10 ms·

Just an anecdote, which I know is not the singular form of 'data', but still: I respect Mozilla as a company, but have no desire to work there (despite there b

Just an anecdote, which I know is not the singular form of 'data', but still: I respect Mozilla as a company, but have no desire to work there (despite there being a lot of technology fit) because the CTO, Brendan Eich, made a donation of $1,000 to support Prop 8—a 2008 California ballot measure which banned gay marriage. Sure, I understood that his views were not those of his employer. But that doesn't make it easier for me to want to work for/with the guy. See, I don’t think it’s about the public message that companies send to their consumers. It’s about the message they give to potential hires: you’ll be working with these people on a daily basis. Depending on the dispensability of the employee in question, a company may choose to fire someone rather than potentially rule out a large number of future employees. It’s an economic decision.

sodomizer 14y ago
I think it's a terrible idea to judge other people's political decisions until you've walked a mile in their shoes. If you are a professional, you should be ready to work with anyone, not just the people who agree with you. Your view is not objectively correct. To insist otherwise is fascism.
- geuis 14y ago
  I dislike your name and sense that we would probably disagree on most things. However, your statement about being able to work with others is true. One of the most important things I learned early in my career is that some people have horrible personalities but are really good at what they do. As long as personality conflicts aren't interfering with the purpose of getting business done, your beliefs and mine don't have to interact.
  - sodomizer 14y ago
    "I dislike your name" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAZOZ5hNN9g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAZOZ5hNN9g Feel differently about it now? I can't think of a better way to illustrate my point about walking a mile in someone else's shoes!
- agilescale 14y ago
  I don't think that fascism means what you think it means. The fascists I have argued with, and this does follow some excerpts from Mussolini's works and speeches, are subjectivists. And yes, they do exist. They are actually a pest in certain forums. 4chan has a board which functions essentially as a ghetto for them and other miscellaneous right wingers, so that they won't be screwing up, say, the science or the sports boards with white supremacist spiel.
- lucisferre 14y ago
  Give me a break, no it's not. Sure, some opinions and politics are clearly subjective, however many others are clearly discrimination and bigotry. Anyone is free to spout their bigotry all they want, but I won't think any less of anyone who does not want to work for bigots or with them or even associate with them in any way. And I definitely won't blame any employeer who feels people like this reflect badly on their company and their culture.
- ben0x539 14y ago
  I think it's not fascism to refuse to work with/for people whose polics are aimed at concretely restricting your civil liberties, in a way that might have affected your day-to-day life for the rest of your life.
  - DannyBee 14y ago
    This is strange, because everyone has a different interpretation of what civil liberties are. There are few any large set of people actually agree on gun control, prayer in schools/government, searches by the government/TSA/whatever There is a lot of subjective disagreement over exactly what liberties exist, and their limits. As the parent said, if you really think you have an objectively correct view of what civil liberties are, and other folks are just wrong, ....
    - ben0x539 14y ago
      I genuinely think that it's objectively correct that some minority must not be banned from being able to marry. I really don't think you can spin that into fascism. To put it more drastically, just because someone dares to stand up to their oppressors, they are not immediately oppressing anyone themselves.
  - anon4atruestory 14y ago
    You're obviously not a libertarian...
- riggins 14y ago
  "Your view is not objectively correct. To insist otherwise is fascism." it's safe to say I'm not sure what you mean. certainly if someone says 'we spend 20% of federal outlays on welfare' and I say 'no, it's about half that', one or both, are objectively wrong. anyway, what do you mean?
- lawnchair_larry 14y ago
  What if a CTO made a donation to a campaign to support fascism, this prospective employee was opposed to fascism, and cited this as the reason they would not work for said CTOs company. Would you call that prospective employee a fascist?
michaelochurch 14y ago
Prop 8 was disgusting, but I would have more reservations about working for a company that fired someone over his political beliefs, than at one that happened to have a conservative CTO. If I work for a company that takes a cavalier approach to firing, I'm putting my career at risk. But as long as there aren't other character issues, I don't think a conservative CTO is damning. They might not even know; it's not really their job not to hire Republicans. (I can't believe I am, sort of, defending Republicans here.)
- lucisferre 14y ago
  Actually, you are defending bigots, I'd hate to paint all Republicans with that same brush (despite there being a bit of an apparent pattern).
