>because people find it easier to heap hatred on someone they've never met, than to act with dignity and respect.
Turn it around. Eich found it easier to treat millions of people he's never met as second class citizens, than to act with dignity and respect.
There are two sides to this story, and you seem to be very eager to tell the one and handwave the other for a "why can't we all just get along" platitude.
> There are two sides to this story, and you seem to be very eager to tell the one and handwave the other for a "why can't we all just get along" platitude.
We should treat people with respect. Not create a sensationalist backlash. Not punish people for having their opinions & being politically active on a gray area.
Most of all, a rational discourse should take place. Not these sensationalist headlines that are designed to manipulate people's unnuanced emotions.
> Eich's behavior impacted a hell of a lot more people than the backlash did
The backlash affects everybody. It creates a hostile environment where your opinion can cost you your job. That coupled with ever growing levels of transparency means everybody needs to have a politically correct opinion or face consequences.
The ends do not justify the means.
Also, what does firing Eich achieve for the gay rights movement? Nothing. This is revenge politics. This is the dark side.
As Ghandi said: "An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind".
>It creates a hostile environment where your opinion can cost you your job.
It would probably already cost you your job to publicly declare (let alone financially support) similar non-equality views of both blacks and women. Why is this so much worse?
Oh no, one more particular flavor of bigotry becomes socially unacceptable. However will I cope. </sarcasm>
>Also, what does firing Eich achieve for the gay rights movement?
An object lession that being bigoted against LGBTs is just as unacceptable and repugnant as being bigoted against blacks or women. Regardless of your position in life. A double standard that I, for one, am glad we are reversing.
Eich said he supported equality. He supported taking care of domestic partners. If you have issue with his "support" then have a respectful dialog. If he is wrong, then that will become obvious. Instead, the movement acted like a bully & does not have the moral high ground anymore.
You are conflating the state not recognizing gay marriage with a human rights issue. Not everyone agrees. Besides, the notion of marriage enforces the status quo of monogamy. I think Polyamory should also be recognized with equal benefits. Or better yet, all people should receive the benefits of a married person.
While I agree that there are equality issues with banning gay marriage, I don't think it's a human rights issue. For example, I'm single. Is it a human rights issue that I don't receive the tax benefits of being married? It's unfair, but I wouldn't say my human rights are being violated.
Support for Prop 8 doesn't necessarily mean that person is a bigot. This labeling is irrational & meant to stir up hatred. There are different reasons to support Prop 8. It's a cultural battle. However, ostracizing is a type of bullying. That behavior is wrong & needs to be called out.
I hope we can be respectful toward each other. It was not that long ago where gay rights activists were in the minority and treated with disrespect. We have an opportunity to have a more tolerant society. Let's not miss this opportunity.
I've said this before here, but I have much less problem with the (small) donation (to a failed cause) than I do his subsequent behavior.
His subsequent hypocrisy proves beyond any reasonable doubt that those views are still very personal and very real to him, regardless of what comes out of his mouth.
One does not abdicate a CEO position, something of great prestige, power, and compensation, on a lark. He was asked, multiple times by multiple people what his true thoughts were and declined to elaborate. He could have just (heartfeltly) apologized. He could have just thrown another $1000 at GLAAD/HRC/etc.
>You are conflating the state not recognizing gay marriage with a human rights issue. Not everyone agrees.
The same could be said of women's suffrage or the equlaity of blacks. The fact that it's a state issue does not preclude it being a human rights issue.
I have skin in this game. I see the behavior of people like Eich as a personal affront to me and people close to me. A proclamation that people like me should remain second class citizens because of some outmoded religious belief.
> However, ostracizing supports makes the ostracizers act like bullies.
Again, how is this any different from publicly announcing your support of some other anti-equality group? How well do you think a CEO would do if it came out that they were donators to Stormfront? I keep hearing this "bullies" line but it doesn't add up.
>I see the behavior of people like Eich as a personal affront to me and people close to me.
Yet you aren't going to get fired for having expressed those views five years ago. How would you feel if your boss decided to fire you over your personal beliefs, overlooking your professional merits? Do you really want McCarthyism again?
> Yet you aren't going to get fired for having expressed those views five years ago.
There was a time, during my own lifetime where it is was perfectly acceptable to openly discuss weather whites and blacks should be allowed to get married or not. Social change can occur quickly, like a wildfire, the recent history of a change is not all that important -- the fire has already happened.
I know more than one transgendered person who was let go from a tech job because of "culture fit" when they decided to transition. So I'm not really sure what the difference is except that it's a white male under the gun.
Those who know him say he treated everybody equally. He set policy & a supported a system in Mozilla that promoted equality. His heart is in a decent place. We all have moral blind spots. He has his past. We all need to grow in some areas.
Painting Eich as some "extremist" is disingenuous.
> How well do you think a CEO would do if it came out that they were donators to Stormfront?
Prop 8 had 52% of the vote. It is a mainstream opinion. Stormfront is a fringe group. Eich does not seem to belong to any other extreme group. He just supported a Proposition.
Numbers does not mean morality, however it does indicate that someone is relatively in line with the rest of the population.
I struggle with this because there are things that most people are ok with that suppress rights of those who don't have a voice right now.
Whenever I bring up those issue, I face the risk of ostricization. That is why I oppose ostracizing Eich. That behavior opposes equality & tolerance. It make it "ok" to be kneejerk judgmental.
If there's one thing that we learned from gay rights, black rights, & woman rights, it's we need to be more tolerant as a society. We need to treat everybody with respect.
> He was asked, multiple times by multiple people what his true thoughts were and declined to elaborate.
Over a period of a few days? He did apologize for hurting people.
He obviously felt strongly about this issue. It's coercive to make him change his mind from social pressure. Actually, it probably meant he would have to lie. He chose to not talk about it, as it would have cause more emotional distress. Given his position, he acted in a respectful manner.
> I have skin in this game.
We all do brother or sister :-)
> I see the behavior of people like Eich as a personal affront to me and people close to me
I see public shaming and bullying as a personal affront to me. I've been unfairly bullied online (and offline). The problem with online bullying is the target's motive & the truth does not matter. Only perception matters.
When you damage someone publicly, you are assaulting them. Especially today where things online stick with you forever. There are also emotional consequences to being bullied.
I have some opinions that are not mainstream. I want to be heard without being disrespected.
I want tolerance. Seeing people act like bullies makes be nauseous.
You can't deny how I feel about your opinion, just like I cannot deny how you feel about my opinion. However, if I don't like your opinion about something, it is not right for me to label you as a bigot or some other loaded term.
Let's not hate people. Let's understand that people live within a context. Let's change the context.
If that was truly the case he would have explained this when asked about it. He did not. He quit his job rather than do this.
Prop 8 had 52% of the vote. It is a mainstream opinion.
With ads like this [1] I'm not surprised. His money went to support those, by the way. And you probably meant was.
"ok" to be kneejerk judgmental.
You and everyone else I've asked this question to seem to dance around it. How is this any different than supporting any other kind of anti-equality thing?
* Don't say his views were in the past, they clearly are not, given his post-reveal behavior.
