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Gay Firefox developers boycott Mozilla to protest CEO hire

132 points by line-zero 12y ago

oddshocks 12y ago
Solidarity with all developers planning to protest
lawl 12y ago
I totally see how this could upset people. But I'm not sure how his management qualities are tied to his political opinions. It's the same with politicans, what the fuck has an affair to do with their political views? I 100% support gay marriage. I also understand they're upset. But I don't know if this is the right reaction.
- Kudos 12y ago
  Bad analogy, you don't work for the people you elect, they work for you (in theory). If the person who had direct control over my career held discriminatory personal beliefs, I'd probably have a problem with it too.
- ebiester 12y ago
  It has to do with our money (via Google ad revenue) going to a corporation headed by someone who cared enough about harming us to spend $1,000 to do so. All I can says is that when I see this from people we otherwise respect, I feel like I'm physically reliving a kick to the ribs from high school. I'd consider it more if Prop 8 hadn't been overturned. But as it stands, he hasn't used his personal platform to speak on the subject or use Mozilla's resources to do so. If that changes, I'll reevaluate.
  - lawl 12y ago
    Usually I'd say you might be right. But I really have this sweet spot for mozilla. They're an NPO and Firefox 1.0 basically fixed the web. I don't know, it's hard. I clearly disagree with his political opinion. But then again, is using chrome any better? Thats Google after all, which I hate to love and love to hate. (And at the end of the day, Google is still just an Ad company!) I don't know it just sucks. Maybe we can try to seek a dialogue with him? I mean if he works for Mozilla he can't be that dumb.
    - smirksirlot 12y ago
      His last public comment on this issue was in 2012, where he basically didn't actually comment. And quite honestly, as a gay man, I would rather use Chrome and have Google profit over my personal data, VS touching Firefox now. The Mozilla Board clearly knew about this issue (it was quite a big deal when the news first broke), and this should have something they considered. If Eich changed his views, then he should have clarified before them formally announcing this. Mozilla making this choice yells to me that they don't give a crap about me and others like me. Even if logically that doesn't make sense, there's this visceral emotional disgust and pain.
    - eropple 12y ago
      I agree it's tough, but who you choose to lead you says a lot about who you want to be. I don't personally want to support a company that wants a dude with the morals of Eich pointing the way. (I don't care for Larry Page much, either, but there's less active attacking of other folks' rights up in the Googleplex. Google's actions with regard to ads and my data don't really bug me, so that isn't a factor to me.)
- Aloisius 12y ago
  There is a huge difference between a politician having an affair with someone and a person actively trying to oppress you.
- IvyMike 12y ago
  Try applying it to yourself. It may be more emotional than logical, but I personally would find it very difficult to work for someone who would deny me the right to marriage because I'm an atheist.
- dinkumthinkum 12y ago
  I think an affair is a little different than trying to affect political change. What if he was a white supremacist? No big deal because if a white supremacists writes qsorts, it's still O(nlogn)? That may seem a bit extreme but it's essentially like this. A CEO is in some a ways political animal and is certainly a representative of an organization. I think political causes are different from affairs. However, he hasn't done anything against the law here but I don't think it is unreasonable for people to want to boycott.
- Karellen 12y ago
  "what the fuck has an affair to do with their political views?" Uh, integrity? If a politician won't keep probably the most solemn vow they've ever made, to the person they were most committed to in their life, in front of all the other people they care about most, why the fuck do you think they'll keep some fucking campaign promise to you and a bunch of other faceless citizens they've never met to make your lives better, instead of taking a backhander from some lobbyist to fuck you all over instead? And if they're not going to keep their campaign promises (yeah, yeah, no need to point out the incredible naïvety of that particular "if") then why should you let them stay in a position of power that they can use to better themselves at your expense? Boot them out, get the next one in, and keep doing it until they learn the lesson that we fucking demand better. I don't know what kind of world you want to live in, but one where we've already given up and don't even try to maintain a pretense of holding our politicians to account for their honesty isn't the one I'm going for.
  - lawl 12y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_marriage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_marriage Just saying... Making public you're in an open relationship will kill your career as a politican just as fast, wanna bet?
    - Karellen 12y ago
      Oh, you're almost certainly correct. Absolutely, there's the right thing to do which involves telling the truth but could cause difficulties, and then there's the easy "political" lie you can tell to try to stay popular and keep your career humming along and your salary rolling in. But no-one said doing the right thing was easy. And you've still totally failed to convince me that I want the second type of person claiming to represent me in government.
    - Zigurd 12y ago
      That's a terrible example. It would only be a career killer among people with a propensity toward intolerance. And there are plenty of places, some of which are represented by politicians with unconventional relationships, that don't care.
- DrewRWx 12y ago
  Personally, politicians' affairs only really bother me if they ran on a "family values" platform. Then it's just straight up hypocrisy, especially if they are caught in a gay affair because "family values" is a euphemism for anti-gay.
- megablast 12y ago
  I see a big difference between having an affair, and spending money to whatever the equivalent is (a proposition to end hetero marriages?). The $1000 was a hateful spend.
  - kybernetikos 12y ago
    I've got no problem with someone campaigning to end hetero marriages. State marriages make no sense to me. The State shouldn't be granting special rights and privileges to people unless there is a good reason, either one of social benefit or of trying to make up for unfair disadvantages that those individuals suffer. I'm not sure what social benefit marriage is supposed to confer. If it's to do with raising of children, then clearly only those who have a child should be able to get married. If it's to do with committed relationships being good for society, then anyone in any kind of committed relationship (and not necessarily a sexual one) should be able to get married. If you can't point to any specific benefit that marriage is supposed to bring to society, then it just looks like the state is trying to control peoples sexuality which is weird, and there's no need for it at all. If you can point to a specific benefit, then that benefit should be the benchmark for who can and who cannot get married.
yuchi 12y ago
Gosh. I’m really upset not by the news about Eich as the new CEO, but about learning that such an idol in my life is anti-LGTB. I really hate this kind of situations.
- dethstar 12y ago
  Although a different kind of situation here's a link for those cases: http://www.theonion.com/articles/boy-ive-really-put-you-in-a-tough-spot-havent-i,34949/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/boy-ive-really-put-you-in-a...
- katowulf 12y ago
  Maybe it would be appropriate to ask him why he was against it before deciding he's anti-LGTB. I'd imagine that, being an intelligent and capable human being, he deserves the consideration of hearing his case before you knock him off the pedestal.
  - alxndr 12y ago
    TFA links to his 2012 personal statement: https://brendaneich.com/2012/04/community-and-diversity/ https://brendaneich.com/2012/04/community-and-diversity/
    - mikeash 12y ago
      Sadly, he doesn't explain himself at all. He says he has no animosity, but provides no explanation for how such a thing could be done without it. I imagine he thinks he has a sound, non-hateful reasoning behind his position which will not be taken as such if discussed. In context, I'd guess he's probably wrong about it being sound and non-hateful. Often, being unwilling to discuss one's positions is part of your brain trying to tell the rest of you that you've got it wrong. Not always, obviously, but I'd say it's the way to bet. In any case, if you're willing to make a public stand on something (and given the political finance laws he donated under, it qualifies as a public stand) then you should be willing to discuss your stand. If he's not willing to discuss it then we don't necessarily have to assume the very best.
HillRat 12y ago