- onemorepassword 14y ago
  Maybe it's cultural context, but in my book homophobia has nothing to do with legitimate political beliefs. Being conservative has nothing at all to do with bigotry. Promoting hatred and discrimination towards any group that is part of your (potential) employees and their friends and families would be good reason to fire someone as far as I'm concerned.
  - mrgoldenbrown 14y ago
    There's no maybe about it, to me. Cultural context is always going to define what a legitimate political belief is. Unless you believe that there is an objective definition of good and evil that exists outside human culture.
    - pc86 14y ago
      And let's be honest, chances are you believe that you are much more likely to be in favor of Prop 8 than against it.[0] [0] Just to be clear: I'm saying if you have that absolutist view you are much more likely to be fundamentally religious, and an order of magnitude more likely to be opposed to gay marriage.
  - 14y ago
lotharbot 14y ago
> "It’s about the message they give to potential hires: you’ll be working with these people on a daily basis." At any company larger than about 3 employees, you'll be working with at least some people who have opinions/ideas/beliefs you find disagreeable or even disgusting -- and, conversely, some of your coworkers will think the same of you. IMO the most important message to give to potential hires is "we won't put your job in jeopardy over such disagreements". Firing people over political disagreements rules out a huge number of potential employees.
- smirksirlot 14y ago
  There's something that needs to be said about political beliefs that stomp on the very fiber of my being. Sure. I would work with these people and execute what I need to do. But knowing what they believe in and the extent of which they would act to remove/restrict rights that I should have ultimately will prevent me from wanting to get to know them, to interact with them beyond a strictly professional capacity. From experience, that doesn't go well - over time, it gets exhausting. Your company culture gets built up with walls between people because there's no trust. So yes, having a difference of opinion/belief/diversity is important. But at the same time, there are certain core values that need to be stood for.
  - at-fates-hands 14y ago
    From my experience of working in both large corporations and small start up companies, it's generally frowned upon to even discuss political matters no matter what side of the isle you sit on. The very reasons you cite is the main reason this is something you simply keep to yourself, period. Likewise, most companies I've worked for don't engage in overtly political events so they don't self select out any candidates based solely on religious or political reasons.
    - jiggy2011 14y ago
      I think that is an aspect of the problem outlined in the article. It's easy enough to keep the discourse at work fairly light when it comes to political issues. But in a world where everyone follows each other on social media it becomes harder to separate. So you find out that the nice pleasant guy you sit next to at lunch has "liked" a ton of neo-nazi groups.
kevinpet 14y ago
I'm pretty sure that you are someone I would not want to work with, because while I may disagree with Eich politically, I find your inability to separate the personal and professional spheres much more alarming. I'm not referring to your personal dislike for working with someone who supported prop 8, I'm referring to your internalizing and remembering that one particular non-politician supported it, and taking the time to post about it to make sure that people associate him with his political views, rather than his professional and public persona.
- nmcfarl 14y ago
  Interestingly I’ve found repeatedly through my career that there is very little separation between personal and professional spheres. I will give you that there’s a giant difference between a public persona and the person. But I find when working closely with someone - particularly in 80hour crunch time weeks - you don’t end up dealing with their public persona, but with a version of them much closer to their "personal life". So day to day your experience with your co-workers is very personal, and frequently in an unprofessional mode. I think that when making choices about who I will work with, I'll lean heavily on what I know about them personally, and treat their public persona with a great deal of distrust.
- icebraining 14y ago
  You're making unsupported assumptions about zacharyvoase's intentions. And I don't think supporting or protesting Prop-8 is something purely of the personal sphere; it's a moral issue, and morality is and should be an important part of someone's professional life. It was certainly part of my decision to join my company.
- mrgoldenbrown 14y ago
  First of all, I think political views are part of your public persona, especially when you've donated a huge chunk of money towards them. I don't think I could have a professional relationship with someone who was actively campaigning to make my life miserable. If my boss were donating money to groups trying to strip civil rights from people with Irish ancestry, which I happen to have, could you really fault me for not wanting to work with them? The phrase "disagree politically" sounds very civilized and sterile. But in practical terms you are asking me to ignore the fact that my boss views me as an inferior being, and holds this feeling so strongly that it's worth spending $1000 to punish me and others like me by legally stripping away my rights.