* Don't say this is different unless you can objectively prove a way that this particular right is somehow different from the right of women or blacks to vote.
So which is it? Why is disliking people because they think women are beneath them or think blacks are sub-human any different than this? It's the same xenophobia dressed up in new clothes - that makes it okay now?
it's we need to be more tolerant as a society. We need to treat everybody with respect
And part of which is naming and shaming those that fail this relatively simple task. Being tolerant does not mean accepting intolerance in the same way that being pacifist does not mean accepting war.
He did apologize for hurting people
Which holds about as much water as "sorry you were offended" in my book. The view underpinning the action he (sort of kind of weaselly) apologized for is still there as strong as it ever was. He couldn't even be bothered to give a counter donation.
The problem with online bullying is the target's motive & the truth does not matter
This is where we diverge. I have no problem what-so-ever castigating someone for bad behavior if it's actually proven that they did engage in bad behavior. Mis-aimed outrage is a huge problem with online communities.
However, I see no such mis-aiming here. You've got someone who failed in two big respects - the ability to treat other people with respect in private, and the ability to handle basic CEO duties such as PR and recognizing conflicts of interest.
He was unfit to be CEO and did not deserve that position, with those two things in mind. Maybe that's a value judgement, but that's mine to make.
I want tolerance
Rejecting intolerance is the first step.
However, if I don't like your opinion about something
Again, you're mis-framing Eich's action as if it were a mere opinion or thought that crossed his mind one day, and not something he gave money to support (this in particular: [1]) and gave his job rather than repudiate. That tells me all I need to know about his "personal beliefs" and how he feels about them.
> You and everyone else I've asked this question to seem to dance around it. How is this any different than supporting any other kind of anti-equality thing?
He has not said anything hateful.
In many ways, I think his opinion is not conducive to equality. In fact, the notion of marriage is unequal. It's unequal to people who don't want to get married or are polyamorous. Also, there are many natural inequalities. There are many gray areas. Also, everybody has prejudices and promote inequality in some contexts.
However, just because someone has an opinion of inequality, doesn't mean he should be the target of a smear campaign.
Tolerance is important.
> Rejecting intolerance is the first step.
That's why I'm rejecting the gay rights movement's online bullying tactics. You don't get a free pass just because you were an oppressed minority in the past.
> Which holds about as much water as "sorry you were offended" in my book.
He said he is sorry he caused pain. He admitted to causing the pain and apologized for that. He did not turn the blame around to say your perception is wrong.
He is the target of your hate. Let go of your hate. Hate is the dark side...
> I have no problem what-so-ever castigating someone for bad behavior if it's actually proven that they did engage in bad behavior.
It's not proven that he behaved badly. Also, who is the proper judge of this? The mob always feels like they are the right judge. The mob always feels justified. How else could the mob justify the bad things that mobs do to their victims?
> you're mis-framing Eich's action as if it were a mere opinion or thought that crossed his mind one day
Have a rational dialog about this. Express how much pain Prop 8 caused. Express why this is an inequality & how that affects you. Don't act with vengeance.
That is why Martin Luther King & Ghandi were successful. They did not act like their oppressors. They had the moral high ground. If they acted with vengeance, equality would not be as far as it is today.
No, he just gave them money. Given the choice, I'd rather he stand outside of Mozilla's corporate office holding an allcaps sign covered in slurs ala Westboro Baptist than financially support them. At least his personal actions don't contribute to further oppression in that case.
doesn't mean he should be the target of a smear campaign
What smear campaign? Every criticism of Eich that I've both read and given focuses on 3 objective and concrete things.
1. He donated money to a group that can be charitably described as a "hate group". This alone wouldn't be so bad, but:
2. He had a chance to walk that back, say that he changed his mind, say that was a long time ago, and did not. In fact, he quit his job rather than do so. Which leads into:
3. He poorly handled this entire event, which calls his credentials for being a CEO in the first place into question.
That's not a smear campaign by any conceivable definition of the words.
That's why I'm rejecting the gay rights movement's online bullying tactics.
Again, 3 facts. Not opinions, facts. Facts cannot be bullying, else any critical analysis of something important to a person becomes "bullying".
He did not turn the blame around to say your perception is wrong.
He went well out of his way to avoid directly confronting anything that would have confirmed or denied this verbally. But, his actions did that for us.
He is the target of your hate
I appreciate your zen, but I do not hate Eich. I think he was a poor choice for CEO and is a hypocrite. He's not someone I'd care to work with or under since he demonstrably dislikes me for who I am, having never met me.
That is not hate. If I have any vitriol at all, it's directed at his defenders and those that want to make him a martyr for "freedom of speech".
It's not proven that he behaved badly
Donating $1000 to a hate group is not "behaving badly"? This is a matter of public record.
Express how much pain Prop 8 caused. Express why this is an inequality & how that affects you. Don't act with vengeance
Which I've gone well out of my way to do. Yet somehow, just be repeating facts about Eich's observable actions, I am acting with "hate" and "vengeance".
The political organization that's behind Prop 8 (the people that Eich donated to, since you can't donate to a bill) quacks like a hate group in a number of ways, not least of which is they dehumanize and make fun of LGBTs.
If you have not already, please view that slate.com link I sent you a couple posts ago. You can ignore the text there as it's basically what I've been saying here verbatim, but I would ask you to pay special attention to the videos - they are actual ads that the group put together and which actually aired in California.
Maybe then you'll see why I apply this label - I didn't just arbitrarily dredge it up as the worst possible thing I could think of to call them.
>That sounds like you hate me now.
I find it very puzzling that you say I am practicing all this hatred by saying I find Eich's actions repugnant, and now you're saying I'm practicing hatred toward you by simply having a (remarkably civil and productive) discussion with you.
Yet Eich is the guy who wants people to be second class citizens.
My response is that Eich didn't personally approve these ads, and may have had no way of possibly knowing what his money would actually fund. (I'd be interested in evidence about the visibility of any prior work, the timing of his donation, etc., though.)
If you find simply supporting the idea repugnant, sure, but then arguments like "he donated to a hate group" and Slate's "The Campaign for Prop 8 Was Unprecedentedly Cruel" aren't really necessary. If they pushed a law that is hateful to the core, it's less relevant how hateful or not the group itself was.
I suppose if he did see and regret the ads, he could have said so, but AFAIK has said nothing. Then again, he probably felt that doing anything other than a long thorough apology, donating to pro-gay-marriage groups, crying for forgiveness, etc., would dig the hole deeper.
> I find it very puzzling that you say I am practicing all this hatred by saying I find Eich's actions repugnant
> If I have any vitriol at all, it's directed at his defenders and those that want to make him a martyr for "freedom of speech".
I'm saying Eich freedom is being violated. I'm just repeating what you said and referring to your "vitriol".
I understand where you are coming from. However, it's easy to misconstrue a position that someone took. Notice I used some weasel words such as "it sounds like". I could misconstrue your statement as you hating me.
