Care to elaborate this? Last time I read, the Mozilla Manifeto[1] says nothing about marriage rights or anything marginally related.

[1] https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/about/manifesto/

Edit: we're not going to have this debate for every minority group. This equal rights thing is happening, whether you like it or not.

That's the deal. They all think differently on subjects unrelated to the Manifesto. True, there may be cases where the ratio is 99% against 1%. But it's still there.

Once diversity meant surrounding oneself with people different from you and learning to deal with them. Now some people understand diversity as surrounding oneself with people looking superficially different but thinking virtually the same, within very near bounds. This is just sad and wrong.

Yes, government-sponsored birth control is a hot issue and many CEOs are having a hard time reconciling it. And, yes some people have quit over it. So, yes, it's similar.

Being pro-diversity does not mean being morally obligated to accept racism or hate-induced views. That's pretzel logic.

>>> Being pro-diversity does not mean being morally obligated to accept racism or hate-induced views

It does not mean that, of course. But it also does not mean you should try to ruin the life of everybody who disagrees with you.

The bare minimum compliance with current law is no way run a company. Great companies do more for their employees than the law requires.

I don't see anyone (other than idiot internet trolls) wanting his life ruined. All I see are some pretty compelling arguments for some difficulties he will face as a CEO and a lot of anguish that this had to happen at all.

If he'd just shown some empathy in that CNet interview, I wonder if things would have gone differently? It read like an engineer's response, not like a CEO. Alas.

>>> If he'd just shown some empathy in that CNet interview, I wonder if things would have gone differently?

I think this is disingenuous. The campaign people were absolutely out for him for donating to prop 8 and won't be satisfied unless he's gone from CEO position. Saying it like "oh, if only he'd say this and that then it all be fine" doesn't make any sense - it wouldn't be fine for people who called to boycott Mozilla over it until he'd be gone. Now he's gone, and probably own't be able to serve in high position in any large company, because if he were, the same people would immediately use it to get more air time attacking him. Does it ruin his life? I don't know, depends on the point of view. But definitely it will have a lasting impact.

He could have let the campaign bluster. A good CEO will piss a few people off anyway. It's inevitable. Eich could have let a few developers quit, but shown everyone else (especially the board!) why he's the right person for the job.

Unfortunately, his recent bumbling turned a medium PR mess into a major one, and demonstrated that he might not be CEO material after all. That's my take anyway -- I don't believe the original donation was the cause of his resignation, just the trigger.

There are a number of Silicon Valley companies that would hire him to a high position today. Probably not to CEO or HR of course. Or PR. But remember how many influential friends he has -- they won't be swayed by this mess. In a few months, when all this has blown over, I expect most companies will be happy to forget this ever happend.

His life is far from ruined.

I don't think that this follows. In this particular case, someone was promoted to a role which many felt was incompatible with his personal views; they made that known, and the person in question stepped down. That's kind of how things should work in a community enterprise.

That said, I understand he's received wildly disproportionate abuse, like death threats. That's totally unacceptable, and frankly I'm surprised that anybody feels that strongly about the issue.

Is it a detailed email summarized as "I know where you live, you better watch your step, because I'm going to kill you"?

Or a tweet of "Fuck off and die"

Indeed, I've gotten quite a few death threats myself over the years for my radical cause of trying to improve the quality of video game emulators.

The problem with the internet is that you can't really judge a person's mental state from a text post. Quite often the person on the other end making the threats is literally mentally ill.

I love your work by the way.

God's work. Thank you for this.

That said, death threats are always disproportional, and I think we can all agree that however you feel about Eich and his contribution, they were uncalled for.

The lack of survivor benefits is ridiculous. But it is (or could and should be) completely orthogonal to how government defines the term "marriage."

"many felt was incompatible with his personal views"

Who all is "many" here? People at Mozilla? People in the tech industry? People who are LGBT? Angry people on the internet with nothing better to do than troll?

People who actually were directly and personally affected by Eich's actions in donating, of which there are quite few compared to the number of people weighing in on this?

It's easy to have an echo-chamber hollering for blood, but let's not pretend that those voices have any automatic credibility.