Zigurd 14y ago
There's a difference between taking an intolerant side in a civil rights issue and a game designer being dismissive of complaints. The latter is par for the course, for one thing, and on top of that, unless I missed the part about Microsoft not requiring always-on connections, he wasn't in disagreement with company policy.
kevingadd 14y ago
Mozilla is one of the safest and most welcoming places to work in software, regardless of your sexual orientation or gender identity. Their actions, collectively as an organization, speak for themselves. But yeah, one of their employees happens to hold personal beliefs you disagree with. That means he should be fired regardless of job performance? How does that make any sense? It's one thing to say that he directly took actions to make a workplace unsafe, or has openly said harmful, awful things in public. But neither of those things are true of Brendan Eich. An employer has no more right to fire someone for being anti-gay marriage than it does to fire them for being pro-gay marriage. And that's a good thing, because there are plenty of staunchly conservative employers out there that would love to force all their employees to support their own pet political agendas.
- Karunamon 14y ago
  >But yeah, one of their employees happens to hold personal beliefs you disagree with. Holding personal beliefs and acting on personal beliefs are two different things entirely. In my arrogant opinion, being anti marriage equality should be held in the same level of disrepute as someone being against racial equality or similar. You're free to hate whatever you want, but when you give money to organizations that cause people to kill themselves, you've directly supported that action. Some things I can see a company wanting no part of.
  - kevingadd 14y ago
    Even if Prop 8 was directly responsible for people like me killing themselves (and it's NOT, and you know it), that doesn't somehow make someone donating to a cause they believe in a murderer. This is literally the laziest argument you can possibly use to support this criticism. I don't personally believe Prop 8 was a good thing, but maybe he had compelling reasons to donate. You won't know unless you ask him. I don't particularly care what his reasons were, because it's HIS MONEY. I mean, if you think somehow boycotting Mozilla and trashing them in public will help advance some social cause you believe in, then go for it. I bet if you looked through the donations made by every Google employee you'd find hundreds, if not thousands of them donated to the campaign for Prop 8. Same goes for Apple, and Microsoft, and pretty much any big company - even in the valley. Being able to ignore political disagreements - even big ones - in favor of making progress in some other field is the mark of being an adult, and it's what our civilization is built on. If we refused to have contact with people who didn't exactly conform to our worldviews, and refused to cooperate with them, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING would get done in this country. You need only look at the utter impotence of the US Senate and House to see an example of this in action. Do you think the world would have benefited if Alan Turing had refused to work with the research establishment because some of his colleagues were homophobes? Do you think the world would have benefited if Turing had been unable to get work because the establishment considered his personal views unacceptable? That's the kind of behavior you're advocating here: Blatant, unflinching intolerance in both directions.
ben0x539 14y ago
I believe I read that adding up all the Mozilla donations, the "against prop 8" donations vastly outweighted the "for" donations. I can't say whether that makes up for anything, but I get the impression that Mozilla as a community is very much not socially regressive.
1123581321 14y ago
There's a lot I am not clear on here. What if Brendan didn't donate any money? What if Mozilla employees net donated against Prop 8? What if you discovered Brendan's donation after working with him for awhile? What if Brendan changed views while you worked there? What if Brendan (work with me) was hired after you worked there? What if you never knew of Brendan's views during your entire tenure at Mozilla? This is a situation I believe you have already experienced because it is so likely.
ChuckMcM 14y ago
