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Re:Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by ... by simonsarris on Thursday September 08, 2016 @03:20PM (#12456367)
> Would you suggest that "men" and "humans" as classes should be discriminated against as a result?

Yes, if you can sell a night's stay for the same price to a houseplant as you can to a human, it would seem wisest to board the houseplant at every opportunity.

> What if, statistically, there were some weird factor...

I would like an AI to make all my booking picks for me, but not one that aims to maximize diversity or exclusivity, simply one that minimizes risk. If it turned out the AI found a strong correlation with ear shape and risk, or favorite color and risk, that would be just fine, as long as it is correct.

I have no such AI, all I have are some mere heuristics gathered from the work of actuarial scientists (Insurers). So if a twenty-something male and a fifty-something female both request the same night, why wouldn't I choose the older female every single time?

(Note that I am discriminating against my very own demographic, not that my feelings play any part in this, I'm simply attempting to minimize risk when booking, when there's an option to do so.)

Re:Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by ... by kmonsen on Thursday September 08, 2016 @09:27PM (#12459037)
You choose to use the obvious case, but it would be just as true for the other one:

Yes, if you can sell a night's stay for the same price to a woman as you can to a man, it would seem wisest to board the woman at every opportunity.

Re:Airbnb Adopts Rules in Effort to Fight Discrimination by ... by gg5ever on Friday September 09, 2016 @03:05PM (#12465167)
Yes - it's legal to discriminate by sex. If you go out looking for apartments in a major city, you will see many "women-only" options, probably for some of the reasons you listed. However, I don't think the arguments for sexual prejudice apply to racial prejudice.