They should be protesting the fact that he's the person responsible for JavaScript. (Hey, don't forget to tip your waitress and try the veal!) More seriously, there's the open question as to whether a career technologist is the right person for the CEO slot, especially since he appears to still be in the trenches when it comes to projects like Rust. Beyond that, this is a cautionary tale for potential CEOs -- within reason, you can give money to politicians and money to foundations, but once you start giving money to specific political causes you're risking a firestorm, and rightfully so. While MoCo isn't exactly a Chik-Fil-A or Hobby Lobby, this is the sort of the thing that causes PR flacks to either wake up in a cold sweat (if they're employees) or start planning the color of their new Aventador (if on agency contract).
- ben0x539 12y ago
  I'm not sure Eich is particularly involved with Rust (anymore?) beyond having his name on some recent related press release.
  - kibwen 12y ago
    Eich hasn't been involved in Rust for the three years that I've been watching the project. Whether he was involved before that, I don't know, but given the primitive and under-the-radar state of pre-2011 Rust it seems unlikely.
- fennecfoxen 12y ago
  In related news, I seem to recall that it's technically against the law for the king or queen of England to be a Catholic. But at least no one in this latest Inquisition / Reformation analogue is being systematically imprisoned or executed for what they believe in and who they've donated to. So the world has made SOME progress.
jack-r-abbit 12y ago
Meh. Prop 8 passed the people's vote with 7,001,084 Californians voting in favor of it and 6,401,482 voting against. Are we to start boycotting every company that employs one of those 7 million people? I'm glad it was made right in the end and I hope at least some of those 7 million people have changed their opinion... but I don't think we need to keep dwelling on it.
- Fomite 12y ago
  I think it's perfectly reasonable for developers to "keep dwelling" on someone telling them they should have less rights because of who they've chosen to love.
- katowulf 12y ago
  I doubt that vehement hatred of 7 million people's views will sway them to the cause either. It's just a bit hard to convince people to respect your beliefs while dancing atop their own--narrow-minded or otherwise.
- redbad 12y ago
  1. There is a difference between voting for something and funding it. 2. There is a difference between being employed by a company and being its CEO. 3. These differences are significant.
  - javert 12y ago
    I strongly disagree with #1.
    - eknkc 12y ago
      Money can buy a lot of votes.
    - danielharan 12y ago
      You need a bit more to than simple disagreement when the initial statement is that a donation (of $1,000) and a vote are different.
ender7 12y ago
If this were any other company I don't think this would turn any heads. However, much of Mozilla's ethos and community support is built on ethical rather than capitalistic foundations. It's hard to reconcile thoughts on a company that seems to so value freedom in some areas but not in others [1]. [1] Inferring what Mozilla values based on the opinions of its CEO is not particularly fair, but then again I'm not sure it's unfair either.
- anaphor 12y ago
  Even if Mozilla started actively discriminating against people and campaigning against minority rights I would have no problem taking the code and starting a forked version. IMO that's what's so great about FLOSS, if you disagree with how something is managed you can ignore the people who created it and start your own version along with other people who agree. So I wouldn't really be worried about the current state of affairs. If people want to boycott then they can do that, but I doubt it will have much effect unless Eich starts going insane, in which case Google will probably cut their funding. In that case we can all start hacking on Iceweasel and forget about it. Yay for free libre open source software!
  - TheZenPsycho 12y ago
    Yes that's the fantasy. The reality is you can't just casually fork a project as big as mozilla. The only way that codebase stays even barely maintained with security bug fixes, is with its army of coders. The great thing about FLOSS is that it's POSSIBLE. The not so great thing about it is, in many cases you're probably better off just starting from scratch.
    - anaphor 12y ago
      In the hypothetical scenario that Mozilla management decides to start discriminating against gay people I think we can count on the support of many of the people who are familiar with the codebase. Would you agree?
      - 12y ago
steve19 12y ago
tolerance is a two way street. would it be OK for conservative muslims to protest a gay CEO? no. in a democracy and in a world with many differing points of view at some point you just have to tolerate each others beliefs, regardless of how much you oppose them, and just get along. edit: and now my words are being twisted. I never said being gay was a belief. what one person thinks of a proposed law is a belief. edit edit: tolerance is not "I am OK with the gays but will never freely associate with one of them" nor is "I am tolerant of his views on gay marriage but I hate him and will never have anything to do with him". tolerance is" I hate what you think/belive/lifestyle/god/wear but I won't hold it against you". my sister frequently nurses racists who are very rude to her. she tolerates then as gives them as good care as she gives anyone else. that is tolerance. welcome to democracy. people have different opinion. they have different religious beliefs and different upbringing. just get along people.
- gtremper 12y ago
  He spent his own money to try to make me a second class citizen. Am I supposed to "tolerate" it when someone has actively tried to take away my rights?
- eropple 12y ago
  Nobody's saying Eich can't donate to whatever causes he wants. But free speech has consequences, and one of them is people not associating with you when you do shitty things. He did a shitty thing and Mozilla is endorsing his shitty thing with its own actions and so people don't really want to get chummy with them. That's not intolerance, that's freedom of association. But I think you already knew that. EDIT: > tolerance is" I hate what you think/belive/lifestyle/god/wear but I won't hold it against you". This is the nonsensical redefinition of "tolerance" that I notice is increasingly preached by those who realize their regressive opinions are increasingly considered unacceptable by a growing majority. It does not reflect the actual definition. It is dishonest. Tolerance is respecting your right to have your regressive, hateful opinions. And I would never suggest that Eich does not have the right to have them. Even to donate money to those causes. But that also means I have the right to avoid using products that benefit him because I do not want to give patronage to people who would do as he does. You don't get a get-out-of-jail-free card about being reprehensible just because you really firmly believe something.
DanielBMarkham 12y ago
I am very sorry that some people are upset with the political opinions of other people. Now can somebody get this political bullshit off the front page of HN? Please? Nothing productive can come from a logical and reasonable conversation with people who are, by definition, very upset. Half the posts here are "hell yeah!" and the other half are baiting arguments from others who feel impassioned by the issue. Not a good topic.
- general_failure 12y ago
  Best of luck getting your signal through in all this noise :-)
  - DanielBMarkham 12y ago
    The internet at its best: a hundred thousand people in a feel-good mob all on a joint rant about somebody who has done something rude and/or unpopular that we can all emote with one another about.
    - jkelsey 12y ago
      You don't have to take part in this discussion if you don't want to. You don't even have to click on the link. If you're a public place, and some group of people that you don't otherwise know are having a conversation amongst themselves, do you go up to them and tell them, "I don't care about you are talking about." You probably don't, right? Because it would be weird. Turns out the same thing applies for the Internet.
- katowulf 12y ago
  And yet here we are...
- tptacek 12y ago
  This issue is uncomfortably political for HN, but I feel like I should chime in to say that HN is clearly not split down the middle about support for Eich's political position. I haven't seen a single comment defending it.
vezzy-fnord 12y ago
I think people would be much more serene if they stopped idolizing certain programmers, computer scientists and tech people in general as demigods. As influential, intelligent and wise as they may be, they are quite fallible, and their political views are very likely to be a volatile mess, like most other people. If it's any consolation, there has yet to be a cult tech figure who is a neo-Nazi/white nationalist or anything of the sort. Or am I wrong? The world would be a much better place if we could learn to separate the artist's work from the artist's personal deeds and opinions. Otherwise you'd probably be unable to enjoy anything made before the 20th century.
- bsder 12y ago
  > The world would be a much better place if we could learn to separate the artist's work from the artist's personal deeds and opinions. In what way does that make the world a better place? Why should we celebrate an artist who does shitty things when there is almost certainly someone equally as talented who does not?
  - vezzy-fnord 12y ago
