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Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

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Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#41

Post by Turing_Machine »

weberer wrote: post #16
0xDEADFED5 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eich is free to express his opinions and free to suffer the consequences. CEO is a very political position and he made a politically bone-headed move. I don't see how it could have ended any differently.

It was obviously a targeted, coordinated attack. People were looking decades back into his donation history to try to find anything that tied him to "the right wing". A thousand dollars a decade before to a anti-gay-marriage proposition in California that most Californians agreed with him on at the time. A few thousand dollars two decades back to Ron Paul. Why do you claim he should "suffer" for that? Should half the…

> a anti-gay-marriage proposition in California that most Californians agreed with him on at the time.

Not just most Californians.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton both agreed with him at the time.

Oddly, neither of those people has been hounded from public life.

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#42

Post by makeitdouble »

tjansen wrote: post #39
makeitdouble wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an infinite number of arguments on how his publicly expressed (these donations were not anonymous) personal views impact his role as the head of an organization. If for instance valuable members of the org quit on it, recruiting becomes noticeably harder, Mozilla's PR is impacted and investors aren't happy about it, I'd assume that's enough to ask him to step down.

Ousting him had similar impact. I used to like Mozilla, but ever after that incident using Mozilla feels wrong. And I am not even a fan of Eich.

I think there was no good out of that situation, keeping Eich wouldn't have been great either.

We've potentially seen a similar thing play out with 37 signals and a third of employees leaving ship after they felt betrayed by the leadership's personal positions.

I personally didn't see Eich as a good leader at the stage they were, and while not being impressed by the current leadership either I'm not sure his ousting had that much impact in the grand scheme of things.

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#43

Post by TMWNN »

benwad wrote: post #26
weberer wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was obviously a targeted, coordinated attack. People were looking decades back into his donation history to try to find anything that tied him to "the right wing". A thousand dollars a decade before to a anti-gay-marriage proposition in California that most Californians agreed with him on at the time. A few thousand dollars two decades back to Ron Paul. Why do you claim he should "suffer" for that? Should half the…

It's not about making people suffer. Eich used his wealth to lobby for something that many people find objectionable. Mozilla is quite an ideological company (many who work there are probably somewhat driven by the "mission" rather than necessarily the company's financial performance), and so the CEO publicly supporting criminalising same-sex marriage could affect hiring and staff morale. It's not like his career has…

>Eich used his wealth to lobby for something that many people find objectionable.

Something which a majority of Californians in 2008 voted for, so your many people were the minority.

But even were that not the case, where should the line be drawn? Even if Eich's view were held by 1% and not the 52.24% that voted for it in 2008, should Eich have been fired for holding that position? Yes or no?

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#44

Post by djkivi »

hilux wrote: post #24
weberer wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My example was the media coverage of these two events. Look at how the Guardian covers Eich in the article linked in a comment above. Pay attention at how they go out of their way to throw out labels like "right wing". Now try to find a single article from the Guardian that so strongly rebukes Gates. If his behavior is not OK, then why don't they address it?

Yes, I agree that the liberal aka mainstream media have lost their way, in the sense of favoring political positions rather than what's objectively true. This became obvious in the coverage of Trump and then Russia's war on Ukraine. If everything I've read for years was true, both Trump and Russia would have been finished long ago. But they're clearly not.

Maybe everything you've read for years isn't true?

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#45

Post by pixxel »

rsynnott wrote: post #28
mrkeen wrote: post #17

"for taking private civic action based upon his quiet Christian faith" One can only dream of a world in which all civic actions are secular, and religious matters are private and quiet.

Ah, yes, quietly and faithfully paying for a campaign to keep people like me second-class citizens. Ah, well, that's fine, then, as long as it's nice and polite and Christian. (Back when equal marriage was a live political issue here, I must say I think I _preferred_ the out-and-proud homophobes to the ones who hid behind religious claims. At least they were honest in their hatred.)

[flagged]

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#46

Post by friend_and_foe »

benwad wrote: post #26
weberer wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was obviously a targeted, coordinated attack. People were looking decades back into his donation history to try to find anything that tied him to "the right wing". A thousand dollars a decade before to a anti-gay-marriage proposition in California that most Californians agreed with him on at the time. A few thousand dollars two decades back to Ron Paul. Why do you claim he should "suffer" for that? Should half the…

It's not about making people suffer. Eich used his wealth to lobby for something that many people find objectionable. Mozilla is quite an ideological company (many who work there are probably somewhat driven by the "mission" rather than necessarily the company's financial performance), and so the CEO publicly supporting criminalising same-sex marriage could affect hiring and staff morale. It's not like his career has…

> publicly supporting criminalizing same sex marriage

Same sex marriage simply wasn't a thing legally at the time, and was an issue the american public was discussing. It was not something in the process of being criminalized. The population of California voted not to allow it in the year we are talking about here, just to give you some perspective. Barack Obama opposed it politically.

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#48

Post by SuperNinKenDo »

bjord wrote: post #15
SuperNinKenDo wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire thing was simply that he had donated to some Christian organisations, some of which spent some of their time advocating against gay marriage. That was it.

incorrect—eich donated to the campaign for california proposition 8, which was "a state constitutional amendment intended to ban same-sex marriage", and actually passed at the time, but was later overturned in court https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_California_Proposition_8

Pretty sure that fits with what I said. But whatever.

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#49

Post by SuperNinKenDo »

MOARDONGZPLZ wrote: post #6
SuperNinKenDo wrote: post #3

Too little, too late I'd say. This pattern is already thoroughly normalised.

Seems like he actively fought against equal rights and a level playing field. That position should be morally repugnant in a modern society. I’d say doing nothing (I.e. too little) was actually too much.

You can say whatever you like. When the mob comes for you, you'll cry foul and appeal to freedom of conscience. Nobody will give a damn because that isn't a value anyone cleaves to any longer. Nobody cares that YOU think YOUR principles are a special case.

Re: Marc Andreessen: I regret not doing more to support and defend Brendan Eich

#50

Post by mvc »

aaa_aaa wrote: post #37
mvc wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Changing the subject to a political comedy show is silly.

It is attitudes like this that give him more power than he should have.

Everyone thought it was a joke in 2016 too.

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