6 ms·

Corrosive Conformity

36 points by pvnick 13y ago

ignostic 13y ago
The whole Mozilla thing is a little bitter-sweet for me. I'm glad that we've progressed to the point where actively working to deny another person equal rights is no longer acceptable, but I wonder if this was really the best use of our time and "outrage." Eich wasn't an activist or even a huge contributor as far as we know. I support sending a peaceful, voluntary message - but in retrospect, I think we sent it to the wrong person and company. The article makes some good points and some weak arguments (the Obama comparison is bizarre), but the author makes little distinction between holding a differing view and contributing to causes that (IMO) encourage discrimination and unjust inequality. In other words, I think it's fair game to boycott and protest supporters of anti-gay-marriage bills, but we (myself included) should have focused on something with greater impact - a "real" bad guy. There are hundreds of politicians who are actively working against equal rights, and a lot of big money going to them and pro-discrimination PACs. For those who support equality in marriage, that's a better place to start.
- Justsignedup 13y ago
  I will only tolerate such behavior in one and only one instance: when the issue is a human rights violation. But where does it end? Do people start boycotting companies because one of their board members are not opposed to abortion? Do people start boycotting companies because the CEO feels that Michael Jackson was not a pedophile? In the end my favorite quote on free speech: "Sir, I disagree with you whole-heartedly, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it." Also, what if since then he has changed his mind? These things happen, people had wrong opinions and through argument have changed them.
  - ChrisGaudreau 13y ago
    People do boycott companies due to abortion and lots of other things. That would be free speech.
    - Justsignedup 13y ago
      Good point. This seems like an interesting case.
  - glesica 13y ago
    > "Sir, I disagree with you whole-heartedly, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it." Yes, but this applies to censorship. No one was censoring Eich or asking for him to be censored and, even more importantly, no one was asking for the government to step in. I support his right to be a bigot. I do not, however, want a bigot running an organization that is important to me, and I (and many others whose opinions matter far more than mine) said so (our right).
    - masklinn 13y ago
      > No one was censoring Eich or asking for him to be censored and, even more importantly, no one was asking for the government to step in. Many were not even asking for him to leave his post, just for him to disown his previous acts (acts, not beliefs) and maybe a comp (e.g. equivalent donation to anti-bullying orgs were floated around) as a show of good will.
      - Justsignedup 13y ago
        I guess he still feels that way. But the board may have decided that even an apology may still not quiet the mob in this instance.
    - sssilver 13y ago
      > I support his right to be a bigot According to Google, "bigotry" is defined as "having or revealing an obstinate belief in the superiority of one's own opinions and a prejudiced intolerance of the opinions of others." I'm getting confused here, since English is not my native language -- but how's Eich a bigot, and the other side of the barricade not? In fact, according to that definition, how are the people who ousted him not the bigger bigots? Just wondering.
      - Justsignedup 13y ago
        Bigotry is usually referred to someone who puts down a group of people, based on their race, sexual orientation, sex, etc. Things that people cannot control: "I hate all left-handed people." In his case he was (at least partially) trying to deny a group of people (homosexuals and other derivatives) the right to Marry a same-sex partner and have equal protection under the law. Note this issue is similar to people protesting that a black man should not be allowed to legally marry a white woman just a few decades ago.
  - thrownaway2424 13y ago
    This isn't about boycotting, it's about hiring and retention. If Mozilla can't hire people, they're fucked. If their CEO is perceived BY THE PEOPLE THEY WANT TO HIRE as a bit of an asshat, that's not good.
    - Justsignedup 13y ago
      Ditto for volunteers
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > Also, what if since then he has changed his mind? Then you'd expect that to be one of the things addressed in the response once the issue is raised.
badman_ting 13y ago
I'm tired of these silly reversals. It's disingenuous, this attitude like there is some sort of gay mafia overpowering commonfolk. "Tolerance" only comes up as a topic when it's about tolerating some shitty retrograde attitude. Please. Mozilla backed Eich the whole way as far as I remember. They initially shrugged off rarebit's reaction with the standard "we should all respect personal opinions" (except for the personal opinions of people affected by Eich's actions, of course).
- bluekeybox 13y ago
