The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays • Hacker News Board

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#91

Post by devindotcom » Mon, Apr 07, 2014, 11:01 PM UTC

johngalt wrote: post #85

devindotcom wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, so you would have maintained a healthy distance during the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s as well?

Would I distance myself from MLK? no. From the black panthers? yes. There is a vast difference between believing something to be true, and wishing harm upon those who refuse to acknowledge that truth. Are there any injustices you see in the world that aren't also the popular opinion in your peer group?

Boy, what a loaded question! Tell me, do you still beat your your wife? But seriously, do you think there are any injustices in the world at all? It sounds like they don't count if they come from, or ar at all influenced by, one's peer group. How do you propose to find justice and injustice if not by agreement by the people that make up society?

Second, by your definition of harm, if a restaurant refuses to serve black customers, and people boycott it so the owner must close down, they have wished him harm and are on the "black panther" side of your equation, yes? Even if he must only change his policy, his "right to think" has been impinged upon, so I suppose that is also harm, right?

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#92

Post by stcredzero » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:05 AM UTC

dllthomas wrote: post #90

stcredzero wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Show me an example of someone being ousted for remaining quiet. In this situation, Brendan Eich would probably have been better served by saying less, though that would probably not have changed the outcome. Is your position that weak that you are really reduced to this degree of nitpicking? A group of people prevented couples that wanted to be married from being married. That is clearly an act. In the same manner th…

"[Preventing people from being married is an act i]n the same manner that speaking is an 'act.'" I'm done here. You clearly have no connection to reality, and this is distracting from more important matters.

I'm done here. You clearly have no connection to reality, and this is distracting from more important matters.

If you are so assured of the rightness of your position and the wrongness of the other's position, that you are entitled to take actions of any degree of severity, then you have lost connection to reality, as have so many others in history. You would be well advised to never be that self righteous.

I have been racially harassed, subject to hate speech, in a situation where the police got involved. There's simply no equating Brendan Eich and his political donation with a situation and actions like that. If you can't deal with others thinking the actions taken against him are out of proportion and have the feeling of a witch-hunt because your position is so evidently right and his is so evidently wrong then you are again the one who has lost connection to reality, as well as having lost track of the meaning of a pluralistic society. A just, pluralistic society will treat even its dissenting members with justice and tolerance.

If past political donations are an acceptable justification for "open season" on others, six years after the fact, we have no hope as an open democratic society.

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#93

Post by dllthomas » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:09 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #92

dllthomas wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"[Preventing people from being married is an act i]n the same manner that speaking is an 'act.'" I'm done here. You clearly have no connection to reality, and this is distracting from more important matters.

I'm done here. You clearly have no connection to reality, and this is distracting from more important matters. If you are so assured of the rightness of your position and the wrongness of the other's position, that you are entitled to take actions of any degree of severity, then you have lost connection to reality, as have so many others in history. You would be well advised to never be that self righteous. I have be…

The sum total of anyone's action here is 1) speech, and 2) deciding not to do business with someone. I'm not saying it's necessarily the correct decision, but painting it as an assumption that we are "entitled to take actions of any degree of severity" just reinforces my point. Anyway, I'm literally not going to respond to a thing below this comment, however crazy or sensible it gets.

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#94

Post by stcredzero » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:22 AM UTC

dllthomas wrote: post #93

stcredzero wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm done here. You clearly have no connection to reality, and this is distracting from more important matters. If you are so assured of the rightness of your position and the wrongness of the other's position, that you are entitled to take actions of any degree of severity, then you have lost connection to reality, as have so many others in history. You would be well advised to never be that self righteous. I have be…

The sum total of anyone's action here is 1) speech, and 2) deciding not to do business with someone. I'm not saying it's necessarily the correct decision, but painting it as an assumption that we are "entitled to take actions of any degree of severity" just reinforces my point. Anyway, I'm literally not going to respond to a thing below this comment, however crazy or sensible it gets.

Legality and the extreme wrongness of someone's position entitles you to do anything, up to and including persecution of someone for a political donation from 6 years ago. Because that donation was so wrong. Thanks for the clarification. Doesn't sound needlessly vindictive at all.

A pluralistic, tolerant society tolerates the holding of private beliefs of all kinds and forgives being on the wrong side of history. A society that doesn't do this simply isn't one that respects the right of free speech. The actions concerning Mozilla do nothing to further civil rights and moves our society towards norms of intolerance of dissent.

EDIT: I think I learned something here today. There are those who think that there is no social justice for sexual orientation until the same degree of vilification is applied to their former political opponents as that which happened to the political opponents of racial civil rights. I'm sorry, but this is illogical, shortsighted, and vindictive. It doesn't matter how wrong people were and how much those who held wrong positions suffer, and any energy which is brought to bear in that sort of direction is not helping the cause of justice. This is merely misplaced vengeance. It is indeed not what MLK, Mandela, or Gandhi would have wanted. Just because this is how it happened in the past doesn't make it wise or right. I happen to believe that an enlightened society can exist without "sufficient punishment of wrong thinking."

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#95

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:38 AM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #57

ryandvm wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. I don't agree with Eich's personal views on gay marriage, but I'm kind of disappointed that everybody seems to be cool with getting people fired because they stood up for their personal views. People are comfortable with his firing because they feel his views are "wrong", but pretty much all progressive views, by definition, started out as "wrong" as well...

