A viral video on TikTok that alarmed thousands of viewers shows the racist decor inside a rental home that a Black woman reportedly booked on Airbnb.
Erica W., whose username on TikTok is @tasteofmelanin, posted a video to her account on July 28 showing several disturbing furnishings inside a home she rented, including monkey toys and fake cotton plants and branches.
One piece of decor seen in the video was a fake cotton branch on a wall with plush monkey toys hanging off it.
There was also a basket full of fake cotton placed on the floor, a vase filled with cotton branches, and a large flower plant with plush monkeys hanging on it.
While it’s unclear where the Airbnb was, the video also shows a wooden plaque on a mantle with the shape of the state of Virginia etched onto it below a deer head trophy mounted on the wall.
Cotton was one of the main crops grown by enslaved people in the South in the 18th and 19th centuries, and monkeys are often used in bigoted depictions of Black people.
The video earned more than two million views and thousands of comments since its posting. Numerous viewers expressed that they were shocked by the decor and suggested Erica W. report the home to the vacation rental company.
“Take pictures to send to Airbnb. This is genuinely insane,” one viewer said.
“Nah, this has to be intentional,” another person wrote.
“POV: They saw who booked the room,” another comment said.
In some updates Erica W. posted in the comments, she stated that she promptly left the home and that Airbnb reached out to her and removed the listing from the channels where it operates its marketplace.
Atlanta Black Star also reached out to Erica W. and Airbnb for more information on the rental.