Is this the case? There are a whole bunch of LGBT people working at Mozilla, and in the wider tech community. On top of that, there are families and friends of these people, who while not being personally affected can certainly legitimately object to the damage done to their close peers.

I suspect that this affects more people than you are implying.

Again, what damage, and how does that get traced directly back to Eich? The law was repealed, marriage reinstated, and everything's fine. The system worked, so what's the issue?

And a "whole bunch"? How many? Numbers? Percentage? Let us not suspect--we are in the Information Age. Google your way to success.

The only number we have is $1000 from Eich to support Prop 8--that's the only number we have. Somehow that one number is enough evidence to cost the man his job, but magically nobody else has to back up their assails.

Look, if the numbers for this act justify the outrage, sure, I'll recant--but that simply hasn't happened yet, and the bookkeeping is pretty shoddy.

And furthermore, are you really trying to say we should have to directly tie how that money went into the Prop 8 bank account and then was spent to influence voters in California?

You're making completely irrational requests. Showing up at an anti-civil rights protest back in the 60s may not have directly influenced someone to keep their mouth shut out of safety(and how would you prove that it did), but it has an influence and to act like because you can't directly tie it to someone is to absolve people of any past wrongdoings short of force.

Changing your mind is okay. Saying you were wrong is okay. They need to be, as society grows and matures. But the same as the risks taken by those who try to push society's opinions ahead of itself, if you lag behind you're just as likely to get hurt.

Sorry, and I hate to be the one to say it, but his view isn't that far from mainstream. In fact, it would seem less than a decade ago, it was quite popular.

Just because your opinion is currently popular, doesn't mean the people who disagreed with you six years ago owe you an apology or they can't have a job.

So, yeah, I don't think it's unreasonable that, in exchange, we be able to show both columns in the ledger.

When controversial stuff like this happens, it is sadly common to receive death threats on the internet. Given that employees merely voicing support received death threats, I would be surprised if the CEO did not receive such things as well.

While I agree with you that the HN crowd is not YouTube, there are still many people reading this and sharing with others etc., and since the blogger I am talking about has already been harassed, I don't see a point in drawing more attention there. It doesn't help our discussion anyhow, there are only downsides.

[citation needed]

It must have been difficult for him to receive the same treatment as every sufficiently notable LGBT individual.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/6239098.stm - 17% of UK gay students report receiving death threats

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2008/victims.html - 17% of hate crimes in the US (2008) are related to sexual orientation (mainly against male homosexuals).

I think it would be fair to extrapolate that famous gay people also receive plenty of death threats.

I completely disagree with his position, but I don't think shutting him up or vilifying him is the answer.

If he held to his own beliefs, but allowed others to have their own beliefs and live their lives how they wanted, I sincerely doubt this would have been such a big issue.

I think this controversy is an indication that -- to the tech community at least -- believing that discrimination based on sexual orientation is one of those illegitimate beliefs.

Finally, personal political views absolutely enter in to public debate when the views are held by a public figurehead that is in place to represent the ideals of an organization. This is how you change public opinion, by making it dangerous to hold these views and still be supported or taken seriously.

People didn't just suddenly decide not to be racist. It took endless shaming of the people that hold those views until those views are no longer the norm, then the next generation grows up in an environment where that kind of bigotry is considered reprehensible and instead of just hiding their bigotry due to shame, they actually find it reprehensible.

This is social change in action. Personal views aren't sacrosanct, and simply believing in something and having the right to say it doesn't entitle you to be tolerated or respected by those who hear it.

Free speech isn't a license to say or do whatever the fuck you want without consequence. It simply protects you from government censorship or physical violence.

I presume most Mozilla users, myself included, are in favor of gay marriage, yet there is no clause that you "have to support gay marriage" to use Mozilla software. It's also obvious that if Eich ever let his political beliefs affect his decisions on software he would be fired immediately.

Yes, those who support gay marriage are "right" and history will show this. But the graceful thing to do when you're right is not to curb-stomp those who were wrong. It's not to rub it in their face. It's not to ruin their lives because they made a mistake.