> I don't agree with Eich's personal views on gay marriage, but I'm kind of disappointed that everybody seems to be cool with getting people fired because they stood up for their personal views. No one got fired here. Brendan Eich quit a job that, from all reports, he was dubious about taking from day one.

[deleted]

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#96

Post by scintill76 » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:52 AM UTC

lexcorvus wrote: post #35

I'm sure many supporters of Brendan Eich's ouster are completely sincere, but it's difficult to explain the intensity of their feelings on this issue. It can't be as simple as "civil rights" and "marriage equality"; for example, (first) cousin marriage is important to many groups—indeed, in Islam cousin marriage is not only allowed, it's often preferred [1]—but it is illegal in most states [2]. And yet, I rarely see…

Even if I don't agree with all of this, it's at least a good explanation of why I find "marriage equality" distastefully propagandistic. If people waving that banner truly wanted "marriage equality" they would be fighting for normalizing marriage laws across the whole nation (marriage age and other requirements like relatedness as you mentioned), polygamy, etc. If they wanted to extend the logistical benefits of marriage (tax breaks etc.) to more people, they could fight for marriage between people that were doing it purely for the legal benefits.

Just call it "fighting for same-sex marriage", because that's what it's mostly about. "Marriage equality" feels like trying to sway the listener by giving a deceptively broad impression of the aims of the movement.

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#97

Post by eropple » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 3:47 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #69

eropple wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First: he didn't get fired. Nobody in a position to know has even suggested that they requested his resignation. Everything I've read points to that Mozilla wanted him to stay . So framing it as "oh, they got him fired" is just plain disingenuous. Second: Is he being harassed at home? Is he getting swatted? Are people throwing rocks through his windows? Then those people should be arrested, because that's a crime . B…

First: he didn't get fired. He probably feels passionate about what he does. Imagine your work and subject of your technical passion becomes a constant reminder of a debacle like this. You would not wish that on yourself. This is no different from refusing to patronize the corner store near me because the owner's a jerk. Oh really? I thought principles of tolerance and social justice were at work. Are you admitting t…

Once you've decided that the "tolerance" of letting one person fuck with less privileged people is virtuous, I literally can't say anything that will parse for you. I'll leave you with a link to the best description of this bullshit affair and one quote from it, and then I am done.

> Did you catch the problem here? I’ll spell it out for you: he doesn’t give a shit about tolerance, or opposing discrimination. He only cares insofar as people tolerate him. He wants to be left alone to fuck with other people.

> And he is wielding it as a weapon to shut everyone up.

It applies to those preaching tolerance for Eich as well as Gerv, about whom Eevee is writing. A "tolerance" that amounts to "sure, he's actively tried to hurt you, but let that slide" is not particularly meaningful. (Whereas the tolerance of "gay people can get married, and if I don't want to get gay married I don't have to" is meaningful because it is not infringing upon anyone--but you'll notice that the word "tolerance" is rarely used by people who support such basic dignities. Strangely enough, it's so frequently the watchword of the oppressor, not the oppressed.)

http://me.veekun.com/blog/2014/04/05/mozilla-and-free-speech...

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#98

Post by tiquorsj » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 10:15 AM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #94

dllthomas wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sum total of anyone's action here is 1) speech, and 2) deciding not to do business with someone. I'm not saying it's necessarily the correct decision, but painting it as an assumption that we are "entitled to take actions of any degree of severity" just reinforces my point. Anyway, I'm literally not going to respond to a thing below this comment, however crazy or sensible it gets.

Legality and the extreme wrongness of someone's position entitles you to do anything, up to and including persecution of someone for a political donation from 6 years ago. Because that donation was so wrong . Thanks for the clarification. Doesn't sound needlessly vindictive at all. A pluralistic, tolerant society tolerates the holding of private beliefs of all kinds and forgives being on the wrong side of history. A…

This whole thing and the justifications sound like reprisals during regime change to me. It is really creepy.

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#99

Post by MetaCosm » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 12:14 PM UTC

> Losing your job for being gay is different from losing your job for opposing gay marriage. Unlike homosexuality, opposition to same-sex marriage is a choice, and it directly limits the rights of other people.

He wrote an entire article equivocating them, then he quickly writes a couple sentences pointing out he full well knows it is absolute nonsense. Well played by him, I read the article.

Re: The Excuses for Purging Brendan Eich Are the Old Excuses for Firing Gays

#100

Post by dclowd9901 » Tue, Apr 08, 2014, 4:37 PM UTC

chc wrote: post #64

dclowd9901 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Believing homosexual behavior undermines society is predicated on a false premise: biblical morality. Doing shitty things that undermine the lives of others is objectively evil.

> Believing homosexual behavior undermines society is predicated on a false premise: biblical morality. And they think your morality is predicated on a false premise. The point is that I still expect them to treat you decently, and I expect you to treat them decently. > Doing shitty things that undermine the lives of others is objectively evil. Like petitioning to get them fired from their jobs? That kind of thing?

I can see how you would think being fired from a job is on the same level as not being allowed to freely live your life without someone shitting on your rights. Wait no I don't.

Everyone is entitled to free speech, but that doesn't mean there aren't consequences for what you decide to do with it.