7 ms·

If you are someone who believes gay people should be allowed to form civil unions, but are offended by the idea that those unions be called marriages, supportin

by gfodor 13y ago

If you are someone who believes gay people should be allowed to form civil unions, but are offended by the idea that those unions be called marriages, supporting prop 8 is consistent with those views even though it doesn't mention civil unions. I have no idea why Brendan donated $1,000 to support prop 8, and I'd be skeptical that he'd do so if he didn't actually have much stronger beliefs than the civil unions point. But I still feel like this entire situation where a donation to a widely supported political cause, context free, can cause your life to be ruined is chilling.

amadeus 13y ago
You're still stretching the point. If you have an issue with the term marriage, then you're coming at it from a religious perspective. There's separation of church and state, it's a constitutional thing. If you want to redefine something as a Civil Union, then you help create and vote for that specific legislation. There was/is no logical or rational reason to vote for Prop 8.
- momentarily 13y ago
  I, personally, have an issue with witch hunts, with McCarthyism, with bigotry. Eich's persecution for his beliefs was bigotry. Everyone complicit in it is a bigot.
  - eevee 13y ago
    One man can't be CEO because other people complained on the Internet. A great many people temporarily couldn't get married because that one man paid good money to make it so. And your sympathies lie with the poor persecuted CEO. Won't someone think of the rich white guy for once?
    - momentarily 13y ago
      No, Eich's $1000 didn't singlehandedly determine a law. It's peanuts. It's nothing. On the other hand, this witch hunt did singlehandedly disenfranchise him of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of employment. There is no comparison.
      - eevee 13y ago
        The inventor of JavaScript will have to find something else to do. Woe unto him. It's not a witch hunt if we really did catch him red-handed using his magical powers for evil.
        momentarily 13y ago
        It is a witch hunt. He didn't do anything illegal. Your moral judgment concerns no one but you. It is binding on no one but you. You are a bigot. Everyone that is complicit in disenfranchising this man of employment because of his political opinions is a bigot. Political persecution doesn't just happen in the third world. It also happens here. And it's a crime against humanity wherever it happens. You are responsible for what you did. I am holding you responsible for your actions. I am holding you responsible for what you did to this man.
        eevee 13y ago
        I didn't do anything illegal, either. Yet you seem to have some unspoken set of rules beyond mere law that govern what is acceptable behavior. I've got some of those, too. I don't want him to not have a job. I want him to not have this job. I'm curious why it's okay for him to pay money in an attempt to enforce his opinions on others via law, but I'm a bigot and a pox upon civilization for talking on Twitter.
        momentarily 13y ago
        You called Eich evil. Eich is not evil. You are evil for helping to disenfranchise him of his employment because you disagreed with his opinions. This is political oppression. You are a bigot. You are evil.
      - dnr 13y ago
        The pro-prop-8 side spent $39M. The passage of the amendment caused the state to stop recognizing 18,000 previously-legitimate marriages. So if you count only immediate effects, his $1000 contribution works out to 0.46 marriages, or destroying the marriage of about one person. Is the emotional harm done to that person worth hundreds of thousands of dollars? It's at least comparable. In fact I think the harm done to Californians and other Americans by the passage of prop 8 is vastly more than is implied by that simple calculation. I'll just link to my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7525692 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7525692
    - chc 13y ago
      > A great many people temporarily couldn't get married because that one man paid good money to make it so. That is not remotely true. There were thousands of people stumping and many people donating tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Eich's donation wasn't even a hundredth of a percent of Prop. 8's support.
      - eevee 13y ago
        Okay, that's fair, I'm clearly exaggerating. But that actually makes the comparison even better! Lots of people pushed for prop 8, which in turn affected lots of people. Lots of people complained about Eich, which in turn affected... Eich. Yet the GGP is focusing on the masses who tried to pass a constitutional amendment to prevent Eich from being CEO. Wait, no, I must be confused.
        cookiecaper 13y ago
