[ender7]

If this were any other company I don't think this would turn any heads. However, much of Mozilla's ethos and community support is built on ethical rather than capitalistic foundations. It's hard to reconcile thoughts on a company that seems to so value freedom in some areas but not in others [1].

[1] Inferring what Mozilla values based on the opinions of its CEO is not particularly fair, but then again I'm not sure it's unfair either.

[gojomo]

Judge Mozilla on the actions of the organization, and the staff while performing their official roles.

What the staff does in other spheres of life, with their own time and money, is their own concern. It's a freer society, and a more pro-freedom organization, that grants individuals the widest range of actions and opinions when away from their official responsibilities.

The CEO position isn't "mascot" or "most popular" or "dear leader". (Those are cult-of-personality failure modes for a professional organization.) It's lead administrator, with specific on-the-job duties which involve essentially no electoral politicking nor meddling in employees' lives.

[wodenokoto]

I think the not in "but not in others" is over-qualifying.

Saying that Mozilla does not value gay rights because of 1000 dollars, donated once, indirectly associated with Mozilla is a crazy given how much they actually spend directly on supporting the cause yearly.

I'm not saying that a care package for 1.000 dollars negates Eichs contribution. But you can't say they don't value gay rights either.

[hugi]

What type of person you choose to head your operations obviously reflects your ideals.

It really doesn't matter if Mr. Eich donated 1000 dollars or a million dollars, he opposes basic human rights. And apparently Mozilla is fine with that.

[eridius]

He opposed basic human rights.

Does Mr. Eich still feel the same now as he did when he made that donation? I haven't done any research on this topic outside of the linked Ars article, but I find it interesting that Eich's own statement[1] about his donation completely avoids talking about his motivations for the donation. He even implied that he does not feel animosity towards gay people (although what he explicitly said was that the donation does not constitute evidence of animosity). So I'm left wondering as to what Mr. Eich actually feels on the topic.

Yes, he donated money to a cause that opposed basic human rights, and that's undeniably an action worthy of condemnation. But in isolation, this 6-year-old action does not prove anything about his feelings on the matter today. What matters right now is how Mr. Eich will lead Mozilla going forward, not personal acts taken 6 years ago that were not on behalf of Mozilla.

[1]: https://brendaneich.com/2012/04/community-and-diversity/

[Mikeb85]

Gay marriage isn't a 'basic human right'. It's subscribing to a governmental institution.

[alexqgb]

This isn't about gay marriage, per se. It's about carving out exceptions to the general writ of legal equality for all guaranteed by the 14th Amendment.

[Mikeb85]

Then where's my native (do you still call them 'indians' in the US?) status card, my veteran benefits, and my handicapped parking permit? While we're at it why can't I get maternity leave or diplomatic immunity?

I'm actually married (religious ceremony) but not officially 'married' (according to the government) and I don't care nor does it really matter where I live (common-law spouses get benefits anyway). And I'm not even against gay marriage, I just don't 'get' why it's a big deal...

Anyhow, I'm sure there's plenty of other exceptions when it comes to equality... Old people, minorities, pregnant women all get preferential treatment in a variety of circumstances, and it's not a bad thing...

[hkphooey]

In the UK, civil partnerships were introduced for same-sex couples, which gave AFAIK the exact same legal rights and tax benefits as heterosexual marriage. However, campaigners for gay marriage said this was not good enough so the Prime Minister eventually pushed through a vote for gay marriage. So it seems the issue wasn't really about legal rights, that just comes along for the ride, it was more about using the word "marriage".

Similar thing when it comes to marriage ceremonies. Why lobby the state to try and force a religious institution to hold a same-sex marriage ceremony when the teachings of that religion are clearly against same-sex relationships? Can't we accept that in the diversity of opinions out there, some are like chalk and cheese? They simply don't go together so why force the issue and make everybody unhappy?

What I find interesting about this last point is that campaigners only focus on the Christian religion. It seems nobody wants to try and force mosques and synagogues to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies. Why is that?

[arg01]

I agree with your reasoning that arbitrary advantages could be viewed as discrimination. I'd argue though that in those cases the goal is to cancel out disadvantages (directly or inderectly) directly related to inherent parts of a person (sex,handicap,race) or are benefits that a person can generally choose to acquire (old age,veteran,handicap;) ).

In the case of maternity leave it cancels out the propensity to fire/not hire a woman because she can get pregnant and is likely to be required to raise the kid for the first few months. Native cards to reduce inherent inequality produced by past events. Handicap to allow the handicapped to function to a level similiar to the non handicapped. Were as age benefits in theory apply to anyone who doesn't croak and presumably if they so desired. Veterans choose to serve the country and are compensated by society at large, admittedly you could argue not all people can join the military so fair point there. Food stamps, just lose all your money.

So onto gay marriage. Marriage is both a legal construct and a religious construct but the government can only recognize the legal part (seperation of church and state). Now the government is currently not recognizing that the couple can be together based on the sex of the partners which is something they can't change (reasonably(you could argue for separate drinking fountains on the basis that skin colour can be medically altered if you think this is reasonable)), you can argue that the marriage is for reproduction but sterile couples can get married, you could argue the child is adversely affected this has been shown not to be the case, you could argue friends will cheat the system but that can already be the case, the issue is the government has no reason to grant the various special right (tax,visitation laws, adoption) to a couple based on the sex of the people in the couple.