I believe that Eich's support & position is being misconstrued. He should be able to express the reasons for his support without fear of reprisal. I would not be surprised if he & his family were harassed, as harassment seems to accompany such emotionally charged situations. I would be fearful if I were publicly targeted like that. Even if you are right, you never bully people into agreeing with your position.
I watched the commercials. The last one is ridiculous, since the couple should have answered that marriage is about love and not necessarily about having children. However, none of the commercials struck me as overtly discriminatory. The one with the two princesses, is somewhat discriminatory; However the position of parents (with religious convictions) should have control over their children's education at least deserved some consideration. To a parent, it coercive to (without warning), teach a child something that they disagree with.
The ads expressed some legitimate concerns that should be addressed. There was even a point where someone was afraid that people's jobs would be targeted for their beliefs. Obviously that fear is well founded.
I'm failing to see how this is a hate group. I believe some of the Prop 8 supporters were bigots, however, the campaign itself does not seem like it is based on hate.
I fail to see how Eich is an aware supporter of hate groups.
But it simply isn't. First, consider the fact that he chose to step down. He wasn't booted out by Mozilla.
Secondly, You have no entitlement, legally or morally to any particular job with any particular company. Eich is free to support any cause he wants, and everyone else is free to react to that how they want.
That's freedom of speech - plain and simple. This same noise was made when A&E chose to (temporarily) end their contract with one of the stars of Duck Dynasty over his public comments in a magazine - again, no freedom being violated. That person was free to make whatever comments he wanted, and everyone else is free to criticize those comments, and the company in question is free to conduct their business operations in accordance with whatever contract law.
Freedom of speech does not, and never has meant, freedom from criticism/repercussions. This is the system working as intended.
I believe that Eich's support & position is being misconstrued
How so? In what other circumstances does one donate to any cause, go out of their way to avoid directly addressing concerns with said donation, and eventually quit their jobs rather than address those concerns?
That's not misconstruing, that's basic logical induction. If you have another plausible theory, I'd love to hear it.
He should be able to express the reasons for his support without fear of reprisal.
Again, freedom of speech != freedom from criticism. You do not have the right to say anything and never be challenged for it. You do have the right to say whatever you please and not have the government take some action against you.
However, none of the commercials struck me as overtly discriminatory.
We will have to agree to disagree on that. I find them to be offensive, inaccurate, hateful fear-mongering. Partially because they target me personally.
Hate doesn't necessarily imply violence or the threat thereof.
The campaign itself does not seem like it is based on hate.
> But it simply isn't. First, consider the fact that he chose to step down. He wasn't booted out by Mozilla.
He stepped down under enormous political pressure. Also, OK Cupid had a campaign against Firefox, not Eich. Firefox's brand was being hurt. At that point, he did the honorable thing under such attack, which was to step down.
> You have no entitlement
Does that mean discrimination is ok? If we have no entitlement, than someone can fire another for being black, gay, a woman, a member of a religion, a political outlook? At what point does the attacking stop? Why does being gay give you more protection than having a private ideology where nobody is hurt by you?
> In what other circumstances does one donate to any cause, go out of their way to avoid directly addressing concerns with said donation, and eventually quit their jobs rather than address those concerns?
When no matter what you say, you are going to get backlash. He said he does not want to be coerced into changing his opinion. That is his right. I think his is also right to have that opinion. He also deserves respect, like any other human.
> That's not misconstruing, that's basic logical induction. If you have another plausible theory, I'd love to hear it.
First of all, attacking others solely based on our "theories" is a "preemtive strike". It's an unprovoked assault. You don't know the truth. You are only speculating. This speculation has grown rampant. No matter what Eich does, he will be criticized. There is no way for him to win. That's the nature of mob mentality.
My theory is he & his family were being harassed from this. People usually start receiving death threats & other drama that causes unhappiness & suffering. I also think he didn't appreciate the group coercion to change his stance on an issue. Coercion is bad. Sometimes, a job is not worth that drama.
> You do not have the right to say anything and never be challenged for it
Challenging is fine. However, it should be done with respect of the person. Having manipulative press activity is not fine. Having a mob mentality is not fine. It's legal, but it's also not conducive to a tolerant society.
> I find them to be offensive, inaccurate, hateful fear-mongering. Partially because they target me personally.
I didn't see any targeting. The ads never said "homosexuality is wrong" nor did they attack homosexuals. The last ad had some questionable premises, however it was obviously ridiculous from a moderate's perspective.
They were mainly appealing to people's autonomy, respecting moral stances on this issue, and protecting people's careers for having a certain stance. Yes, even intolerant people should be able to have work. Aren't we all a little intolerant? I understand that you are persecuted. I'm also persecuted in some areas of my life. Everyone is persecuted to some degree. We need to remove the persecution. If we can reduce or remove this societal issue, then people change in positive ways.
Politics is never black & white. Prop 8 has positions & a constituency. Even if it does not pass, popular support brings leverage on related issues.
> The campaign itself does not seem like it is based on hate.
> Then what is it based on?
It's not based on one thing. There are a number of motivations for Prop 8. Some people are motivated by hate. Some people have legitimate issues. I think most supports don't approach it from a standpoint of hate.
Eich did not seem like a hateful person. He never spoke out publicly against homosexuals. His campaign donation is not speech. It was meant to be private.
I'm for making campaign contribution public. However, we should also be responsible & not jump to conclusions about supporters of a campaign. Maybe it's evidence. However, it's not proof of anything.
If Eich openly discriminated against homosexuals, that's one thing. However, supporting a Proposition is not proof.
The notion that Prop 8 is H8, is conjecture & a political campaign in itself. It's a redefinition that you obviously buy into. I was a supporter, but now I'm not because it seems to give people license to demonize Prop 8 supporters (without any other evidence of discrimination). I disagree & I think it's dangerous to our culture & it's dangerous to Progressive movements. This demonization is against the progressive ideal of tolerance & intelligent discussion.
Also, the tone of justifiers of this demonization seems off. I'm often a contrarian & think differently from the crowd. The force of this justification reminds me of how groups will force individuals to change & to stop thinking independently or face ostracization. Ostracization is a powerful force. It's has a strong psychological influence on someone's well being & happiness. People are often more afraid of ostracization than death.
Not all discrimination is bad (another difference between the legal and dictionary versions of the same word). In particular, I think the common difference between okay discrimination and not-okay discrimination is judging people for what they are vs what they do.
The first is unfair and cruel, the second is a necessity of daily life and may or may not be cruel depending on circumstances.
Judging someone because of their race, sex, orientation, religious beliefs? Things they have absolutely no direct control over? Pretty much universally decried as unfair at best.
Judging someone because their actions negatively impact other people? The only way laws are created and society moves.
No matter what Eich does, he will be criticized. There is no way for him to win.
First, this is false. The things Eich could have done are wide and varied, and detailed in particular by me and others elsewhere in this very thread. This isn't about "winning". Critical evaluation of actions is not a game where there are winners and losers.
Why does being gay give you more protection than having a private ideology where nobody is hurt
Having a private ideology is one thing. You can think as negatively as you want to of any race, sex, orientation or gender identity. At the moment you throw money at a cause to legislate that thinking, to directly repress people you don't even know, or speak about those opinions in public, it ceases being private. And per the freedom of speech we all get in this country, everyone has the right to comment on it.