    It'll stop us from getting consistently outraged at various people over their personal convictions and save us more energy to enjoy their work, which is often unrelated to the former. Talent is a highly subjective measure. No doubt there are people as equally or more talented than Eich, but he is the creator of JavaScript, which is the fundamental language of the web and everyone's favorite double-clawed hammer to hammer in nails with, whether you like it or not.
    - jbeja 12y ago
      I just going to start using a transpiler to not feel so uncomfortable and dirty inside when i work in a web project :).
  - wyclif 12y ago
    Let me know when you're going to start boycotting Picasso paintings.
mindslight 12y ago
Oh cuil, it's apparently time for the entitled mob to direct its groupthink towards tearing down one of the rare worthwhile software companies.
- oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
  Sorry, can you explain exactly where the bar is set to determine how 'worthwhile' a software company has to be before we turn a blind eye to their having a homophobic CEO?
  - mindslight 12y ago
    mu.
  - michaelwww 12y ago
    I am for gay marraige. Eich is against it. These facts don't necessarily make me a homophile or Eich a homophobe. We have differing views on what marraige means.
jbeja 12y ago
Is sad. Just when i was going to learn JS.
- Bahamut 12y ago
  What the heck does this have to do with JS?
  - gtremper 12y ago
    He invented Javascript.
    - Bahamut 12y ago
      I know that part, but boycotting the language he created over 10 years ago & doesn't actively develop is a stretch is more what I was getting at.
      - gtremper 12y ago
        I think he was being a bit facetious.
        jbeja 12y ago
        I wasn't :).
jkelsey 12y ago
I'm trying to keep this in perspective with all the massively positive things that Mozilla has done over the years. I've used Firefox all the time, proclaimed the value of Mozilla to others, and even donated to Mozilla. Regardless, I'm having a hard time getting past this. I started up Firefox this morning, and almost immediately, I felt dirty. I closed it and switched over to Chromium. I can't buy the argument that it's just his personal political opinion and that the type of inclusion that Mozilla wants to have requires a large ecosystem of diverse opinions. Perhaps on issues like income inequality, taxation, foreign policy. Hell, if this was about him being a massive gun-rights advocate, I could see myself budging on not letting it bother me like this. Sorry, but human rights are human rights, and contributing to a effort to deny a group of people a right that everybody else enjoys based simply on their sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity, or culture is as disgusting a human behavioral trait as it comes. It needs to rooted out from our collective human identity. I don't necessarily want to see Eich removed. His contributions to free and open source software are incredibly significant and deserve praise. However, simply pointing out Mozilla's health care policies isn't going to cut it. Without anything more significant, an apology or something, I'm just going to see Firefox and Mozilla as tarnish under a shade of bigotry. It's not a purposeful perspective, or something I will enjoy, but I can't just let this slide away like it's nothing.
- joyeuse6701 12y ago
  Will you boycott every company that has an employee that has belief that isn't yours? Isn't that the definition of intolerance? One of those things, I guess, can't tolerate the intolerant =).
  - oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
    Read the comment you're replying to: it specifically mentioned a series of beliefs that the commenter would not go to the lengths of boycotting over.
  - jkelsey 12y ago
    No, that's not what I argued. I agree with the notion that there's room for honest political disagreements within a community. However, I consider equal treatment of LGBT people to be a human right, and human rights don't fall under the spectrum of honest political disagreements. Honest political disagreement are about the hows of accomplishing the humanity's goals of equal liberty and justice for all. Anti-marriage-equality advocates are about the outcome of said equal liberty and justice; that is, preventing it for LGBT people and treating them as second-class citizens. > One of those things, I guess, can't tolerate the intolerant =). That's not accurate. I can tolerate the intolerant. I'm not asking for their civil liberties to be taken away like Prop 8 attempted to take away from LGBT people. All I'm stating that I'm not going to be as supportive and praise of Mozilla and Firefox as I used to be. Don't get me wrong, Mozilla is still a great organization made up of wonderful people, and the whole organization shouldn't be ruined by the actions of one member. But that this one person now is the head of the organization tarnished it significantly.
xupybd 12y ago
I understand why people could get offended about this. But as I understand it most who oppose this have a religious reason to do so. Now religion is as deeply person and important to a person as is the right to marry. So where do we draw the line on what we allow others to think, believe or support? As a for instance my Aunty is vegan and is offended that I or any one else would ever eat meat. And I know eating meat is much less of an issue, but I support her right to oppose the eating of meat. She has would vote against my ability to eat meat. But my response would not be to attack her as a person but simply vote in the opposite direction. On the other end I can see why a Jewish person living in Nazi Germany would have attached Hitler and the Nazi party at any chance they got. But is there a middle ground?
- stbtrax 12y ago
  I draw the line at if you can make a logical argument, there are many logical arguments for not eating meat. There are no convincing logical arguments for opposing gay marriage that don't involve bringing mystical wizardry into play.
  - Xcelerate 12y ago
    Except you can't assume you're right and use that as the basis of an argument against someone who you thinks you're wrong. You'll get nowhere with that. It's the same thing your opponent does too. It always bothers me when listening to (or reading) a debate and both sides say that the other side isn't being logical. Well, you can't both be logical and still be in contradiction with each other.
- vezzy-fnord 12y ago
  There's actually other reasons one could support Prop 8 without necessarily being anti-LGBT. This includes an opposition to all marriage in general, or a desire to keep the traditionalist definition of "marriage" and have the same rights for non-traditional couples under a different moniker, a perceived triviality of the issue (whether rationally justified or not) and so on. I do not approve of his actions, but there's plenty of other variants besides "Eich is a despicable homophobe." Of course, outrage porn is very popular in our interconnected society these days. As for me, I'll keep using Mozilla's products and learn to draw a line between technical accomplishments and political views. Mozilla's contributions to FOSS are far too great to brush them off over something like this.
Camillo 12y ago
I'd like to urge everyone to consider whether it's a good idea to comment on this story. If you voice an opinion in support of Eich, obviously that's going to be a liability in the future. But voicing an opinion against him is also a liability - there is no telling how the zeitgeist might change ten or twenty years from now. I think it's best to voice no opinion at all - and I hope this comment is not misconstrued as support for any particular position.
- nine_k 12y ago
  What a sad example of meandering with the party line I see here. The desire to have always had the currently approved opinion is bad enough as it is, but the need to have it to comply with political correctness, or face a "liability", is worse.
- asdfologist 12y ago
  I agree. Posting HackerNews comments in favor of gay rights is going to haunt you 20 years later, because clearly homosexuality is becoming less accepted over time.
- hkphooey 12y ago
  I disagree. People have died for the right to speak their minds so don't live in fear of what may or may not happen. If you have an opinion, voice it. If somebody is going to discriminate against you because of your opinion, then they are the bigot. Don't let political correctness silence you.
- nikatwork 12y ago
  So your suggestion is - don't ask, don't tell? Sorry but I think it's important to discuss these issues out in the open. If calling out homophobia is a liability, then I'm happy to be guilty as charged.
- dinkumthinkum 12y ago
  I don't think you meant anything bad by this but this statement makes it seem like you are overly concerned with being political or extremely worried about literally voicing your own view. It's not exactly like "When they came for X I did not care because was not X" but its sort of in the ballpark. Sure, it is a charged issue. But if the zeitgeist changes in twenty years to march further toward theocracy then I think I will be voicing opposition against that. :)
badman_ting 12y ago
Why does rarebit pulling their app represent a lack if respect for personal beliefs? Why is it ok for Eich to do what he will but not ok for others to act in response to that? That's bullshit. Actions have consequences. Actions have consequences.
joyeuse6701 12y ago
So, do Gay Firefox developers boycott Javascript too?
- badman_ting 12y ago
