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Mozilla CEO Firestorm Likely Violated California Law
theodp (442580) writes "While the rise and fall of Brendan Eich at Mozilla sparked a debate over how to properly strike a balance between an employee's political free speech and his employer's desire to communicate a particular corporate 'culture,' notes Brian Van Vleck at the California Workforce Resource Blog, the California Labor Code has already resolved this debate. 'Under California law,' Van Vleck explains, 'it is blatantly illegal to fire an employee because he has donated money to a political campaign. This rule is clearly set forth in Labor Code sections 1101-1102.' Section 1102 begins, 'No employer shall coerce or influence or attempt to coerce or influence his employees through or by means of threat of discharge or loss of employment to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or following any particular course or line of political action or political activity.' Corporate Counsel's Marlisse Silver Sweeney adds, 'Mozilla is adamant that the board did not force Eich to resign, and asked him to stay on in another role. It also says that although some employees tweeted for his resignation, support for his leadership was expressed by a larger group of employees. And this is all a good thing for the company from a legal standpoint.' As Eich stepped down, Re/code reported that Mozilla Executive Chairwoman Mitchell Baker said Eich's ability to lead the company had been badly damaged by the continued scrutiny over the hot-button issue. 'It's clear that Brendan cannot lead Mozilla in this setting,' Baker was quoted as saying. 'I think there has been pressure from all sides, of course, but this is Brendan's decision. Given the circumstances, this is not surprising.' Van Vleck offers these closing words of advice, 'To the extent employers want to follow in Mozilla's footsteps by policing their employees' politics in the interests of 'culture,' 'inclusiveness,' or corporate branding, they should be aware that their efforts will violate California law.'"
n/t
He fucking resigned.
By this line of "reasoning", if your CEO decides to run as mayor or get a new ballot initiative declaring some minority group as 3/5ths of a human or making it illegal for them to serve food due to being dirty (insert minority here)'s, then I guess the companies hands are tied and they can't fire him.
And in other news, AcmeCorp's CEO has come out and blathered another insane "political opinion". AcmeCorp's board of directors were last seen hurling themselves against the plate glass windows of their 38'th floor offices.
If you don't want to be penalized for your political opinions, don't run around spouting off about them.
He said he considers gays to be subhuman. We don't need that kind of person in our state much less running a hugely important organization. Those Republicans with their hate need to just get the fuck out of this state. They have openly called for our death so why are they still allowed freedom? They should be either be put in prison or shown to the border. At the start-up where I work, I've never heard a single person even try to defend these haters. Why do the Republicans that rule our state not do something to police their own?
I may not agree with Brendan's position, but it is a scary precedent to get rid of people based on their personal beliefs and political activities.
--MyLongNickName
that protect ceo's and c-levels. the game is already stacked in their favor from the start. they can get away, almost literally, with murder in the US system. the world's tiniest violin is now playing for the poor little ceo's who didn't get everything they wanted.
its usually the other way around. you have to tip-toe around the c-levels so you don't offend them, lest you get handed your walking papers. they can hire and fire pretty much without challenge.
besides all that, though, he was not fired. he was asked to step down from the public and a percentage of the employees. no one in the company forced him to leave. there was no illegal act here.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
So if one of your employees makes a contribution to the Nazi party, you can't fire them for being the type you don't want around?
Don't say anything about the gays. Don't say anything about the blacks.
Those two groups are so virulently nasty about anyone who "goes against them" that it's absolutely sickening.
You're better off kicking a puppy and being filmed doing so.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
I understand how law serves like a guide to what is just and right, but let's not turn it the other way around. Eich had to go in the eyes of the public, and that's the end of it. Also, he wasn't fired for his opinions, but because of the backlash from the community. His status as CEO was seriously harming the company.
Mozilla *fired* Eich? First, he still works there. Second, he stepped down from his CEO position of his own free will. Third, it may be illegal for an *employer* to fire an employee in certain ways but (setting aside all the public pressure) even equating peer pressure of subordinate colleagues within a company with the company ("corporate person"?) acting as an firing employer seems extremely tenuous. Being a CEO, he'd have to fire himself to violate the law, wouldn't he?
Ezekiel 23:20
1) He resigned, he wasn't fired.
2) There was pressure to resign, or else be fired, sure, but the fundamental reason is that users were throwing tantrums and threatening a boycott. That seems like a legit reason to fire someone to me.
How do you color the whole issue as him only resigning, when three board members quit over his presence there. That's a lot of pressure from the company.
It looks an awful lot like coercion...
But, isn't it up for him to sue if he feels he did not resign voluntarily? It seems like he probably would not do so.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The crux of the issue is that social attitudes are in flux on this matter. If you don't give people leeway to change, they will likely harden their positions.
And if you give some people leeway to change (eg- Obama, Hilary) and deny leeway to others (Brendan Eich) you are being blatantly partisan and unfair.
Had he donated $1000 to pro-gay organization and was fired - there would be wide action in his support....
But he donated to the wrong organization so he "resigned" - after external and internal pressure...
It sickens me... there is no more free speach... and some people clearly can be discriminated because of their political views...
Those laws are only supposed top protect those that hold the same opinion as myself, because I'm perfect and the opinions I hold are truth incarnate. People that don't share every single one of my opinions should never be allowed to work because they're wrong thus bigots thus evil.
GLBT organizations have a perfect right to express their opinions, and even to use political and economic pressure to achieve their desired ends. The Mozilla foundation acted correctly in not bowing directly to this pressure. Mr. Eich acted both correctly and even (some might say) with noble altruism in resigning.
Understand the causes of actions - if you insist on placing blame, place it where it belongs. Mr. Eich was forced out by the GLBT community over his support for a bill which directly contradicted their political agenda. Their actions were within what is considered to be acceptable, and resulted in Mr. Eich sustaining a personal loss for his open support of a bill he obviously believes in. I don't think anybody here behaved badly or did anything wrong; but I believe that all involved should now be judged by their actions and their roles in this drama.
As it stands, I think he probably had a moderate chance of succeeding in a legal suit. At the very least he could of sued Mozilla over some workplace harassment law (not providing a safe workplace).
But with the quote from the Mozilla Executive Chairman: "'It's clear that Brendan cannot lead Mozilla in this setting,' Baker was quoted as saying." I would say any legal action over discrimination against Mozilla is now in his favour. To me that says that only reason he was not fired, was because he was given the option to resign, before they fired him. And Mozilla would/will find it hard to explain to the court how firing someone who was unpopular because of a political belief is completely different than firing someone for a political belief. I am not saying it is cut and dry, but he definitely seems to have a case.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Mozilla lost a great technically minded CEO who could have done some good things for the organization; which IMHO badly needs strong leadship right now.
Why because a bunch of the rabble could not deal with someone not sharing their opinions. Honestly I don't think anyone supporting same sex marriage supports equality at all. Government should not recognize ANY marriage. If you get married that should be entirely between you, your God(s), who ever else attends where you warship, and that's it.
It should not be your boss's business, nor the state's nor any courts. Government recognizing marrige does nothing but create a special class of people (married people), and there is no reason they should get the special treatment they do.
As far as children go, both biological parents should be considered to have parental rights and responsibilities, unless the father isn't known and nobody comes forward for in some reasonable time frame.
Everyone should be entitled to name someone (anyone) they wish to specify to share anything that exists as a spousal benefit today or those benefits should be withdrawn. I don't think anyone should have to file a tax return, but as long as we have tax returns EVERYONE should have to file individually.
So will I continue to vote against so called marriage equality; you bet I will because the last thing I want to see is the expansion of what is already a special class which should not exist in secular society.
Mozilla continues its downward spiral down the drain.
While the rise and fall of Brendan Eich at Mozilla sparked a debate over how to properly strike a balance between an employee's political free speech and his employer's desire to communicate a particular corporate 'culture,'
Except the issue at hand was Mr Eich's actions, not his speech. I really don't give a fuck about his opinion regarding my sexuality, but the moment he starts acting on that opinion and attempting to restrict my basic humans right, that's where I draw the line.
I will defend to the death your right to spout off bigoted nonsense. But I will fight tooth and nail if you act on that bigotry to bring harm to others.
(If I have it wrong, then I apologize. But it's been my understanding all along that this was not mere speech, that he has in fact actively tried to strip away the basic human rights of others)
You bring Hitler to the conversation, I bring whites. You bring gays, I bring muslims. A black chief can't lay off a white worker because he is white, just the same as a white one can't fire a black one. A muslim can't fire a chirstian for being christian. NO, you can't fire someone because their beliefs, race, sexual orientation, gender or health unless that is something that endengers others in some REAL way or their status/actvity is ILEGAL.
So if your Nazi donates to a group which promotes totalitarian nationalism as a political view, you CAN'T fire him. If he donates to a group which promotes mere violence, goes around vandalizing houses or attacking people, then YES. If he insults someone at work due to their race or religion, then YES.