Freedom of speech != Freedom from criticism.
Oh, and as mentioned elsewhere, it's expressly illegal in this country to have civil rights unequally applied. Case law recognizes marriage as one of those rights, so even if we remove all ethics from this discussion, it's still illegal.
It's legal, but it's also not conducive to a tolerant society.
And again we disagree at a basic level. Tolerance does not mean accepting intolerance. Intolerance should be named, shamed, and driven out of our society as an ugly and corrupting influence.
This is a favorite tactic of social regressives, mind - upon making some comment or taking some action that incites mass outrage (Akin's "legitimate rape" comment from the election comes to mind, or Limbaugh's calling a woman a "slut" for campaigning for birth control coverage), trying to paint the opposers as the true evil, and usually invoking these flawed, incorrect comparisons to freedom of speech in an attempt to turn the outrage around.
It seldom works.
First of all, attacking others solely based on our "theories" is a "preemptive strike". It's an unprovoked assault. You don't know the truth.
One does not directly support the backers of a bill unless they want that bill passed. His reasons for doing so are irrelevant, but supporting something that unfairly targets and attempts to remove rights from people can be recognized for the evil that it is. Evil doesn't necessarily imply malice aforethought.
Further, his continued support after being informed that this was seen as unacceptable has only one logical conclusion.
Challenging is fine. However, it should be done with respect of the person.
Why should I respect someone who has absolutely none for me, and wants to make my life miserable having never met me? Respect is a two way street, and Eich has not only not earned mine, he's actively went out of his way to destroy any respect he might have had.
You don't support an attack on rights on people you "respect".
My theory is he & his family were being harassed from this.
Your theory has no more support than mine.
I also think he didn't appreciate the group coercion to change his stance on an issue. Coercion is bad.
I'm sure the people who support apartheid didn't appreciate the group coercion to change their stance either. Yet without that coercion, blacks would still be treated as three fifths of a human for the purpose of law. And women would be unable to vote or have most civil rights. And interracial marriages wouldn't be allowed.
Not all coercion is bad. Sometimes coercion is necessary for progress.
Aren't we all a little intolerant?
Thoughts and actions are different things.
One of my coworkers, who I respect greatly, was raised as a devout Christian and thinks that gay marriage is wrong from a moral perspective. You can't logic someone out of something they didn't logic themselves into in the first place - and believe me we've had some interesting talks bout this very topic :)
Do you know why I respect him? Because despite those beliefs, he doesn't support legislation that codifies his moral restrictions on other people into law. He doesn't vote for politicians that do that. He doesn't give money to boosters of laws that would restrict my equal rights. He did what Eich does not - he recognizes that what people do in their private lives has no effect on him or his morals. He doesn't attempt to legislate his moral restrictions in this matter so that everyone must abide by his narrower version of allowed conduct.
We're getting more into legislative philosophy here, but in this country, generally things are allowed unless there is a good reason for them not to be. Restrictions need to have a good reason, and religious beliefs and personal moral qualms are not a good reason for restricting the conduct of the population. Even less so when that comes to restricting a recognized right.
I think most supports don't approach it from a standpoint of hate.
Maybe, maybe not. But I can only judge what they do - and the fact that they want to treat me as a second class citizen is a case of either ignorance (they don't know that this is a big deal, why this is important, why change what isn't broken), arrogance (they feel they have the right to impose their moral restrictions on the world), disdain (they actually feel that I am strange, broken person that should not have my weirdness recognized by law), or religion (they feel that by denying me this right, they are preventing me from sinning against their deity of choice)
All four of those things reflect pretty badly on the person supporting the law. And you're probably tired of hearing me beat this particular drum, but the same four failings I just mentioned played heavily in the interracial marriage fight many years ago... which is why I find it very puzzling that someone can support interracial marriage (or not speak out against it) and then turn around and oppose gay marriage. Puzzling to the point it calls the supposed pure motives of the person into question.
Also, the tone of justifiers of this demonization seems off.
You keep bringing up this word, "demonize", "disrespect" and so on. Why do you think that morally judging Eich's actions is either of these things? I'd bet that if you were to poll the people who spoke out against him, you'd find very little "hate" for him, and a great deal of exactly what I've mentioned here, the 3 facts why this is unacceptable, based not on his motivations, but on his actions.
> Tolerance does not mean accepting intolerance. Intolerance should be named, shamed, and driven out of our society as an ugly and corrupting influence.
Tolerance means respect for all people. It benefits us as a community as well. Positivity or Negativity spreads. Precedents are set by behavior.
I'm against labeling people, because it encourages them to fulfill that label.
'labeling theory postulates that it is possible to prevent social deviance via a limited social shaming reaction in "labelers" and replacing moral indignation with tolerance. Emphasis is placed on the rehabilitation of offenders through an alteration of their label(s)'
> You keep bringing up this word, "demonize", "disrespect" and so on. Why do you think that morally judging Eich's actions is either of these things?
The line is crossed when you judge Eich as a "bigot". You can criticize his support of Prop 8. But when you attack him, you are assaulting his character & giving him the identity of a bigot. It does not help him. It does not help you. It does not change his mind. Tolerance does change minds. Removing fear changes minds.
The perpetrator/victim role dynamic that we ascribe to others goes beyond this Eich scandal. It's a pattern & certain aspects of the so called "rights" movement have created such a story.
Gay rights & Women rights are emotional subjects. Speaking as a heterosexual male, I'm aware of the power a woman has to get her way. If she were to accuse me of violence, even if it's not true & even if there is no other evidence, I'm going to jail. There is no due process. There are also a number of other rights that the male does not have in these situations.
Public perception is conditioned to side with the "victims" against the "perpetrators". In this example, people are going to side with the woman, independent of evidence in this situation. This also includes harsh & unthoughtful anger toward those who are viewed as perpetrators & even those who speak out against the group. There is a air of self-righteousness to this anger, which makes people even less understanding.
That is the dark side of moral righteousness. The target of the crowd are often the victims of brutality, motivated by self-righteousness.
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> Freedom of speech != Freedom from criticism. it's expressly illegal in this country to have civil rights unequally applied. Case law recognizes marriage as one of those rights, so even if we remove all ethics from this discussion, it's still illegal.
I agree with both points. Prop 8 was overturned for good reason. I'm mainly disturbed by the mob mentality & how quickly someone is labeled as a "bigot" (a person who is obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices). That is a serious accusation & label to put on someone.
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I suspect that there is a personality divide on people's opinions. I'm relativistic. I appreciate how morals change with society. Our society is also diverse. One aspect of society enforcing their morality on another aspect of society creates conflict. This is part of culture & ideas. Sometimes, there's a battle.
I'm proposing that we settle this through reflective, mature, & deflamatory discourse. The same facts will come out. The same conclusions would be drawn. There would be less shame, stress, & other resentment. I suspect you would have gotten a more satisfactory answer from Eich.
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> Your theory has no more support than mine.