Just as a heads up, there were a non-zero number of people who "supported" Prop 8 for a very different reason. This group of people reasoned that the only way to get equal protection under the law for gay and straight people was to have this law pass, have it be contested, and have the Supreme Court toss it out. Here is the thing, you can't go to the Supreme Court with some random request to rule on a principle they need to do that in the context of an argument. But the Supreme court's decision can be narrow or broad. And the argument limits how broadly it can be applied. If you look at another decision, Roe vs Wade, the controversial abortion decision. That was based on a right to privacy between you and your doctor. Because it was based on the right to privacy, and not some definition of when life begins or doesn't begin, or when a person is or isn't a person, it has been very durable at being applied against a number of other laws that would seek to overturn it. even laws that would ban the 'day after' pill. So to be a good decision, and one that will put this issue to rest for a while, the contested law needs to be written in a way that allows for a broad, structural, decision. One where the Supreme court can say on principle the constitution gives equal protection under the law and any attempt to deny those protections or rights based on sexual orientation is invalid. Prop 8 was reasonably well written as a foil against which this argument could be made. (and was made and has so far succeeded as far as the Circuit court is concerned). My point is that because you saw Brendan's name on a list of names that gave money in support of the proposition, you don't know anything about the context of that donation. And by immediately dismissing the company based on this imperfect understanding you close off opportunities that may be much better than you know. And even if Brendan is morally opposed to same sex marriage, by choosing not to work at the company (which doesn't take the same position) your actions put you at risk of committing the same sins that a hiring manager might make of choosing not to hire someone because of a difference of opinion. Raganwald's piece was a well written plea to see past the individuals of an organization when those people are not speaking for the organization. Understand that in any group of people there will be some with whom you disagree. But if the mission of the group is true, perhaps your contribution can help it to succeed, and in so doing you may also be able to change the opinions a few of your co-workers to something less disagreeable.
- lawnchair_larry 14y ago
  I think you're stretching, and I think we do know why Eich supported it. It was not for any legitimate or strategic reason. I agree that any group of people will have some that disagree, but he is the CTO. That changes things.
pc86 14y ago
I don't mean any of this to sound like a personal attack, so please don't take it that way. I'm just trying to show you the other side of your argument. Let's pretend I agree with Prop 8 (I don't, with the exception of what ChuckMcM mentioned below). Clearly you feel strongly about it, enough to avoid a company on the sole basis there is a leader there who disagrees with you, someone you may or may not work directly for or with on a daily basis. If I were a hard-line conservative and I knew that about you, I would be terrified to work for you. I have no idea what you might if you come across a blog post, a random tweet, or something else after we've been working together. Surely if you're willing to write off an entire company due to a single $1,000 donation (the line of reasoning goes..), you might be willing to fire me over a mundane tweet about a controversial issue you feel strongly about. This is to say nothing of the huge nebulous area about if I apply for a job working directly for you and we both know we are at polar political extremes. Ideally, there would be a clear demarcation between public/professional lives and personal lives. I don't care what my coworkers believe in, vote for, or donate to. I hope the same respect is afforded to me.
- eropple 14y ago
  He's not writing off an entire company because of a $1,000 donation. He's writing off a company because one of its leaders chooses to publicly do shitty things. Relative power is important to understand and take into account in a situation like this. Within the Mozilla community, Eich has power. Eich also not only holds repellent viewpoints, but acts on them (and while I respect the hell out of ChuckMcM I think he's several miles off-base with his what-if). I can understand not wanting to work for an organization where the powerful has no problem with a public declaration of hatred for me (if I were gay) or for dear friends of mine (in my own case). As an aside, this is also why the arguments for at-will employment often fall very short; they equate "you can be fired for any reason" with "you can quit for any reason" without acknowledging the vast gulf in power between employer and employee in most situations and industries. Power dynamics matter. Context matters.
gyardley 14y ago
Thanks for your input, Senator McCarthy. Attitudes like yours are why things like donations to political causes should be private.
learc83 14y ago
Until very recently the vast majority of people were opposed to gay marriage. If this were 15 years ago would you have been able to work anywhere. Are all of the people who changed their minds over the last 10-15 years suddenly better people who are now worthy of your association? How many people woke up one day and said, "wow I was wrong. Gay marriage should be allowed, and I am truly repentant for holding such an evil belief", versus the people who are just parroting what they think they should say. Did these people change their minds or is that people who are pro gay marriage have stepped up the attacks on those who are anti-gay marriage (calling them bigots etc...), so that anti-gay marriage-ites are afraid to publicly express their beliefs?

