It is absolutely reasonable for gay employees to be concerned. As CEO of a company guides company policy about a lot of things that have nothing to do with writing code such as health benefits.

The link between any particular issue and what Eich's day-to-day responsibility would have been can be made as tenuously as we want. I could argue six-degrees-of-separation-style that every belief he held is relevant to his position. The basic point remains: we shouldn't be punishing people for holding beliefs that we disagree with, or coerce them into renouncing their disagreement in order to remain in our good graces. That's not democracy and it's not how you win a policy argument. No matter how right or wrong the belief in question is, such policing creates a hostile environment where people are afraid to argue, debate, and say what they really think.

> No matter how right or wrong the belief in question is, such policing creates a hostile environment where people are afraid to argue, debate, and say what they really think.

What if his belief was the blacks should not be allowed to get married? would you have the same opinion on this then? Would there even be a discussion?

That is the problem with the ad hominem culture in America. Just because a person is racist/whatever doesn't necessarily mean that s/he is a bad person. We should actually be open to people who have these ideas. We don't have to hurt people to change them.

An environment where people are allowed to debate over even the most atrocious ideas is much more productive and inline with what the ideal democracy is.

I would have loved if Mozilla had an internal, open, philosophically rigorous, discussion that employees would participate in. Brendan would be forced to change his mind, not by force, but by reasoning.

Unfortunately, this is just my rosy way of thinking.

Yup, same belief. Because that archaic thinking is going away. I don't care if he donated $1000 to the KKK. If it isn't affecting his role as CEO, then who cares. But I support gay marriage and I still eat at Chic Filet, so what do I know.

What if his belief was something that you agreed with, and he got fired for it? Would have you the same opinion then? Would there be any discussion?

The real question here is whether democracy (i.e. the vote) is taken after influence games have been played out and resolved, or before.

I think the vote should be taken after influence has been applied, because I think part of what defines a person is their influence (it is perhaps the most important part, especially in questions of politics like this one).

I'm not sure that punishing is the right word here. people who did what they did, whether it be his board leaving, or people uninstalling firefox,or op-ed letters or forum comments. All that is not punishment, that is nobody was deprived of anything. Negative public sentiment is a tough thing. But I think that it actually represents democracy quite well. Democracy can do the morally wrong thing, it can keep a minority enslaved for example.

Which specifically policy of Mozilla has any relation to gay marriage in California?

an obvious policy: since CA doesn't have gay marriage, it's optional to offer partners of gay employees health benefits

Are you sure it is optional? [1] In any case Mozilla does offer them. So what exactly is the problem? What would change with or without gay marriage recognized by California? If anything, this shows that while Eich may be opposed to gay marriage, he is not at all opposed to equal benefits (unless of course you could point to instance where he tried to remove that policy).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_partnership_in_Califo...

California does have gay marriage now, Prop 8 was overturned on appeal.

True, but a) Mozilla had benefits equality all along anyway, and b) California moved to equalize benefits way before prop 8 was overturned, see my link above or look it up - for almost all matters except calling it "marriage", domestic partnerships in California have the same meaning as "marriage" for about a decade now. The whole hoopla seems to be exclusively about calling it "marriage", not about any benefits or any economic or legal matters.

A two class system leaves room to give one class new and exclusive benefits.

The only issue I had with domestic partnerships was the lack of federal recognition, and the lack of universal recognition by other states.

If that were true then would you consider it right to oust Mr Eich because the company in which he only just became CEO abides by the law? Wouldn't it be more mature, and democratic, to request that the company adjusted to allow people equal benefits regardless of their beliefs about sexuality and then take action if they refuse.

Oh, it would be, only Mozilla already has equal benefits. So they can't adjust something they've been doing all along.

No, the basis for a reasonable fear is that he helped strip a civil right from gay people.

He has refused to speak about his views, so Mozilla employees and partners could reasonably fear that he might take other actions that harm gay people. Those need not be explicit and declared ones. Anybody who has been on the receiving end of bias knows that out-and-out bigots are rare these days; it's the subtle stuff that is more often the problem.