Sure. Because he didn't really want to be CEO, and would have resigned anyway.
I don't know about California, but many places have laws against companies pushing employees to resign, too.
The 'public' , had spoken, and he ended up resigning. How would this law apply to the 'mob'?
The question is not whether this CEO has a right to "political speech"; he clearly does. The question is whether he has a right to "hate speech" or "intolerant speech." To be clear, I think all speech must be allowed under the 1st amendment, and "being allowed" has to include "being free from punishment." But let's say the CEO had given money to a political group that was trying to re-introduce ethnic segregation, or maybe trying to forcibly repatriate blacks to Africa. Would his contribution represent "free political speech" or would it represent "hate speech"? The former is protected under the laws cited but the latter is not (even though I think it should be).
"The Rt Hon Patricia Hewitt MP a recent Labour Secretary of State for Health, became General Secretary of NCCL in 1974. The very next year, 1975, NCCL invited the Paedophile Information Exchange and Paedophile Action for Liberation to affiliate. In the year after, 1976, the now-notorious paedophile Tom O'Carroll was invited to address the NCCL conference, which promptly voted to 'deplore' the use of chemical castration treatments for paedophiles."
"Also in 1975, Patricia Hewitt joined the Campaign for Homosexual Equality, as a 'straight', in the same year that Keith Hose of the Paedophile Information Exchange addressed its second annual conference. Hose moved a motion of censure on the conference organising committee for 'relegating paedophilia to ancillary status in conference.' The motion was seconded by Trevor Locke, who just happened to be a member of the Executive Council of the NCCL. 'An awareness and acceptance of the sexuality of children is an essential part of the liberation of the young homosexual,' the motion went on. It was duly passed."
Around one third of the victims of paedophiles are boys. Only ONE PERCENT of men are homosexual. Please explain...
I wonder how damaged Mozilla is by the Streisand effect for this whole debacle. If nobody publicized Eich's relatively small contribution to a political campaign from six years ago, nobody would know about any of this. I seriously doubt Eich had some kind of master plan for a gay purge at Mozilla. It is possible for one to be opposed to gay marriage without hating gay people, and chances are his political opinion would have no negative impact on Mozilla.
If nobody had said anything, Mozilla would probably sail along just fine. Instead, a big deal was made, and now you've got pro gay marriage people who were upset that Mozilla would ever employ such a gay-hatin' monster, you've got anti gay marriage people claiming persecution, and then the base of people who think it's much ado about nothing, anyway, because somebody's political opinions shouldn't have anything to do with their job.
Basically, everybody comes out of this smelling like shit, when if nobody had ever said anything, things probably would have been just fine.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
All humans have a right to free personal speech and should have the freedom to express themselves politically however they choose, within the bounds of the law. I don't support or condone his beliefs, I believe they are wrong-headed, but he has the right to be judged in the workplace on merit and merit alone. I realize this to be somewhat of a simplification, but the fact is the hammer can fall both ways, and I believe this man should have the right to express whatever idiot belief he wants and still keep his job.
That's right. If you're going to fire someone you need to think of a better reason than what they do on their own time outside of work.
If they are careful enough to not run afoul of HR rules regarding employee conduct and having a Hitler-free work place then you have to try writing them up for poor performance or transferring them to someone else's department. For the tricky situation where you have appointed someone as CEO without first checking on their background it is customary for the board to either set impossible performance goals and then replace him when he doesn't meet them, or politely ask him to resign in exchange for a small but undisclosed amount of cash.
If all else fails just wait until he goes into space and then forge his signature on a letter of resignation while he's off-planet. It can't possibly go wrong.
Nit-picking here: All of the definitions of a political campaign I could find (OK, I spent 5 minutes on Google) define a political campaign as a campaign for a candidate to get elected. They say nothing about ballot initiatives such as Proposition 8 which is a referendum on state law. Not sure how California law defines it but in my book, politics is people and corporations, organizations, laws and policies are not people.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
And, to my mind, the biggest point was not "how did you vote in 2008?" but "are you open enough to treating the people you intend to manage objetively, even if they are LGBT?"
Given his dodging about his feelings today, I'd suggest that even if he was forced out, the issue wasn't his vote, but instead, his ability to do his fucking job today.
I'm a nature photographer.
There's been a lot of misinformation being reported by various major news sites. Get the FAQs straight https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2014/04/05/faq-on-ceo-resignation/
I'm thinking this line of thought is wrong, simply because Prop 8 was deemed unconstitutional, right? So, in reality, this guy was fired,err,resigned because he held views that conflicted with the law of the land. So essentially it comes down to whether or not he has the right to be the leader of a company when the company knows he supports a Proposition that was deemed to be unconstitutional. And we're supposed to accept that his rights were violated under the aforementioned labor laws? I don't think so. They didn't attempt to stop him from supporting the proposition, right? So where did they violate his rights? They didn't. They haven't. If he had been put through this scenario during the political campaign or anytime before the Supreme Court action, maybe he'd have a case. The flip side to this argument is what kind of exposure would Mozilla being undertaking if they allowed this guy to stay? I know that if I were gay and married, I would certainly be paranoid working with the man. And I don't think it would be unreasonable to feel the same about the company, since they chose a man with anti-gay views to lead the company. Following that line of logic, it seems likely that Mozilla, under his continued leadership, would have laid itself open to potential lawsuits. So who's violating the law? Mozilla by keeping him or Mozilla by inviting him to leave?
employees get fired for virtually everything...the annecdotes are ridiculous
if an entry level new-hire at a software company dropped a grenade in the first meeting they were allowed to attend and said, "Our app doesn't make money because everyone knows it is spam"
**right in front of the boss/guy who invented the app**
and that guy got fired...or reassigned to something so bullshit that he quit...
would we even care or suspect something wrong happend?
in my mind Mozilla's CEO is the same
just b/c he's a CEO doesn't mean he is immune to the vagaries of contemporary employment
Thank you Dave Raggett
Involve the community when picking their leader, lest you draw ire from both within and without the community should you have to backtrack.
You really are a piece of shit. It's nice to see shit this smug. However, quit fucking posting, you disgusting choad.
Have a nice day.
"GLBT organizations have a perfect right to express their opinions,"
I'll be impressed if you can point at a signficant GLBT organization that actually did discuss Eich. As near as I can tell, the repsonse was entirely grassroots, and not limited to GLBT individuals.
I'm a nature photographer.
FUCK California.
This all started with the LA Times obtaining a list of all donors to Prop 8 and publishing it's contents as a searchable online database.
http://hotair.com/archives/2014/04/03/how-did-people-find-out-that-mozillas-ceo-donated-to-support-prop-8/
The law that requires that all political donors who donate more than $100 may be divulged is the issue here. So it would seem that if you want to donate and NOT face repercussions for having an unpopular opinion, then you should never ever donate more than $99 to any California Ballot Measure or Political Initiative based in California.
In this case, it appears that CA law regarding disclosure of political contributions has come head to head with CA Labor Code. And considering SCOTUS' recent decision to consider monetary campaign contributions as free speech, it also would potentially have Constitutional ramifications (not for Mozilla, but for the State of California disclosure policy) So in this case, there is likely fuck-all Eich can do about it unless he wants to make a major stink about it in Federal Courts, at his own expense and with no possibility of personal gain.
I'd argue that it was more about the straight allies of the LGBT community than the LGBT community themselves. OKCupid is run by straight dudes, and they're not a front for any LGBT organisation that I know of.
This was a delightfully broad-based protest, not stemming from any group in particular.
It is, in fact, why I find it so absolutely irritating that bloggers keep going on about how 'damaging' this is to 'free speech'. This was free speech WORKING. This was a whole bunch of people speaking out and saying that it's no more acceptable for CEOs to hold this kind of opinion on equal marriage as it would be for them to hold a similar opinion on interracial marriage.
Why is it OK to have a hate campaign against Eich and what he believed in?
Either you are against hate campaigns and truly believe in difference of opinion, or you start a hate campaign yourself and hypocritically drum someone out of work through the very kind of hatred you claim to deplore.
It really is that simple. One bigot left Mozilla - but EVERYONE remaining who did not quit in disgust is a bigot also. Were I am employee of Mozilla I would have resigned alongside him, even though I am on the opposite side of the prop 8 debate. I find it sad that no-one there seems to have any strength of character.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Politics: noun plural but singular or plural in construction
activities that relate to influencing the actions and policies of a government or getting and keeping power in a government
the work or job of people (such as elected officials) who are part of a government
the opinions that someone has about what should be done by governments : a person's political thoughts and opinions
Why isn't there more conservative anger that Eich folded and quit under pressure, especially when California law protected him?
Google. They support their budget by more than 90-percent. Guess what dickwad was going against Google's charter. I'll give you a fucking hint - his job title was CEO.