  You are not seeing the full picture. There is no "gay mafia". I have gay friends who are wonderful people, and I support their right to marry. Some of my biggest idols in tech are gay. What scares me, however, is that the same confrontational tactics that are used to police tech sector against you-name-it people who had made a silly or insensitive joke about women or donated a couple of bucks to some non-PC campaign -- those same confrontational, entryist tactics were used in the early 20th century by Lenin and his supporters, and we all know where that led. It's not the message, it's how it is delivered.
  - fennecfoxen 13y ago
    First they came for Brendan Eich. But I did not speak out, because I disagreed with Brendan Eich's political position and thought it was obnoxious. Jerk had it coming, I say. cough
    - bluekeybox 13y ago
      Eich is far from the first. The mob's appetite for blood is greater than you think: * http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/donglegate-adria-richards http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/donglegate-adria-richar... * http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/pr-executive-justine-sacco-apologises-after-losing-job-over-racist-aids-joke-provoked-hasjustinelandedyet-twitter-storm-9020809.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/pr-executive-j... * http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2013/09/10/business-insider-fires-cto-over-offensive-tweets/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2013/09/10/busines... * http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/30/paul-graham-responds-to-critics/ http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/30/paul-graham-responds-to-cri...
tasty_freeze 13y ago
The problem wasn't that mozilla doesn't allow dissent; the problem is that the world wouldn't allow Eich to be CEO, and he realized that whatever good he could do as CEO was overwhelmed by the harm he would do to it as staying CEO. Mozilla didn't bounce Eich; the internet did.
- MrZongle2 13y ago
  More specifically: a particularly noisy part of the Internet did.
  - jjgreen 13y ago
    Those hysterical screaming queens?
caseysoftware 13y ago
Does Eich have grounds to file suit against Mozilla employees for making a hostile work environment?
BrainInAJar 13y ago
The problem wasn't that "some CEO of some company has an anti-gay view" the problem is that the ideological head (the CEO) of an organization whose stated mission is one of greater good (rather than profit) not only harbours anti-gay thoughts, but actively acted to deny people of their human rights, and it wasn't a mistake (he's never said anything to suggest he's changed his mind or regrets it at all)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
deveac 13y ago
>In 2008, Barack Obama and Brendan Eich both were against gay marriage...Barack Obama inexplicably remains, as of this writing, president of the United States of America, but Mr. Eich has just been forced out as CEO of Mozilla because of his political views. Nonsense. A two-party political horse race is not analogous. If you don't like one or more views your closest candidate has, the ONLY other alternative is often MUCH worse on the whole, not only for your issue of choice, but a range of them. Compare that to selecting a leader of an organization that is not structured to return profit to shareholders, but instead carry out a social and ethical objective and it is easy to see why a leader that is NOT ethical (in the view of significant numbers of people inside the org and "customers/users" outside the org) would be deemed not qualified to hold the job. Couple that with plethora of other viable candidates (as opposed to the two-person horse race of a presidential run), and the analogy doesn't just fall flat, it refuses to exist.
rbanffy 13y ago
George Takei said it so well I'll have to quote him: "Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. This man donated money to a campaign designed to keep LGBT people from full equality and to deny our families equal rights under the law. He was free to make that choice, but we are free to hold him accountable. If he'd donated money to White Supremacists to help outlaw interracial marriage, there'd be little outcry over his ouster". It's not conformity, but Mozilla stands for a set of values, among those equality, which is not compatible with the values publicly demonstrated by Eich.
- fennecfoxen 13y ago
  I'll counter with Clarence Thomas. "I cannot endorse a view of the First Amendment that subjects citizens of this Nation to death threats, ruined careers, damaged or defaced property, or pre-emptive and threatening warning letters as the price for engaging in "core political speech, the 'primary object of First Amendment protection.' " - Dissenting in part, _Citizens United vs FEC_. Regarding Proposition 8, and the fact that the law compelled the disclosure of donors and made all this donation information public to begin with.
  - rbanffy 13y ago
    If at the time he made his donation the rules allowed his contribution to remain secret, then this is disturbing. If not, it's just that he is not suited to run the Mozilla Foundation after stating publicly he does not agree with one of the core values of the foundation and its contributors. If it were the case, he could have apologized and say he changed his mind. If he didn't change his mind, again, he is not suitable to run a foundation where many core contributors have strong moral feelings about equality.
ChrisGaudreau 13y ago
