> The likely answer is that Airbnb used Jay’s biometric data to refine its facial-recognition technology, a practice that earlier this year landed the company in court, using a product with the potential to generate millions of dollars in revenue.
> Freya didn’t use Airbnb properties for sex work, but she had her suspicions about how Airbnb flagged her. In May of 2020, before adopting cryptocurrency, she was paying for escorting advertisements with her credit card. Data sharing between platforms could have led Airbnb to algorithmically put two and two together.
> Airbnb is developing a product that essentially assigns each of us a social credit score.
The accusation is that Airbnb is using facial recognition to deny people lodging. It's a reddit link so I don't know if it's true, but if so, it seems my 2033 prediction from an hour ago is coming early. This shouldn't stand, we need proper regulation (which I can't believe I'm arguing for) to prevent companies from making their own rules like this. It's a failure of government. (If the whole thing is true, I'd want some proper confirmation. But even if it isnt, this is not the first situation like this)
> Airbnb more or less admitted this four years earlier when it told Jay it had found her picture: How else would it have been unearthed?
> Airbnb’s open admission to Freya and her partner that their accounts were suspended as a result of Freya’s sex work suggests that Airbnb, which until recently denied targeting sex workers when not avoiding the question entirely, is confident in the surveillance technology it has been refining for years.
That's just basic freedom of association. If technology provides a way to deduce association at scale, it doesn't mean that freedom of association is wrong.
Take the second amendment as an example. The invention of automatic weapons doesn't invalidate the second amendment. In the same way, the creation of realtime identification and syndicated blocklists won't invalidate the freedom of association.
Besides, we already deny people things based on what they do all the time. I don't go into a church and expect to be met with open arms. They wouldn't have me as I am and them and I both know it.
"It's not literally criminal" is a very poor defense. So is pretending that anybody who thinks A did something crappy is out to deny A basic freedoms to do anything. If you can't go to a concert because MegaCorp X got into a legal fight with MegaCorp Y, it's a crappy situation, and it deserves to be called as such without implying that this means you denying MegaCorp X rights to have legal fights or their right of association. You can both have rights and not use them in crappy ways.
Not sure what this has to do with the second amendment... Seems to be a complete non-sequitur.
I use the second amendment as an example of an enshrined right that doesn't change when new tech develops. It's an analogy. Freedom of association doesn't change when we develop new tech either.
> You can both have rights and not use them in crappy ways.
And using rights in crappy ways doesn't mean we revoke them. See all the speech I disagree with and yet still support the freedom of speech. Again, I'm using an analogy here.
> I use the second amendment as an example of an enshrined right that doesn't change when new tech develops.
But neither the First nor the Second apply to private property/services. Never have. The Second Amendment infers rights in certain situations, just as the First does.
Twitter gets to say "no transphobia" if they want for the same reasons they can say "no guns allowed in our HQ". The newness of the technology is irrelevant; their right to determine what happens on their property goes back to the founding of the country and further.
I look forward to differential pricing based on every client's characteristics. Libertarians will be charged double, and have their bookings cancelled randomly just before cancelation fees become too high. People with DV charges or who don't return their shopping trolleys will be refused.
The article isn't really about banning the use of Airbnbs for sex work. It's about banning people who do that work from using any Airbnb at all, for any purpose.
I'm progressive and live in an east coast city - but to be honest I don't support the proliferation of sex work or the removal of social stigma.
Sites like OnlyFans are really just a conduit for further exploitation and promoting the idea to other young women that selling their bodies is an acceptable form of income.
It's certainly dystopian for AirBnB to target customers like this - but the government is who pioneered this kind of outsourced sleuthing.
If I was a host on AirBnB the last thing I'd want is for my property to be used to shoot a porno - clearly that's the intent of AirBnB I can't really blame them here other than the way they went about doing it.
This issue creates some strange political bedfellows; hardcore midwestern conservatives and disconcerted coastal liberals see the sharing-economy of sex and agree that it's exploitative and bad for women.
I think we're slowly entering a new era of intellectual / practical honesty as a result of so much division and political grandstanding. Nuanced opinion is important - not changing what you think to fit into a cookie cutter thought group is how we understand what we really want, what progress is and who to exclude as irate grifters (on both sides of the isle).
The issue of abortion also shows similar political bedfellows - even deep red states where Trump won by 20+ points during the 2016 election have vehemently upheld access to abortion.