Let's take a look at OKCupid's CEO as well.
http://www.motherjones.com/moj...
In 2004 Sam Yagan donated $500 to Rep. Chris Cannon (R-Utah). Rep. Cannon voted for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, against a ban on sexual-orientation based job discrimination and for a prohibition on gay adoptions.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
The first part is that there are basically two groups of people: those that feel they should be able to do whatever makes them happy as long as what they're doing doesn't adversely affect others, and those who feel they have the right to tell others what they can and can't do regardless of impact on themselves.
Make whatever convoluted case or slippery slope argument you want, Adam and Steve getting married has zero actual effect on anyone else. So what you have is a CEO basically giving his social opinion that he feels something is wrong that people who work for him feel is okay. My last company allowed employees to wear shorts to work because it was 120 out in the summer. One day someone brought that up in a room with a vice president in it and his comment was "Yeah, you're allowed to do it...but I think its damned unprofessional". Half the people in the room were wearing shorts. Word got around and nobody wore them anymore. So what a senior manager says has a significant effect on workers, right or wrong, rules/laws or not.
Second part is that roughly half the people/customers/programmers/business owners/executives believe one way on this and the other half believe the opposite. You're therefore alienating half the people that work for the company and half the people it works with. Not a good idea from any perspective. Sure, the ones that feel like you do will rally behind you while the other half walk away. Probably okay if you're making chicken sandwiches. Not okay when you're trying to manage a major software company.
Bottom line: keep your social opinions to a personal level and keep them out of a professional environment. You can make all the legal arguments you want. The VP still thinks shorts are unprofessional and chances are if you wear them, you're going to be getting the crap jobs if he notices.
The stunning implication is that in some states other than California it is not illegal to fire someone because of how they voted!!!!!!!!
The land of the free?
All of those idiots will be looking for new jobs as soon as Brendan Eich sues them to oblivion anyway. Wanted to be the better men? They should've come out and -DEFENDED- him, showing that the way forward is to get along, even if we have different views. This will be a slam dunk discrimination lawsuit, with a nice big settlement.
Eich refused to try to manage the controversy by even stating he had moved on from his former position much less actually changing his position. If Obama still was sticking to that position after things entirely changed nationwide you bet people would be screaming their heads off in exactly the same way.
If we're speaking purely business ethics, and assuming widespread customer loss to the point where it's significantly detrimental to your bottom line...
Absolutely.
It's great when businesses can stand up for what's right and moral and socially progressive. That's not what they're for, and if you allow a single individual - no matter their title - to drive a company into the ground, well, frankly - the board of directors should be waterboarded.
So, question: what does a company do with a senior executive who's harming the company because large numbers of valuable employees and executives don't want to work with him, or at a company where he's in charge, because of his political views? Nothing in California law requires individuals to ignore political views when deciding whether to associate with someone. And it seems to me that deciding to let someone go because he's causing too many other employees to leave is perfectly allowable. So what's a company to do in such a case?
Government does recognize marriage so by voting against marriage equality for all what you are really saying is you support privileges for the people that already have them.
Mary Kay Lotourneau ring a bell???
I feel that Mr.Eich was compelled to resign not by his employer, but by the GLBT community. They exerted political pressure which would have impacted the Mozilla organization, and Mr. Eich made a personal decision to shield the organization from that political pressure.
GLBT organizations have a perfect right to express their opinions, and even to use political and economic pressure to achieve their desired ends. The Mozilla foundation acted correctly in not bowing directly to this pressure. Mr. Eich acted both correctly and even (some might say) with noble altruism in resigning.
Understand the causes of actions - if you insist on placing blame, place it where it belongs. Mr. Eich was forced out by the GLBT community over his support for a bill which directly contradicted their political agenda. Their actions were within what is considered to be acceptable, and resulted in Mr. Eich sustaining a personal loss for his open support of a bill he obviously believes in. I don't think anybody here behaved badly or did anything wrong; but I believe that all involved should now be judged by their actions and their roles in this drama.
Ok, cool. So how do I boycott the GLBT community to show my distaste? Wait, I can't cause such badthink, that makes me a hatemonger!!
Ironic because the treatment of this person and his political free speech has been treated with so much intolerance - from a group who whats tolerance from everyone. It goes both ways and shows what kind of extremists are involved in this debate. Those who called for him to step down are no better, and are perhaps worse, than he is. He has his view point and yet doesn't treat gays as less than human. At the same time, because of his view point, he IS treated as less than human.
I'd settle for reserving the word "hate" for, I don't know, actual hate?
as w/the various "isms" when the various "enlightened/sensitive/multicultural/whatever" groups engage in a race to the bottom to lower the bar for applying a given label you unavoidably dilute its potency until it's effectively meaningless ("rape culture" is my personal favorite cliche du jour).
does that mean Eich's right? HELL NO! my best man was gay (yes, my spouse is a woman) & I've even photographed a gay wedding in Whistler (spontaneous/unplanned between friend of wife & his partner) but if you're going to apply the same label which used to be reserved for klan level people/actions (inciting/participating in actual violence) to someone who's merely a little behind the acceptance curve & working within established legal frameworks (which legislatures & ballot initiates are even when misguided or even unconstitutional) then don't act surprised when sympathetic moderates like myself roll our eyes & ignore you when you use it in the future!
again, I can NOT state this clearly enough: Eich's wrong, gays should (& will) be allowed to marry/have full rights/etc but hyperbole is counterproductive!
Let's explain the difference with super elementary graph theory. Have each adult woman (whether black or white) and each adult man (whether black and white) be represented by a node. Now draw an edge between every pair of person that would be allowed to marry if they were single. The graph is connected when interracial marriage is allowed but same-sex marriage isn't. It isn't connected when interracial marriage is not allowed. This means that not allowing inter-racial marriage divides the population in two sets and no one belonging to one set can ever lawfully become family with any one belonging to the other set. So forbidding inter-racial marriage is segregatory while forbidding same sex marriage isn't.
TLDR, in a world where same sex-marriage is not allowed, two individuals are either related, or could marry if they were single or are both marriable to a third person (not both at the same time obviously since polygamy is illegal). This is not the case when forbidding same-sex marriage.
Get some fucking perspective people. This guy's (small) donation had zero effect on the proposition's outcome, nor did it have any effect on the Mozilla foundation (before anyone knew about it). All of his contributions to Mozilla have been exemplary and accepted until someone found out he supported pop 8.
Someone took a non-issue and cried "biggot", in effect doing more harm to Mozilla and Brendan Eich than was done by the donation itself.
The "Moral Authority" that has convicted Brendan Eich is unleashing a powerful weapon and setting a terrifying precedent in the U.S.: exercise free speech (read lobbying, money as free speech) and be ostracised.
It is comical that the "Moral Authority" on this issue fights for "Equality" by denying to others.
A court may actually decide that Non-profits can terminate employees for activities "incompatible with and adversely impacting
the mission and purpose of the organization."
If California wants to make a test case....Im sure a lot of people would love to take this to Federal court.
No, this was free speech failing. This was a case of punishing an individual for his political actions. The people speaking out were not discussing the issue, they were saying that if you don't agree with us, we will attack you personally.
Does labor laws apply for CEO position in California? In my country, positions like CEO and chair in board of directors are held outside of labor laws, based on specific mandate contract.
This was free speech WORKING. This was a whole bunch of people speaking out and saying that it's no more acceptable for CEOs to hold this kind of opinion on equal marriage as it would be for them to hold a similar opinion on interracial marriage.
let me consider that statement...
Free speech works by "a whole bunch of people" saying someone else's (ceo or otherwise) opinion (speech) is unacceptable "free" speech. My brain hurts!
There's an old saying . . . "Four boxes to use in defense of freedom. Soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order."
True. Permissible (even encouraged) under the current US political/governmental system.
it was maggot backlash.
Yes, I use maggot as a derisive term, it stands for people who are offended by those that do not agree with them. Maggots are prejudiced against those who do not agree with them. Maggots then act out in negative ways trying to force others to bend their opinions to match their own.
In this case, it was certain members of the gay and lesbian communities and some of those that support said community.
People have a right to their own opinions. People have a right to practice their religion and vote their consciences.
That is why I consider these people maggots. They believe that because they take offense at what someone else believes that they have the right to take away the rights and freedoms of the person who *offended* them by disagreeing with them.
These maggots are bigots, spewing vitriol and hatred. These maggots are the problem with today's society. These maggots are doing their damnedest to strip away constitutional rights in favor of some false assumption that nobody can say or do anything that is offensive to them.
Idiot maggots.
You know what else is an association? Marriage.
Whoever used their rights and abilities to enforce their agenda on Mr. Eich, the Mozilla Foundation and (by extension) all of us should be identified and made to answer for their actions. The right to do a thing does not equate to the right to do so without regard for the consequences. We can all use the same rights and methods against those responsible. I wonder if anybody at "OK Cupid" is listening?
