Do you, at all, consider, at least sometimes, that people that disagree with you might have to say something intelligent about their position? I am not trying to defend homophobism, irrespective of the question of Brendan Eichs action or believes are homophobe, or not. But, I do believe that somebody disagreeing with me, might have something to tell me. I believe even that it is boring to talk to people with whom I agree on everything, although it is comforting and easy. There is value in communicating with people of different believes, standpoints, intellectual fields, religions, or sexual orientation or ... . Therefore, I cannot fathom how people can prefer being lied to.
In your worldview at what point can I start rejecting people's positions? Why do I have to give ground here?
"you can just lie" is a cynical position, of course, but people are faced with much larger dilemnas. I would like for people to have basic empathy and _not_ finance anti-civil rights movements. But hey, at least a public apology/fix does a bit of damage to the reactionary movement.
And maybe they are actually a different person or have reflected on their actions, and it's not a lie. Nobody's a mind reader.
And when you are directly affected/targeted by the movement that Eich is donating too, it's not just a conversation. The guy was funding an effort to take away your rights.
Maybe consider that "you have to be nice to people trying to take away your rights" is something that relatively few people would actually subscribe to.
He actively chose between "have a good relationship with employees at Mozilla" and "stick to his guns on the issue at hand". He made that decision, and had a hell of a lot of agency in how things turned out.
Granted this was a while ago, but imagine being so committed to anti-marriage equality that you do what he did? Why do you feel the need to carry water for somebody doing that?