        I'd say Eich's deposition affects a lot of people ... the users of all Mozilla software. We've discarded the technical brilliance and direction of this man because a few noisy people disagreed with his political beliefs, which he expressed politely and quietly, never intentionally inflaming anyone. He was "exposed" by witch hunters for supporting a very mainstream and normal political position. If we're going to throw away the technical expertise of anyone who disagrees with us, we're going to have a bad time.
        eevee 13y ago
        I have strong emotional investment in Mozilla, because they fight to do the right thing, not just do whatever's mainstream and normal. Prop 8 was emphatically not the right thing. Eich has fought some of the battles I sympathize with, and I certainly hope he keeps doing that, but I'm not comfortable seeing him as head of the company.
        momentarily 13y ago
        Mozilla had nothing to do with Prop 8. Eich's professional position at Mozilla had nothing to do with Prop 8. His personal opinions and actions are his own business. Judging his professional placement on the basis of his personal life is unprofessional, invasive, and bigoted.
    - atomicfiredoll 13y ago
      > One man can't be CEO because other people complained on the Internet. Just as importantly--if not more so: board members and employees in the organization were complaining.
      - oberto 13y ago
        So why did they appoint him in the first place?
        eevee 13y ago
        That's a pretty good question, and (as noted elsewhere) it's amazing that nobody saw this coming. It took them a while to settle on him, too.
  - amadeus 13y ago
    Anecdotally, I've only heard a lot of people complain. Comparing this to a witch hunt appears pretty absurd. Nobody is physically attacking him for what he believes. Free speech is a 2 way street. I can disagree with him and express that, just as he can express his own views. Free speech is not expressing an opinion with everyone else shutting up about it. Why is this so hard to understand? Edit: The more I read your comments, the more ridiculous you sound. People protest and boycott things all the time. Why is this any different? If he can't handle public outcry to his own actions, well, that's his problem, not mine.
    - momentarily 13y ago
      You disenfranchised him of employment, which has very physical repercussions. Yes, you very much physically attacked this man.
      - amadeus 13y ago
        Well, you're just wrong, simple as that. If you can't see the difference, I suggest you try educating yourself. I'm not going to waste my time with your factually incorrect pedantry.
        momentarily 13y ago
        Point out exactly how I am wrong. I am not wrong. What I said is factually correct. You are lying. You are a liar. You are also a bigot.
ScottBurson 13y ago
> If you are someone who believes gay people should be allowed to form civil unions, but are offended [emphasis added] by the idea that those unions be called marriages ... then you still see gay people as fundamentally different from and less than straight people. There's no way out of this. EDITED to add: Also, what's happening to Eich isn't happening just because he made that donation. As furious as I was about Prop. 8, I could understand someone supporting it in 2008 just because gay marriage was a new and strange issue to them at that time. What I have more of a problem with is someone who has spent the intervening 5+ years working shoulder-to-shoulder with gay people in an atmosphere in which acceptance of them was espoused and apparently practiced, and in a world in which gay marriage was being debated vigorously and often, and yet has not reconsidered his beliefs. That, I think, really says something about who they are. All that said, I don't really feel I have standing to object to his being CEO of Mozilla. I think what this comes down to is that many Mozilla employees felt they couldn't work for him.
- gfodor 13y ago
  > There's no way out of this. Sure there is. Many people who oppose gay marriage not because of their feelings towards gay people but because they believe or were taught that the Bible says that God says that marriage is between a man and a woman, and regardless of their personal views they defer to the Bible as the word of god. Is this a fucking stupid belief? I think so, yes. Is it the same belief as thinking that gay people are subhuman? No. Seeing the difference is what makes it possible to get through to people who feel this way in order to persuade them their beliefs should be reconsidered. Calling them bigots and shutting them out as being intolerant and evil (and getting them fired from their jobs) is a sure fire way to ensure they become entrenched and feel it's an "us vs. them" environment.
  - shakethemonkey 13y ago
    Well, in that case: marriage is absolutely a polygamous institution; if a virgin is raped she must marry her rapist; a husband owns his wife's property; a wife may not assume any sort of authority over her husband, etc.