"Where is the outrage over that?"
Fucking everywhere. There was a lot of backlash to that from various liberal/progressive/Democratic sources, and Obama ultimately ended up making statements in support of Prop 8. It was irrelevant to the election because McCain also believed marriage should only be between a man and a woman.
Let us identify those responsible and subject them to their own tactics. Those tactics are legal and even acceptable here in the US. Distasteful, but there is a certain aspect of "poetic justice" here.
In the most liberal state in the country prop 8 had 52% voter support in 2008 which is just 6 years ago... All it said was "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California" That is all it said. It was not an attack against gay people, just a decision to confer the legal benefits, recognition and title of marriage on men and women who marry. I think it is great that gay couples feel more included in society because they can share the title of "marriage" with straight couples now, but these are different types of relationships.
No, he's right. This is free speech working - and in order to keep it working, we (those of us who disagree with their speech or their tactics) have an obligation to make an answer, to exercise our free speech.
Honestly the entire thing is moot at this point but, from all of the comments I've read, nobody seems to have mentioned that his contribution to Prop 8 could be based on his personal religious beliefs.
If anything (and there is no signs of him doing so at this point), he could press on the Federal level a case of discrimination for violating his Civil Rights based on the religious aspect alone.
He would probably also win if there was even a slight whiff of him having been pressured into resigning because of this. Race, religion, gender = the big three when it comes to discrimination lawsuits and highest on the no-no scale of what companies can fire for/pressure over.
@Mindless Drivel: 100% of Twitter posts ever Tweeted.
There's no hate campaign against Eich.....Address what I've actually advocated or STFU.
Classic. A new record.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
What a fascinating, near-perfect being you must be!
Obama didn't get a pass, there was no better alternative - the only other option was McCain, who was even more strongly against gay marriage.
Further, Eich was given plenty of leeway to change. He chose not to change. If at any point Eich had made any indication that he had changed his perspective, this "firestorm" would have died down.
Company have no morals they are here to make profits. That's why we have so many rules to force them as a society to do stuff they would not do on their own on pure economical ground. For example all tragedy of common like air pollution, or even not hiring children to work in mines, or pay the same a woman and a man, or not discriminate based on skin color.
As such If the CEO political position are such that the customer will massively impact the company , then if the CEO really has the responsibility associated with the (usual) high salary, he should leave on his own on pure economical ground for the company. And that include your case.
Now on the moral position, it is much more iffy depending on what sort of moral you adhere to. In the above case I would say "screw the bigot customer" and try to reposition the company toward non-idiot and keep the CEO no matter the skin color or gender or religion or sexuality or cis/trans or yes indeed politic or whatever people find to discriminate. But it is much harder to define a general point.
In this specific case, even if I tend to be against idiot bigot living in the 19th century like Eich, but I tend to think that he should not be forced to resign (he was not as far as i can tell) but should resign on his own when his own private life negatively impact the customer base (which he did).
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
The real point is this little shitstorm started not because of any Prop8 views, but because some employees were scared for their jobs. Not because they are gay, but because of their projects. Mozilla as a company is more bloated than Firefox. Outside of the core suite (browser, email, FirefoxOS) they have a slew of technically useless "social" projects that do nothing for the bottom line. For instance, OpenBadges. WTF is this shit? And why does it need a team of 6 people (only one "tech" person, but three project leads), and over two years in development with nothing but some pretty pictures and a confusing video to show for it?
I feel Eich, being more technically minded and devoted to the core products than these hipster, feel-good social experiments, would have dropped these resource wastes in order to hire more real developers for the core projects.
Look into the job titles of all the people who originally posted to twitter. None of them are actual developers, and most, if not all of them are on these non-technical social projects. Also note that not one of them actually mentions Prop8, just "culture and mission". It was the tech press that made the jump from "culture and mission" to anti-gay.
If you pushed for Eich to resign, are you still using ReiserFS?
I can be moderated as Inciteful...
Freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from the consequences of your speech. We have to balance the need to let people support unpopular opinions with the need to prevent people from secretly subverting the government. Ultimately if you want to influence public policy you have to be willing to stand up and do it publicly.
...to the Kool Aid swilling, fudge packing geeks of the Open Source world.
There's an old saying . . . "Four boxes to use in defense of freedom. Soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order."
Since the screaming left owns the first 3, and has made the final prohibitively expensive, I have no other choice but to just enjoy the decline
They do have that right. And we also have the right to call the campaign against him what it is: more bigotry and hate. I tend to think we need less of that, not more.
If you are an employee for Mozilla you are helping the CEO earn a paycheck. Technically you are aiding your enemy because he turns around and uses that money against your own interests if you happen to be LGBT. Kind of a moral dilemma now. The CEO wasn't there when you hired on so who needs to leave? Comes down to who has the power and seems to me the CEO lacked power once all the workers got organized. Doesn't really matter what the law is, something had to happen due to the power clash. Generally people that high up are a little more savvy and hide their political affiliations and donations. Yeah I know everyone extracts money from their employee and uses it for political purposes, just don't be blatant about it and have it directly effect such a narrow target, especially a target well represented in your organization.
The Left is unprincipled and has a decidedly totalitarian bent.
I'm not at OKCupid, (don't even have an account there anymore), but I totally agree with you about taking responsiblity for one's actions.
I'm a nature photographer.
That individuals, rather than advocacy groups, called for his resignation is really beside the point in this case. Individuals have an even greater recognized right to speech than corporations (regardless of current "corps are people" rulings from the Supreme Court).
You are going off the plane....you have a golden parachute in one hand and your lawyer's number in the other... which one you going to use?
Choose your own CEO adventure!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Andrew Sullivan — a prominent Illiberal — has drawn some fire upon himself by claiming, "we are no better than the anti-gay bullies who came before us."
While Andrew's employment remains secure, I take an exception with this statement. Though there surely were (and remain) anti-gay bullies, I can not find a single case of a CEO being fired (or forced to resign) simply for being either a homosexual himself, or for supporting a homosexual cause. The only thing, that comes close is the US military — but even they stopped doing it over 20 years ago, when "don't ask don't tell was implemented".
This makes today's Illiberals not "no better", but worse than the "bullies of the past". Much worse...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Reading constant defense of Eich under the guise of protecting free-speech speaks volumes to why this is even still an issue. I can't wait until this is looked back upon as a form of persecution and every body championing "traditional values" will have their day in the mud. The most ludicrous part is that for most politicians who are propping up this unjust opposition to equality, their position's are probably completely unfounded in belief and are little more than talking points to get uninformed voters roweled up.
You would be instantly booted from office for saying "X people should not be able to marry" where X is any type or group of people. But for some reason "Gay people should not be able to marry" is completely okay for 50% of people. Such an assertion should be seen as abhorrent as "Black people must sit at the back of the bus" but for some reason it's not.
This is not a "Political View", it is a dangerous and divisive sentiment that is retarding progress and destroying lives.
Has anyone noticed how much faster Slashdot is when view with Chrome?
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
It's easy to criticize. But what were they supposed to do?
I don't know about a political organization, but in terms of politically visible persons: George Takei was fairly vocal in this (with lots of discussion from his supporters/detractors in regards to that as well). Sometimes it seems that an official political "organization" versus "group with figurehead" is a blurry line sometimes.
What kind of severance package did Eich get. Somewhere in a contract of a multimillion dollar CEO has to say they will lose millions if they leave by quitting before the contract is over but, if they are fired/removed by the board they get the full contract plus a severance package. Would not put it passed that based on contracts they say he quit in the PR spin but at the bank he is still on the payroll.
Resist the Gaystapo!
Where does it end? I suppose we could just do away with elections and voting, eh? After all, some number of people will not be as wise or enlightened as you, why should they be allowed to vote, or to express any opinions at all?
Mr. Eich was forced out by the GLBT community over his support for a bill which directly limited their freedom to marry the person of their choice
FTFY. Would you really take no action if someone tried to pass a bill saying you were not allowed to marry your wife because of the colour of your eyes? Would that be your "political agenda", or just you standing up for your basic rights?
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
He wasn't fired, he left. The employees protest did not violate this law for the same reason that this law exists in the first place: The political actions of an individual employed by a company aren't controlled by that company. Mozilla had no authority to either order or forbid their employees to protest Eich's appointment.
... if he had given money to the local chapter of the KKK?
Mitchell's blog post is still up yet even Mozilla employees defending Mozilla admit it is misleading. This blog post is causing huge damage and it is shameful that you will not take it down. Mitchell can not be allowed to continue damaging Mozilla and needs to be fired.
Will Mitchell's views be allowed to damage the company? If so why?