Exactly. We don't know what happened. He is silent on the issue. There's no evidence of him being a "bigot". He supported prop 8. It would be interesting to know why. Silence is a common response to group criticism.
> the people who support apartheid didn't appreciate the group coercion to change their stance either
Those people were in power used coercion to silence their critics & perpetuate apartheid. The whole system of apartheid was based on disrespect of the individual & labeling races as "inferior".
The only avenue against this system was resistance & to gain the support of other nations. Nelson Mandela did not demonize his opponents. He had respect for his opponents. He won because his vision respects autonomy, inclusiveness, respect, & intelligence.
I'd say the lesson is that, Despite evidence of overwhelming hypocricy amongst one of the biggest and most vocal supporters, LGBTQ's in the valley will form a mob and start boycotts that prove to be just as damaging and counter-productive as anything the conservatives and white power idiots can do.
Another lesson is that if I started a company in the Silicon Valley, released a combination AIDS/Cancer vaccine for free, and used the South Park Redefinition of "Faggot" (referring to insensitive harley motorcycle riders), I would destroy my company and people would boycott the cure for AIDS and Cancer.
Another lesson is that Silicon Valley is just as socially intolerant as Utah, but like most geographically-distinct cases of bigotry, the "lower class" is different. in Mississippi, it's African American crack users. in SV's case, it's anyone not 100% in-step with GLAAD. one is no better than the other.
(disclosure: I'm an lgBtq that thinks that marriage should not be a government institution. if you want tax breaks, incorporate.)
There needs to be a Godwin's corollary for invoking racism about discussion of issues not involving racism at all. If you can't reason about a political issue without comparing your opponents to Hitler or slave owners, then you probably have a terrible opinion.
An equality fight is an equality fight. The closest parallel to this one were the early/mid 1900's ban on interracial marriage - in fact aside from the personal characteristics being argued about, the concerns are identical.
> I'd say a fundamental portion of respect is not encoding your personal beliefs of other people's personal lives into law.
I keep seeing this line from gay marriage supporters. I always have to ask, what exactly is the pro-gay-marriage movement about then? It sounds to me like it's exactly what you're describing here.
There's a fundamental difference between recognizing that what people do with their lives is their business, and attempting to force them to stop through legislative fiat.
Nobody's forcing you to do or not do anything by allowing marriage equality. The same cannot be said of its opponents.
See, the anti-gay-marriage crowd doesn't see it that way. Marriage has historically been a religious ceremony, and by legalizing gay marriage we're codifying what opponents view as an assault on their deeply-held religious beliefs. You might say they are wrong, and you're entitled to say that in our free society. Where my problem comes in is when we try to stamp out any opposing view with the trump card of "bigotry". It's a very strong label that kills any meaningful dialogue.
There seems to be this sect of the American left that prescribes that everyone follow the left-wing cultural viewpoint, while claiming to be inclusive and diverse. The cognitive dissonance is palpable.
>Marriage has historically been a religious ceremony
This is patently false. Religion does not hold a monopoly of any kind on the concept of matrimony.
There is a massive problem with your view. You think a religious belief holds any legal sway. It does not. Laws based on religious overtones are absolutely forbidden by the supreme law of the land. This might be different in other countries, but here? No law concerning an establishment of religion.
In other words, whether or not a law conflicts with any given religious belief is utterly irrelevant to that law. It should not at any point enter the discussion.
>There seems to be this sect of the American left that prescribes that everyone follow the left-wing cultural viewpoint, while claiming to be inclusive and diverse. The cognitive dissonance is palpable.
Yada yada being intolerant of intolerance is actually intolerance.
Because in quite a few cases since 1888, SCOTUS has specifically recognized "marriage" as a fundamental right or all people. Rights recognition like this is specifically granted in the U.S. Constitution (Amendment IX).
Simply put, if 2 same-sex people wish to partake in "marriage" they have a fundamental, unquestionable right to do so. They also have a right not to do so and partake in some other formal or informal coupling agreement at their discretion.
However, there are a tremendous number of laws which grant specific allowances, rights and responsibilities which are specifically tied to the legal meaning of "marriage", which as a fundamental right same-sex people can choose to exercise, is the only coupling agreement that will qualify them for those things.
In terms of efficiency, changing thousands of laws, and the U.S. Constitution to allow for some other separate but equal coupling agreement is less efficient than just ensuring that same-sex couples can exercise the rights they already have.
There's some argument that the government shouldn't be in the marriage business, but it's what we have to work with right now.
No, SCOTUS has affirmed "marriage" in the general sense as being a fundamental right 14 times. There's not a lot of qualification in the recognition of the right.
e.g. Maynard v. Hill (1888)
"Marriage is something more than a mere contract, though founded upon the agreement of the parties. When once formed, a relation is created between the parties which they cannot change, and the rights and obligations of which depend not upon their agreement, but upon the law, statutory or common. It is an institution of society, regulated and controlled by public authority. Legislation, therefore, affecting this institution and annulling the relation between the parties is not within the prohibition of the Constitution of the United States against the impairment of contracts by state legislation."
Meyer v. Nebraska (1923)
"While this Court has not attempted to define with exactness the liberty thus guaranteed, the term has received much consideration and some of the included things have been definitely stated. Without doubt, it denotes not merely freedom from bodily restraint, but also the right of the individual to contract, to engage in any of the common occupations of life, to acquire useful knowledge, to marry, establish a home and bring up children, to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience, and generally to enjoy those privileges long recognized at common law as essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men."
Skinner v. Oklahoma (1942)
"But the instant legislation runs afoul of the equal protection clause, though we give Oklahoma that large deference which the rule of the foregoing cases requires. We are dealing here with legislation which involves one of the basic civil rights of man. Marriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race. The power to sterilize, if exercised, may have subtle, far-reaching and devastating effects. In evil or reckless hands, it can cause races or types which are inimical to the dominant group to wither and disappear. There is no redemption for the individual whom the law touches. Any experiment which the State conducts is to his irreparable injury. He is forever deprived of a basic liberty."
Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)
"We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights -- older than our political parties, older than our school system. Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred. It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Yet it is an association for as noble a purpose as any involved in our prior decisions."
etc.
So it's actually a modern assertion that gay-marriage is not allowed by law as "marriage" in the general sense has been recognized and reinforced numerous times, without specificity as to the nature of the parties involved. It's the modern dawning realization by parties wishing to marry and being denied, and by parties wishing to deny them, that the scope of who can marry is largely unconstrained.
Persons against gay-marriage are actually in a battle to contract the existing right, while persons for gay-marriage are looking for explicit confirmation that they are included in the right. Given the general trend of rights expansion over American history, it's unlikely that an argument to contract an existing right will win without a general rewrite of several Constitutional Amendments (privacy, due process, etc.) explicitly naming the minority class that they wish to specifically oppress.
Just so you won't feel your efforts here have been entirely useless (as one can often feel in such conversations), you have convinced me of this point, that restrictions on marriage are a modern view and not supported by ample case law.
Thanks for the reply. I too have strong emotions about this subject, but am trying to keep conversational about it.
