@Rebecca0 Hi Rebecca. Thank you for voicing your opinion.
You have been permitted to voice your opinion (or judgement) on this forum based on what I had to say and how you personally feel about the issue. I could have said, "no-one needs to see profile pictures" and your opinion (or judgement) of me and what I had to say would have been completely the opposite. You have not discriminated against me, but you have judged an formed an opinion of me (having never met me but basing your judgement purely on some lines of text I wrote - even going so far as to say that "it is disturbing to you").
And this is where the lines get confused. Having an opinion or "judging" if you will of someone is not discrimination.
Here are their definitions for your interest:
Judge - "form an opinion or conclusion about"
Discrimination - "the unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex"
We do not teach our children to judge people from photographs but we do teach our children to use their intuition and when things "feel" bad they usually are. Whether you care to admit it or not, every person on the planet forms an immediate opinion of someone based on first impressions.
Sometimes our immediate impression of a person may be incorrect. As you correctly state, sometimes dangerous people resemble the average person on the street and they elude our intution. But for the most part our intuition is what keeps us safe.
Our "opinion" of potential guests goes further than that in that we sell an "experience" that is tailored mostly towards younger travelers who want to have fun WITH us. Yes, we also accommodate others but our main purpose for inviting AirBnB guests into our home is to make friends from differrent countries, have fun with them, take them out to local places and for our guests to experience and enjoy living with a South African family. That may be different to what your objective is.
Having said that, let's us all not forget... we are NOT a hotel. These are OUR HOMES. We decide who comes through them and cannot be dictated to and forced to accommodate people we do not wish to have in our home - especially when they are living WITH us.
Our intentions are not to have a conveyer belt of strangers coming in and out of our doors. Maybe that is yours, but it is not ours. AirBnB are not doing us a favour. We are doing them a favour and making them very rich in the process!
Personally, I find it disturbing that you allow so many people into your house with your son and his girlfriend there and you seem to have no interest at all as to who your potential guests may be. On the other hand, my "opinion" about this is formed without knowing how old your son and girlfriend may be. Your son could be 13 or he may be 40 and 6ft 5".