Drop that first sentence and you've got yourself a good argument. It will never happen as long as the protestants are in control, but it's a nice idea.
The problem is that you've conflated it with the wrong reason. Mozilla needs a strong CEO, yes, however the first thing a CEO is is a manager of people. You cannot effectively manage people of mixed composition if you genuinely believe that a certain percentage of them are not deserving of basic human rights. If he was a member of the KKK, would you expect him to treat black employees equitably? If it was public knowledge, would black employees even expect him to treat them fairly (even if he did, would they believe it - knowing he was KKK)?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
By no measure this statement accurate. He didn't leave because he wanted to.
What good is freedom of speech if you can't speak your mind without being vilified by everyone?
de Tocquerville even warned that freedom of speech is useless unless the speaker is allowed to voice their view without being persecuted for it.
He even closed "Democracy in America" with: "Tyranny in democratic republics does not proceed in the same way, however. It ignores the body and goes straight for the soul. The master no longer says: You will think as I do or die. He says: You are free not to think as I do. You may keep your life, your property, and everything else. But from this day forth you shall be as a stranger among us. You will retain your civic privileges, but they will be of no use to you. For if you seek the votes of your fellow citizens, they will withhold them, and if you seek only their esteem, they will feign to refuse even that. You will remain among men, but you will forfeit your rights to humanity. When you approach your fellow creatures, they will shun you as one who is impure. And even those who believe in your innocence will abandon you, lest they, too, be shunned in turn. Go in peace, I will not take your life, but the life I leave you with is worse than death.”
Freedom of speech is useless without the tolerance to allow a person's views to be heard, without persecution. Unless you can voice your view without persecution, "You will retain your civic privileges, but they will be of no use to you" is literally true - you can voice your view, but you will suffer for it, what good is it?
It's perversion of the spirit of the first amendment to say "You have freedom of speech, but not freedom from its consequence."
I may not like what I consider ignorant drek spouted by Neo-Nazis, KKK, certain Westboro Baptist Church members, etc. I may think they are personally the worst filth humanity has to offer. But I am willing to fight to give them the right to spew their bile and to protect them from those who seek to silence them by whatever means necessary. Anything less amounts to tyranny by the majority.
And that's precisely what is being done here - Eich voiced a view - years ago, and now that what was then the minority is now the majority, he is being punished for it.
The very cornerstone of freedom of speech is being willing to protect those whose views we hate, and the ability to exercise their right without fear of backlash or persecution.
I'm not saying Eich is left starving... far from it. The point is that nobody should feel a threat to their person, livelihood, or property because their views -- however unpopular, ignorant, or wrong -- are expressed.
-- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
I think a lot of people are mislabeling the CEO as an employee. The CEO is the _employer_, not the employee. While the CEO might serve at the pleasure of the board, everyone else in the company serves at the pleasure of the CEO. And while everyone is harping on free speech, a CEO's position is as much political as it is business. And being political that means how the public views the person is as important as what the person does. That's why the CEO's make the big bucks.
Under both federal and California law it is illegal for non-profits to contribute to political campaigns. For example, religious organizations organized as non-profits contributing to California proposition campaigns. Do you _really_ want to follow up on violations of California law?
sPh
https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2014/04/05/faq-on-ceo-resignation/
Gonna be hard to legally blame this on Mozilla if they really offered him another position and he quit anyway.
Posting as AC since the hounds of political correctness are running killing anything in their path. The GLBT community is overplaying their hand. It's interesting to note that it took so little time for them to move to being tyrants themselves. Since they like civil rights comparisons I'll use that. There was a marked shift between the approaches of MLK and people like Jesse Jackson. The GLBT community has clearly moved from a more noble quest about equal rights to a more hatred based "getting even". They are a more modern Jesse Jackson. And just as Jesse lost his ability to do much of anything since he clearly a joke, so too will GLAAD run out of supporters.
Boycotts are protected as free speech under the first amendment of the US Constitution .
Brendan Eich resigned, as a result of the backlash. We don't know if the board would have terminated him if he did not. That just didn't happen.
Would that hypothetical termination have violated California law ? It's unclear.
Wouldn't the ongoing boycott of Mozilla because of its CEO would have been reason enough for the board to terminate him, whether this boycott was due to some political or non-political action of his ? I guess we will never know.
-- Julien Pierre http://www.madbrain.com/blog
Sure people might think that, but there isn't any substantive difference between the Klan of the 21st century and the people opposing same sex marriage. Both groups propagate fear, hatred and irrationality for their purpose. Both groups are opposed to equal rights for everybody and neither group has anything resembling a rational reason for it.
Now, if you're comparing them with the Klan of the '20s into the '50s, I think you'd have a point, there's been very little violence on the issue compared with the Klan back in the day.
When animals evolve the the point where they can engage in informed consent, then beastiality might be OK. Polygamy is outlawed for the simple reason that there are serious social problems that come from it. Basically when there's marriage between pairs of consenting adults, just about everybody has a shot at marriage. However, when you allow one man to marry 3 wives, all of a sudden the supply of single men decreases by one whereas the supply of single women decreases by 3, making it so that there are now 2 men that can't get married. The FLDS had a practice of kicking out about 2/3 of the males in order for things to work out.
The point though is that when it comes to consenting adults, there really shouldn't be much say from anybody else.
Function of marriage is to identify, assign and protect property-rights for natural born children of hetero-couples. Mak it easy on them to excel! Any couple owning significant property is likely more-able than most of their fellow citizens. They will create the most value in the future, thus strengthing the state. Expect the same of their children; marriage grants these children special rights w.r.t. their parents property so they may more easily generate future value (for the state). The state puts a **property wall** around well-blooded children ... expecting a future payoff! Childless or non-property-owning citizens or faghgboiz may 'rut-in-the-rushes down by the riverside' for all the value they likely produce for the state ---- without genetic children that's NONE going for'ard. Marriage is a **don't care** item for them.
This. Let's get the list of anti-gun supporters next and start getting them fired. Don't take my rights away, and don't tread on me.
I don't care if he was supporting a bill to impose shariah on California, or give tax breaks to encourage polygamous marriage, or circumcise all males that enter the state. I don't have to agree with him, I can campaign against him, but it is still his right to think that.
The right to free political involvement is where all other rights come from. Once you permit someone to be harassed for their political beliefs, no-matter how abhorrent they are to you, then whatever your rights are will soon become subject to the whims of those who have the most power to harass their opponents.
Being against anything to the extent that it overrides your civility is the basic core of intolerance. History has been full of groups who have seen their cause as being more important than basic civility such as KKK, Taliban, Supreme Harmony Society, Hutu militia, Red Guards, some US Civil War era democrat politicians, and the result has always been roughly the same. To my knowledge Eich was not practicing uncivil behavior towards gays by discriminating against them or using slurs against them, he just supported a bill. This bill, you might believe is discriminatory in nature, but that decision in a democracy is up to the people and their representatives, and at the very least we all have the right to put forward any question for the people to decide on.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
Yeah, now that you mention it, the GLBT community mostly seemed to not care too much about the whole thing, and at least some of them even sided publicly with Brenden.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
My God look. gmhowell wrote more than 1 line! He's been nspired to literary genius (not). Thinking? Forget thinking. It's not for you gmhowell. You might hurt yourself. Lmao.
Picture that. Hahaha! I'm gonna steal the bit about confused tying your shoes.
it was over before the real humans got involved...gays are at best 5-8% of the world
they dont marry and have kids like marraiage is about as much as your love of one another...end of storry
get a govt paper for unions big deal move on...
its all distraction form the real issues like the economy , debt and nsa spying
From the NYTimes interview: `When asked if Mr. Eich might step down if the controversy surrounding his political donations and his beliefs continued to grow, Mr. Eich said he served as chief executive at the request of the board of Mozilla, and it would be up to those members to decide his fate. “I serve at the pleasure of the board. I would have them ask me to step down,” he said. “Until then I have to be C.E.O. 100 percent.”'
The obvious conclusion then is that the board (illegally) pressured him to resign.
But all of a sudden allegations that marriage is only the first step and the final plan is mandatory gay sex education in elementary schools do not sound so far fetched. I have and will donate to political causes others may not agree with, for example school choice. I sure hope that a donation I made as a private citizen would not some day preclude me from being CEO of a company. If Hobby Lobby doesn't have corporate religious freedom to restrict health insurance, perhaps OkCupid should be penalized for boycotting based on a political viewpoint.
You can boycott the LGBT community by not marrying someone of the same-sex.
Also, by leaving the rest of us who did alone, rather than try to take away our rights, as Prop 8 did.
-- Julien Pierre http://www.madbrain.com/blog
The solution to polygamy is gay marriage! Lots!
Also reverse traditional polygamy - one woman (probably a domme) and several men (usually all but one slaves)
Also polygamous gay marriage. The possibilities are endless!