If in question about the Constitution and the intent of it, I usually just refer to the first bits of the Declaration of Independence
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness"
Which is a longer and more arduous process to fix. In the mean time, you've got a constitutional issue that must be addressed now.
California had a few options here.
* Redefine all "marriages" as "civil unions". Makes the religious folks and libertarians happy, but introduces a problem in that you've deleted something that every other state recognizes. How will marriages in other states carry over? How about contracts that recognize a marriage (out of state insurance comes to mind)? Etc? Those would all be invalid. You've also ensured that any union in California (ANYONE's, not just LGBT's) would be invalid in any other state because they're legally not marriages anymore.
I say this solution introduces what would be known in the packaging world as dependency hell. Too many other things rely on the first thing to exist in its current state. You've introduced a change that is going to break a lot of things without dealing with them first.
Bad idea all around.
* Amend the legal definition of marriage to include any two people. Simplest thing that could possibly work, ensures that marriages performed in the state will be recognized elsewhere and for other purposes. No dependency issues. Annoys the religious folks a bit, but religious views have no say in law anyways!
This is a rational argument, and this is the argument people should be having with those who oppose it rather than name calling and mudslinging. But nothing that you say here justifies calling those who oppose this bigots, etc. Either way, the California legislature is probably the wrong place to have this discussion, as a marriage in California wouldn't necessarily be recognized in other states anyways.
I think that was part of the goal of redefining marriage legally. Which is pretty damn brilliant once you think about it.
The full faith and credit clause ensures that contracts (which is what a marriage technically is) are valid in all other states in the union. This completely sidesteps any local laws that might be otherwise inferior, and also ensures that the case can be easily escalated (all the way to SCOTUS if necessary) in case of issues.
> Marriage has historically been a religious ceremony
This depends on where and when you constrain your view. Marriage is a diverse institution with as many manifestations as there are years in the existence of civilization.
> Marriage has historically been a religious ceremony, and by legalizing gay marriage we're codifying what opponents view as an assault on their deeply-held religious beliefs.
Let's buy that argument for a moment. And let's suppose that religious interference in law isn't explicitly forbidden by the U.S. Constitution.
Which religion or religious faction then should supply the law? The particular Christian denomination I was raised in says gay people can marry and they'll even do the marrying. And they can even become priests! They represent over 2 million (1 in 150) Americans. I can think of at least a half dozen other Christian denominations alone that not only allow for same-sex marriage, but will perform marriage and otherwise allow for full religious participation of gay members.
Why should the teachings of my religion be shut down in favor of somebody else's? Who gets to pick which religion we follow? Am I now being forced to follow somebody else's religion?
(I don't support forcing other religions to observe same-sex relationships, people are free to leave their religion and go somewhere else or nowhere as they please).
> Marriage has historically been a religious ceremony, and by legalizing gay marriage we're codifying what opponents view as an assault on their deeply-held religious beliefs.
Couldn't the same be said about civil marriage in general? Yet I don't see many religious groups opposing civil marriage between a man and a woman.
There's a fundamental difference between supporting the government's authority in the realm of marriage, and supporting the government's authority to ban homosexuality itself. One can, for example, easily oppose laws which ban homosexual cohabitation, while also opposing government having any role in marriage.
> I'd say a fundamental portion of respect is not encoding your personal beliefs of other people's personal lives into law.
I fully believe that claim, but that's because I'm a crazy anarchist. If you're not a crazy anarchist, then you probably don't fully believe that claim.
And yet elsewhere in this thread you're saying a man who literally made laws negatively affecting gays should be able to keep his job because hey, the economy.
If you'd stop willfully misinterpreting my posts, you'd know that was not what I was saying at all. The whole point there was that certain things are more important than other things at certain times.
And I did say five years ago, which you conveniently omitted from your little summary here.
But you're single issue on Eich. Who wasn't actually making laws against same sex marriage, but instead made open source software that improved the world.
The other side of this coin is that marriage has religious significance to many people, and by forcing the definition to change, pro-gay rights groups are also codifying personal belief into law.
Both sides fucked it up. The only proper response should have been to remove all legal rights associated with marriage, and force all couples to get a civil union. Tax that instead. Churches are welcome to marry people all they desire (on both sides, gay or straight as they please according to their beliefs)
>religious significance to many people, and by forcing the definition to change, pro-gay rights groups are also codifying personal belief into law.
The establishment clause to the constitution says that religious beliefs do not get to be encoded in law. And considering I have not seen one single anti-equality argument that wasn't either religiously motivated or a gigantic mass of "appeal to tradition" fallacies, I suggest the "anti" side move to a different country where theocracy is an accepted form or government. Because this isn't one.
> The only proper response should have been to remove all legal rights associated with marriage, and force all couples to get a civil union. Tax that instead.
I'd be okay with this, but it's not a change that happens overnight. There are too many things.. insurance benefits, tax benefits, inheritances, visitation rights, etc. associated with the spousal relationship. Those will take some time to work through. In the mean time, this is a suitable band-aid.
There already was a suitable band-aid, it was called domestic partnerships, and had the full legal rights of marriage in California.
Co-opting the word marriage in law, rather than asking for it to be removed was actively choosing to force religions to accept your personal beliefs.
That's bullying.
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That said, I generally fall much closer on the scale to you than to the supporters of prop 8, but you have to be able to recognize and draw a line as to where your rights end. Attacking a personal donation made as part of a democratic process is not something I can condone. Particularly when the end result cost a man his job.
Ah yes, "separate but equal". Where have I heard this before...
>actively choosing to force religions to accept your personal beliefs.
Nonsense. Churches do not have a monopoly on the word or the concept of matrimony. If there was any consistency in religious beliefs whatsoever, there would be infinitely more backlash at the Vegas drive through chapels than two people wanting to live their lives together in peace.
And my response to the separate but equal argument is literally sitting in my comment above, and part of my argument, remove rights from the word marriage. There is ONLY civil unions. There is no separation.
You yourself claimed that appropriating the word marriage was a band-aid, and yet you ignore that a band-aid was in place, and a much more rational argument would have been to remove rights associated with marriage.
Instead you continue to argue that codifying your beliefs into law was correct, even while you denounce the other side for trying to do that.
Come back when you can intelligently make an argument that is internally consistent. I have to agree with the others commenting on your posts, you have some serious cognitive dissonance.
> Come back when you can intelligently make an argument that is internally consistent. I have to agree with the others commenting on your posts, you have some serious cognitive dissonance.
Could it be that you've managed to ferret out hypocrisy in their mental model in just a few short minutes?
Or are you (and others) just straw-manning their position to be "Discrimination is bad no matter what!" so you can tear it down easily? I hope you yourself don't subscribe to that mental model, because it's not only overly-reductive, but like you said, it actually just plain doesn't work - neither in favor of the status quo or for changing it.
>and part of my argument, remove rights from the word marriage.
And as I said before, I'm fine with this, but it's a process that takes longer than fixing the inequality now. You could write a law that says all marriages are now civil unions, but in doing so you've broken the dependency chain to any out-of-state agency that uses "marriage" as anything in particular underpinning any kind of contract.