The key to that argument is that the government can't use the religious part of marriage as a basis for their decision. It's also worth noting that even if the government allows gay marriage that only guarantees you can get married in a courthouse, nothing about churches would be guaranteed (or in theory enforceable if they decided to say you could).

[jbeja]

So equality is not a "basic huma right"?

[Mikeb85]

When gays are forced to sit at the back of the bus, or not allowed to go to the same schools, or vote, then you can argue your equality angle...

[TheZenPsycho]

Or be allowed to be included in the will of your loved one, or be allowed to visit them in the hospital, or be allowed to attend their funeral if your loved one's parents don't like you...

Can we argue it now?

Prohibiting same sex marriage is the government asserting that it is not possible for two people of the same sex to love one another, by any definition that would allow them to be considered legally "family", and that is definitely not equality.

[hkphooey]

This is silly, almost fascist.

What next?

If a person doesn't donate to a campaign supporting gay marriage, does that mean the person is a bigot and homophobic?

[eropple]

How about a guy who donates to people who are homophobic bigots and who make being homophobic bigots a central part of their schtick? Like this guy, who Eich donated money to (it's on OpenSecrets): http://www.tommcclintock.com/press-releases/mcclintock-calle...

There's a pattern here. This issue is one that's important to Eich. I will certainly judge him on that and judge those who empower him and there's absolutely nothing fascist about exercising my freedom of association.

[Fomite]

Not doing something and making an active, affirmative, financially-backed choice are miles apart.

[mikeash]

What a crazy idea, that it's somehow "fascist" to criticize a company based on the political activities of their CEO, but I can only assume "not fascist" to restrict the rights of minorities.

[anaphor]

Even if Mozilla started actively discriminating against people and campaigning against minority rights I would have no problem taking the code and starting a forked version. IMO that's what's so great about FLOSS, if you disagree with how something is managed you can ignore the people who created it and start your own version along with other people who agree.

So I wouldn't really be worried about the current state of affairs. If people want to boycott then they can do that, but I doubt it will have much effect unless Eich starts going insane, in which case Google will probably cut their funding. In that case we can all start hacking on Iceweasel and forget about it. Yay for free libre open source software!

[TheZenPsycho]

Yes that's the fantasy. The reality is you can't just casually fork a project as big as mozilla. The only way that codebase stays even barely maintained with security bug fixes, is with its army of coders. The great thing about FLOSS is that it's POSSIBLE. The not so great thing about it is, in many cases you're probably better off just starting from scratch.

[anaphor]

In the hypothetical scenario that Mozilla management decides to start discriminating against gay people I think we can count on the support of many of the people who are familiar with the codebase. Would you agree?

[TheZenPsycho]

I find hypothetical scenarios quite challenging. I suppose it's possible the people within mozilla may pull another "mozilla" and spawn a new company made out of many of the same people to maintain its codebase.

I think it's more likely Mozilla, as an organisation, would fire or enfeeble Brendan Eich before that happens.

I only recently learned about the donation, so you have no idea the cognitive dissonance I have been going through.

I believe that, as a champion and a leader, you can't get anyone better than Brendan Eich for the free software movement. But as a symbol, and a figurehead, the donation is really problematic. If it had never come to light, if he had never revealed his inner feelings about homosexuals, would it be a problem for mozilla with him in this role? Maybe, I doubt it though. I think he is utterly professional at keeping those things seperate and interior.

On the other hand, it could very much affect his leadership abilities if he ever has to work directly with someone he knows to be gay. Or many someones. Or an entire company of someones.

This is not to justify his donation. Which was a bad bad idea on his part, and bad ethically speaking too, not just because he got caught. but that I think it's not enough to discard a whole person over.

But on the other hand.. can you sense my cognitive dissonance?

[mason55]

People probably would have said that about MySQL a few years ago

[TheZenPsycho]

And all it took to fork mariaDB was the support of several large corporations.

[general_failure]

Agree. To me, Mozilla is much more than a company. It's more like family. It's purpose is to set a high moral ground and place values over anything else. With that in mind appointing someone whose moral standing is questionable, makes this decision hard to accept.

I guess it was silly of me to imagine mozilla as something larger than life/more than a run of the mill company.

[hkphooey]

I'm sorry, but you made a mistake of projecting your own beliefs and value system onto Mozilla.

Mozilla is simply a technology organization and their mission is to promote a free and open web. It is not human rights, animal rights, or anything else.

If Brendan Eich believes in a free and open web then he is the right person for the job.

[neotek]

He doesn't even believe in free and open marriages...

[benjohnson]

I don't either - I believe in governmental civil-unions for all, and the marriage ceremony (or not) of your own choosing and would allow for stricter contracts to be signed among willing parties.

[dinkumthinkum]

No, I think for any major or known company this would turn a lot of heads. Any CEO that has ties to homophobia or whatever you want to call it is going to get talked about. But, I will say given the kind of culture Mozilla seems to support, it is an odd choice.

[alexqgb]

This is exactly what Gregg Steinhafel (Chairman, President, and CEO of Target) discovered the hard way back in 2010.

http://consumerist.com/2010/08/05/target-ceo-explains-suppor...