  Yes, they prefer ECMAscript.
Houshalter 12y ago
I don't get why his personal views have anything to do with the business. This is an absurd non-issue.
lexcorvus 12y ago
There's a common wrong argument against this sort of boycott, but its comparably common rebuttal is subtly wrong as well. common wrong argument: This is a violation of Eich's freedom of speech. subtly wrong rebuttal: The First Amendment protects you against government infringement of free speech (including campaign donations, since money is "speech"), but it doesn't protect you against the social consequences of that speech. While true on its surface, the reason this rebuttal is subtly wrong is that it ignores a critical distinction, which is that, as a "protected class", gays are privileged under the law. This means that you are especially vulnerable to being sued for violating their rights. As Mencius Moldbug put it in the context of McCarthyism and the anti-Communist Red Scare [1]: "[M]ost of what we call 'McCarthyism' was a matter of 'social consequences.' Besides, the social consequences work for one and only one reason: there's an iron fist in the velvet glove. Being sued for disrespecting a privileged class—excuse me, a protected class—is not in any way a social consequence, but rather a political one." To appreciate the asymmetry, imagine a counterfactual reality in which Eich donated against of Prop. 8 instead of for it. In this context, suppose he made a comment in the workplace about his support for gay marriage. Suppose further that some Mozilla employees, who happened to vigorously oppose gay marriage, sued on the grounds of a "hostile working environment". Such a lawsuit would have no chance of success. In contrast, in the real reality we actually live in, Eich will now have to monitor his workplace speech very carefully—one wrong word about gay marriage could be all it takes to precipitate a lawsuit against him and the Mozilla Foundation. It would be unwise to underestimate the chances of such a suit's success. In the counterfactual universe, a pro–gay marriage Eich might still face a boycott or protests, but they would be incomparably weaker because non-gays are not a protected class. Whereas in real reality, the "social consequences" of a boycott are supported by the full power of the US Federal Government. For obvious reasons, such boycotts have a habit of succeeding. [1]: [Technology, communism, and the Brown Scare](http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2013/09/technology-communism-and-brown-scare.html http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2013/09/technol...)
- mikeash 12y ago
  Non-gays are absolutely a protected class. Sexual orientation is what's protected, not a particular orientation. A business that discriminates against straight people is just as liable under the law as a business that discriminates against gay people. (This is not, as I understand it, currently illegal under federal law. Many states outlaw it, though.) The problem is that you see Prop 8 as symmetrical, but it is not. Prop 8 is an attempt to remove rights from a group of people. Opposing prop 8 is not an attempt to remove rights from other people, but rather to grant them to everyone. The proper analogy would be a hypothetical Prop 88 which seeks to ban straight marriage while allowing gay marriage. Ignoring the complete impossibility of such a thing ever going anywhere, donating money to support the passage of such a proposition would rightfully attract a great deal of negative attention.
michaelwww 12y ago
What Brendan Eich does with his own money on his own time is none of my concern. His opposition to Google Dart is my concern and I wish he would lighten up about that.
NextUserName 12y ago
What he did is support the disagreement that what is now considered a "right" by an increasingly liberal society was indeed a "right". What is wrong with this? Liberals and gays need to realize that they are often bigots against religion. Those believing the Bible's teachings have a different set of moral standards. I find it ironic that this man is called immoral by liberals and that gays are dubbed the immoral ones by believers in God. Can't Liberals see that Believers hold themselves to a different set of standards? It is not often personal (though unfortunately for some religious extremists it is). The only hate that is being displayed here is by the anti-religious groups and individuals. Think of it like this. A girl is invited to a friend's birthday party. She does not attend because her father forbids her to go and won't driver her there either. She tries to explain it to her friend, but here friend hates her now because can not come. Is this fair to the girl? Some of you will say that this case is more like the girl paying someone to disrupt the party. Again, if the girl's father was responsible as God is for believer's convictions, then should the girl be hated anyway? I suppose if you think that the girl's father only existed in her own mind (was a phantasy) then you would think this. Still does not seem fair? Well what if it came out later that the girl planning the party was going to do something harmful to the guests. By disrupting the party, the girl who looked cruel now in hindsight looks like a hero. This knowledge of the devious girl's plan is akin to the belief and knowledge that religious people have in God. God cannot be proven or dis-proven via science. So how do atheists know they are really correct? how do religious people? At least the religious people have a basis that does not rely on unexplained things. A God and a creation are certainly a more plausible and simple explanation to our existence then any offered by atheists. So who are the real bigots here? From each side's perspective, it is the other. My hope is that each side will respect (not agree with) the others reasons and not show hatred toward the other. If a gay person donates to a fund pushing gay marriage, don't show hate toward them, if a religious person donates to the opposition, the same applies. This is almost sportsmanship in a way. Play hard against the opposition, but when they fall down (when they are in need of help), show them kindness, help them up and continue the competition.
- mikeyouse 12y ago
  The only hate that is being displayed here is by the anti-religious groups and individuals. Aren't you forgetting the people trying to implement state-sponsored discrimination. God cannot be proven or dis-proven via science. So how do atheists know they are really correct? how do religious people? At least the religious people have a basis that does not rely on unexplained things. A God and a creation are certainly a more plausible and simple explanation to our existence then any offered by atheists. Insane presuppositions aside. The existence of God has nothing to do with equal rights under state laws. Prop 8 wasn't a referendum on whether or not God exists, it was a vote by a 'tyrannical majority' to strip the rights of the minority. So who are the real bigots here? The people who try to deny rights to others. Play hard against the opposition, but when they fall down (when they are in need of help), show them kindness, help them up and continue the competition. Or just don't actively work to harm other people, that will go much further.
smoyer 12y ago
I don't support gay-marriage either ... I've said it before and I'll repeat it again (if necessary). My religious beliefs hold that marriage is between a man and a woman, and I choose to follow my religion because it's something I feel deeply about. Asking me to compromise my religious beliefs or be called homophobic (I'm not), full of hatred (I'm not) or even biased (I'm not) just isn't fair. I've got friends that live an alternative life-style, and I can discuss this sanely with them. We don't have to agree on everything to be friends and we certainly don't agree on whether their lifestyle can be aligned with my religious beliefs, but we also don't make it the focal point of our relationship. I've never said I was against the various domestic partnership rules that allow equal insurance, tax breaks and other benefits to committed partners. I'm simply not willing to use the word marriage to describe the relationship. So when I see all the commotion about a measly $1000 donation to support proposition 8 in CA, I wonder why anyone is actually wasting their time on a protest. I don't think that Eich is filled with hatred ... I suspect he barely thinks about it at all. But why is it okay when the hatred is directed at him? Why are people so consumed by the issue that they give up vast amounts of their time and energy? I can live without hating ... can you? P.S. I'll admit that there are probably things and people in the world that are worth hating.
- mikeyouse 12y ago
  You mentioned a key part of your moral defense: I've never said I was against the various domestic partnership rules that allow equal insurance, tax breaks and other benefits to committed partners. That's where you and Eich differ. By donating to the Prop-8 campaign, he was directly supporting state-sponsored discrimination. It goes past personal beliefs when you take steps to strip others of their rights.
ArtDev 12y ago
Now I am the one regretting the donation I gave to the Mozilla Foundation last year.
sockypuppy 12y ago
s/LGBT-friendly/orthodox/ s/hateful/heretical/ And we thought we were over the sloppy thinking habits that lead to forceful suppression of unpopular viewpoints...