What we have here is a failure to imaginate.
Hilariously ironic captcha: buggers
Sure, it is your right to call the backlash hate, but that doesn't really make it so.
If that's hate, I'd love to know what you call the "Yes on 8" video ads that called gays dangerous to children, etc ?
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2014/04/04/brendan_eich_supported_prop_8_which_was_worse_than_you_remember.html
Please watch them before answering.
-- Julien Pierre http://www.madbrain.com/blog
What if we replaced gay with Jew/Muslim then would there be all this talk of free speech being violated? Persecution is persecution with any way you segment the population.
This was a delightfully broad-based protest, not stemming from any group in particular.
Shenanigans. This was a very clever advertising campaign.
The new right fascists are bilingual. They speak English and Bullshit.
Yes: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it (Evelyn Beatrice Hall, regarding Voltaire's beliefs)"
The antidote to bad speech is more good speech.
I agree "chilling precedent" is a risk here. What could it be next? Using campaign finance disclosures against Progressive Democratic or Green voters? So, there is wisdom in the CA law on that.
From here about me BTW:
http://www.fec.gov/finance/dis...
"FERNHOUT, PAUL
KUCINICH, DENNIS J
VIA KUCINICH FOR PRESIDENT INC.
06/30/2003 500.00 26940295925
09/21/2003 250.00 26960140255
STEIN, JILL
VIA JILL STEIN FOR PRESIDENT
10/22/2012 250.00 13964633282
Total Contributions: 1000.00"
Yet I know in some sense that does foreclose some opportunities laws or not -- although it may also open others. There was also a time in the USA before the secret ballot when people would sometimes even have to fight their way through to the polls. It's not clear to me the secret ballot even is worth it if the cost is vote fraud via voting computers and also not being able to vote via the internet. Still, there was a chilling effect a bit in knowing any campaign donation would be a matter of record, it's true. I live in a very staunch Republican area. Although in looking at that record I do regret not donating to Cynthia McKinney's campaign as a matter of record (although I did vote for her against Obama). I think I was still a bit disillusioned supporting Kucinich where he seemed to cave on antiwar stuff at the Democratic Convention. Still, we homeschool which Republicans tend to support and Democrats tend to work against somewhat as Democrats push expanding compulsory prison-like public schooling. Republicans have tended to support digital rights a bit better than Democrats. Greens tend to be a bit anti-technology whereas I would like to see better technology. I feel Kucinich actually made more sense coherently given his stated beliefs and personal religion back when he was against abortion (even if preventing abortion in the USA may not be practical culturally or legally or politically). McKinney has her own anger management issues apparently like at an ID checkpoint (not saying sometimes anger is not justified though). Sometimes we don't have the combination of choices we might wish for -- or even know exactly what we might wish for. Possibly the deeper issue is that, compared to other Western democracies, the USA has only two parties -- far right (Republicans) and center right (Democrats). It's hard to make good choices with such a limited set of options. And even left/right is a little arbitrary, since there is no reason that, say, opposition to abortion should go with Republicans. Once could almost just as easily imagine the Democrat platform arguing for the sanctity of life from conception with collective responsibility for care and Republicans arguing for the individual right to choose with an individual responsibility for care. Same for many other arbitrary constellations of political alliances which differ in other countries.
Although, it sounds like from what others write here that Eich was a controversial choice even before he took the position for various reasons, including both for management style and also on technology vs. marketing. And it sounds like some of the propaganda for Proposition 8 was essentially gay bashing. Things are so rarely black and white. If Eich been less controversial, and if Proposition 8 commercials had been less indirectly gay bashing, then it seems possible Mozilla might have said something like "Mozilla takes no position on the protected speech of employees; however Mozilla endorses inclusiveness and diversity" (or something like that).
Still, it is ironically interesting that 50 seconds into the third video here (pro-Proposition 8) the actor (?) says "It's already
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Mozilla is major TOAST. They butt fucked themselves and Eich will have the last laugh as Mozilla bellies up like a dead carp in SF Bay.
HO RI FUK
BAND DING OW BANG DING OW
LOL
The problem with 99% of the defenses of Eich is that they pretend he was a working stiff instead of the boss. And also ignoring the power he had over other employees, including gay ones.
In this country, it used to be socially acceptable to hate blacks and discriminate against them.
That is no longer the case.
In this country, it used to be socially acceptable to hate Jews and discriminate against them.
That is no longer the case.
In this country, it used to be socially acceptable to hate Italians/Irish/Chinese/Catholics and discriminate against them.
That is no longer the case.
Homophobia is at the place where racial or religious discrimination was at a long time ago: unacceptable in polite society.
It all came out in the end:
Idiot. People aren't "special" for finally having the rights you've always enjoyed. Blacks weren't "special" after the passage of the 13th Amendment or the Civil Rights Act. Non-property owning men and women weren't "special" after Universal Suffrage. Etc.
> Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from all consequences.
In the case of anti-discrimination laws, it *does* mean freedom from being fired (or constructively dismissed, as is the case with a "voluntary" resignation) for who you donate to. This isn't a case of someone "refusing to buy" anything (Mozilla is free), but harassing someone one to the point where it's an intolerable workplace.
That *is* illegal and long has been.
It was Brendan that made it clear to Mitchell. She was offering him all sorts of options to remain, and he got angry that she wasn't accepting his resignation.
Why doesn't OKStupid fire all their employees who don't support same sex marriage? They'd be lying if they said there aren't any.
When liberals do it, it's okay.
could it be?
I have to agree. No matter how much of an asshole view a person has, they should be able to act on their belief within the law without being condemned for it. The thing that really gets me is that they took it to his employer. If you have a political problem, fight that problem on the political stage. Don't bring that crap to the workplace!
> I'll be impressed if you can point at a signficant GLBT organization that actually did discuss Eich.
How about the ones who sued to get the list of voters in order to allow this sort of thing?
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Judge-Prop-8-donors-have-no-right-to-anonymity-2323493.php
Yeah, I'm a little disgusted that OKCupid stuck their nose into this...
I understand the guy is responsible for the initial short-sighted (non)design of Javascript though.. that's enough reason to fire him.. the language is still trying to overcome his incompetence!
Dude, get over yourselves. The guy stepped down. Even if he was fired, it was because the public didn't want him as CEO. There's no law that you have to keep a CEO that the public doesn't like just because the reason they don't like him involves politics.
Back in 2000, the Democrats jammed-through a law making it so nobody can get teaching credentials in CA without first being indoctrinated with a class in gay-tolerance. In 2011, California Democrats put in place laws to mandate that CA schools teach positive things about gays, and banned teaching ANYTHING negative about homosexuality... you cannot legally tell kids the truth in California schools if that truth involves homosexuality and it's something negative (like the stats on longevity for gays vs straights for example). The LGBT activists out here have been VERY busy and very goo at hiding their actions from average parents who are busy-as-hampsters-on-a-wheel just trying to hold jobs, make house payments, pay taxes, feed and clothe the kids, etc. California has become an evil trash heap and the taxes have to keep rising to pay for all the societal wreckage; at the end of the day, you cannot be both socially liberal AND fiscally conservative because all the people damaged by libertine life choices require hugely expensive social safety nets like the BILLIONS we have to spend on healthcare for all the folks who end-up HIV positive.
Incidentally, the "Gay Marriage" effort is, indeed, intended to dismantle/destroy traditional marriage. Progressives lie about this all the time, of course, because a central tenet of their political ideology is that the truth is flexible and the ends justify the means. This was NEVER about equality; men always have had the right to marry a woman provided neither neither the man nor the woman was already married, both were of age, and both consented - there was no "homosexual" test applied to a man to deny him this right. Marriage was never defined by "love" (though friends and family of those who married hoped the couple would love each other) as evidenced by the huge numbers of "arranged marriages", "marriages of convenience", "shotgun weddings" etc in history. The relationship was designed for procreation and the raising of children. Two adults who just want to live together, share stuff, and get frisky do not need the extra structure of marriage that families having and raising kids need. What gay advocates are demanding is something new: the right for a man to marry another man. There's no legitimate right to have this logically-absurd, biologically-toxic, non-conjugal whatever it is declared legitimate as a marriage, no matter how frequently two (or more) "consenting adults" (plus the optional assorted blow-up toy, fence post, farm animal, robot, or corpse (for extra excitement perhaps?) - hey it's all just "sexual orientation") engage in it. Calling it "marriage" will never make it marriage just as I will never become a Martian even if I insist that I am one. Insisting more loudly, or more frequently, or getting a corrupt judge to support the claim will still not make me a Martian. The Supreme court could declare me a Martian and the president could sign a proclamation to that effect... but I'd still not be a Martian.
Free speech means you will get taken to task for saying horrible things. Nothing about free speech means there won't be consequences.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
The people speaking out were not discussing the issue, they were saying that if you don't agree with us, we will attack you personally.
