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What If There Was a Microsoft Appreciation Day?

Posted by Soulskill on from the good-luck-finding-one-around-here dept.

theodp writes "In 2005, Microsoft came under fire after withdrawing support for an anti-gay-discrimination bill. 'I don't want the company to be in the position of appearing to dismiss the deeply-held beliefs of any employee, by picking sides on social policy issues,' explained CEO Steve Ballmer. That was then. Microsoft — like Google and Amazon — has since very publicly declared its support for gay-marriage legislation, which means it — unlike Chick-fil-A — needn't worry about the 'deeply-held beliefs of any employee' causing it to be blocked from doing business by the mayors of Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. I guess we'll never know what Microsoft versions of 'Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day' or 'National Same-Sex Kiss Day' would have looked like."

16 of 362 comments (clear)

  1. Ready... set... Troll! by pspahn · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm not even sure what this post is about or why it is something that matters.

    I imagine there will be a troll fest coming in 3... 2...

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    Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
    1. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by cpu6502 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      >>>Chick-Fil-A has a rather affectionate relationship with its customers. Hard to see the same thing happening at McDonalds, never mind Microsoft.

      Interesting. Maybe I ought to try this Chick-Fil-A business.
      The ACLU has strongly criticized the mayors of Boston, Chicago, et cetera. They say if the government follows-through on blocking Chick-Fil-a then the ACLU will sue the local governments for discrimination against a business (or group) based upon its religious beliefs. Though I am pro-same sex marriage, I agree with teh ACLU that it is not the role of government to punish/boycott/ban people or businesses or groups for their speech or ideas.

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    2. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by icebraining · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Chick-Fil-A isn't refusing to serve gays, so I don't see how is your post relevant.

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      Dilbert RSS feed
    3. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by AdamWill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Well, statistically speaking, since approx. 50% of Americans are opposed to same-sex marriage, you can no longer ever buy anything at all, because at least _someone_ whose salary is paid by the business probably opposes same sex marriage.

      Look, I'm gay. Hell, I'm married to someone of the same sex. But I really think some of the pro-marriage activists in the U.S. are going off the freaking deep end. It's a complex issue which deeply divides your country (and many countries). Approaching it like a cartoon in which everyone who supports same-sex marriage is a glorious white knight and anyone who opposes it is evil and eats babies isn't really a mature approach. It's frankly disingenous, disrespectful, rude and counter-productive to imply that anyone who opposes same-sex marriage is necessarily a hate-mongering bigot. A lot of them aren't.

      But then, this is America, where major sociopolitical issues are fought out in fast-food chicken restaurants.

    4. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The funny part? There is NO "biblical view of marriage" and in fact many of the great leaders of the bible had multiple wives. In fact most of the "traditions" we have of marriage are less than a century old and the ones that are older than that most would be horrified if they knew where they came from. An example, the throwing of the garter? Came from the middle ages when they would rip the clothes right off the "bride' who was usually outright bought and didn't have shit to say about the whole thing, to "loosen her up" before being drug off to the bedroom. Source.

      So while there is plenty of precedent for hiding bigotry with the bible, both slavery and racism were considered defensible by scripture, to say its "biblical tradition" to have a single man and a woman is complete horseshit.

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    5. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by amiga3D · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Is it your view that when someone disagrees with your position he is a hate monger? I know lot's of people that believe that Christianity is based on a book of fairy tales and yet I don't consider them "hate mongers" simply because they don't believe what I believe. It's not hate to state that you feel something is wrong morally. If he had stated that all gays should be shot on sight then certainly that would be hate mongering but his statement in no wise resembled anything like that. The appreciation day for chick fil-a was in response to the backlash they received in the media and by certain politicians. People wanted to show that they appreciated Mr. Cathy for standing up for what he believed. I shop lots of places that are run by people that dislike what I believe. I don't see any reason to avoid them simply because we differ in opinion.

    6. Re:Ready... set... Troll! by ArcherB · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's not just the personal views of the CEO. From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org], Chick Fil A donates a significant amount of money to anti-gay rights organizations:

      And Bill Clinton signed the "Defense of Marriage Act". President Obama said he supports the Defense of Marriage Act.