by gfodor 13y ago

amadeus 13y ago

You're still stretching the point. If you have an issue with the term marriage, then you're coming at it from a religious perspective. There's separation of church and state, it's a constitutional thing. If you want to redefine something as a Civil Union, then you help create and vote for that specific legislation. There was/is no logical or rational reason to vote for Prop 8.

momentarily 13y ago
I, personally, have an issue with witch hunts, with McCarthyism, with bigotry. Eich's persecution for his beliefs was bigotry. Everyone complicit in it is a bigot.
- eevee 13y ago
  One man can't be CEO because other people complained on the Internet. A great many people temporarily couldn't get married because that one man paid good money to make it so. And your sympathies lie with the poor persecuted CEO. Won't someone think of the rich white guy for once?
  - momentarily 13y ago
    No, Eich's $1000 didn't singlehandedly determine a law. It's peanuts. It's nothing. On the other hand, this witch hunt did singlehandedly disenfranchise him of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of employment. There is no comparison.
    - eevee 13y ago
      The inventor of JavaScript will have to find something else to do. Woe unto him. It's not a witch hunt if we really did catch him red-handed using his magical powers for evil.
      - momentarily 13y ago
        It is a witch hunt. He didn't do anything illegal. Your moral judgment concerns no one but you. It is binding on no one but you. You are a bigot. Everyone that is complicit in disenfranchising this man of employment because of his political opinions is a bigot. Political persecution doesn't just happen in the third world. It also happens here. And it's a crime against humanity wherever it happens. You are responsible for what you did. I am holding you responsible for your actions. I am holding you responsible for what you did to this man.
        eevee 13y ago
        I didn't do anything illegal, either. Yet you seem to have some unspoken set of rules beyond mere law that govern what is acceptable behavior. I've got some of those, too. I don't want him to not have a job. I want him to not have this job. I'm curious why it's okay for him to pay money in an attempt to enforce his opinions on others via law, but I'm a bigot and a pox upon civilization for talking on Twitter.
        momentarily 13y ago
        You called Eich evil. Eich is not evil. You are evil for helping to disenfranchise him of his employment because you disagreed with his opinions. This is political oppression. You are a bigot. You are evil.
    - dnr 13y ago
      The pro-prop-8 side spent $39M. The passage of the amendment caused the state to stop recognizing 18,000 previously-legitimate marriages. So if you count only immediate effects, his $1000 contribution works out to 0.46 marriages, or destroying the marriage of about one person. Is the emotional harm done to that person worth hundreds of thousands of dollars? It's at least comparable. In fact I think the harm done to Californians and other Americans by the passage of prop 8 is vastly more than is implied by that simple calculation. I'll just link to my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7525692 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7525692
  - chc 13y ago
    > A great many people temporarily couldn't get married because that one man paid good money to make it so. That is not remotely true. There were thousands of people stumping and many people donating tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars. Eich's donation wasn't even a hundredth of a percent of Prop. 8's support.
    - eevee 13y ago
      Okay, that's fair, I'm clearly exaggerating. But that actually makes the comparison even better! Lots of people pushed for prop 8, which in turn affected lots of people. Lots of people complained about Eich, which in turn affected... Eich. Yet the GGP is focusing on the masses who tried to pass a constitutional amendment to prevent Eich from being CEO. Wait, no, I must be confused.
      - cookiecaper 13y ago
        I'd say Eich's deposition affects a lot of people ... the users of all Mozilla software. We've discarded the technical brilliance and direction of this man because a few noisy people disagreed with his political beliefs, which he expressed politely and quietly, never intentionally inflaming anyone. He was "exposed" by witch hunters for supporting a very mainstream and normal political position. If we're going to throw away the technical expertise of anyone who disagrees with us, we're going to have a bad time.
        eevee 13y ago
        I have strong emotional investment in Mozilla, because they fight to do the right thing, not just do whatever's mainstream and normal. Prop 8 was emphatically not the right thing. Eich has fought some of the battles I sympathize with, and I certainly hope he keeps doing that, but I'm not comfortable seeing him as head of the company.
        momentarily 13y ago
        Mozilla had nothing to do with Prop 8. Eich's professional position at Mozilla had nothing to do with Prop 8. His personal opinions and actions are his own business. Judging his professional placement on the basis of his personal life is unprofessional, invasive, and bigoted.
  - atomicfiredoll 13y ago
    > One man can't be CEO because other people complained on the Internet. Just as importantly--if not more so: board members and employees in the organization were complaining.
    - oberto 13y ago
      So why did they appoint him in the first place?
      - eevee 13y ago
        That's a pretty good question, and (as noted elsewhere) it's amazing that nobody saw this coming. It took them a while to settle on him, too.
- amadeus 13y ago
  Anecdotally, I've only heard a lot of people complain. Comparing this to a witch hunt appears pretty absurd. Nobody is physically attacking him for what he believes. Free speech is a 2 way street. I can disagree with him and express that, just as he can express his own views. Free speech is not expressing an opinion with everyone else shutting up about it. Why is this so hard to understand? Edit: The more I read your comments, the more ridiculous you sound. People protest and boycott things all the time. Why is this any different? If he can't handle public outcry to his own actions, well, that's his problem, not mine.
  - momentarily 13y ago
    You disenfranchised him of employment, which has very physical repercussions. Yes, you very much physically attacked this man.
    - amadeus 13y ago
      Well, you're just wrong, simple as that. If you can't see the difference, I suggest you try educating yourself. I'm not going to waste my time with your factually incorrect pedantry.
      - momentarily 13y ago
        Point out exactly how I am wrong. I am not wrong. What I said is factually correct. You are lying. You are a liar. You are also a bigot.