You'e making a false difference, where none really exists.
People are saying they don't want to work for an asshole. That's fine too. The coporate veil is a legal fiction. If you'e an asshole IRL, then you're an asshole, end of. Suddenly being a corporate employee does not wipe the slate clean from 9-5.
People are saying they don't want to do business with an asshole too. That's also fine too. There are people I won't do business with also.
The thing is: the point of speech is to convince people to do things, otherwise it's pointless. If everyone ageed that he was being an asshole but then made no change in their actions, what would be the point.
The point about free speech protections is to be free from government sanctioned (i.e. legal) violence for what you say. Insisting that people treat you the same no matte what you say is not what fee speech is about.
He's suffered no violence and there's a big debate on the matter going on. That is free speech working exactly as it should.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
All humans have a right to free personal speech
Yep.
d should have the freedom to express themselves politically however they choose, within the bounds of the law
Yep!
I believe this man should have the right to express whatever idiot belief he wants and still keep his job.
And that's where the problem lies, and where I disagree. The thing is being an asshole IRL does not get wiped clean 9-5 merely by being in a company. Since you've given a general argument, we can prod the bonudaries to see how far it goes.
So apparently it's within the free speech laws of the US to declare that one grouping of people "should" be killed. It only steps over the bounds into solicitation of murder when you say a specific person should be killed.
Imagine a hypothetical situation where you have a company with a significant number of key employees falling into a category targeted by real wing nuts, say Jews. The you get a CEO who in his off hours is known ot rant and rave about the Zionist Imperialism and how all Jews should be killed.
Well, now you have a bit of a problem. What do you do. The thing is you can't have both keeping their jobs. Tose key employees aren't going to work for a company where the CEO espouses views about how they should be murdered for their beliefs. In fact they'd have a good case for construtive dismissal. Or you eject the nutty CEO for holding his views.
What do you do?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
there should line between tech and politics, but it's very difficult. Brendan was one of the Founders of the Mozilla Foundation, I think he does believe what Mozilla stands for, it's sad that he left. I still believe in the Manifesto "People are needed to make the Internet open and participatory - people acting as individuals, working together in groups, and leading others. The Mozilla Foundation is committed to advancing the principles set out in the Mozilla Manifesto. We invite others to join us and make the Internet an ever better place for everyone." Here's the link to the Mozilla Manifesto: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/a...
Eich wasn't fired/resigned/whatever because he expressed a political opinion He resigned because the reaction both inside and outside of Mozilla to that action was having serious, negative repercussions for the organization. If Steve Jobs had showed up at One Infinite Loop in full Nazi regalia one day, one might also argue that he was just expressing his political opinion. The fact that half the business world suddenly stopped buying Macintoshes in protest is key here. Would the CEO's right to express his admiration of Nazis (or at least Nazi fashion) be more important than the fact that he was tanking the company? Should the Board simply sit back and watch the entire company die because they don't want to "break the law"? This is quite idiotic. I'll speculate that if Eich had expressed regret or a change of heart, the whole thing would be done by now and he'd be working. But he chose not to, and this has led a lot of people (including three board members) to signal their great displeasure. For those looking to blame the "gay lobby," I would suggest they think this through more carefully. Gay people don't want to be treated badly, so when they see someone in a prominent position acting like that's ok, they react sharply. If Mr Eich had given money to an anti-Hispanic organization and people protested, would they want to say, "Oh, that's just appeasing the Latino Lobby"?
So you'll be campaigning for all of the black and hispanic CEOs who supported Proposition 8 to be fired as well?
Why is it that it's now imperative "we" have diversity in colour, creed, religion, sexual orientation but diversity in opinion and belief, if it doesn't gel with diversity of colour, creed, religion, and sexual orientation is bad? Stupid. The desire and drive to normalize homosexual behaviour is brandishing those who don't affirm this behaviour as bigots. It's OK if some people don't find the idea of two guy humping OK. It's not normal. It's permissible, but it's not what nature intended. Flame me all you want, but the force an issue down society's throat at all costs is stupid.
by the single issue, bully, heterophobes
"Rapidly losing the will to live here."
If not a joke, your contributions would be missed, whether agreed with or not. See also my comment to someone else related to depression: http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
And on the value of public disagreements: ..."
https://sites.google.com/site/...
" The theory Dan Sperber suggested--the argumentative theory of reasoning--proposes that instead of having a purely individual function, reasoning has a social and, more specifically, argumentative function. The function of reasoning would be to find and evaluate reasons in dialogic contexts--more plainly, to argue with others. Here's a very quick summary of the evolutionary rationale behind this theory. Communication is hugely important for humans, and there is good reason to believe that this has been the case throughout our evolution, as different types of collaborative--and therefore communicative--activities already played a big role in our ancestors' lives (hunting, collecting, raising children, etc.). However, for communication to be possible, listeners have to have ways to discriminate reliable, trustworthy information from potentially dangerous information--otherwise speakers would be wont to abuse them through lies and deception. Listeners must have mechanisms of epistemic vigilance. One way listeners and speakers can improve the reliability of communication is through arguments. The speaker gives a reason to accept a given conclusion. The listener can then evaluate this reason to decide whether she should accept the conclusion. In both cases, they have used reasoning--to find and evaluate a reason respectively. If reasoning does its job properly, communication has been improved: a true conclusion is more likely to be supported by good arguments, and therefore accepted, thereby making both the speaker--who managed to convince the listener--and the listener--who acquired a potentially valuable piece of information--better off.
Our evolutionary account is much more in touch with the prevailing view of the evolution of human cognition. According to this view--alternatively named the social brain hypothesis, or the Machiavellian intelligence hypothesis, among others--most of human cognition evolved to answer the demands of our social world.
And:
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes....
"We do not claim that reasoning has nothing to do with the truth. We claim that reasoning did not evolve to allow the lone reasoner to find the truth. We think it evolved to argue. But arguing is not only about trying to convince other people; it's also about listening to their arguments. So reasoning is two-sided. On the one hand, it is used to produce arguments. Here its goal is to convince people. Accordingly, it displays a strong confirmation bias -- what people see as the "rhetoric" side of reasoning. On the other hand, reasoning is also used to evaluate arguments. Here its goal is to tease out good arguments from bad ones so as to accept warranted conclusions and, if things go well, get better beliefs and make better decisions in the end."
So, thanks for being part of that process. In any case, hang in there, there is a chance it might get better.
Also, tangentially, on things "getting better" and depression and being in a minority:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I...
"Its goal is to prevent suicide among LGBT youth by having gay adults convey the message that these teens' lives will improve."
Example:
"It Gets Better - Princeton University"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
But that sentiment can apply to lots of things given a life so full of
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
This is a ridiculous straw man you're building here, and please do note where I said that I was making somewhat of a simplification. The correct example for you to make would be something to the effect of "Knowing that he holds these personal beliefs, can he be trusted to not exempt or exclude homosexual employees, from XXXX due to their yyyy...." To which my answer is that, yes, this is certainly a valid concern. But I can't imagine that this man was hired off the street with no previous examples of his character and actions to draw from. So where's the line for you? At what level is personal speech "acceptable"?. What is "the right level" of tolerance? Let's take it further: "what is the right level of patriotism?" "What is the right level of morality?" "what is the right level of piety?" Just because you and I agree that LGBT crowd should be allowed to marry gives us no right to impose those beliefs on others, and to do so is wrong.
multiple marriage (regardless of which sex is the single) = polygamy [ok so far]
"reverse traditional" by which I assume you mean one Female, multiple Male marriage = polyandry [note same root as android, etc. Literally "many men."]
the far more common one Male, multiple Female marriage = polygyny [note same root as gynacologist. Literally "many women."]
McFly777
- - -
"What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
This is a ridiculous straw man you're building here, and please do note where I said that I was making somewhat of a simplification.
Turnabout is fair play. It is precisely because you were making a simplification that he responded with his own.
You call his simplification a strawman? He probably feels the same for yours.
The correct example for you
That's actually evidence that it is you who are constructing a strawman. You're making up an example for him, putting words in his mouth and arguing against that, instead of what he actually said.
Just because you and I agree that LGBT crowd should be allowed to marry gives us no right to impose those beliefs on others, and to do so is wrong.
None of us imposed any beliefs on others. We can't legally do it even if we wanted to. I can't call up Eich and tell him he's fired. Nor can you, or anybody else who whined about him
Yes, to put it poorly, all people did was WHINE. Whining doesn't have legal powers. Me whining at you imposes nothing on you. You can laugh me off as some random AC troll. Or you could get mad and respond with your own speech. Or you listen and seriously reconsider your beliefs and take action. The choice is ultimately yours.
It would have been perfectly fine (and legal) for Eich to refuse to resign. "I did nothing wrong. If you (Mozilla) fire me I'll sue for wrongful dismissal". He choose not to.