The simplest, easiest thing to do is to amend the legal (not religious) definition of marriage to fix this problem. The religious definition of marriage is irrelevant to the legal one.
>Instead you continue to argue that codifying your beliefs into law was correct
Yeah, fuck me for wanting equality like blacks and women.
Yo, FUCKHEAD: You claimed appropriating marriage was a band-aid. BUT... you ALREADY HAD THE FUCKING RIGHTS. You JUST WANT TO ARGUE ABOUT WHAT MARRIAGE IS.
FUCK YOU. You don't give a SHIT about the rights, because you don't even know that you already have them. You JUST WANT TO FORCE RELIGION to let you call it marriage.
And we've already had the separate but equal argument, don't even fucking bother with it. You can't stand that you can't make a coherent argument here, because you're a bully. A fucking FUCKHEAD bully.
I'm not going to delete it, it's there for a reason.
Maybe you're just so busy arguing with everyone else that you can't remember who said what, or what we were even talking about. But you've intentionally walked in circles, and had problems making a consistent argument.
You claim you wanted rights without even knowing that you had them, or acknowledging that my proposed solution also does away with the separate but equal bullshit.
And yes, you insult me every time you make derisive comments like "Yeah, fuck me for wanting equality like blacks and women." That's just a plain lie. There's no lack of equality, and I'm even agreeing with you about the separate but equal statements. You still demand that you're right though, and insist that I must be a bigot.
That's demeaning to me, and it short circuits a real discussion, like you've been trying to do all along. You're JUST as bad as the supporters of prop 8, and that's what I'm trying to call out.
>I'm not going to delete it, it's there for a reason.
Demonstrating your hypocrisy when you throw around the word "bully", apparently.
> or acknowledging that my proposed solution also does away with the separate but equal bullshit.
That particular argument was debunked both by me up top (what about other states? what about federally? what about non-government entities?) and by other people in this thread. Your proposed solution does nothing of the sort considering that you completely ignore the time issue I've brougnt up twice now.
>You're JUST as bad as the supporters of prop 8, and that's what I'm trying to call out.
More insults?
You have shown beyond any doubt that you are incapable of having a mature discussion without pounding the keyboard like an impudent child ("FUCKHEAD", really?) completely ignoring points that are inconvenient for your argument, and all around going well out of your way to misinterpret what I say and lower the standard of discussion here.
Prop 8 was part of a long-running--to this day--national campaign to create and maintain this separation across many jurisdictions with different takes on marriage and civil union. The campaign has employed every negative tactic imaginable. You have to look at it in that context to understand why it's still an issue, even if it seems okay on the level of one state.
The trouble is, it's easy to give one class new things that the other doesn't get, making them unequal again. Making marriage equal ensures everyone acts fairly when modifying the legal institution of marriage.
edit: Since HN won't let me reply to bluntly_said --
Trouble is, the fight to move those rights to civil unions and properly separate church and state is a decades-longer fight. I would like to be able to get those essential legal protections within my lifetime. We can finish the job in a few years when marriage equality is universal.
But I think this is still wrong. Giving marriage any rights at all is respecting a religious practice in the government.
I think we solve the problem not by forcing those who are religious to accept gays, or by forcing gay people to accept a different word for the same rights. I think we solve it by acknowledging that marriage should never have had rights, and forcing anyone who wants the rights currently afforded to marriage, gay or straight, to get a civil union. Or hell, if you don't like civil union, call it a taxed co-habitation rights application.
Once the government has no interest in marriage, no one can stop a gay person for getting married if they'd like to. Just like no one can force a very religious community or church to recognize that marriage.
A practice that religion happens to do - not a religious practice. Marriage did not originate as a religious ceremony, but as a legal contract to deal with things like childen and property.
The fact that various churches horned in on this should carry no meaning, or else you're setting a really bad precedent, namely that anything enough churches do cannot be legislated on in any way.
Sorry, but I find it incredulous that the only reason that some folks are unwilling to give LGBT folks the right to marry is because of what the state happens to call the practice.
Why is that hard to believe? A lot of people demonstrably oppose calling it marriage, even when homosexual couples already have the same legal rights and benefits as heterosexual couples.
I think the issue is that as long as the state endows rights to religious practice (marriage) there is a problem.
If the state only gave rights and taxed civil unions, the churches cannot, by definition, control if other people get married. All they'd need to do is find a church willing to marry them, or start their own.
To quote from another of my posts:
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I think once the legal implications are removed, churches would lose their control over the word by default. It doesn't have meaning outside of the church at that point, and the government "shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" So if gay people wanted to get married, no one could stop them.
> I think the issue is that as long as the state endows rights to religious practice (marriage) there is a problem.
Legal marriage and religious marriage are already not the same thing. That was the entire point of my statement - that legally, it didn't matter what the state called it because it is a separate institution. You can get legally married without a religious ceremony.
I agree with this point of view, and have always been a bit skeptical of the gay marriage movement because of it. But on the other side, it sounds like Prop 8 is the exact opposite of what we're talking about - a measure to codify the definition of marriage and define it as exclusively heterosexual into the constitution. I can't think of any decent reason to support it.
Treating people with respect also means holding their opinions up to a respectable standard. There are some opinions that are disrespectable that otherwise good people harbor. Because you respect them, those opinions are even less tolerable.
As Karunamon states, no more evidence is needed than his financial support for a bigoted law, and his subsequent failure to rescind this support.
It's kind of sad that this needs to be repeated so often, but Proposition 8 was an attempt to limit the rights of a minority of the population (a minority I happen to belong to, as a bisexual man). It is an unprovoked act of aggression -- bullying, if you want.
If Eich had donated $1000 for a law seeking to prohibit marriage between Jews, would you still be asking Karunamon to "elaborate on when Eich said they were second-class citizens"?
I just want to add that I applaud Karunamon's cogent and spirited defense of LGBT rights.
So, I can interpret your reply as "no. I could not find any examples of Brendan Eich saying that gays were second-class citizens." I appreciate your agreement in this.
I am not familiar with the asterisk variant: LGBTQ*. Initially I thought it was a italic formatting error but you have used it in a number of places in addition to lgBtq. What does the added asterisk represent? And is there any significance to the capitalization of "lgBtq"?
in recent years, most pride marches and supporting organizations have adopted the asterisk to handle the inclusiveness of all those that aren't neccessarily "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, genderQueer", but still fall under the umbrella of the movement. Recently, this has included Genderfluids, Furries and the Polyamorous as well.
I capitalized the letter in which I personally identify. though I can't capitalize the asterisk. :)
You're demonstrating the exact problem the person to whom you were responding was discussing.
You can take a "damn them all and defeat them at all costs" stance if you want to. There's always something that "the other side" did at some point that you can avoid looking past or working with.
Grind that axe forever, I guess... but as the previous poster said, that level of intransigence is disheartening.
> Eich found it easier to treat millions of people he's never met as second class citizens
You act as if Prop 8 didn't pass by 52.24% of the voting public, or by 7 million people. But no, Eich was dictator of California, enslaving millions of gays. Or whatever.