ScottBurson 13y ago

> If you are someone who believes gay people should be allowed to form civil unions, but are offended [emphasis added] by the idea that those unions be called marriages ... then you still see gay people as fundamentally different from and less than straight people. There's no way out of this. EDITED to add: Also, what's happening to Eich isn't happening just because he made that donation. As furious as I was about Prop. 8, I could understand someone supporting it in 2008 just because gay marriage was a new and strange issue to them at that time. What I have more of a problem with is someone who has spent the intervening 5+ years working shoulder-to-shoulder with gay people in an atmosphere in which acceptance of them was espoused and apparently practiced, and in a world in which gay marriage was being debated vigorously and often, and yet has not reconsidered his beliefs. That, I think, really says something about who they are. All that said, I don't really feel I have standing to object to his being CEO of Mozilla. I think what this comes down to is that many Mozilla employees felt they couldn't work for him.

gfodor 13y ago
> There's no way out of this. Sure there is. Many people who oppose gay marriage not because of their feelings towards gay people but because they believe or were taught that the Bible says that God says that marriage is between a man and a woman, and regardless of their personal views they defer to the Bible as the word of god. Is this a fucking stupid belief? I think so, yes. Is it the same belief as thinking that gay people are subhuman? No. Seeing the difference is what makes it possible to get through to people who feel this way in order to persuade them their beliefs should be reconsidered. Calling them bigots and shutting them out as being intolerant and evil (and getting them fired from their jobs) is a sure fire way to ensure they become entrenched and feel it's an "us vs. them" environment.
- shakethemonkey 13y ago
  Well, in that case: marriage is absolutely a polygamous institution; if a virgin is raped she must marry her rapist; a husband owns his wife's property; a wife may not assume any sort of authority over her husband, etc.