U.S. hotels caught on video refusing to allow Chinese guests for fear of coronavirus
#16
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: OSL/IAH/ZRH (time, not preference)
Programs: UA1K, LH GM, AA EXP->GM
Posts: 38,257
The Chinese-Indian dislike/competition is mutual after all, I am sure that a few individuals fight their own silly wars.
#17
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Jun 2013
Posts: 17,395
Did everyone just decide to ignore post#6 because the law is not as interesting as talking about other people's obsession with tribalism?
It doesn't matter whether the owner is white, black, Indian, or Chinese. It doesn't matter whether they are afraid of a virus or they think Chinese people smell bad. It's illegal to deny service in a public accommodation because of race, religion, ethnicity, or national origin in the United States. Full stop. That's been the law for 56 years.
It doesn't matter whether the owner is white, black, Indian, or Chinese. It doesn't matter whether they are afraid of a virus or they think Chinese people smell bad. It's illegal to deny service in a public accommodation because of race, religion, ethnicity, or national origin in the United States. Full stop. That's been the law for 56 years.
#18
Suspended
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Watchlisted by the prejudiced, en route to purgatory
Programs: Just Say No to Fleecing and Blacklisting
Posts: 102,095
Mutual, schmutual, staged/tuned/incomplete or not, these were Hmongs — not Chinese — that should have been able to stay at these hotels; and illegal discrimination in the US is illegal whether it’s aimed at Hmongs, Chinese or anyone else. Even if the illegal discrimination is being done by people of one’s own ethnicity or anyone else who has been buying into (or even selling) anti-Chinese hysteria, it’s still illegal.
#19
Moderator: Manufactured Spending
Join Date: Jul 2011
Posts: 6,578
U.S. hotels caught on video refusing to allow Chinese guests for fear of coronavirus (Days Inn and Super 8 in Indiana)
https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/14/us/hm...als/index.html
(1) does it violate any U.S. federal or state laws?
(2) can a hotel ask a guest what country he/she is a citizen of? (in this case, asking someone who look Asian if he's Chinese)
(3) where could those hotel employees gotten the idea to do or say something like that?
https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/14/us/hm...als/index.html
(1) does it violate any U.S. federal or state laws?
(2) can a hotel ask a guest what country he/she is a citizen of? (in this case, asking someone who look Asian if he's Chinese)
(3) where could those hotel employees gotten the idea to do or say something like that?
(2) I doubt there is any law against asking.
(3) My guess is they took it upon themselves to try and protect their hotel from the corona virus.
What makes you think the guests were in the US illegally? You have no basis to believe that. But even if they are, that's not the hotel's problem.
Last edited by cbn42; Feb 20, 2020 at 9:16 pm
#20
Suspended
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Watchlisted by the prejudiced, en route to purgatory
Programs: Just Say No to Fleecing and Blacklisting
Posts: 102,095
“Cancellation and/or change penalties will be waived for guests traveling to or from China with direct bookings for stays in any of our hotels from Jan.“ is language from the hotel websites.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the hotel employees had been told by the owner/management that employees and customers who have been to China recently should be in isolation/quarantine for two weeks and not to work or stay at the hotels during the two weeks following coming from China.
Chinese passports often list the province of birth, but I doubt that these two American Hmongs were traveling with a Chineses passport with a POB listing in Hubei or anywhere else in China.
The idea that the average Indiana hotel owner or front desk employee has a ready link to government information about Chinese place of birth and China travel history for some American Hmongs strikes me as being far-fetched, to put it kindly.
It wouldn’t surprise me if the hotel employees had been told by the owner/management that employees and customers who have been to China recently should be in isolation/quarantine for two weeks and not to work or stay at the hotels during the two weeks following coming from China.
Chinese passports often list the province of birth, but I doubt that these two American Hmongs were traveling with a Chineses passport with a POB listing in Hubei or anywhere else in China.
The idea that the average Indiana hotel owner or front desk employee has a ready link to government information about Chinese place of birth and China travel history for some American Hmongs strikes me as being far-fetched, to put it kindly.
Last edited by GUWonder; Feb 21, 2020 at 7:46 am
#21
A FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Jul 2002
Location: MCI
Programs: AA Gold 1MM, AS MVP, UA Silver, WN A-List, Marriott LT Titanium, HH Diamond
Posts: 52,550
(1) It's expressly illegal and I hope the hotel is firmly prosecuted. I mean, this is literally one of THE exact scenarios that led to and is now protected by the Civil Rights Act.
(2) No American hotel has ever asked my citizenship. I have never shown a passport or birth certificate to an American hotel. If a regular hotel is doing this to people of color it is beyond crass, racist, and unacceptable, although I'm not sure if merely asking is against the law. There were some Airbnb hosts that were at one point asking for photographs or access to guests' social media, but I'm not sure if this process is still permitted. Airbnb was allegedly going to try to be slightly less racist, according to their responses to some bad press.
(Sidebar story: I was having difficulty getting an Airbnb in a particular city once, even though lots of units were showing available. When I'd contact hosts, they'd ask for a photo. When I would not give them one, they'd say "the unit is booked, sorry." I later learned that my unusual last name happens to be shared by an African-American local public figure in that city.)
(3) Where did the hotel employees get the idea to think this way? Probably childhood. I picked up all sorts of racist/xenophobic ideas on the playground, in my neighborhood, and from certain parts of my family (although thankfully my parents were fairly well-traveled and took time to debunk any racist crap they heard teenage me say). Many people go out an interact with the world and realize these ideas are wrong. Many others don't, and then they choose to consume media that augments their existing misconceptions to the point where anyone trying to convince them otherwise gets immediately shut down. So while I hope the hotel employees can change, I don't have too much hope...and unfortunately we would need the corporate brand to do the right thing and require the property to follow the law.
(2) No American hotel has ever asked my citizenship. I have never shown a passport or birth certificate to an American hotel. If a regular hotel is doing this to people of color it is beyond crass, racist, and unacceptable, although I'm not sure if merely asking is against the law. There were some Airbnb hosts that were at one point asking for photographs or access to guests' social media, but I'm not sure if this process is still permitted. Airbnb was allegedly going to try to be slightly less racist, according to their responses to some bad press.
(Sidebar story: I was having difficulty getting an Airbnb in a particular city once, even though lots of units were showing available. When I'd contact hosts, they'd ask for a photo. When I would not give them one, they'd say "the unit is booked, sorry." I later learned that my unusual last name happens to be shared by an African-American local public figure in that city.)
(3) Where did the hotel employees get the idea to think this way? Probably childhood. I picked up all sorts of racist/xenophobic ideas on the playground, in my neighborhood, and from certain parts of my family (although thankfully my parents were fairly well-traveled and took time to debunk any racist crap they heard teenage me say). Many people go out an interact with the world and realize these ideas are wrong. Many others don't, and then they choose to consume media that augments their existing misconceptions to the point where anyone trying to convince them otherwise gets immediately shut down. So while I hope the hotel employees can change, I don't have too much hope...and unfortunately we would need the corporate brand to do the right thing and require the property to follow the law.
#22
Join Date: Jan 2019
Location: SAN, BOS
Programs: AS MVPG100K, BAEC Gold, Hilton Diamond, Bonvoy Plat,
Posts: 2,279
There are millions of Chinese-Americans who have never set foot out of the country, let alone China. Assuming something negative that has no correlation with someone’s race, is by definition racist. Also it’s mind boggling you’d compare the dictatorship of the PRC where you have no reasonable expectation of privacy to the United States.
#23
Moderator: Travel Buzz
Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: Sunny San Diego
Posts: 3,095
Moderator Note: Time to close this thread.