How the hell did friendship become so transactional? Is this an American thing I don't know about?
I have never even for a single moment considered asking a house guest to pay for food. I get being broke - I've been absolutely broke - but then I wouldn't offer hospitality because I couldn't afford to offer it.
But in all the cultures I've ever lived in, I have never encountered this. When people have only a little, then the meal is just simpler.
@Remittancegirl I read this as "we bought an AirBnB property, sometimes we let friends stay there for free, but they expect us to pay for the food". Which is a bit different to inviting a guest into your own home.
@cstross @Remittancegirl I can’t find a way to read it that way.
No one except a looney staying in an Airbnb expects free food, if you lend someone your holiday home or even normal home they don’t expect you to pay for food — you’re not there. If I invite a friend to stay with me I don’t expect them to pay for my food, that would be weird.
@cstross Hmmm.
But if you invite someone to stay as a friend, that's not an AirBnB transaction. Or am I wrong.
I don't know. For some reason, I just found this completely disturbing.
@Remittancegirl Correct; it's a perk of owning a spare home. But they're not there at the same time as the owners, they're not socializing, they're not "guests" as such, they're just non-paying tenants. It's an odd edge-case to the usual social norms, isn't it?
@cstross I assumed the verb 'hosting' meant being there and socialising together. But I guess they are using the verb in the rentier's sense?
@Remittancegirl That was my read of it.
@cstross Then your conclusion makes sense. I read it differently. But I've never run an AirBnB.
@cstross If they aren't there, then it's basically a no cost AirBnB.
But then, as a person who accepts that invite, I would assume I was going to have to cater for myself.
I didn't really get that part of it. I thought they were there.
