3 ms·

Are you sure it wasn't public? Those kinds of donation rolls often are. In either case, I do think it is reasonable to reject a CEO who is actively attempting t

by coldpie 10y ago

Are you sure it wasn't public? Those kinds of donation rolls often are. In either case, I do think it is reasonable to reject a CEO who is actively attempting to harm their own employees through government enforcement of personal religious beliefs. Especially for an altruistic company like Mozilla.

Turing_Machine 10y ago
Given that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were also opposed to gay marriage at that time, would you agree that that they should also have been disqualified? If not, why not?
- coldpie 10y ago
  I don't think it's an interesting comparison, given one is a choice between two "lesser evils" and elected by three hundred million citizens VS the other being a leader of a private company appointed by a board from a pool of presumably many (or at least several) valid candidates. Totally different scenarios. But yes, it was a big black mark against them and they, too, received lots of public pressure to change their public policy on the matter. And eventually, they did. Eich refused to even say he wouldn't make such a donation again, much less apologize for the harm he caused.
  - Turing_Machine 10y ago
    Sorry, why should a public official should be held to a lower standard than the director of a private company? I'm not seeing that. Most observers believe that the passage of Proposition 8 in California had far more to do with black churches turning out for Barack Obama than it did with contributions from people like Eich. Edit: updating with citation. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/06/AR2008110603880.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11... 70% of black voters supported Proposition 8, which means that they were against gay marriage.
    - coldpie 10y ago
      You're right that I didn't answer your question directly. To be explicit, yes, I think wishing to impose your personal religious beliefs on your constituents should disqualify you from holding public office. However, when presented with two options that both fail that test, I will vote for the lesser of the two evils presented to me. I don't think that Mozilla was faced with that dichotomy, and the fact that Eich was relatively quickly and easily replaced backs that up.
      - humanrebar 10y ago
        > I think wishing to impose your personal religious beliefs on your constituents should disqualify you from holding public office. Should officials be cajoling or forcing people to "convert" (not every religion has conversion as such)? Nope. Can we divorce all laws from any metaphysical worldview? No. That's not possible. We presume certain things matter, like human lives, freedom of conscience, truth, the health of the planet, etc. Banning murder assumes that the Flying Spaghetti Monster does not exist and/or does not require human sacrifice to get into heaven. I can't come up with the right adjective, but that's imposing an (a)theological position on constituents. It's obviously the right position, too. Point being, even the idea of "inalienable rights" is an (a)theological position. Some people think rights are given by God or the nature of humanity. Others think laws are given by the people and groups that can enforce them. The goal isn't to have agnostic laws. That's literally impossible. The goal is to find a just baseline worldview we can all compromise on and have tolerant laws that follow from that.
        coldpie 10y ago
        I don't agree with your premise, and this isn't the forum to debate that. But even if I did, given that even members of the same religion have disagreements about the morality of gay marriage, I don't think your argument is relevant to this specific situation.
humanrebar 10y ago
> Are you sure it wasn't public? Ah, I was mistaken on that detail. Apologies. Apparently I've read some poorly researched sources on the subject. There was a lawsuit about whether it should be made public and a judge ruled that it should be. So "leaked" is inaccurate, though there was and is disagreement about whether the information should be public.

by coldpie 10y ago

Turing_Machine 10y ago

Given that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were also opposed to gay marriage at that time, would you agree that that they should also have been disqualified? If not, why not?

coldpie 10y ago
I don't think it's an interesting comparison, given one is a choice between two "lesser evils" and elected by three hundred million citizens VS the other being a leader of a private company appointed by a board from a pool of presumably many (or at least several) valid candidates. Totally different scenarios. But yes, it was a big black mark against them and they, too, received lots of public pressure to change their public policy on the matter. And eventually, they did. Eich refused to even say he wouldn't make such a donation again, much less apologize for the harm he caused.
- Turing_Machine 10y ago
  Sorry, why should a public official should be held to a lower standard than the director of a private company? I'm not seeing that. Most observers believe that the passage of Proposition 8 in California had far more to do with black churches turning out for Barack Obama than it did with contributions from people like Eich. Edit: updating with citation. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/06/AR2008110603880.html http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11... 70% of black voters supported Proposition 8, which means that they were against gay marriage.
  - coldpie 10y ago
    You're right that I didn't answer your question directly. To be explicit, yes, I think wishing to impose your personal religious beliefs on your constituents should disqualify you from holding public office. However, when presented with two options that both fail that test, I will vote for the lesser of the two evils presented to me. I don't think that Mozilla was faced with that dichotomy, and the fact that Eich was relatively quickly and easily replaced backs that up.
    - humanrebar 10y ago
      > I think wishing to impose your personal religious beliefs on your constituents should disqualify you from holding public office. Should officials be cajoling or forcing people to "convert" (not every religion has conversion as such)? Nope. Can we divorce all laws from any metaphysical worldview? No. That's not possible. We presume certain things matter, like human lives, freedom of conscience, truth, the health of the planet, etc. Banning murder assumes that the Flying Spaghetti Monster does not exist and/or does not require human sacrifice to get into heaven. I can't come up with the right adjective, but that's imposing an (a)theological position on constituents. It's obviously the right position, too. Point being, even the idea of "inalienable rights" is an (a)theological position. Some people think rights are given by God or the nature of humanity. Others think laws are given by the people and groups that can enforce them. The goal isn't to have agnostic laws. That's literally impossible. The goal is to find a just baseline worldview we can all compromise on and have tolerant laws that follow from that.
      - coldpie 10y ago
        I don't agree with your premise, and this isn't the forum to debate that. But even if I did, given that even members of the same religion have disagreements about the morality of gay marriage, I don't think your argument is relevant to this specific situation.

humanrebar 10y ago

> Are you sure it wasn't public? Ah, I was mistaken on that detail. Apologies. Apparently I've read some poorly researched sources on the subject. There was a lawsuit about whether it should be made public and a judge ruled that it should be. So "leaked" is inaccurate, though there was and is disagreement about whether the information should be public.