      Strange that I didn't see any kiss-ins at the White House. Strange that so many of the people protesting Chick-Fil-A today voted for both Bill Clinton AND Barack Obama after they said the same things that the CEO of Chick-Fil-A said. The difference is that these men were/are president of the United States and could put that anti-gay rights stuff into LAW!

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  2. Meme time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Soulskill: This article is bad and you should feel bad.

  3. Missing Borg Logo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    how much $$$ did /. receive to remove it?

  4. It seems by maroberts · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...that most IT companies have led the way on gay rights.

    OK, Microsoft was a little slower than a few off the blocks, but in general I think that IT corporations should be proud of their lead in this issue, and MS should be applauded for being among them.

    Still won't stop me loading up Linux instead though...

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  5. People bash Microsoft by Smallpond · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ... because they don't know what the software market was like before them.

    A good CAD setup including workstation and licenses could be $100K. A mainframe to handle your accounting could be $6000 per month.

    Personal computing - IBM, Microsoft, and Apple - demolished the old model which was low volume, buggy software at high prices. I have no illusions about their intentions, they've made more money than any emperor. But I do appreciate what they created.

    1. Re:People bash Microsoft by Xtifr · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nope. Most people don't know what the software market was like before MS, and those people are divided between bashers and non-bashers. Some people know what the software market was like before MS, and they are also divided between bashers and non-bashers.

      I used QDOS before Microsoft bought it and renamed it MS-DOS. I helped develop software for the IBM PC before it was released to the general public. I used CP/M, Apple II DOS, C64 OS, and Unix before MS was more than an obscure BASIC vendor. I contributed to at least one ISO language standard before the PC was released. I know what the market was like back then, and I unreservedly bash MS.

      The best thing they've done is try to implement Gary Kildall's vision--badly. The worst thing they've done is set software development back by years if not decades by deliberately ignoring or undermining open standards, and by destroying competition in the market. Between those two, I think the latter is more significant, so I freely bash them. I think I've earned the right.

      You seem to be confusing "personal computers" with Microsoft. Microsoft didn't invent the personal computer, and they weren't the first to come up with the idea of creating a vendor-independent OS. In fact, I come up empty trying to list their actual contributions to the world--aside from not dropping the market IBM handed them on a silver platter.

    2. Re:People bash Microsoft by Nethead · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I too was an early MicroSoft user. I remember the paper tape of BASIC 1.0 being passed around at the computer club. I grew up using MS BASIC on the Altair, TRS-80, Kaypro, VIC-20 and C64 (sysres made that so sweet to work with.) I even "re-engineered" the VIC-20 BASIC and ROM for use in a telecom board (think of a VIC-88 with 4x6522 and 4x20 LCD display with a 4MHz 65C02, hella board for the day.) Come the PC I used QBASIC to run broadcast automation. I could freaking fly around a DOS machine with Norton Commander and my Northgate keyboard ("Function keys on the left, where God intended!")

      When Windows came along and I found this Linux thing, and then later, this BSD thing. I just can't do Windows anymore.

      But I do have to give it to them for giving us a common language that was easy to port from platform to platform back in the day. Not an easy thing considering the vast architectural differences between those machines. I'm not sure if that is what they intended, but it worked out that way. I mean, you could take a BASIC program for calculating orbits that was developed on a Cromemco and quickly get it running on a C64.

      I do have to thank Bill Gates for choosing to locate in the Pacific Northwest. I've never worked for Microsoft, directly, (and god knows I've had the offers) but he created a great ecosystem where I am able to get people to pay me to play with very expensive network toys.

      As much as I don't like working with current MS products (except keyboards and mice, hell, I'm typing on one now) I sure am glad to have grown up in their shadow.

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  6. What if... by SpeZek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What if Slashdot just stuck to posting actual news stories instead of speculatory flamebait?

  7. Re:Tolerance by bmo · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Being tolerant of intolerant people does not make you tolerant. It is you standing idly by as bad things are done to people.

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    BMO

  8. Re:What if... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    you must be new here