Airbnb: Why all the outrage?
Over the past 24 hours, I have been forwarded post after post urging that I protest Airbnb’s discriminatory decision to remove Jewish homes in Judea and Samaria from their platform.
Now to be sure, I have voiced my outrage to AirbnBias about this blatant anti-Semitic action, but something about our ranting to the choir as been AirbnBugging me.
Why all this over-explanation and righteous indignation? This feels like our similarly apologetic justification of our right to defend ourselves, as if that were needed.
AirbnBias has calculated this move and knows full well what they are doing. They don’t need an explanation of the farce in their claim not to service residents in contested territories.
Do we, the most moral nation on earth, need to justify our innocence in every act of aggression against us? G’d forbid, would we be calling out our haters for not requiring celestial fashion accessories of all minorities, or offering only Jews the privilege of Arbeit Macht Frei?
Most of us have been looking on with increasing angst, as anti-Semitism once again begins to rear its evil head. We must take a stand where we can, and not allow this onslaught in our own land, to set a precedent.
We can yell and scream and rant to each other till we are AirbnBlue in the face, or we can call out the AirbnBan for what it AirbnBlatantly is, an attack on all of Israel. And AirbnBullies, we don’t sit by as you attack our citizens.
For months, Israelis have been watching the onslaught in the south, and feeling helpless to affect the situation. This attack on the other hand, seems comparably simple (unless of course we don’t draw the line when we need to).
As a now former Airbnb superhost, this will not be easy. I am admittedly anxious about how I will finance the rent on my apartment without the platform, yet I believe it is the necessary price of not kowtowing to anti-Semitism, a decision I feel is not meant to be conducted on an individual level.
I believe we must call on the Ministry of Tourism to AirbnBanish this offensive entity, and make way for Israeli entrepreneurs to create the platform that will welcome the 3.5+ million annual tourists to our shores.
That’s it. No pleading and whining. No moaning and sighing. No diplomacy. No threats.
AirbnBackstabbers… AirbnByeBye. Here BnBe no more.