sodomizer 14y ago

I think it's a terrible idea to judge other people's political decisions until you've walked a mile in their shoes. If you are a professional, you should be ready to work with anyone, not just the people who agree with you. Your view is not objectively correct. To insist otherwise is fascism.

geuis 14y ago
I dislike your name and sense that we would probably disagree on most things. However, your statement about being able to work with others is true. One of the most important things I learned early in my career is that some people have horrible personalities but are really good at what they do. As long as personality conflicts aren't interfering with the purpose of getting business done, your beliefs and mine don't have to interact.
- sodomizer 14y ago
  "I dislike your name" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAZOZ5hNN9g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAZOZ5hNN9g Feel differently about it now? I can't think of a better way to illustrate my point about walking a mile in someone else's shoes!
agilescale 14y ago
I don't think that fascism means what you think it means. The fascists I have argued with, and this does follow some excerpts from Mussolini's works and speeches, are subjectivists. And yes, they do exist. They are actually a pest in certain forums. 4chan has a board which functions essentially as a ghetto for them and other miscellaneous right wingers, so that they won't be screwing up, say, the science or the sports boards with white supremacist spiel.
lucisferre 14y ago
Give me a break, no it's not. Sure, some opinions and politics are clearly subjective, however many others are clearly discrimination and bigotry. Anyone is free to spout their bigotry all they want, but I won't think any less of anyone who does not want to work for bigots or with them or even associate with them in any way. And I definitely won't blame any employeer who feels people like this reflect badly on their company and their culture.
ben0x539 14y ago
I think it's not fascism to refuse to work with/for people whose polics are aimed at concretely restricting your civil liberties, in a way that might have affected your day-to-day life for the rest of your life.
- DannyBee 14y ago
  This is strange, because everyone has a different interpretation of what civil liberties are. There are few any large set of people actually agree on gun control, prayer in schools/government, searches by the government/TSA/whatever There is a lot of subjective disagreement over exactly what liberties exist, and their limits. As the parent said, if you really think you have an objectively correct view of what civil liberties are, and other folks are just wrong, ....
  - ben0x539 14y ago
    I genuinely think that it's objectively correct that some minority must not be banned from being able to marry. I really don't think you can spin that into fascism. To put it more drastically, just because someone dares to stand up to their oppressors, they are not immediately oppressing anyone themselves.
- anon4atruestory 14y ago
  You're obviously not a libertarian...
riggins 14y ago
"Your view is not objectively correct. To insist otherwise is fascism." it's safe to say I'm not sure what you mean. certainly if someone says 'we spend 20% of federal outlays on welfare' and I say 'no, it's about half that', one or both, are objectively wrong. anyway, what do you mean?
lawnchair_larry 14y ago
What if a CTO made a donation to a campaign to support fascism, this prospective employee was opposed to fascism, and cited this as the reason they would not work for said CTOs company. Would you call that prospective employee a fascist?

michaelochurch 14y ago

Prop 8 was disgusting, but I would have more reservations about working for a company that fired someone over his political beliefs, than at one that happened to have a conservative CTO. If I work for a company that takes a cavalier approach to firing, I'm putting my career at risk. But as long as there aren't other character issues, I don't think a conservative CTO is damning. They might not even know; it's not really their job not to hire Republicans. (I can't believe I am, sort of, defending Republicans here.)