It's curious that gay-rights supporters are being called the "intolerant ones." I keep hearing this. It was a common talking point during the Duck Dynasty fiasco. I wonder if this tactic was used in the past to attack opponents of racism?
- mkr-hn 13y ago
  I don't know if I'll ever understand how people reason that using one right to deny a right to another person should be immune to criticism.
cynwoody 13y ago
For those who haven't seen it, Barack Obama opined on this topic around the same time as Brendan Eich, and over a much bigger megaphone than $1000 will buy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6K9dS9wl7U http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6K9dS9wl7U tl;dv: "I believe that marriage is the union between a man and woman ... For me as a Christian, it's also a sacred union .. you know, God's in the mix. ... I’m not somebody who promotes same-sex marriage, but I do believe in civil unions.”
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > For those who haven't seen it, Barack Obama opined on this topic around the same time as Brendan Eich, and over a much bigger megaphone than $1000 will buy: If you mean the topic actually at issue -- California's Prop. 8 -- that's true, but not on the side you suggest: http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Obama-opposes-proposed-ban-on-gay-marriage-3278328.php http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Obama-opposes-proposed-ba... --[quote]-- John Wildermuth, Chronicle Staff Writer Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, July 2, 2008 Gay rights moved to the forefront of the presidential campaign Tuesday after Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's announcement that he opposes a November ballot measure that would ban same-sex marriage in California. In a letter to San Francisco's Alice B. Toklas Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Democratic Club, the presumptive presidential nominee said he opposed "the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution" and similar efforts in other states. --[end quote]--
MisterBastahrd 13y ago
The problem isn't that he was pretty much forced to step down as CEO, it's that he was ever given the position without proper vetting in the first place. Being a co-founder does not make one CEO material. I don't know Mozilla's process, but if I were just making a casual observance, I'd say they were determined to hire the guy without using all the resources available to determine whether he was the best candidate for the job. The slippery slope argument is bullshit. "Where do we draw the line?" Well, let's see: if he has simply voted Republican, he'd have been fine. If he'd have voted for Prop 8 but contributed no money to it, there wouldn't be a money trail to show that he's a bigot. He'd probably fine until he got himself into the potential HR fiasco that would have damaged Mozilla a great deal more than they've been for not doing a proper executive search. But neither of those happened. Instead, he left a money trail to specifically support a bigoted cause. There's the line.
benjohnson 13y ago
The interesting thing to notice is that us 'old people' will be on the losing side of another human-rights issue if the demographics are correct. It looks like the younger generations are much more likely to be pro-life, and it will be interesting to see if pro-choice people will be haunted for their views going forward. If denying denying civil marriage to gay partners incurs such wrath - I dearly hope that the our pro-life children will find it possible to forgive us.
filmgirlcw 13y ago
My issue with this is that it is completely political. The National Review isn't against what happened to Eich because of "conformity," but because they happen to agree with his political views. Want proof? In 2011, a Notre Dame Board of Trustees member was pressured to resign because of her donations to a pro-choice group. Not only did the National Review not have a problem with her resignation, they published a feature criticizubg Notre Dame at length[1] for appointing her to begin with and in general not upholding pro-life only Catholic values. So you'll forgive me if I think this article is bullshit and its arguments completely specious. I await your downvotes. [1]: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269303/more-cracks-golden-dome-george-weigel http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269303/more-cracks-go...
- camus2 13y ago
  Yes,these guys are hypocrites, but that's all you'd expect from bigots... they are just "my way or the highway",and see injustice only when it's convenient.
- yypark 13y ago
  The National Review may be on this side purely due to politics, but many others (For instance gay-marriage supporter Conor Friesedorf) are on this side due for open political discourse and anti-comformity. http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/mozillas-gay-marriage-litmus-test-violates-liberal-values/360156/ http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/mozillas... I completely agree that a lot of the rhetoric is completely tribal (this side is right, the other side is wrong, now let's sling mud and accuse the other side of X!). But some people (in fact, a lot of Hacker News) does seem to get beyond this.
  - filmgirlcw 13y ago
    There is absolutely a non-political argument to be made, you are absolutely correct. I guess what I'm saying is that this article is not making that argument. At all.

