I am stunned at how many people on HN seem to thing Eich should not be judged on his personal so-called "political" views.
If he was a racist in favor of segregation would people still take that position? I seriously doubt it.
Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
521–530 of 1001 posts
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#522Earlier quoted context omitted.
I generally agree with you but I think the problem here is that being against gay marriage is more than just a "political view." Being for low taxes is a political view. Being for smaller government is a political view. Believing a certain group of people don't deserve to live their lives like other simply because of who they love is not a political view. It reads as extremely hateful and that makes people uncomforta…
So Barack Obama, the President of the US, was against gay marriage in 2008; I'm confused as to why he gets a pass here, but the head of Mozilla doesn't?
Who said he gets a free pass?
Our election system is deliberately designed and maintained so that only two parties--only two candidates--matter. That sucks, and I'd change it if I could, but in the meantime my options are to either stay home, which accomplishes nothing; vote for a third-party candidate, which shows admirable idealism but is also unlikely to accomplish anything; or vote for the lesser of two evils, which at least has a chance of producing some of the results I want.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#523Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nobodies' right to have different viewpoints is being taken away. Nobodies' right to donate to political causes is being taken away. The only people in this entire story that were/are trying to take away the rights of others were the people who pushed for Prop 8. The right to support legislation like Prop 8 remains intact. The right to not be criticized by others for doing so has never existed in the first place. The…
I'll tell you what we should do. We shouldn't give those rights to gay people and we should take away those rights from straight people as well . The status quo is a clear discrimination of people who choose not to marry, but may have others in their lives where it would be mutually beneficial to opt into an agreement where they share some of those rights/benefits. Each one of the rights currently afforded to people…
I see this arguement crop up a lot and I feel like this is largely a semantics issue. "Marriage" as a union under some God and "Marriage" as a package of some 1000+ legal contracts hold the same name for historical reasons (dynamics of the Church in European power structure mostly). When gay mariage is brought up I feel like people just see the religious side and ocasionally the tax breaks and fail to completely grasp the issue. What they gay community wants is to have the easy contract that handles the passing of estates, the combination of insurance, citizenship issues, adoption preferences, etc. Currently we lack the infrastructure to affordably deliver "a la carte" packages; it's the same reason everyone gets the same TOS when installing a particular piece of software. It is not particularly realistic to say that a particular group be denied rights because the infrastructure for delivery isn't ideal.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#524Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the community has pressured him to step down because he expressed an opinion not held by the majority. That's not true. The fact that the majority believe the idea was necessary for the pressure to be applied, but it is not why the pressure was applied. The pressure was applied because his views trample on others' rights, and equal rights is philosophically closely tied with the entire mission of an organization li…
> his views trample on others' rights No; I don't agree with Eich's views, but merely having those views does not implicate anyone else's rights in any way at all. Rights are violated by actions , not merely by expressing distasteful opinions.
You mean actions like donating $1,000 to a campaign to deny people's rights.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#525Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the community has pressured him to step down because he expressed an opinion not held by the majority. That's not true. The fact that the majority believe the idea was necessary for the pressure to be applied, but it is not why the pressure was applied. The pressure was applied because his views trample on others' rights, and equal rights is philosophically closely tied with the entire mission of an organization li…
> his views trample on others' rights No; I don't agree with Eich's views, but merely having those views does not implicate anyone else's rights in any way at all. Rights are violated by actions , not merely by expressing distasteful opinions.
I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you somehow have been living under a rock and did not know that he donated $1000 to support California Prop 8.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#526Earlier quoted context omitted.
You could also say that it was pretty much unacceptable to support women's suffrage or be against slavery in certain times and places. But, the thing is, these ideas have trajectories. The idea that slavery is wrong or women should have the right to vote never got less accepted over time.
This is very wrong. Various cultures have had different systems of slavery - some better, some worse - and vastly different views of women's civil rights or participation in society.
I don't think so. I think that the societies that practiced slavery were always amenable to the practice. The societies themselves just grew and spread.
For example: Iran's official policy went from being progressive to oppressive, but it was a result of the Islamists moving into power in the 70s. They didn't just suddenly convince everybody that "hey we should oppress women". All of those people were there, and had been there for a long time. They just weren't in power.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#527Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here's the root of the issue: "many felt was incompatible with his personal views" Who all is "many" here? People at Mozilla? People in the tech industry? People who are LGBT? Angry people on the internet with nothing better to do than troll? People who actually were directly and personally affected by Eich's actions in donating, of which there are quite few compared to the number of people weighing in on this? It's…
People who actually were directly and personally affected by Eich's actions in donating, of which there are quite few compared to the number of people weighing in on this? Is this the case? There are a whole bunch of LGBT people working at Mozilla, and in the wider tech community. On top of that, there are families and friends of these people, who while not being personally affected can certainly legitimately object…
"damage done to their close peers"
Again, what damage, and how does that get traced directly back to Eich? The law was repealed, marriage reinstated, and everything's fine. The system worked, so what's the issue?
And a "whole bunch"? How many? Numbers? Percentage? Let us not suspect--we are in the Information Age. Google your way to success.
The only number we have is $1000 from Eich to support Prop 8--that's the only number we have. Somehow that one number is enough evidence to cost the man his job, but magically nobody else has to back up their assails.
Look, if the numbers for this act justify the outrage, sure, I'll recant--but that simply hasn't happened yet, and the bookkeeping is pretty shoddy.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#528Earlier quoted context omitted.
>but if you are actively working to remove existing rights from other people How is opposing redefining marriage (in the context of law) working to remove existing rights of people? Its framed in terms of removing rights/civil rights because it suits the cause. But this characterization is not supported by a dispassionate reading of the issue here.
Rights are not granted. Laws merely define approach to Rights.
I don't believe in natural rights. I believe all rights worth writing down are granted.
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#529I am a strong supporter of gay marriage, but I have to say that I find this very unfortunate and worrying. Apparently many Mozilla supporters seem to think it is okay to bully a qualified person out of his job only for his political views, even if they had absolutely no effect on his qualification or his actions on the job. I can't help but feel like this campaign has done a lot more harm to him than his $1000 donati…
"for his political views" In this case, you cannot speak generally like this. In this case, it really matters exactly what those political views are, not just that they are "political". And that's why there was such an uproar, and why he's stepping down. People seem to be willfully misunderstanding this. It's not like, "Whoa! Guys! We can persecute people for their ''''political'''' views now? What's up with that?" N…
"And it really does not take a genius, or an orator, to see which side is the oppressing one."
Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO
#530Comments here are pretty supportive of Brendan but I see this as nothing but a victory for Mozilla and a victory for consumer activism. It should be clear by now that you cannot run a large company in the public eye while you espouse vitriolic and discriminatory views that belong in the last century.
Except that he didn't "espouse vitriolic and discrimatory views." A majority of voters in CA pulled the lever for Prop 8. 70% of African-American voters in CA voted "yes" for Prop 8. Doesn't sound discriminatory to me. What it sounds like is political correctness run amok, and punishment for thought crime.
You seem to be under the impression that no majority vote can be discriminatory. I cannot rightly apprehend such a confusion of ideas.