132 points by line-zero 12y ago

Solidarity with all developers planning to protest

lawl 12y ago

I totally see how this could upset people. But I'm not sure how his management qualities are tied to his political opinions. It's the same with politicans, what the fuck has an affair to do with their political views? I 100% support gay marriage. I also understand they're upset. But I don't know if this is the right reaction.

Kudos 12y ago
Bad analogy, you don't work for the people you elect, they work for you (in theory). If the person who had direct control over my career held discriminatory personal beliefs, I'd probably have a problem with it too.
ebiester 12y ago
It has to do with our money (via Google ad revenue) going to a corporation headed by someone who cared enough about harming us to spend $1,000 to do so. All I can says is that when I see this from people we otherwise respect, I feel like I'm physically reliving a kick to the ribs from high school. I'd consider it more if Prop 8 hadn't been overturned. But as it stands, he hasn't used his personal platform to speak on the subject or use Mozilla's resources to do so. If that changes, I'll reevaluate.
- lawl 12y ago
  Usually I'd say you might be right. But I really have this sweet spot for mozilla. They're an NPO and Firefox 1.0 basically fixed the web. I don't know, it's hard. I clearly disagree with his political opinion. But then again, is using chrome any better? Thats Google after all, which I hate to love and love to hate. (And at the end of the day, Google is still just an Ad company!) I don't know it just sucks. Maybe we can try to seek a dialogue with him? I mean if he works for Mozilla he can't be that dumb.
  - smirksirlot 12y ago
    His last public comment on this issue was in 2012, where he basically didn't actually comment. And quite honestly, as a gay man, I would rather use Chrome and have Google profit over my personal data, VS touching Firefox now. The Mozilla Board clearly knew about this issue (it was quite a big deal when the news first broke), and this should have something they considered. If Eich changed his views, then he should have clarified before them formally announcing this. Mozilla making this choice yells to me that they don't give a crap about me and others like me. Even if logically that doesn't make sense, there's this visceral emotional disgust and pain.
  - eropple 12y ago
    I agree it's tough, but who you choose to lead you says a lot about who you want to be. I don't personally want to support a company that wants a dude with the morals of Eich pointing the way. (I don't care for Larry Page much, either, but there's less active attacking of other folks' rights up in the Googleplex. Google's actions with regard to ads and my data don't really bug me, so that isn't a factor to me.)
Aloisius 12y ago
There is a huge difference between a politician having an affair with someone and a person actively trying to oppress you.
IvyMike 12y ago
Try applying it to yourself. It may be more emotional than logical, but I personally would find it very difficult to work for someone who would deny me the right to marriage because I'm an atheist.
dinkumthinkum 12y ago
I think an affair is a little different than trying to affect political change. What if he was a white supremacist? No big deal because if a white supremacists writes qsorts, it's still O(nlogn)? That may seem a bit extreme but it's essentially like this. A CEO is in some a ways political animal and is certainly a representative of an organization. I think political causes are different from affairs. However, he hasn't done anything against the law here but I don't think it is unreasonable for people to want to boycott.
Karellen 12y ago
"what the fuck has an affair to do with their political views?" Uh, integrity? If a politician won't keep probably the most solemn vow they've ever made, to the person they were most committed to in their life, in front of all the other people they care about most, why the fuck do you think they'll keep some fucking campaign promise to you and a bunch of other faceless citizens they've never met to make your lives better, instead of taking a backhander from some lobbyist to fuck you all over instead? And if they're not going to keep their campaign promises (yeah, yeah, no need to point out the incredible naïvety of that particular "if") then why should you let them stay in a position of power that they can use to better themselves at your expense? Boot them out, get the next one in, and keep doing it until they learn the lesson that we fucking demand better. I don't know what kind of world you want to live in, but one where we've already given up and don't even try to maintain a pretense of holding our politicians to account for their honesty isn't the one I'm going for.
- lawl 12y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_marriage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_marriage Just saying... Making public you're in an open relationship will kill your career as a politican just as fast, wanna bet?
  - Karellen 12y ago
    Oh, you're almost certainly correct. Absolutely, there's the right thing to do which involves telling the truth but could cause difficulties, and then there's the easy "political" lie you can tell to try to stay popular and keep your career humming along and your salary rolling in. But no-one said doing the right thing was easy. And you've still totally failed to convince me that I want the second type of person claiming to represent me in government.
  - Zigurd 12y ago
    That's a terrible example. It would only be a career killer among people with a propensity toward intolerance. And there are plenty of places, some of which are represented by politicians with unconventional relationships, that don't care.
DrewRWx 12y ago
Personally, politicians' affairs only really bother me if they ran on a "family values" platform. Then it's just straight up hypocrisy, especially if they are caught in a gay affair because "family values" is a euphemism for anti-gay.
megablast 12y ago
I see a big difference between having an affair, and spending money to whatever the equivalent is (a proposition to end hetero marriages?). The $1000 was a hateful spend.
- kybernetikos 12y ago
  I've got no problem with someone campaigning to end hetero marriages. State marriages make no sense to me. The State shouldn't be granting special rights and privileges to people unless there is a good reason, either one of social benefit or of trying to make up for unfair disadvantages that those individuals suffer. I'm not sure what social benefit marriage is supposed to confer. If it's to do with raising of children, then clearly only those who have a child should be able to get married. If it's to do with committed relationships being good for society, then anyone in any kind of committed relationship (and not necessarily a sexual one) should be able to get married. If you can't point to any specific benefit that marriage is supposed to bring to society, then it just looks like the state is trying to control peoples sexuality which is weird, and there's no need for it at all. If you can point to a specific benefit, then that benefit should be the benchmark for who can and who cannot get married.

yuchi 12y ago

Gosh. I’m really upset not by the news about Eich as the new CEO, but about learning that such an idol in my life is anti-LGTB. I really hate this kind of situations.

dethstar 12y ago
Although a different kind of situation here's a link for those cases: http://www.theonion.com/articles/boy-ive-really-put-you-in-a-tough-spot-havent-i,34949/ http://www.theonion.com/articles/boy-ive-really-put-you-in-a...
katowulf 12y ago
Maybe it would be appropriate to ask him why he was against it before deciding he's anti-LGTB. I'd imagine that, being an intelligent and capable human being, he deserves the consideration of hearing his case before you knock him off the pedestal.
- alxndr 12y ago
  TFA links to his 2012 personal statement: https://brendaneich.com/2012/04/community-and-diversity/ https://brendaneich.com/2012/04/community-and-diversity/
  - mikeash 12y ago
    Sadly, he doesn't explain himself at all. He says he has no animosity, but provides no explanation for how such a thing could be done without it. I imagine he thinks he has a sound, non-hateful reasoning behind his position which will not be taken as such if discussed. In context, I'd guess he's probably wrong about it being sound and non-hateful. Often, being unwilling to discuss one's positions is part of your brain trying to tell the rest of you that you've got it wrong. Not always, obviously, but I'd say it's the way to bet. In any case, if you're willing to make a public stand on something (and given the political finance laws he donated under, it qualifies as a public stand) then you should be willing to discuss your stand. If he's not willing to discuss it then we don't necessarily have to assume the very best.