The abortion issue is especially weird to me, because I'm heavily emotionally invested in the Catholic extreme worldview while conservatives as a whole are not.
IMO as someone who grew up in the south, I had friends in very deeply religious families who got abortions quietly. They clearly knew it was the best course of action to reduce emotional harm, a potential bad life for the child and cover for peers who would religiously shame them (ironic - I know).
> Society lets people sell their bodies in more exploitative ways for less money.
Marginalizing sex work is done largely to increase the supply of labor (and thereby depress its price) for other forms of exploitation. (Making those who remain sex workers more exploitable by removing access to the resources other workers have is also a motive.)
I liked this essay on the topic. I recall it discussing that, while sex work is often pretty shitty, so are the alternatives; and discusses how while society will judge sex work (as exploitative), not much is done to sincerely protect/benefit sex workers, either.
https://www.nplusonemag.com/issue-35/essays/cashconsent/
> - Weakens the nuclear family, which is the foundation of stable civilization, by decoupling sex from responsibility
That sounds like you have a problem with birth control, not prostitution.
> - Exploits women, and then once they have grown old and wrinkled leaves them without support of any kind
Exploitation can be fixed with labor laws. Being unable to continue when you're old applies to tons of non-sex jobs too, and is better fixed by adding support structures than banning the jobs entirely.
> - Can result in a child, which the prostitute is likely not equipped to care for
Pretty rarely. I'm skeptical of that being enough to make a job immoral, but among other things there are many types of prostitution that can't result in a child.
People have lots of hookups with no responsibilities, with or without the existence of prostitution. I don't think prostitution really makes that worse.
And tying sex to marriage causes a lot of issues...
> And tying sex to marriage causes a lot of issues...
What issues, in your view? From my perspective, it solves a lot of issues. Marriage ensures that society knows exactly who is responsible for the consequences of sex. That's why the institution of marriage has been developed independently by so many different cultures, and has endured for so many centuries.
(And there is always the potential for consequences; no contraception is 100% effective, and on top of that there are the psychological effects)
I'm not arguing against marriage at all. But tying it very tightly to sex means people rush into marriage more, before they're entirely sure about compatibility, and can also tie into a feeling that you can't leave that leaks into widespread resentment for marriage in general.
It's a way to strengthen and formalize a long-term relationship. Very good if you're having kids. But you should probably live together for at least half a year before you get married.
Also let me go to the dictionary: the legally or formally recognized union of two people as partners in a personal relationship (historically and in some jurisdictions specifically a union between a man and a woman).
And again I'm not being anti-marriage, it's good overall, but it's not flawless, and there are ways to make its interaction with the rest of society more or less flawed.
The point where prostitution is treated as inherently immoral, because of marriage, is adding too much baggage to marriage. You can have both without hurting marriage in a way that undermines society.
My point is, there are two ways of thinking about marriage:
- It's a ceremony, a procedure, a word. It has emotional/social value, but it can be modified or reversed without too much trouble if the married couple desires it.
- It's a permanent engagement into a deep responsibility, a vow that's designed to be hard to undo. A deliberate choice to trade away being able to have romantic relationships with whoever, and in exchange gain the lasting stability needed to raise a family.
When society strongly couples sex with marriage, especially with monogamous, non-incestuous marriage of the second kind, it aligns the passion of sex—a very powerful force—with perpetuating civilization, via families and children. When society permits selling sex for money, it takes that same powerful force of sexual desire, and puts it instead in the service of commercial exploitation and instant gratification, thereby weakening civilization.
Let's stick with the second model. That's a perfectly good model. But tying sex to it that strongly seems pretty artificial to me. Sure, that's a way to make marriage stronger. But we could also require marriage for car ownership and it would have a similar effect. Marriage is about bonding together, not getting a reward.
> Marriage is about bonding together, not getting a reward.
The reward of sex, family, and a lasting relationship with someone you love, is only half the story. That reward is paired with sacrifice: marriage is exclusive and difficult to break. One and one's parter are in it for the long haul. The price ensures that the rewards are appreciated to their proper value. It incentivizes people to be extra careful about marrying the right person, and to treat their partner and their marriage with the respect and care they deserve. Unrestricted sexual promiscuity with whoever is fundamentally incompatible with that kind of commitment.
Sacrifice without reward encourages people not to bother with marriage at all.