lucisferre 14y ago
Actually, you are defending bigots, I'd hate to paint all Republicans with that same brush (despite there being a bit of an apparent pattern).
onemorepassword 14y ago
Maybe it's cultural context, but in my book homophobia has nothing to do with legitimate political beliefs. Being conservative has nothing at all to do with bigotry. Promoting hatred and discrimination towards any group that is part of your (potential) employees and their friends and families would be good reason to fire someone as far as I'm concerned.
- mrgoldenbrown 14y ago
  There's no maybe about it, to me. Cultural context is always going to define what a legitimate political belief is. Unless you believe that there is an objective definition of good and evil that exists outside human culture.
  - pc86 14y ago
    And let's be honest, chances are you believe that you are much more likely to be in favor of Prop 8 than against it.[0] [0] Just to be clear: I'm saying if you have that absolutist view you are much more likely to be fundamentally religious, and an order of magnitude more likely to be opposed to gay marriage.
- 14y ago

lotharbot 14y ago

> "It’s about the message they give to potential hires: you’ll be working with these people on a daily basis." At any company larger than about 3 employees, you'll be working with at least some people who have opinions/ideas/beliefs you find disagreeable or even disgusting -- and, conversely, some of your coworkers will think the same of you. IMO the most important message to give to potential hires is "we won't put your job in jeopardy over such disagreements". Firing people over political disagreements rules out a huge number of potential employees.

smirksirlot 14y ago
There's something that needs to be said about political beliefs that stomp on the very fiber of my being. Sure. I would work with these people and execute what I need to do. But knowing what they believe in and the extent of which they would act to remove/restrict rights that I should have ultimately will prevent me from wanting to get to know them, to interact with them beyond a strictly professional capacity. From experience, that doesn't go well - over time, it gets exhausting. Your company culture gets built up with walls between people because there's no trust. So yes, having a difference of opinion/belief/diversity is important. But at the same time, there are certain core values that need to be stood for.
- at-fates-hands 14y ago
  From my experience of working in both large corporations and small start up companies, it's generally frowned upon to even discuss political matters no matter what side of the isle you sit on. The very reasons you cite is the main reason this is something you simply keep to yourself, period. Likewise, most companies I've worked for don't engage in overtly political events so they don't self select out any candidates based solely on religious or political reasons.
  - jiggy2011 14y ago
    I think that is an aspect of the problem outlined in the article. It's easy enough to keep the discourse at work fairly light when it comes to political issues. But in a world where everyone follows each other on social media it becomes harder to separate. So you find out that the nice pleasant guy you sit next to at lunch has "liked" a ton of neo-nazi groups.

kevinpet 14y ago

I'm pretty sure that you are someone I would not want to work with, because while I may disagree with Eich politically, I find your inability to separate the personal and professional spheres much more alarming. I'm not referring to your personal dislike for working with someone who supported prop 8, I'm referring to your internalizing and remembering that one particular non-politician supported it, and taking the time to post about it to make sure that people associate him with his political views, rather than his professional and public persona.

nmcfarl 14y ago
Interestingly I’ve found repeatedly through my career that there is very little separation between personal and professional spheres. I will give you that there’s a giant difference between a public persona and the person. But I find when working closely with someone - particularly in 80hour crunch time weeks - you don’t end up dealing with their public persona, but with a version of them much closer to their "personal life". So day to day your experience with your co-workers is very personal, and frequently in an unprofessional mode. I think that when making choices about who I will work with, I'll lean heavily on what I know about them personally, and treat their public persona with a great deal of distrust.
icebraining 14y ago
You're making unsupported assumptions about zacharyvoase's intentions. And I don't think supporting or protesting Prop-8 is something purely of the personal sphere; it's a moral issue, and morality is and should be an important part of someone's professional life. It was certainly part of my decision to join my company.
mrgoldenbrown 14y ago
First of all, I think political views are part of your public persona, especially when you've donated a huge chunk of money towards them. I don't think I could have a professional relationship with someone who was actively campaigning to make my life miserable. If my boss were donating money to groups trying to strip civil rights from people with Irish ancestry, which I happen to have, could you really fault me for not wanting to work with them? The phrase "disagree politically" sounds very civilized and sterile. But in practical terms you are asking me to ignore the fact that my boss views me as an inferior being, and holds this feeling so strongly that it's worth spending $1000 to punish me and others like me by legally stripping away my rights.

