From Eich's position, and assuming he wanted to lead Mozilla, and assuming Mozilla wanted above all else for Eich to lead Mozilla, yes. Lying would have been the best move.

In a greater societal context, I'm not sure. I think it is naive to say being 100% honest and transparent 100% of the time is always the best solution, as theoretically appealing as that is. I think it depends on whether you personally think the greater good Mozilla could have done with Eich as CEO, if any, outweighs the (positive?) message that we send when we force people with unpopular beliefs out of their positions. I purposefully ignore the actual monetary contribution, since the Supreme Court struck down Prop 8 anyway.

This is the culture we've created for ourselves. The only people who can be in a position of power or publicity must be sanitized to the extreme. Hold a view that isn't mainstream and you will be eviscerated by a mob that has hijacked the media. I guarantee that no one has a completely "right" set of views that won't anger some faction of the population enough to create a mob response. Of course, we still need politicians, CEOs, and presidents. And thus the only way these people can rise to the top is to lie through their teeth. This is the environment we've created, and thus this is what we get.

Incentives matter, and instances like this simply re-enforce the fact that one must lie about their true opinions otherwise you will be tarred and feathered.

"sanitized to the extreme"

"Hold a view that isn't mainstream"

We're not talking about slightly controversial views, 'colorful' language, or a 'racy' past here, we're talking about out-and-out homophobia, wanting people to be treated as lesser humans simply because of who they love. Please, that is a LONG way from being 'sanitized to the extreme'.

Personally I think your characterization is hyperbole. There are a lot of rational reasons to oppose gay marriage (if you allow one their irrational premises). Opposing the state recognizing gay marriage is far from "treating people as lesser humans".

If there were no state benefits for those married, of course. But there are. Both opposing gay marriage AND not opposing that benefit system is patently discriminatory - how could it be anything else? It is saying 'there is no way you are going to get the same benefits as other people, because of whom you happen to love'.

I was under the impression that a sizeable amount of people are against gay marriage for purely symbolic reasons and that they would be fine with civil unions, which would grant all the same legal benefits of marriage. Under this scenario opposition to gay marriage seems more like a political/religious belief rather than a civil rights issue.

It seems like a semantic belief in that case, which doesn't seem to be worth spending $1,000 on, let alone the rest. Unfortunately, I don't share your optimism: I suspect that many of those objecting have a pathological dislike of gay people.

If this were true, then all religious bigots would simultaneously be "pro civil unions", which is like never the case.

I agree with you, they are two different tunes, but never sung simultaneously in practice.

Err, did you actually read Prop 8 legislation?

This was never about "treating people as lesser humans", despite the cawing hyperbole from the pro-homosexual-marriage faction...

This was basically a semantic debate.

Marriage, for most of recorded history, was defined as one thing.

There's a new style of relationship that's arisen in modern times, and that group wants to extend the definition of marriage to cover that as well.

Heck, in many countries, you don't even need a marriage, leg alone a civil union - simply being in a de-facto relationship (i.e. living together) will give you the same privileges (tax, medical etc.)

It was never about privileges (government's can't grant rights), but just about ideologies.

> There are a lot of rational reasons to oppose gay marriage (if you allow one their irrational premises).

How can you have a rational reason with an irrational premise? If the premise is irrational, so is anything based on it.

I disagree. Rationality is the process of deducing new knowledge from existing knowledge and axioms. Axioms generally aren't rational in this sense. "Irrational premises" were meant specifically to evoke the idea of religion, not necessarily as the opposite of "rational" used in the preceding sentence.

I genuinely don't want to rag on religious people, but I don't think that's legit. "We need to cut out peoples' hearts and offer them to the gods, because if we don't the sun won't rise" is not a "rational" argument for human sacrifice by any useful standard. No more so is "we need to deny gay people human rights because God wants us to." No amount of earnest belief makes that argument remotely valid.

So, no, there are zero rational reasons to oppose gay marriage, only irrational, bigoted reasons.

My response to the same point in another thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7536635

Not to make a general rule, but in this case I think it would have.

The most damaging thing about homophobic (or other bigoted) views isn't necessarily how the holder of those views acts toward people based on them (in this case it's clear that Eich didn't treat individuals any differently), but how making those views public legitimizes them in other people, giving space for others to act on them directly, and delays full societal acceptance of the marginalized group.

In other words, it's the knowledge that a public figure has those beliefs, not the beliefs themselves. If he just hid them, it would make things better overall.

I don't think he's suggesting that at all. He's saying that might've resolved the controversy while allowing Eich to remain as CEO.

I certainly think so, at least for Mozilla. Perhaps his close family and friends would be upset with him for lying about his views, but if he estimated that they would be okay with it, I don't see what the problem would be.

It depends if lying as such would be "ethical", but of course that too is open to interpretation.

Although this not exactly written for the audience of CEO's here's one viewpoint on this: http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/04/02/the-right-and...