The existence of prostitution also discourages marriage by providing an alternatove source of sex. And it can also be a source of temptation that weakens extant marriages.
Wouldn't encourage anybody to get into sex work, but it's no one's place to tell others what they can and can't do with their body. The industry should be regulated for the safety of workers and to help root out exploitative/abusive scumbags.
Sure, but then again regulating drugs for the safety of addicts whom we shouldn't tell what to do / not do with their bodies has gone great over the last two decades...
I was stunned to travel to the Netherlands to find that even in a country where sex work is legal - Dutch citizens have done everything they can to close the red-light district in Amsterdam and see the industry as a source of crime and degeneracy. Those engaging are still largely ostracized, shamed and seen to have a net negative affect on Dutch society at large.
Where are you talking about? Definitely hasnt been done in the States. Portugal seems fine.
Also, could careless about pearl clutchers and moral zealots shaming folks for what they choose to do with their own bodies. They're the real problem in society. Always have been.
I'm not religious, I find those ways of thinking idiotic - but his line of thinking is childish and arguably is what has lead to a lot of current societal decline.
Well then you are agreeing to live with some very detestable general principles just for the short lived victory of seeing your moral convictions enforced in this specific case.
Who cares what her past employment is or if you approve of it. Are we all just supposed to acquiesce to McCarthy style blacklists just so long as they target the "right people" like sex workers rather than the wrong people like "Communists"? Are you really happy to live in a world where the concept of a "no fly list" has been extended by private entities into a "no room and board", "no attend show", "no serve food" list that you could be put on for any reason without being told and with no due process to get off it?
Later in the thread you justify yourself as "deep into Catholicism". What makes you so sure that tomorrow you won't be stranded somewhere unable to buy gas because the service station camera recognized your face in a database of religious extremists?
No one should have to worry about being discriminated against on the grounds of wholly irrelevant personal business. Your personal feelings on the morality of others isn't grounds to revoke their rights.
This is a double edge sword. She should be allowed to use the service, without question, but Airbnb is right to be concerned properties might be used for prostitution. Airbnb does not trust sex workers.
Why is it surprising or out of place? How is this different from hotels that will not rent out rooms to prostitutes, even if they are not 'working'? I imagine it must be burdensome to AirBnB to distinguish the two scenarios, and it will likely ruin their reputation, same as drug dealing out of hotel rooms or airbnb properties would. If hotel chains have these databases of sex workers in their workers heads' (hotel managers presumably have lists or can recognize sex workers by sight), then why can't AirBnB build a database or use facial recognition to do the same thing? And hotels are not denying Muslims access to bookings, so why imply that AirBnB would/could?
I'm trying to understand how AirBnB, which necessarily has to rely on technology to perform these functions (that hotels already do via their employees) is such a threat.
Compare the position "Airbnb shouldn't refuse service to a prostitute" with "AWS shouldn't refuse service to Parler" or "CloudFlare shouldn't refuse service to Kiwi Farms". When people agree with the former but not the latter, what argument/principle are they using?
The problem with that argument is that there are many groups of people it's ok to be intolerant toward, according to the people making such judgements.
A more accurate statement would be "tolerate all but people who offend certain favored groups".
> We won't tell you why we ban you.
> We might not even tell you that you are banned.
> Of course we don't tell you how we found out.
This violates the human right of informational self-determination. Informational self-determination is related to privacy but has a broader scope. It includes the right to know what happens with information about oneself. In Switzerland for example one has the right to request a data dump.
Well meant. But FAANG or MAMAA are not transparent about how they gain information about people and what they do with it. And they get away with it. In a way, USA resembles China in their way to social dystopia. Europe tried to fight with GDPR, but we know that went.
I hope the people of the world will understand that transparency is essential. I hope they get the power to enable the human right of informational self-determination.
America has a sex problem, both in cultural puritanicalism and media exploitation (except California where adding a camera makes it "not prostitution"). Almost all of the rest of the civilized world doesn't have prostitution prohibition because it gives organized crime a revenue stream and it criminalizes behavior between consenting adults.
Oh and the US doesn't have legalized abortion because body autonomy is apparently too much to ask. SCOTUS majority wants to criminalize LGBT and turn America into Gilead / ISIS where the "wicked" are pushed off buildings or hung on walls.