Zigurd 14y ago

There's a difference between taking an intolerant side in a civil rights issue and a game designer being dismissive of complaints. The latter is par for the course, for one thing, and on top of that, unless I missed the part about Microsoft not requiring always-on connections, he wasn't in disagreement with company policy.

kevingadd 14y ago

Mozilla is one of the safest and most welcoming places to work in software, regardless of your sexual orientation or gender identity. Their actions, collectively as an organization, speak for themselves. But yeah, one of their employees happens to hold personal beliefs you disagree with. That means he should be fired regardless of job performance? How does that make any sense? It's one thing to say that he directly took actions to make a workplace unsafe, or has openly said harmful, awful things in public. But neither of those things are true of Brendan Eich. An employer has no more right to fire someone for being anti-gay marriage than it does to fire them for being pro-gay marriage. And that's a good thing, because there are plenty of staunchly conservative employers out there that would love to force all their employees to support their own pet political agendas.

Karunamon 14y ago
>But yeah, one of their employees happens to hold personal beliefs you disagree with. Holding personal beliefs and acting on personal beliefs are two different things entirely. In my arrogant opinion, being anti marriage equality should be held in the same level of disrepute as someone being against racial equality or similar. You're free to hate whatever you want, but when you give money to organizations that cause people to kill themselves, you've directly supported that action. Some things I can see a company wanting no part of.
- kevingadd 14y ago
  Even if Prop 8 was directly responsible for people like me killing themselves (and it's NOT, and you know it), that doesn't somehow make someone donating to a cause they believe in a murderer. This is literally the laziest argument you can possibly use to support this criticism. I don't personally believe Prop 8 was a good thing, but maybe he had compelling reasons to donate. You won't know unless you ask him. I don't particularly care what his reasons were, because it's HIS MONEY. I mean, if you think somehow boycotting Mozilla and trashing them in public will help advance some social cause you believe in, then go for it. I bet if you looked through the donations made by every Google employee you'd find hundreds, if not thousands of them donated to the campaign for Prop 8. Same goes for Apple, and Microsoft, and pretty much any big company - even in the valley. Being able to ignore political disagreements - even big ones - in favor of making progress in some other field is the mark of being an adult, and it's what our civilization is built on. If we refused to have contact with people who didn't exactly conform to our worldviews, and refused to cooperate with them, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING would get done in this country. You need only look at the utter impotence of the US Senate and House to see an example of this in action. Do you think the world would have benefited if Alan Turing had refused to work with the research establishment because some of his colleagues were homophobes? Do you think the world would have benefited if Turing had been unable to get work because the establishment considered his personal views unacceptable? That's the kind of behavior you're advocating here: Blatant, unflinching intolerance in both directions.

ben0x539 14y ago

I believe I read that adding up all the Mozilla donations, the "against prop 8" donations vastly outweighted the "for" donations. I can't say whether that makes up for anything, but I get the impression that Mozilla as a community is very much not socially regressive.

1123581321 14y ago

There's a lot I am not clear on here. What if Brendan didn't donate any money? What if Mozilla employees net donated against Prop 8? What if you discovered Brendan's donation after working with him for awhile? What if Brendan changed views while you worked there? What if Brendan (work with me) was hired after you worked there? What if you never knew of Brendan's views during your entire tenure at Mozilla? This is a situation I believe you have already experienced because it is so likely.