HillRat 12y ago

They should be protesting the fact that he's the person responsible for JavaScript. (Hey, don't forget to tip your waitress and try the veal!) More seriously, there's the open question as to whether a career technologist is the right person for the CEO slot, especially since he appears to still be in the trenches when it comes to projects like Rust. Beyond that, this is a cautionary tale for potential CEOs -- within reason, you can give money to politicians and money to foundations, but once you start giving money to specific political causes you're risking a firestorm, and rightfully so. While MoCo isn't exactly a Chik-Fil-A or Hobby Lobby, this is the sort of the thing that causes PR flacks to either wake up in a cold sweat (if they're employees) or start planning the color of their new Aventador (if on agency contract).

ben0x539 12y ago
I'm not sure Eich is particularly involved with Rust (anymore?) beyond having his name on some recent related press release.
- kibwen 12y ago
  Eich hasn't been involved in Rust for the three years that I've been watching the project. Whether he was involved before that, I don't know, but given the primitive and under-the-radar state of pre-2011 Rust it seems unlikely.
fennecfoxen 12y ago
In related news, I seem to recall that it's technically against the law for the king or queen of England to be a Catholic. But at least no one in this latest Inquisition / Reformation analogue is being systematically imprisoned or executed for what they believe in and who they've donated to. So the world has made SOME progress.

jack-r-abbit 12y ago

Meh. Prop 8 passed the people's vote with 7,001,084 Californians voting in favor of it and 6,401,482 voting against. Are we to start boycotting every company that employs one of those 7 million people? I'm glad it was made right in the end and I hope at least some of those 7 million people have changed their opinion... but I don't think we need to keep dwelling on it.

Fomite 12y ago
I think it's perfectly reasonable for developers to "keep dwelling" on someone telling them they should have less rights because of who they've chosen to love.
katowulf 12y ago
I doubt that vehement hatred of 7 million people's views will sway them to the cause either. It's just a bit hard to convince people to respect your beliefs while dancing atop their own--narrow-minded or otherwise.
redbad 12y ago
1. There is a difference between voting for something and funding it. 2. There is a difference between being employed by a company and being its CEO. 3. These differences are significant.
- javert 12y ago
  I strongly disagree with #1.
  - eknkc 12y ago
    Money can buy a lot of votes.
  - danielharan 12y ago
    You need a bit more to than simple disagreement when the initial statement is that a donation (of $1,000) and a vote are different.

ender7 12y ago

If this were any other company I don't think this would turn any heads. However, much of Mozilla's ethos and community support is built on ethical rather than capitalistic foundations. It's hard to reconcile thoughts on a company that seems to so value freedom in some areas but not in others [1]. [1] Inferring what Mozilla values based on the opinions of its CEO is not particularly fair, but then again I'm not sure it's unfair either.

anaphor 12y ago
Even if Mozilla started actively discriminating against people and campaigning against minority rights I would have no problem taking the code and starting a forked version. IMO that's what's so great about FLOSS, if you disagree with how something is managed you can ignore the people who created it and start your own version along with other people who agree. So I wouldn't really be worried about the current state of affairs. If people want to boycott then they can do that, but I doubt it will have much effect unless Eich starts going insane, in which case Google will probably cut their funding. In that case we can all start hacking on Iceweasel and forget about it. Yay for free libre open source software!
- TheZenPsycho 12y ago
  Yes that's the fantasy. The reality is you can't just casually fork a project as big as mozilla. The only way that codebase stays even barely maintained with security bug fixes, is with its army of coders. The great thing about FLOSS is that it's POSSIBLE. The not so great thing about it is, in many cases you're probably better off just starting from scratch.
  - anaphor 12y ago
    In the hypothetical scenario that Mozilla management decides to start discriminating against gay people I think we can count on the support of many of the people who are familiar with the codebase. Would you agree?
    - 12y ago

steve19 12y ago

tolerance is a two way street. would it be OK for conservative muslims to protest a gay CEO? no. in a democracy and in a world with many differing points of view at some point you just have to tolerate each others beliefs, regardless of how much you oppose them, and just get along. edit: and now my words are being twisted. I never said being gay was a belief. what one person thinks of a proposed law is a belief. edit edit: tolerance is not "I am OK with the gays but will never freely associate with one of them" nor is "I am tolerant of his views on gay marriage but I hate him and will never have anything to do with him". tolerance is" I hate what you think/belive/lifestyle/god/wear but I won't hold it against you". my sister frequently nurses racists who are very rude to her. she tolerates then as gives them as good care as she gives anyone else. that is tolerance. welcome to democracy. people have different opinion. they have different religious beliefs and different upbringing. just get along people.

gtremper 12y ago
He spent his own money to try to make me a second class citizen. Am I supposed to "tolerate" it when someone has actively tried to take away my rights?
eropple 12y ago
Nobody's saying Eich can't donate to whatever causes he wants. But free speech has consequences, and one of them is people not associating with you when you do shitty things. He did a shitty thing and Mozilla is endorsing his shitty thing with its own actions and so people don't really want to get chummy with them. That's not intolerance, that's freedom of association. But I think you already knew that. EDIT: > tolerance is" I hate what you think/belive/lifestyle/god/wear but I won't hold it against you". This is the nonsensical redefinition of "tolerance" that I notice is increasingly preached by those who realize their regressive opinions are increasingly considered unacceptable by a growing majority. It does not reflect the actual definition. It is dishonest. Tolerance is respecting your right to have your regressive, hateful opinions. And I would never suggest that Eich does not have the right to have them. Even to donate money to those causes. But that also means I have the right to avoid using products that benefit him because I do not want to give patronage to people who would do as he does. You don't get a get-out-of-jail-free card about being reprehensible just because you really firmly believe something.

DanielBMarkham 12y ago

I am very sorry that some people are upset with the political opinions of other people. Now can somebody get this political bullshit off the front page of HN? Please? Nothing productive can come from a logical and reasonable conversation with people who are, by definition, very upset. Half the posts here are "hell yeah!" and the other half are baiting arguments from others who feel impassioned by the issue. Not a good topic.

general_failure 12y ago
Best of luck getting your signal through in all this noise :-)
- DanielBMarkham 12y ago
  The internet at its best: a hundred thousand people in a feel-good mob all on a joint rant about somebody who has done something rude and/or unpopular that we can all emote with one another about.
  - jkelsey 12y ago
    You don't have to take part in this discussion if you don't want to. You don't even have to click on the link. If you're a public place, and some group of people that you don't otherwise know are having a conversation amongst themselves, do you go up to them and tell them, "I don't care about you are talking about." You probably don't, right? Because it would be weird. Turns out the same thing applies for the Internet.
katowulf 12y ago
And yet here we are...
tptacek 12y ago
This issue is uncomfortably political for HN, but I feel like I should chime in to say that HN is clearly not split down the middle about support for Eich's political position. I haven't seen a single comment defending it.

vezzy-fnord 12y ago

I think people would be much more serene if they stopped idolizing certain programmers, computer scientists and tech people in general as demigods. As influential, intelligent and wise as they may be, they are quite fallible, and their political views are very likely to be a volatile mess, like most other people. If it's any consolation, there has yet to be a cult tech figure who is a neo-Nazi/white nationalist or anything of the sort. Or am I wrong? The world would be a much better place if we could learn to separate the artist's work from the artist's personal deeds and opinions. Otherwise you'd probably be unable to enjoy anything made before the 20th century.

bsder 12y ago
> The world would be a much better place if we could learn to separate the artist's work from the artist's personal deeds and opinions. In what way does that make the world a better place? Why should we celebrate an artist who does shitty things when there is almost certainly someone equally as talented who does not?
- vezzy-fnord 12y ago
  It'll stop us from getting consistently outraged at various people over their personal convictions and save us more energy to enjoy their work, which is often unrelated to the former. Talent is a highly subjective measure. No doubt there are people as equally or more talented than Eich, but he is the creator of JavaScript, which is the fundamental language of the web and everyone's favorite double-clawed hammer to hammer in nails with, whether you like it or not.
  - jbeja 12y ago
    I just going to start using a transpiler to not feel so uncomfortable and dirty inside when i work in a web project :).
- wyclif 12y ago
  Let me know when you're going to start boycotting Picasso paintings.

mindslight 12y ago

Oh cuil, it's apparently time for the entitled mob to direct its groupthink towards tearing down one of the rare worthwhile software companies.

oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
Sorry, can you explain exactly where the bar is set to determine how 'worthwhile' a software company has to be before we turn a blind eye to their having a homophobic CEO?
- mindslight 12y ago
  mu.
- michaelwww 12y ago
  I am for gay marraige. Eich is against it. These facts don't necessarily make me a homophile or Eich a homophobe. We have differing views on what marraige means.

jbeja 12y ago

Is sad. Just when i was going to learn JS.