68 comments
[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 148 ms ] thread> Freya didn’t use Airbnb properties for sex work, but she had her suspicions about how Airbnb flagged her. In May of 2020, before adopting cryptocurrency, she was paying for escorting advertisements with her credit card. Data sharing between platforms could have led Airbnb to algorithmically put two and two together.
> Airbnb is developing a product that essentially assigns each of us a social credit score.
sent a request to have that fixed so hopefully the link gets updated
Reddit links to the source article at https://www.thenation.com/article/society/airbnb-banning-sex...
> If the whole thing is true, I'd want some proper confirmation.
The thenation.com article links to a court case (to be precise a complaint, so it hasn't been heard in court yet) https://classactionsreporter.com/jumio-facial-scans-for-iden...
From the article
> Airbnb more or less admitted this four years earlier when it told Jay it had found her picture: How else would it have been unearthed?
> Airbnb’s open admission to Freya and her partner that their accounts were suspended as a result of Freya’s sex work suggests that Airbnb, which until recently denied targeting sex workers when not avoiding the question entirely, is confident in the surveillance technology it has been refining for years.
Take the second amendment as an example. The invention of automatic weapons doesn't invalidate the second amendment. In the same way, the creation of realtime identification and syndicated blocklists won't invalidate the freedom of association.
Besides, we already deny people things based on what they do all the time. I don't go into a church and expect to be met with open arms. They wouldn't have me as I am and them and I both know it.
Not sure what this has to do with the second amendment... Seems to be a complete non-sequitur.
> You can both have rights and not use them in crappy ways.
And using rights in crappy ways doesn't mean we revoke them. See all the speech I disagree with and yet still support the freedom of speech. Again, I'm using an analogy here.
But neither the First nor the Second apply to private property/services. Never have. The Second Amendment infers rights in certain situations, just as the First does.
Twitter gets to say "no transphobia" if they want for the same reasons they can say "no guns allowed in our HQ". The newness of the technology is irrelevant; their right to determine what happens on their property goes back to the founding of the country and further.
For women who do want to sell sex, this ends up with some bad consequences. https://www.reddit.com/r/SexWorkers/comments/n11oqk/the_ongo...
And how did we end up with Schrödingers Hooker who is both poor oppressed victim and empowered "Yass Queen" sex worker?
Also, it's not at all unreasonable for people to not want their property used as a brothel.
Sites like OnlyFans are really just a conduit for further exploitation and promoting the idea to other young women that selling their bodies is an acceptable form of income.
It's certainly dystopian for AirBnB to target customers like this - but the government is who pioneered this kind of outsourced sleuthing.
If I was a host on AirBnB the last thing I'd want is for my property to be used to shoot a porno - clearly that's the intent of AirBnB I can't really blame them here other than the way they went about doing it.
The issue of abortion also shows similar political bedfellows - even deep red states where Trump won by 20+ points during the 2016 election have vehemently upheld access to abortion.
Recently I was listening to an interview with a sex worker talking about how she far preferred that to working in a factory.
Marginalizing sex work is done largely to increase the supply of labor (and thereby depress its price) for other forms of exploitation. (Making those who remain sex workers more exploitable by removing access to the resources other workers have is also a motive.)
Your opinion, if you mean there's an inherent difference from other jobs.
> exploitation
Every new kind of job is "more exploitation" at some level. That's not a good enough reason by itself.
- Weakens the nuclear family, which is the foundation of stable civilization, by decoupling sex from responsibility
- Exploits women, and then once they have grown old and wrinkled leaves them without support of any kind
- Can result in a child, which the prostitute is likely not equipped to care for
That sounds like you have a problem with birth control, not prostitution.
> - Exploits women, and then once they have grown old and wrinkled leaves them without support of any kind
Exploitation can be fixed with labor laws. Being unable to continue when you're old applies to tons of non-sex jobs too, and is better fixed by adding support structures than banning the jobs entirely.
> - Can result in a child, which the prostitute is likely not equipped to care for
Pretty rarely. I'm skeptical of that being enough to make a job immoral, but among other things there are many types of prostitution that can't result in a child.
>> That sounds like you have a problem with birth control, not prostitution.
No, birth control doesn't change anything. I wasn't talking about just responsibility to one's child, but also responsibility to one's partner.
And tying sex to marriage causes a lot of issues...