ChuckMcM 14y ago

Just as a heads up, there were a non-zero number of people who "supported" Prop 8 for a very different reason. This group of people reasoned that the only way to get equal protection under the law for gay and straight people was to have this law pass, have it be contested, and have the Supreme Court toss it out. Here is the thing, you can't go to the Supreme Court with some random request to rule on a principle they need to do that in the context of an argument. But the Supreme court's decision can be narrow or broad. And the argument limits how broadly it can be applied. If you look at another decision, Roe vs Wade, the controversial abortion decision. That was based on a right to privacy between you and your doctor. Because it was based on the right to privacy, and not some definition of when life begins or doesn't begin, or when a person is or isn't a person, it has been very durable at being applied against a number of other laws that would seek to overturn it. even laws that would ban the 'day after' pill. So to be a good decision, and one that will put this issue to rest for a while, the contested law needs to be written in a way that allows for a broad, structural, decision. One where the Supreme court can say on principle the constitution gives equal protection under the law and any attempt to deny those protections or rights based on sexual orientation is invalid. Prop 8 was reasonably well written as a foil against which this argument could be made. (and was made and has so far succeeded as far as the Circuit court is concerned). My point is that because you saw Brendan's name on a list of names that gave money in support of the proposition, you don't know anything about the context of that donation. And by immediately dismissing the company based on this imperfect understanding you close off opportunities that may be much better than you know. And even if Brendan is morally opposed to same sex marriage, by choosing not to work at the company (which doesn't take the same position) your actions put you at risk of committing the same sins that a hiring manager might make of choosing not to hire someone because of a difference of opinion. Raganwald's piece was a well written plea to see past the individuals of an organization when those people are not speaking for the organization. Understand that in any group of people there will be some with whom you disagree. But if the mission of the group is true, perhaps your contribution can help it to succeed, and in so doing you may also be able to change the opinions a few of your co-workers to something less disagreeable.

lawnchair_larry 14y ago
I think you're stretching, and I think we do know why Eich supported it. It was not for any legitimate or strategic reason. I agree that any group of people will have some that disagree, but he is the CTO. That changes things.

pc86 14y ago

I don't mean any of this to sound like a personal attack, so please don't take it that way. I'm just trying to show you the other side of your argument. Let's pretend I agree with Prop 8 (I don't, with the exception of what ChuckMcM mentioned below). Clearly you feel strongly about it, enough to avoid a company on the sole basis there is a leader there who disagrees with you, someone you may or may not work directly for or with on a daily basis. If I were a hard-line conservative and I knew that about you, I would be terrified to work for you. I have no idea what you might if you come across a blog post, a random tweet, or something else after we've been working together. Surely if you're willing to write off an entire company due to a single $1,000 donation (the line of reasoning goes..), you might be willing to fire me over a mundane tweet about a controversial issue you feel strongly about. This is to say nothing of the huge nebulous area about if I apply for a job working directly for you and we both know we are at polar political extremes. Ideally, there would be a clear demarcation between public/professional lives and personal lives. I don't care what my coworkers believe in, vote for, or donate to. I hope the same respect is afforded to me.

eropple 14y ago
He's not writing off an entire company because of a $1,000 donation. He's writing off a company because one of its leaders chooses to publicly do shitty things. Relative power is important to understand and take into account in a situation like this. Within the Mozilla community, Eich has power. Eich also not only holds repellent viewpoints, but acts on them (and while I respect the hell out of ChuckMcM I think he's several miles off-base with his what-if). I can understand not wanting to work for an organization where the powerful has no problem with a public declaration of hatred for me (if I were gay) or for dear friends of mine (in my own case). As an aside, this is also why the arguments for at-will employment often fall very short; they equate "you can be fired for any reason" with "you can quit for any reason" without acknowledging the vast gulf in power between employer and employee in most situations and industries. Power dynamics matter. Context matters.

gyardley 14y ago

Thanks for your input, Senator McCarthy. Attitudes like yours are why things like donations to political causes should be private.

learc83 14y ago

Until very recently the vast majority of people were opposed to gay marriage. If this were 15 years ago would you have been able to work anywhere. Are all of the people who changed their minds over the last 10-15 years suddenly better people who are now worthy of your association? How many people woke up one day and said, "wow I was wrong. Gay marriage should be allowed, and I am truly repentant for holding such an evil belief", versus the people who are just parroting what they think they should say. Did these people change their minds or is that people who are pro gay marriage have stepped up the attacks on those who are anti-gay marriage (calling them bigots etc...), so that anti-gay marriage-ites are afraid to publicly express their beliefs?