabic company banning jews from
housing?

Fascism should be fought, but not in this way.

------
zachrose
There is a place for boycott and a place for civil rights. Much of the 1964
Civil Rights Act focused on ensuring equal access to public accommodations. Is
Airbnb a public accommodation? Absolutely. Is equal access protective of
ideology? I'd argue yes, it should be, on the same grounds as speech.

~~~
cooper12
Sorry, Nazi isn't a protected class.

~~~
zachrose
Correct. To be clear I'm talking about what Airbnb should do not strictly what
the law says they must do. I'm not sure that Airbnb is violating the civil
rights act, but at the least it's an instructive framework for comparison.

And while I welcome Airbnb's attention to the issue and the basic first-order
attempt at doing the right thing, I also see this as an insidious way for
Airbnb to shirk the responsibilities that come with public accommodation, and
a lack of imagination on the ways they could contribute to a just world.

~~~
cooper12
My point was that you're misunderstanding public accommodation. It only
protects against discrimination on specific factors, of which political
ideology is not one of them. Private businesses still have the right to deny
service to those not protected by these laws, and airbnb is exercising their
right as they know how.

~~~
zachrose
Thank you for this sharp distinction. I had forgotten the particulars about
what constitutes a protected class.

------
submersiveblue
Why can't these tech companies just do business and stop getting involved in
activism. Oh, right because they are staffed with millenials.

------
cup
As a customer I definitely prefer giving my money to a business that refuses
to profit off the back of NAZIs