What issues, in your view? From my perspective, it solves a lot of issues. Marriage ensures that society knows exactly who is responsible for the consequences of sex. That's why the institution of marriage has been developed independently by so many different cultures, and has endured for so many centuries.
(And there is always the potential for consequences; no contraception is 100% effective, and on top of that there are the psychological effects)
Also let me go to the dictionary: the legally or formally recognized union of two people as partners in a personal relationship (historically and in some jurisdictions specifically a union between a man and a woman).
And again I'm not being anti-marriage, it's good overall, but it's not flawless, and there are ways to make its interaction with the rest of society more or less flawed.
The point where prostitution is treated as inherently immoral, because of marriage, is adding too much baggage to marriage. You can have both without hurting marriage in a way that undermines society.
- It's a ceremony, a procedure, a word. It has emotional/social value, but it can be modified or reversed without too much trouble if the married couple desires it.
- It's a permanent engagement into a deep responsibility, a vow that's designed to be hard to undo. A deliberate choice to trade away being able to have romantic relationships with whoever, and in exchange gain the lasting stability needed to raise a family.
When society strongly couples sex with marriage, especially with monogamous, non-incestuous marriage of the second kind, it aligns the passion of sex—a very powerful force—with perpetuating civilization, via families and children. When society permits selling sex for money, it takes that same powerful force of sexual desire, and puts it instead in the service of commercial exploitation and instant gratification, thereby weakening civilization.
The reward of sex, family, and a lasting relationship with someone you love, is only half the story. That reward is paired with sacrifice: marriage is exclusive and difficult to break. One and one's parter are in it for the long haul. The price ensures that the rewards are appreciated to their proper value. It incentivizes people to be extra careful about marrying the right person, and to treat their partner and their marriage with the respect and care they deserve. Unrestricted sexual promiscuity with whoever is fundamentally incompatible with that kind of commitment.
The reward encourages people to not be careful and to rush into marriage without testing whether they have the right person.
> Unrestricted sexual promiscuity with whoever is fundamentally incompatible with that kind of commitment.
I'm not suggesting that married people use prostitutes.
Also allowing prostitution doesn't imply there are no restrictions.
The existence of prostitution also discourages marriage by providing an alternatove source of sex. And it can also be a source of temptation that weakens extant marriages.
I was stunned to travel to the Netherlands to find that even in a country where sex work is legal - Dutch citizens have done everything they can to close the red-light district in Amsterdam and see the industry as a source of crime and degeneracy. Those engaging are still largely ostracized, shamed and seen to have a net negative affect on Dutch society at large.
Also, could careless about pearl clutchers and moral zealots shaming folks for what they choose to do with their own bodies. They're the real problem in society. Always have been.
Who cares what her past employment is or if you approve of it. Are we all just supposed to acquiesce to McCarthy style blacklists just so long as they target the "right people" like sex workers rather than the wrong people like "Communists"? Are you really happy to live in a world where the concept of a "no fly list" has been extended by private entities into a "no room and board", "no attend show", "no serve food" list that you could be put on for any reason without being told and with no due process to get off it?
Later in the thread you justify yourself as "deep into Catholicism". What makes you so sure that tomorrow you won't be stranded somewhere unable to buy gas because the service station camera recognized your face in a database of religious extremists?
No one should have to worry about being discriminated against on the grounds of wholly irrelevant personal business. Your personal feelings on the morality of others isn't grounds to revoke their rights.
I'm trying to understand how AirBnB, which necessarily has to rely on technology to perform these functions (that hotels already do via their employees) is such a threat.
No, the "contradiction" from taking the short version literally, without even ten seconds of thought put into it, is not actually a thing.
Following the rule doesn't count as intolerance to itself. Come on.
Of course it's a thing! It's literally everywhere! And if you're involved, stop.
A more accurate statement would be "tolerate all but people who offend certain favored groups".
Are their partners also blocked (as happened in this article)?
Well meant. But FAANG or MAMAA are not transparent about how they gain information about people and what they do with it. And they get away with it. In a way, USA resembles China in their way to social dystopia. Europe tried to fight with GDPR, but we know that went.
I hope the people of the world will understand that transparency is essential. I hope they get the power to enable the human right of informational self-determination.
Oh and the US doesn't have legalized abortion because body autonomy is apparently too much to ask. SCOTUS majority wants to criminalize LGBT and turn America into Gilead / ISIS where the "wicked" are pushed off buildings or hung on walls.