@Huma0 : it got personal and insulting when someone repeatedly and snarkily accused me of violating UK law (when they obviously hadn't spent much time looking over UK law, choosing to selectively and deceptively quote a website to get the result they wanted etc), rather than respond to the topic at hand, didn't it?
(Or in my two previous posts, in which I made simple inquiries seeking advice, and the immediate first comments were about "better suited for a hotel?").
Our host in Venezia tomorrow messaged that he had a gas leak this morning, and couldn't get a plumber to fix it. I replied to ask if there was some electric way to boil water, showers in Mexico and Israel can be quite spotty, we could do with that if need be and he could still get some revenue. (I suspect this is the only issue we'll have).
My current hosts in Milan are ... problematic. They are using a closed, unventilated sitting room / entrance between two apartments for storage and temporary space, which is awkward enough; and workers keep passing through and doing stuff without masks every half hour (or so it seems today: I try to give it a half hour since anyone has been there, then rush out in a respirator while disinfecting the whole area while exiting... not that half an hour is going to kill much virus).
This is a violation of the ECP however you look at it or swing it or give some leeway for reasonableness; at best, they just haven't thought about Covid suppression (there's been a lot more: they wanted me to leave 30E on the table, which they'd come in and get ... )
I've generally not mentioned these though I may follow up after we check out. Messes have a tendency to take effort to clean up, and this mess isn't mine.
Their internet went down last night (3rd time). Without going into what the problem is in Milano, I currently have two guests in Chicago and have had to wake up and reset the router remotely twice in the past week because they were worried it was too slow. Our current Italian host was unwilling to come and reset the router, which they have locked away, when we got in after 11pm. My message about that was pointed but diplomatic: "if this were my Airbnb, I'd be fixing it, and have had to ..."
Most people in this forum seem OK to me, and it's been up and down. But this is primarily a help forum. I can't imagine what it is like for the people who come here once or occasionally, and instead of help receive a certain, small amount of hosts "setting the negative tone" jumping down their throats with insults and accusations and whatnot.
I have a nice semi-permanent indentation around my face from wearing N100 gear 12+ hours a day for months. (It's awfully hot stuff above 75F). I came here to raise some issues about host hygiene and the ECP, just after reading the ECP, realizing that my past 3 hosts had violated the ECP pretty extensively.
What I don't need, and what no one coming to these forums needs, is people suddenly setting the tone by accusations of this, that, or the other-- such as that I'm violating UK law and subject to arrest or fine or whatever.
Maybe there's a way to raise such an issue, but it's not the topic at hand. In a business context, someone who keeps pulling discussion away from the topic at hand in the ways going on above, is usually pretty destructive. (I don't know if you've had a few months, in an office with three people out of six doing that?).
No, asserting that someone here is breaking UK law, based on nothing, then going off to google a page and prove it is not appropriate behavior when what we're trying to discuss are cleaning protocols, reasonable boundaries, and Covid. At best it's distracting from the topic and goal; at worst, it's some odd drama playing out.
Ditto similar dynamics.
Giving timing, we're going to check out tomorrow and try to deal with any issues with out Italian host via Message Center follow-up. If our host had insisted on having people walk in the apartment during covid, i'd probably have called the caribenieri, sure, and I certainly throught about that if the host turned more unreasonable. (We had a drunk on one of the regional trains yesterday, with a big bottle of liquor in his hand and poking people asking for money, mask down; an older man on the train, pulled the stop alarm just as we got into a station, called the caris and he was arrested in minutes).
Sometimes you do escalate aggressively, and I appreciated the old guy doing that. (There have been a series of people not nearly as far over the line on trains, where I've been thinking about calling someone. Ultimately if we're not careful, things seem fine now at least in most of Europe, but the speed at which we can fall back should be terrifying).
Generally, unless I think something is beyond the par, I'll mention it in a polite note to the host, so they can potentially fix it. If I think something may be beyond the par, I would like to bring it here to see what others think. But that doesn't work if a third of the replies are inappropriately and aggressively down-my-throat in one way or another; I don't have time to sift that out, and neither to most guests coming here, as occasional users of the forums.
It's bad enough that my Italian host has a couple people going in and out of the room outside the front door all day, and maybe he should get an earful of "what the frack do you think you're doing?" Walking into the apartment is another story-- and would be without covid, I think. You do certain things, you deserve certain responses.
Plenty of people (such as Sarah) have posed reasonable questions, such as whether gloves are useful and appropriate regardless of the technical details (mumbo jumbo) of the ECP. (Though she did seem to miss, that I'm well past any isolation period when dining in Milan... but not a big deal, even if "skewed" seemed a tad over the line to me). But the couple above, did not pose questions.
The reason I've been aggressive here, is that I've brought three issues in a row, and a small contingent has been insulting and done things that are just not reasonable. Questioning is one thing (I suppose you could try "hey, weren't you violating UK quarantine terms by moving, mate?") but a direct claim of criminal activity is quite another, especially when it's off base.
As I stated on another thread, I also can't imagine that Superhosts here treat guests with the level of disrespect on display in this forum. (Well, I can imagine that a few do.)
And then suddenly we're arguing about the details of the UK's isolation requirements-- those requirements are actually a bit complex, so they might take a while to work through, but the point is it's always an argument-- rather than dealing with the issues that have been brought to the table. (Parents, is this game familiar or not?)
When someone is raising an issue you don't necessarily like or want to respond to-- what going on, when someone deflects from the main point and issue, with an accusation like that which is another topic over in left field? (I hope you're better than dealing with this from the kids than I am ...)
There's no good faith in making wild, insulting and diversionary accusations about someone bringing a concern, rather than addressing their primary concern directly and first.
And yes, I'm calling it as I see it, a pattern childish behavior.