In the same way you can't imagine he was just hired off the streets, I can't imagine a man of his caliber succumbed to make that decision under coercion.
I understand that position, but it's not practical. The government has an interest in recognizing marriage, it provides framework for a number of legal and property issues that otherwise would require everyone to produce and maintain multiple legal documents. Look into the statistics of estate planning, percentage of people that draft a will, power of attorney's, etc etc.
This is a ridiculous straw man you're building here,
It's not a straw man, it's reductio ad absurdum. Quite different.
and please do note where I said that I was making somewhat of a simplification.
Yes, but you'd simplified it so far that what you said didn't work. Unfortunately I did not know the more complex thing you were thinking.
To which my answer is that, yes, this is certainly a valid concern. But I can't imagine that this man was hired off the street with no previous examples of his character and actions to draw from.
But there's more than that. Mozilla is a very public organisation and a charity dedicated to "doing good" in some regard. There's also the problem that mozilla employees who have opted to work at such a place not being happy working for someone who is a known bigot. The thing is you get to choose to have one or the other but not both working for you. Who do you choose?
So where's the line for you? At what level is personal speech "acceptable"?
Circumstance dependent, of course. At a certain stage, I'm not going to do business or work for someone who is too far over. It's always easy to identify things far to the side of the line.
What is "the right level" of tolerance?
That's an easy one. I'm happy to tolerate (from a legal point of view) anyone that doesn't try to restrict the freedom of others. Your freedom ends where my nose begins and all that. From a personal and professional point of view, I don't like assocating with assholes.
"What is the right level of morality?"
Your freedom ends where mine begins.
Just because you and I agree that LGBT crowd should be allowed to marry gives us no right to impose those beliefs on others, and to do so is wrong.
That's the thing though: Eich was the one using the force of law to impose his beliefs on the LGBT crowd, not the other way around. He funded a law which prevented people he'd never see or never meet from marrying. Of course he's free to do that if he likes, and I'd never dream of trying to use government sanctioned violence to prevent him from doing so (a qualm, you'll note that te doesn't share). However, I see no reason why anyone should choose to associate with someone like that if they don't wish to.
Free speech is generally about preventing government sanctioned violence against the speaker. It allows the speaker to say unpleasant things about others, and of course on the flip side, it allows others to say unpleasant things about the speaker. Free speech doesn't say you get to keep your friends etc.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
No, it's enough to say something needed to change, but that need not be the resignation of the CEO. It could be an open discussion with the employees to assuage their well justified fears that someone who had acted, not spoken, against the interests of themselves and their peers would not do it again. As an adult he took actions, he is responsible for his actions and his words, even if it comes with a consequence he may not have wanted or intended. Mozilla the company didn't create the situation and actively tried to help him. His reactions to the consequences for his actions caused the issues. He didn't get a handle on his message, and it got away from him.
So this article is typical bullshit.
Resistance is futile.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Brenden invented Javascript and has remained very active in that community. He has DEMONSTRATED the ability to engender an active ecosystem which is what Mozilla requires. To weigh that against a political contribution 6 years ago is insanity and nonsense. The strident call for his resignation bodes very poorly for the validity of LGBT concerns and suggests an underlying coercion that is coming to the surface now that they consider themselves in the ascendant.
Be More, Be Manly, The Manly Geek Ubergeek Extraordinaire Blogger: www.manlygeek.com/blog Podcaster: podcast.man
The mis-characterizations of those who oppose same sex marriage shows a lot of close-mindedness. The first step to pursuading someone is to understand their point of view.
Society has an interest in advocating stable families that provide the proper environment for children. Government plays a role in that advocacy, and democracy is a process by which different opinions come to a workable agreement.
The religious argument is not about bigotry. Religious people have an opinion about what constitutes the proper environment for raising children. Though single-sex families can be nurturing, there is a rational argument that children are best served by having both a male and female role model.
Too often the argument for same-sex marriage revolves around the idea that people should act on any feeling that they have. Religious people, who focus on self mastery and a divine purpose, see that argument as debasing.
So stop with the name calling, and engage in a useful discussion.
Okay, they the GLBT community members who took part in this are hypocritical bullies who are using their newfound political favor to engage in the same acts they used to condemn loudly when they were done to their members.
For what it's worth, I'd be equally pissed if Eich was "forced out" for being gay or for donating in opposition to Prop 8. That would be equally wrong to do this for those reasons.
Okay, then when the political winds change you would also consider it "free speech working" if a CEO is forced out because he supported gay marriage once 6 years prior? Because that would be the exact same thing that happened with Eich for a reversed position.
Funny thing about discrimination law is that it doesn't prevent discrimination, it merely trains people what not to say. The OP says that clearly. What would be illegal was implied but carefully never said explicitly, and it is hard to prove intent. I knew of a case many years ago where it looked like a line manager was choosing people to lay off who had used the company medical benefits, such costs come directly off the bottom line, but nothing was provable because no intent to do that was stated, meaning in public. The result is that the law is an aid to people who discriminate.
We are lucky that many people who lead like to be liked and almost worse than being fired outright is to be shamed. At least if the CEO has a disagreement with the board and the shareholders, he can rationalize that he did the best he could, but if he knows that according to his own standards he made a mistake or did wrong that he feels shame for it, then he may resign on his own accord. That is good. It levels the playing field between ordinary and powerful people.
Why is Californian law an issue? Mozilla developers are located all around the world, as are Mozilla users. This is a world-wide Open Source software development community, not a USian business.
...in this setting,' Baker was quoted as saying... Doesn't sound like she gave him much of a try at it unless you believe the 'It was Brendan's decision' part. Wouldn't a newly minted, first-time CEO want to give it the old college try and see where the chips fall after some open (and lengthy) discourse?
I'm not following your logic. You say that Eich did something that was within his rights. At that point, numerous people complained about him, which was within their rights as clearly as the donation was within Eich's rights. You seem to be implying that Eich has free speech but should have immunity from consequences, while the people who complained about him should suffer consequences for their complaints. Why does Eich get the free pass here?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
http://hotair.com/archives/201...
Obama wasn't on board until about 2012 as well, he must resign too.
I must respectfully disagree. By simply campaigning against him, he may consider himself harassed. Free speech, to be really free, must have license to offend.
There is no reasonable definition of harass here, that's the real problem. It's basically what you could probably get a civil jury to agree with, and I think we've all noticed how split right down the middle this whole case is. Is it harassment if 90% of the Mozilla user base stops using the product? Is it harassment to write a letter to the board protesting their choice? Is it harassment to stand outside their offices with a placard chanting? If he feels harassed he has every right to file protective motions in a court of law, I doubt he'll be following that up though.
As for your uncivil points, a lot of people would argue that 'yes' he was being uncivil when he donated money to that cause. Other people would disagree (maybe me included). People are going to have their say, and California criminal codes don't trump the constitution of the land.
Nice post though, made me stop and think for a minute. It's a shame we have to tolerate the horrible, nasty, venom filled, bigoted, hurtful, degrading and insulting free speech to allow all the other good stuff. But it's well worth that offence and harassment.
I really like some players like OkCupid urging users to abandon Firefox, but yet we have this: OKCupid's CEO Donated to Anti-Gay Campaign Once, Too
Hypocrisy.
he was fired for bad judgement
just like in my new hire embarrasing the boss/founder example...even though its true it's still bad judgement which is enough to get you fired in the "vagaries of contemporary employment"
think twitter...twitter is speech...if a person sends a dick pic via twitter they might be fired depending on their job
that's ***legal***
those are two examples but the point is he had *bad judgement*
is it fair? i'm not addressing that question b/c I don't know the details of his hiring in the first place...maybe he had been warned internally, maybe all Mozilla are like him...no way for us in this discussion to know
he apologized...that should be noted
Thank you Dave Raggett
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!)
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!)
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!)
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
See you here http://tech.slashdot.org/comme... you bigmouthed little nobody...
APK
P.S.=> Have the balls to show up there in the link above to reply to it (& NOT days later like you did, LONG after I left that thread!)
NOW, in the link above, I simply tore you apart in it vs. your "so-called 'points'" that you "amended" bogusly, changing your parameters/constraints there!
(& I am going to rip you a new asshole there YET AGAIN, publicly, for your BIG mouth you little shit - prepare to be utterly humiliated, publicly...)
... apk
If Mozilla has an open culture then they would be open to someone wanting proposition 8 and someone not wanting proposition 8. Thus they would be open to someone supporting monetarily proposition 8 or supporting an organization against it. Mozilla should not call themselves open if they allow for a one time donation to affect and change all the work that Eich did for the company. Reinstate Eich. Reinstate Eich. Reinstate Eich.
You can have freedom of speech, in the free speech zones. However, if you step outside them we'll starve your family?