36 points by pvnick 13y ago

The whole Mozilla thing is a little bitter-sweet for me. I'm glad that we've progressed to the point where actively working to deny another person equal rights is no longer acceptable, but I wonder if this was really the best use of our time and "outrage." Eich wasn't an activist or even a huge contributor as far as we know. I support sending a peaceful, voluntary message - but in retrospect, I think we sent it to the wrong person and company. The article makes some good points and some weak arguments (the Obama comparison is bizarre), but the author makes little distinction between holding a differing view and contributing to causes that (IMO) encourage discrimination and unjust inequality. In other words, I think it's fair game to boycott and protest supporters of anti-gay-marriage bills, but we (myself included) should have focused on something with greater impact - a "real" bad guy. There are hundreds of politicians who are actively working against equal rights, and a lot of big money going to them and pro-discrimination PACs. For those who support equality in marriage, that's a better place to start.

Justsignedup 13y ago
I will only tolerate such behavior in one and only one instance: when the issue is a human rights violation. But where does it end? Do people start boycotting companies because one of their board members are not opposed to abortion? Do people start boycotting companies because the CEO feels that Michael Jackson was not a pedophile? In the end my favorite quote on free speech: "Sir, I disagree with you whole-heartedly, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it." Also, what if since then he has changed his mind? These things happen, people had wrong opinions and through argument have changed them.
- ChrisGaudreau 13y ago
  People do boycott companies due to abortion and lots of other things. That would be free speech.
  - Justsignedup 13y ago
    Good point. This seems like an interesting case.
- glesica 13y ago
  > "Sir, I disagree with you whole-heartedly, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it." Yes, but this applies to censorship. No one was censoring Eich or asking for him to be censored and, even more importantly, no one was asking for the government to step in. I support his right to be a bigot. I do not, however, want a bigot running an organization that is important to me, and I (and many others whose opinions matter far more than mine) said so (our right).
  - masklinn 13y ago
    > No one was censoring Eich or asking for him to be censored and, even more importantly, no one was asking for the government to step in. Many were not even asking for him to leave his post, just for him to disown his previous acts (acts, not beliefs) and maybe a comp (e.g. equivalent donation to anti-bullying orgs were floated around) as a show of good will.
    - Justsignedup 13y ago
      I guess he still feels that way. But the board may have decided that even an apology may still not quiet the mob in this instance.
  - sssilver 13y ago
    > I support his right to be a bigot According to Google, "bigotry" is defined as "having or revealing an obstinate belief in the superiority of one's own opinions and a prejudiced intolerance of the opinions of others." I'm getting confused here, since English is not my native language -- but how's Eich a bigot, and the other side of the barricade not? In fact, according to that definition, how are the people who ousted him not the bigger bigots? Just wondering.
    - Justsignedup 13y ago
      Bigotry is usually referred to someone who puts down a group of people, based on their race, sexual orientation, sex, etc. Things that people cannot control: "I hate all left-handed people." In his case he was (at least partially) trying to deny a group of people (homosexuals and other derivatives) the right to Marry a same-sex partner and have equal protection under the law. Note this issue is similar to people protesting that a black man should not be allowed to legally marry a white woman just a few decades ago.
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  This isn't about boycotting, it's about hiring and retention. If Mozilla can't hire people, they're fucked. If their CEO is perceived BY THE PEOPLE THEY WANT TO HIRE as a bit of an asshat, that's not good.
  - Justsignedup 13y ago
    Ditto for volunteers
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > Also, what if since then he has changed his mind? Then you'd expect that to be one of the things addressed in the response once the issue is raised.

badman_ting 13y ago

I'm tired of these silly reversals. It's disingenuous, this attitude like there is some sort of gay mafia overpowering commonfolk. "Tolerance" only comes up as a topic when it's about tolerating some shitty retrograde attitude. Please. Mozilla backed Eich the whole way as far as I remember. They initially shrugged off rarebit's reaction with the standard "we should all respect personal opinions" (except for the personal opinions of people affected by Eich's actions, of course).