Bahamut 12y ago
What the heck does this have to do with JS?
- gtremper 12y ago
  He invented Javascript.
  - Bahamut 12y ago
    I know that part, but boycotting the language he created over 10 years ago & doesn't actively develop is a stretch is more what I was getting at.
    - gtremper 12y ago
      I think he was being a bit facetious.
      - jbeja 12y ago
        I wasn't :).

jkelsey 12y ago

I'm trying to keep this in perspective with all the massively positive things that Mozilla has done over the years. I've used Firefox all the time, proclaimed the value of Mozilla to others, and even donated to Mozilla. Regardless, I'm having a hard time getting past this. I started up Firefox this morning, and almost immediately, I felt dirty. I closed it and switched over to Chromium. I can't buy the argument that it's just his personal political opinion and that the type of inclusion that Mozilla wants to have requires a large ecosystem of diverse opinions. Perhaps on issues like income inequality, taxation, foreign policy. Hell, if this was about him being a massive gun-rights advocate, I could see myself budging on not letting it bother me like this. Sorry, but human rights are human rights, and contributing to a effort to deny a group of people a right that everybody else enjoys based simply on their sexual orientation, gender, ethnicity, or culture is as disgusting a human behavioral trait as it comes. It needs to rooted out from our collective human identity. I don't necessarily want to see Eich removed. His contributions to free and open source software are incredibly significant and deserve praise. However, simply pointing out Mozilla's health care policies isn't going to cut it. Without anything more significant, an apology or something, I'm just going to see Firefox and Mozilla as tarnish under a shade of bigotry. It's not a purposeful perspective, or something I will enjoy, but I can't just let this slide away like it's nothing.

joyeuse6701 12y ago
Will you boycott every company that has an employee that has belief that isn't yours? Isn't that the definition of intolerance? One of those things, I guess, can't tolerate the intolerant =).
- oneeyedpigeon 12y ago
  Read the comment you're replying to: it specifically mentioned a series of beliefs that the commenter would not go to the lengths of boycotting over.
- jkelsey 12y ago
  No, that's not what I argued. I agree with the notion that there's room for honest political disagreements within a community. However, I consider equal treatment of LGBT people to be a human right, and human rights don't fall under the spectrum of honest political disagreements. Honest political disagreement are about the hows of accomplishing the humanity's goals of equal liberty and justice for all. Anti-marriage-equality advocates are about the outcome of said equal liberty and justice; that is, preventing it for LGBT people and treating them as second-class citizens. > One of those things, I guess, can't tolerate the intolerant =). That's not accurate. I can tolerate the intolerant. I'm not asking for their civil liberties to be taken away like Prop 8 attempted to take away from LGBT people. All I'm stating that I'm not going to be as supportive and praise of Mozilla and Firefox as I used to be. Don't get me wrong, Mozilla is still a great organization made up of wonderful people, and the whole organization shouldn't be ruined by the actions of one member. But that this one person now is the head of the organization tarnished it significantly.

xupybd 12y ago

I understand why people could get offended about this. But as I understand it most who oppose this have a religious reason to do so. Now religion is as deeply person and important to a person as is the right to marry. So where do we draw the line on what we allow others to think, believe or support? As a for instance my Aunty is vegan and is offended that I or any one else would ever eat meat. And I know eating meat is much less of an issue, but I support her right to oppose the eating of meat. She has would vote against my ability to eat meat. But my response would not be to attack her as a person but simply vote in the opposite direction. On the other end I can see why a Jewish person living in Nazi Germany would have attached Hitler and the Nazi party at any chance they got. But is there a middle ground?

stbtrax 12y ago
I draw the line at if you can make a logical argument, there are many logical arguments for not eating meat. There are no convincing logical arguments for opposing gay marriage that don't involve bringing mystical wizardry into play.
- Xcelerate 12y ago
  Except you can't assume you're right and use that as the basis of an argument against someone who you thinks you're wrong. You'll get nowhere with that. It's the same thing your opponent does too. It always bothers me when listening to (or reading) a debate and both sides say that the other side isn't being logical. Well, you can't both be logical and still be in contradiction with each other.
vezzy-fnord 12y ago
There's actually other reasons one could support Prop 8 without necessarily being anti-LGBT. This includes an opposition to all marriage in general, or a desire to keep the traditionalist definition of "marriage" and have the same rights for non-traditional couples under a different moniker, a perceived triviality of the issue (whether rationally justified or not) and so on. I do not approve of his actions, but there's plenty of other variants besides "Eich is a despicable homophobe." Of course, outrage porn is very popular in our interconnected society these days. As for me, I'll keep using Mozilla's products and learn to draw a line between technical accomplishments and political views. Mozilla's contributions to FOSS are far too great to brush them off over something like this.

Camillo 12y ago

I'd like to urge everyone to consider whether it's a good idea to comment on this story. If you voice an opinion in support of Eich, obviously that's going to be a liability in the future. But voicing an opinion against him is also a liability - there is no telling how the zeitgeist might change ten or twenty years from now. I think it's best to voice no opinion at all - and I hope this comment is not misconstrued as support for any particular position.

nine_k 12y ago
What a sad example of meandering with the party line I see here. The desire to have always had the currently approved opinion is bad enough as it is, but the need to have it to comply with political correctness, or face a "liability", is worse.
asdfologist 12y ago
I agree. Posting HackerNews comments in favor of gay rights is going to haunt you 20 years later, because clearly homosexuality is becoming less accepted over time.
hkphooey 12y ago
I disagree. People have died for the right to speak their minds so don't live in fear of what may or may not happen. If you have an opinion, voice it. If somebody is going to discriminate against you because of your opinion, then they are the bigot. Don't let political correctness silence you.
nikatwork 12y ago
So your suggestion is - don't ask, don't tell? Sorry but I think it's important to discuss these issues out in the open. If calling out homophobia is a liability, then I'm happy to be guilty as charged.
dinkumthinkum 12y ago
I don't think you meant anything bad by this but this statement makes it seem like you are overly concerned with being political or extremely worried about literally voicing your own view. It's not exactly like "When they came for X I did not care because was not X" but its sort of in the ballpark. Sure, it is a charged issue. But if the zeitgeist changes in twenty years to march further toward theocracy then I think I will be voicing opposition against that. :)

badman_ting 12y ago

Why does rarebit pulling their app represent a lack if respect for personal beliefs? Why is it ok for Eich to do what he will but not ok for others to act in response to that? That's bullshit. Actions have consequences. Actions have consequences.

joyeuse6701 12y ago

So, do Gay Firefox developers boycott Javascript too?

badman_ting 12y ago
Yes, they prefer ECMAscript.

