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Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

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Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#561

Post by gum_ina_package »

macspoofing wrote: post #535
gum_ina_package wrote: post #88

I honestly feel like Brendan is the victim here. He might have religious or moral views on gay marriage that some of us don't agree with, but being forced to step down as CEO because of those views... well that's something I don't think any of his critics should be proud of.

On the other hand, those that didn't agree with those views were free to boycott and criticize Mozilla. Mozilla Foundation was also free to live with those consequences or decide that they didn't want their brand to be associated or muddled by its CEO's accidentally public position on a very sensitive topic. My view: It's a shame that Eich decided to stand his ground on this issue. It's a real shame that he felt so s…

More important than his morality and/or religious views?

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#562

Post by retartyr »

sp332 wrote: post #462
SimHacker wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your idea that human rights are about social consensus is really dangerous. The argument that homosexuality is acceptable is not based on cultural attitudes, it's based on science and ethics. Why don't you let Brendan Eich play the victim and feel sorry for himself, he doesn't need any of your help.

Not to hijack the thread, but... science? How?

you know the saying "a square peg in a round hole"? well: round peg, round hole.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#563

Post by saturdaysaint »

crassus wrote: post #347
DangerousPie wrote: post #45

I 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…

The tech community needs to rewatch "The Lives of Others". Making ideological purity a precondition to employment is fucking terrifying. I'm terrified.

Right, and the fact that no CEO could safely utter racist sentiments is another sign of how we're living this Orwellian nightmare.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#564

Post by jiggy2011 »

jbooth wrote: post #406
HillRat wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's two sides to that -- the first is that, yes, he absolutely has the right to hold any opinion he wants to, no matter how noxious I or others may find them. To paraphrase Hall on Voltaire, I'll defend to the death their right to be assholes. (Full disclosure: pro- gay marriage, anti-Prop 8, not a CA resident, so doesn't really affect me.) On the other hand, there's no absolute right to be a public-facing CEO, a…

To piggyback, there's an additional difference between being a public-facing CEO of, say, McDonald's, Exxon or Apple, and being the public-facing CEO of a non-profit which exists due to the donations of primarily liberal and libertarian internet people. The prior case might cost them a little revenue due to boycotts but if the person's effective, you can make a case for 'private views' and 'shareholder value'. When y…

I thought mozilla exists mainly because of google?

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#565

Post by tommorris »

metaphorm wrote: post #467
blisterpeanuts wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What evidence is there that he's a "homophobe"? 7 million other Californians also voted for Prop 8. Does that make them all homophobes?

yes, actually. not all homophobes are virulent, frothing-at-the-mouth gay bashers who use the word "faggot" a lot. mostly its a pervasive attitude that homosexual relationships are "abnormal" or "ungodly" or something like that. its homophobic to feel that way, even if you're polite in public when discussing it.

It's the socially respectable homophobes in the suits and ties that politicians and people in power listen to, not the thugs shouting "cocksucker!" at people coming out of bars.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#566

Post by honksillet »

angersock wrote: post #365
matthewmacleod wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

on the other hand we just showed that when a mob on the Internet wants something - they get it. I don't think that this follows. In this particular case, someone was promoted to a role which many felt was incompatible with his personal views; they made that known, and the person in question stepped down. That's kind of how things should work in a community enterprise. That said, I understand he's received wildly disp…

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…

Yes. The "many people" here is a small but shrill collection of single issue voters/activists. Through slick PR these individuals were able to convert his employment status into a referendum on a political issue, even though one should have nothing to do with the other.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#567

Post by apetresc »

Mozilla's stance on respecting people's private, personal decisions (as a company working on a communication medium) is way more important to me than its stance on same-sex politics. Where did all the privacy advocates suddenly disappear to?

I'm staunchly pro-gay-rights and would've debated Eich vociferously on the issue of gay marriage back in 2008 if he had chosen to make his opinion public (which he didn't), but frankly Mozilla firing somebody based on a private donation to a political cause makes me want to boycott it more than the donation ever did. This seems like a textbook case of the privacy abuse that the tinfoil-hatters are usually getting so worked up about.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#568

Post by marshray »

jbooth wrote: post #406
HillRat wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's two sides to that -- the first is that, yes, he absolutely has the right to hold any opinion he wants to, no matter how noxious I or others may find them. To paraphrase Hall on Voltaire, I'll defend to the death their right to be assholes. (Full disclosure: pro- gay marriage, anti-Prop 8, not a CA resident, so doesn't really affect me.) On the other hand, there's no absolute right to be a public-facing CEO, a…

To piggyback, there's an additional difference between being a public-facing CEO of, say, McDonald's, Exxon or Apple, and being the public-facing CEO of a non-profit which exists due to the donations of primarily liberal and libertarian internet people. The prior case might cost them a little revenue due to boycotts but if the person's effective, you can make a case for 'private views' and 'shareholder value'. When y…

"non-profit which exists due to the donations of primarily liberal and libertarian internet people"

Citation needed.

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#569

Post by Touche »

OpieCunningham wrote: post #501
Touche wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How many lives need to be ruined before an oppressed community can fight back? The oppressed already did fight back and won. This is putting your enemies on trial afterwards.

The oppressed have already won? No, I don't think so. I do not see any reality to a claim that the gay community is not actively oppressed. Perhaps you mean the gay community is sufficiently less oppressed that it should stop defending itself. Then how few lives need to be ruined for that qualification to take effect?

I mean that prop 8, the thing Eich supported, was overruled. Anti-gay marriage laws are being overturned across the country.

No, not every injustice has been thwarted. But Eich isn't responsible for every injustice, just the one he participated in. He is not, to my knowledge, actively oppressing anyone today.

I asked someone else this elsewhere in this topic and I'll ask you the same: What is the victory here? What does this change, positively for the cause of equality?

And I ask again, how did Mandela treat his opponents after his cause was won, and why do we not strive for those standards?

Re: Brendan Eich Steps Down as Mozilla CEO

#570

Post by waterlesscloud »

sp332 wrote: post #493
thrownaway2424 wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Support for Prop 8 has a huge age gradient, as does anti-homosexuality in general. Support for Prop 8 falls by about 0.75% per year Ages 18-24 voted overwhelmingly against it. 65+ voted overwhelmingly for it. Old people hate gays. Young people don't. Support for Prop 8 among young people in the SF Bay Area is negligible. These are the people Eich was supposed to lead as CEO of Mozilla. You can't lead people who think…

Old people only know gay people as Elton John and Freddie Mercury. Younger people know normal people as gay, so it's no wonder.

Do young people really believe this?
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