bluekeybox 13y ago
You are not seeing the full picture. There is no "gay mafia". I have gay friends who are wonderful people, and I support their right to marry. Some of my biggest idols in tech are gay. What scares me, however, is that the same confrontational tactics that are used to police tech sector against you-name-it people who had made a silly or insensitive joke about women or donated a couple of bucks to some non-PC campaign -- those same confrontational, entryist tactics were used in the early 20th century by Lenin and his supporters, and we all know where that led. It's not the message, it's how it is delivered.
- fennecfoxen 13y ago
  First they came for Brendan Eich. But I did not speak out, because I disagreed with Brendan Eich's political position and thought it was obnoxious. Jerk had it coming, I say. cough
  - bluekeybox 13y ago
    Eich is far from the first. The mob's appetite for blood is greater than you think: * http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/donglegate-adria-richards http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/donglegate-adria-richar... * http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/pr-executive-justine-sacco-apologises-after-losing-job-over-racist-aids-joke-provoked-hasjustinelandedyet-twitter-storm-9020809.html http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/news/pr-executive-j... * http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2013/09/10/business-insider-fires-cto-over-offensive-tweets/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2013/09/10/busines... * http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/30/paul-graham-responds-to-critics/ http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/30/paul-graham-responds-to-cri...

tasty_freeze 13y ago

The problem wasn't that mozilla doesn't allow dissent; the problem is that the world wouldn't allow Eich to be CEO, and he realized that whatever good he could do as CEO was overwhelmed by the harm he would do to it as staying CEO. Mozilla didn't bounce Eich; the internet did.

MrZongle2 13y ago
More specifically: a particularly noisy part of the Internet did.
- jjgreen 13y ago
  Those hysterical screaming queens?

caseysoftware 13y ago

Does Eich have grounds to file suit against Mozilla employees for making a hostile work environment?

BrainInAJar 13y ago

The problem wasn't that "some CEO of some company has an anti-gay view" the problem is that the ideological head (the CEO) of an organization whose stated mission is one of greater good (rather than profit) not only harbours anti-gay thoughts, but actively acted to deny people of their human rights, and it wasn't a mistake (he's never said anything to suggest he's changed his mind or regrets it at all)

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

deveac 13y ago

>In 2008, Barack Obama and Brendan Eich both were against gay marriage...Barack Obama inexplicably remains, as of this writing, president of the United States of America, but Mr. Eich has just been forced out as CEO of Mozilla because of his political views. Nonsense. A two-party political horse race is not analogous. If you don't like one or more views your closest candidate has, the ONLY other alternative is often MUCH worse on the whole, not only for your issue of choice, but a range of them. Compare that to selecting a leader of an organization that is not structured to return profit to shareholders, but instead carry out a social and ethical objective and it is easy to see why a leader that is NOT ethical (in the view of significant numbers of people inside the org and "customers/users" outside the org) would be deemed not qualified to hold the job. Couple that with plethora of other viable candidates (as opposed to the two-person horse race of a presidential run), and the analogy doesn't just fall flat, it refuses to exist.

rbanffy 13y ago

George Takei said it so well I'll have to quote him: "Freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. This man donated money to a campaign designed to keep LGBT people from full equality and to deny our families equal rights under the law. He was free to make that choice, but we are free to hold him accountable. If he'd donated money to White Supremacists to help outlaw interracial marriage, there'd be little outcry over his ouster". It's not conformity, but Mozilla stands for a set of values, among those equality, which is not compatible with the values publicly demonstrated by Eich.

fennecfoxen 13y ago
I'll counter with Clarence Thomas. "I cannot endorse a view of the First Amendment that subjects citizens of this Nation to death threats, ruined careers, damaged or defaced property, or pre-emptive and threatening warning letters as the price for engaging in "core political speech, the 'primary object of First Amendment protection.' " - Dissenting in part, _Citizens United vs FEC_. Regarding Proposition 8, and the fact that the law compelled the disclosure of donors and made all this donation information public to begin with.
- rbanffy 13y ago
  If at the time he made his donation the rules allowed his contribution to remain secret, then this is disturbing. If not, it's just that he is not suited to run the Mozilla Foundation after stating publicly he does not agree with one of the core values of the foundation and its contributors. If it were the case, he could have apologized and say he changed his mind. If he didn't change his mind, again, he is not suitable to run a foundation where many core contributors have strong moral feelings about equality.