The graceful thing to do when you are right is to let those who were wrong to get away with it. To let them pretend like it never happened.

Because "winning" history is not about destroying those who opposed you.

Eich never said that he was wrong. That’s his prerogative – he can have that opinion – but I’m not sure why anyone would forgive someone who isn’t even asking for forgiveness.

I’m really all for forgiving mistakes and being graceful. There is no reason to rub someone’s past mistakes in their face when they already admitted to making a mistake. Humans screw up, even CEOs. I think in general we need to be more forgiving.

But Eich never asked for forgiveness, so that’s really a moot point with him.

Of course, harassment is not ok, but I really can’t see a problem (and also no internet mob) in voicing your opinion (even strongly worded) and calling for a boycott.

Is gay marriage, or equality in general, now going in a different direction because Eich was forced to resign?

Can you come up with any positive effect of this controversy?

If the answer is no, and I believe it is, then I don't think you can call any of this graceful.

Donating $1000 to support a movement that undermines human equality is incredibly out of line with Mozilla's views. From my perspective, that's about a month's rent or a mortgage payment; he must care about the issue a lot to donate that much of his own money. His interview non-apologies certainly didn't help the issue.

Is it the most monumental gain ever, or the cause for a "different direction" for gay marriage? Of course not, few things are. It's a war made up of small battles, and small victories that add up. That's how societal change works.

Since we're just throwing questions, here is one for you: How exactly do you think most societal change occurs?

I prefer the term 'equality'. This particular fight is just one example of a large group of people trying to prevent a smaller group of people which they dislike from enjoying the same benefits as the larger group. There are many others, and they're all equally important on principle.

It's not about being gay; it's about being equal no matter who you are or what you do.

Brendan has don neither, and in fact has pretty much doubled-down on his opposition with his clearly crafted non-answers.

There are, and should be, limits to how much we allow politics to influence business, but in this case we're not talking about issues of small import. This isn't about monetary policy or minimum wages, this is an issue related to the civil rights and equitable treatment of millions of human beings. It's OK to take that issue extremely seriously.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ochlocracy [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_action_committee

It's a large group lobbying a nonprofit to persuade it to have someone who represents the ideals they supposedly uphold. That Mozilla is a company that shouldn't stand for X political position is something lots of people agree with. That the CEO is the company face and can be held to a different standard than an ordinary employee is clear to a larger group than just activists for cause X (even if some large group on HN don't seem to grasp it).

For example, some movement to force the CEO of company X take a positive position in favor of political cause Y would have a lot harder time because it would seem much less reasonable to a larger group.

If this were a CEO who had been found to be donating to ban blacks and whites marrying it wouldn't even be a discussion.

It basically comes down to this - if Mozilla cares this much about what the internet thinks of it this strongly, then why didn't they pick someone else to begin with?

So Mozilla has to "act" the way some people "expect them to act". There was not even a ballot, poll or evaluation of the man in the position. It was a pretty ridiculous move to avoid bad press. Talk about to sticking to values like meritocracy.

http://pastebin.com/ekaFQXbE

Also, almost all of the donations predate OkCupid's acquisition by IAC in February 2011.

This is such an important point. Please, let us not put all our eggs in one basket.

"I don’t see there’s much to gain by asking Brendan to resign."

And then: "Beyond that I guess I only have one more thing to say, which is to Brendan, who is doubtless also having one of the most challenging weeks of his professional life.

Brendan, I grew up in a very conservative religious home and many of the people I love the most can still be described as very religious and very conservative. I think your views on this issue are wrong, and that your actions have done harm, but I can no more caricature you as a terrible person driven by homophobia and hatred than I can break off relations with my cherished family members because they take actions similar to yours."

Why are you completely mischaracterising her post (and, by extension, her)?

[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/03/28/three-mozilla-board-m...

"The three board members ended their terms last week for a variety of reasons. Two had been planning to leave for some time, one since January and one explicitly at the end of the CEO search, regardless of the person selected."

[0] http://arstechnica.com/business/2014/03/three-mozilla-board-...