I'm not qualified to tell the other side of the story. I don't know why Eich made that contribution. Neither do you.
It might have been family pressure, it might have honestly been that he's religious and doesn't believe the word "marriage" can be applied to same sex couple (who had Domestic partnerships available in California, which provide the same legal rights as marriage, so I find the "second class citizen" argument entirely lacking. [although now I'll wait to be attacked for simply stating that, even if you have no idea what my personal beliefs on the matter are])
Again, life is filled with shades of gray. Hell, maybe mozilla even benefited from the donation in ways that aren't clear (and they didn't want to put out in the media) You just don't fucking know. Instead you've decided this man should lose his livelyhood based on hearsay and rumor, and outrage on the internet.
We have public information. The public information is damning: he donated to an organization that ran a campaign of hateful slurs against gay people in order to permanently deny them their human rights in the California Constitution.
I guess there might be some private exonerating information, but I have a hard time imagining what it might be.
Again, the "deny them their human rights" argument fails to pass the bullshit test.
The had domestic partnerships, they had the full legal rights marriage granted available. Prop 8's entire quibble was over the word marriage, so was the pro-gay rights movement. Both sides are trying to codify belief into law, both are wrong.
The first is that you simply have your facts dead wrong. Domestic partnerships did not grant all the benefits of marriage. The federal government did not recognize them, and other states didn't recognize them, and other countries didn't. The only way Californians could fix that inequity was through supporting marriage.
Two: if this was such a quibble, why did Prop 8 proponents feel the need to spend tens of millions of dollars attacking gay people with dark and disturbing allegations? If it's just a matter of terminology, why be so hateful and angry about it?
"Family" or "religious" pressure is fucking pathetic.
We're supposed to be talking about adults here, why don't you change his diapers while you're at it?
If family or community is such a strong force in our lives, maybe the systemic criminalization of those concepts for certain people is a bigger tragedy than you admit.
I'm not qualified to tell the other side of the story.
What a cop out. You're, like everyone else who disagrees with this, downplaying Eich's behavior and trying to turn activists into the "real" monsters for speaking out.
Why the double standard? Why does one man, Eich, get a pass on speaking out for his personal political beliefs (with cash), but you demonize the the (hundreds? thousands? more?) people who did nothing but say that it was unacceptable?
You want pathetic? Look at your own post. Realize what you're defending. You should be ashamed of yourself.
Nope. Not one bit. Shitstorm like this just reinforces my people that all people are equally capable of evil and good. This time with emphasis on evil.
I don't get what does his private belief have to do with making Firefox? Seriously, what?
Also replace this scandal with person X becoming CEO and then media discovering he fucked a cat once. Do you think he'd really rise to top ranks and suddenly turn the firm into a place for cat orgies?
I appreciate the intensity of the issue, but personal attacks are not allowed on Hacker News.
Edit: thanks to seertaak below for pointing out that this was trivial compared to what Karunamon was responding to.
I get that it gives the wrong impression to admonish one person while ignoring something much worse. On the other hand, we (and certainly I) can't read all the comments, so there's inevitably some randomness here. I can't promise to get everything right, but I do promise to listen to correcting feedback.
You understand you're the definition of a schoolyard bully, right?
I've read all my posts, several times. I'm internally consistent, and I almost always favor cautious respect over ignorant bashing.
I'm not even defending Eich, again, I don't know him. I'm stating that a social environment where a man loses a job Mozilla thought he was qualified for because of private personal beliefs and internet outrage is not only actively undemocratic, it's foolish and childish.
> loses a job Mozilla thought he was qualified for because of private personal beliefs
Ah yes, this again. The old, "yes, his personal values seriously conflict with the employer's values[1] but hey, he can still check his opinions at the door when he comes in to work and do a good job!" gambit. My opinion is that this is transparently balderdash. The CEO represents the brand. The CEO's values matter. The CEO's values will out. People don't have firewalls in their heads between personal and professional like that.
I would like to state that me and others expressing our opinions here in normal language does not constitute bullying, a "lynch mob" and does not compel Mozilla or any other company to do anything. Characterising it as other than free speech is incorrect.
>I'm stating that a social environment where a man loses a job Mozilla thought he was qualified for because of private personal beliefs
Private "personal beliefs" that he reached into his wallet and tried to force into law. This is the one thing that people don't seem to understand. Eich didn't just think gays were second class citizens. This isn't a "thoughtcrime" he's being pilloried for.
It was the action. The donation, coupled with his complete refusal to backtrack, explain, or apologize. Just evade and spin all day long.
I have absolutely no problem stamping Eich with "unrepentant bigot" on his forehead because he's proven beyond any shadow of a doubt that those are his beliefs. It is both unreasonable and inconsistent to give him "the benefit of the doubt" after his behavior when the donations came to light. There is no question anymore.
>actively undemocratic, it's foolish and childish.
I don't think you know what democracy means.
Publicly proclaim your allegiance to Stormfront or a group that holds similar regressive views for women, and tell me your life will remain unaffected.
Hey this is my first post. The word "bigot" seems to be used a lot in these post. I was curious to find out what was the exact definition of the word and found this on m-w.com: "a person who strongly and unfairly dislikes other people, ideas, etc...one who regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance" I have a hard time believing that a guy who worked for a company as diverse as Mozilla with almost no signs of mistreating his gay or lesbian employees could be given such a strong label, again, someone who "strongly and unfairly dislikes" gays.
As someone new to this post, your comments seem to be more aligned with this definition then Eich's. For someone who seeks equality, your post seem full of "hatred and intolerance."
And remember that "a hate group" is actually "more than one hate groups" because Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul definitely qualify as haters and bigots.
If you have the stomach, google yourself up some Pat Buchanan quotes -- it's really vile and disgusting stuff, and he absolutely and without question qualifies as an archetypal "bigot".
In fact, the Guardian article that recently outed him as contributing money to Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul happened between the short time that he announced in an interview he was NOT going to resign, and between when he DID resign, so it may have been a factor, the straw (or rather the bay of straw) that broke the camel's back.
No, I think you've decided that when democracy doesn't cater exactly to your personal morals, it must be wrong.
Making a donation based on private, personal beliefs is ENTIRELY the point of a democracy. The correct action is to speak out in support of your ideas, not to cast hatred on those who disagree.
Instead of sitting here arguing, you could have gone and made a 10 dollar donation to a pro-lbgt group, and done a lot more good. Instead of forcing Eich to resign, you could have used it as a rallying point to get A LOT of other like minded people to make that same 10 dollar donation. You could have chosen to voice your opinions with both words and monetary support, (like Eich did) instead of attacking the opposition. You aren't doing that.
So in other words, if you as an activist do anything that has a real impact, you're a "fucking bully", but you "support my actions" if I take meaningless, "feel good" steps.
Turn it around. Eich found it easier to treat millions of people he's never met as second class citizens, than to act with dignity and respect.
There are two sides to this story, and you seem to be very eager to tell the one and handwave the other for a "why can't we all just get along" platitude.