Houshalter 12y ago

I don't get why his personal views have anything to do with the business. This is an absurd non-issue.

lexcorvus 12y ago

There's a common wrong argument against this sort of boycott, but its comparably common rebuttal is subtly wrong as well. common wrong argument: This is a violation of Eich's freedom of speech. subtly wrong rebuttal: The First Amendment protects you against government infringement of free speech (including campaign donations, since money is "speech"), but it doesn't protect you against the social consequences of that speech. While true on its surface, the reason this rebuttal is subtly wrong is that it ignores a critical distinction, which is that, as a "protected class", gays are privileged under the law. This means that you are especially vulnerable to being sued for violating their rights. As Mencius Moldbug put it in the context of McCarthyism and the anti-Communist Red Scare [1]: "[M]ost of what we call 'McCarthyism' was a matter of 'social consequences.' Besides, the social consequences work for one and only one reason: there's an iron fist in the velvet glove. Being sued for disrespecting a privileged class—excuse me, a protected class—is not in any way a social consequence, but rather a political one." To appreciate the asymmetry, imagine a counterfactual reality in which Eich donated against of Prop. 8 instead of for it. In this context, suppose he made a comment in the workplace about his support for gay marriage. Suppose further that some Mozilla employees, who happened to vigorously oppose gay marriage, sued on the grounds of a "hostile working environment". Such a lawsuit would have no chance of success. In contrast, in the real reality we actually live in, Eich will now have to monitor his workplace speech very carefully—one wrong word about gay marriage could be all it takes to precipitate a lawsuit against him and the Mozilla Foundation. It would be unwise to underestimate the chances of such a suit's success. In the counterfactual universe, a pro–gay marriage Eich might still face a boycott or protests, but they would be incomparably weaker because non-gays are not a protected class. Whereas in real reality, the "social consequences" of a boycott are supported by the full power of the US Federal Government. For obvious reasons, such boycotts have a habit of succeeding. [1]: [Technology, communism, and the Brown Scare](http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2013/09/technology-communism-and-brown-scare.html http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2013/09/technol...)

mikeash 12y ago
Non-gays are absolutely a protected class. Sexual orientation is what's protected, not a particular orientation. A business that discriminates against straight people is just as liable under the law as a business that discriminates against gay people. (This is not, as I understand it, currently illegal under federal law. Many states outlaw it, though.) The problem is that you see Prop 8 as symmetrical, but it is not. Prop 8 is an attempt to remove rights from a group of people. Opposing prop 8 is not an attempt to remove rights from other people, but rather to grant them to everyone. The proper analogy would be a hypothetical Prop 88 which seeks to ban straight marriage while allowing gay marriage. Ignoring the complete impossibility of such a thing ever going anywhere, donating money to support the passage of such a proposition would rightfully attract a great deal of negative attention.

michaelwww 12y ago

What Brendan Eich does with his own money on his own time is none of my concern. His opposition to Google Dart is my concern and I wish he would lighten up about that.

NextUserName 12y ago

What he did is support the disagreement that what is now considered a "right" by an increasingly liberal society was indeed a "right". What is wrong with this? Liberals and gays need to realize that they are often bigots against religion. Those believing the Bible's teachings have a different set of moral standards. I find it ironic that this man is called immoral by liberals and that gays are dubbed the immoral ones by believers in God. Can't Liberals see that Believers hold themselves to a different set of standards? It is not often personal (though unfortunately for some religious extremists it is). The only hate that is being displayed here is by the anti-religious groups and individuals. Think of it like this. A girl is invited to a friend's birthday party. She does not attend because her father forbids her to go and won't driver her there either. She tries to explain it to her friend, but here friend hates her now because can not come. Is this fair to the girl? Some of you will say that this case is more like the girl paying someone to disrupt the party. Again, if the girl's father was responsible as God is for believer's convictions, then should the girl be hated anyway? I suppose if you think that the girl's father only existed in her own mind (was a phantasy) then you would think this. Still does not seem fair? Well what if it came out later that the girl planning the party was going to do something harmful to the guests. By disrupting the party, the girl who looked cruel now in hindsight looks like a hero. This knowledge of the devious girl's plan is akin to the belief and knowledge that religious people have in God. God cannot be proven or dis-proven via science. So how do atheists know they are really correct? how do religious people? At least the religious people have a basis that does not rely on unexplained things. A God and a creation are certainly a more plausible and simple explanation to our existence then any offered by atheists. So who are the real bigots here? From each side's perspective, it is the other. My hope is that each side will respect (not agree with) the others reasons and not show hatred toward the other. If a gay person donates to a fund pushing gay marriage, don't show hate toward them, if a religious person donates to the opposition, the same applies. This is almost sportsmanship in a way. Play hard against the opposition, but when they fall down (when they are in need of help), show them kindness, help them up and continue the competition.

mikeyouse 12y ago
The only hate that is being displayed here is by the anti-religious groups and individuals. Aren't you forgetting the people trying to implement state-sponsored discrimination. God cannot be proven or dis-proven via science. So how do atheists know they are really correct? how do religious people? At least the religious people have a basis that does not rely on unexplained things. A God and a creation are certainly a more plausible and simple explanation to our existence then any offered by atheists. Insane presuppositions aside. The existence of God has nothing to do with equal rights under state laws. Prop 8 wasn't a referendum on whether or not God exists, it was a vote by a 'tyrannical majority' to strip the rights of the minority. So who are the real bigots here? The people who try to deny rights to others. Play hard against the opposition, but when they fall down (when they are in need of help), show them kindness, help them up and continue the competition. Or just don't actively work to harm other people, that will go much further.

smoyer 12y ago

I don't support gay-marriage either ... I've said it before and I'll repeat it again (if necessary). My religious beliefs hold that marriage is between a man and a woman, and I choose to follow my religion because it's something I feel deeply about. Asking me to compromise my religious beliefs or be called homophobic (I'm not), full of hatred (I'm not) or even biased (I'm not) just isn't fair. I've got friends that live an alternative life-style, and I can discuss this sanely with them. We don't have to agree on everything to be friends and we certainly don't agree on whether their lifestyle can be aligned with my religious beliefs, but we also don't make it the focal point of our relationship. I've never said I was against the various domestic partnership rules that allow equal insurance, tax breaks and other benefits to committed partners. I'm simply not willing to use the word marriage to describe the relationship. So when I see all the commotion about a measly $1000 donation to support proposition 8 in CA, I wonder why anyone is actually wasting their time on a protest. I don't think that Eich is filled with hatred ... I suspect he barely thinks about it at all. But why is it okay when the hatred is directed at him? Why are people so consumed by the issue that they give up vast amounts of their time and energy? I can live without hating ... can you? P.S. I'll admit that there are probably things and people in the world that are worth hating.

mikeyouse 12y ago
You mentioned a key part of your moral defense: I've never said I was against the various domestic partnership rules that allow equal insurance, tax breaks and other benefits to committed partners. That's where you and Eich differ. By donating to the Prop-8 campaign, he was directly supporting state-sponsored discrimination. It goes past personal beliefs when you take steps to strip others of their rights.

ArtDev 12y ago

Now I am the one regretting the donation I gave to the Mozilla Foundation last year.

sockypuppy 12y ago

s/LGBT-friendly/orthodox/ s/hateful/heretical/ And we thought we were over the sloppy thinking habits that lead to forceful suppression of unpopular viewpoints...