ChrisGaudreau 13y ago

It's curious that gay-rights supporters are being called the "intolerant ones." I keep hearing this. It was a common talking point during the Duck Dynasty fiasco. I wonder if this tactic was used in the past to attack opponents of racism?

mkr-hn 13y ago
I don't know if I'll ever understand how people reason that using one right to deny a right to another person should be immune to criticism.

cynwoody 13y ago

For those who haven't seen it, Barack Obama opined on this topic around the same time as Brendan Eich, and over a much bigger megaphone than $1000 will buy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6K9dS9wl7U http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6K9dS9wl7U tl;dv: "I believe that marriage is the union between a man and woman ... For me as a Christian, it's also a sacred union .. you know, God's in the mix. ... I’m not somebody who promotes same-sex marriage, but I do believe in civil unions.”

dragonwriter 13y ago
> For those who haven't seen it, Barack Obama opined on this topic around the same time as Brendan Eich, and over a much bigger megaphone than $1000 will buy: If you mean the topic actually at issue -- California's Prop. 8 -- that's true, but not on the side you suggest: http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Obama-opposes-proposed-ban-on-gay-marriage-3278328.php http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Obama-opposes-proposed-ba... --[quote]-- John Wildermuth, Chronicle Staff Writer Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, July 2, 2008 Gay rights moved to the forefront of the presidential campaign Tuesday after Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's announcement that he opposes a November ballot measure that would ban same-sex marriage in California. In a letter to San Francisco's Alice B. Toklas Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Democratic Club, the presumptive presidential nominee said he opposed "the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution" and similar efforts in other states. --[end quote]--

MisterBastahrd 13y ago

The problem isn't that he was pretty much forced to step down as CEO, it's that he was ever given the position without proper vetting in the first place. Being a co-founder does not make one CEO material. I don't know Mozilla's process, but if I were just making a casual observance, I'd say they were determined to hire the guy without using all the resources available to determine whether he was the best candidate for the job. The slippery slope argument is bullshit. "Where do we draw the line?" Well, let's see: if he has simply voted Republican, he'd have been fine. If he'd have voted for Prop 8 but contributed no money to it, there wouldn't be a money trail to show that he's a bigot. He'd probably fine until he got himself into the potential HR fiasco that would have damaged Mozilla a great deal more than they've been for not doing a proper executive search. But neither of those happened. Instead, he left a money trail to specifically support a bigoted cause. There's the line.

benjohnson 13y ago

The interesting thing to notice is that us 'old people' will be on the losing side of another human-rights issue if the demographics are correct. It looks like the younger generations are much more likely to be pro-life, and it will be interesting to see if pro-choice people will be haunted for their views going forward. If denying denying civil marriage to gay partners incurs such wrath - I dearly hope that the our pro-life children will find it possible to forgive us.

filmgirlcw 13y ago

My issue with this is that it is completely political. The National Review isn't against what happened to Eich because of "conformity," but because they happen to agree with his political views. Want proof? In 2011, a Notre Dame Board of Trustees member was pressured to resign because of her donations to a pro-choice group. Not only did the National Review not have a problem with her resignation, they published a feature criticizubg Notre Dame at length[1] for appointing her to begin with and in general not upholding pro-life only Catholic values. So you'll forgive me if I think this article is bullshit and its arguments completely specious. I await your downvotes. [1]: http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269303/more-cracks-golden-dome-george-weigel http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/269303/more-cracks-go...

camus2 13y ago
Yes,these guys are hypocrites, but that's all you'd expect from bigots... they are just "my way or the highway",and see injustice only when it's convenient.
yypark 13y ago
The National Review may be on this side purely due to politics, but many others (For instance gay-marriage supporter Conor Friesedorf) are on this side due for open political discourse and anti-comformity. http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/mozillas-gay-marriage-litmus-test-violates-liberal-values/360156/ http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/mozillas... I completely agree that a lot of the rhetoric is completely tribal (this side is right, the other side is wrong, now let's sling mud and accuse the other side of X!). But some people (in fact, a lot of Hacker News) does seem to get beyond this.
- filmgirlcw 13y ago
  There is absolutely a non-political argument to be made, you are absolutely correct. I guess what I'm saying is that this article is not making that argument. At all.