[lawl]

I have commented on this issue before [0].

I've been thinking about this again. After reading this I think he still stands to his opinion, that he personally thinks gay marriage is wrong. Obviously he's an idiot, but I think even idiots are entitled to their opinion as long as it doesn't interfere with his work at mozilla.

I think that is also what he's trying to say with his blog post. I think he made it pretty clear that he does not want this to interfere with his work at mozilla. So as long as he does not discriminate LGBT at work, I think he deserves a shot at it.

You can't force him to change his opinion. I think that is more honest than an apology he doesn't mean.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7470134

[coldtea]

>I've been thinking about this again. After reading this I think he still stands to his opinion, that he personally thinks gay marriage is wrong. Obviously he's an idiot

Well, nothing obvious about it. It's just a cultural preference. If you were born merely 30 years ago, or in another culture, you'd be laughed for even considering the idea of gay marriage. Make it 100 years ago and you would be considered a madman.

The thing is, HE might have been raised in another culture than yours (e.g some conservative environment). And there's nothing objective to tell one belief is better than the other.

Allowing gay marriage is surely more permissive, but believing that "more permissive is better" is a value judgement, not some natural law.

[lawl]

Don't take it too literal. I was just voicing my disagreement :)

[coldtea]

Yep, I tend to do that!

[danudey]

The problem is that of a fundamental issue in character. This is a man who donated a thousand dollars (a not-insignificant sum) in order to prevent a group of people from sharing the same rights as everyone else. What he's saying is that there is a group of people in society who do not deserve to be treated the same as everyone else.

I don't really care if he changes his opinion or not; I have an issue with people who go out of their way to prevent other people from having something when it loses them nothing.

If there was any sort of reason why banning gay marriage was economically beneficial or caused tangible harm to any group of people, then it would be 'live and let live', but at some point, he decided to attempt to prevent gay people from getting married for no reason other than what effectively comes down to spite. That's not really someone I trust in a leadership position.

[macu]

The debate has been going on for years, with enormous investment of all kinds of resources from every side. Everyone involved has a stake, and the claim that "it loses them nothing" indicates a lack of perspective.

I can only speak for myself here. I'm 24, and I grew up with the view that religion was a funny ritual the neighbours carried on, because it gave them something to do. Repeat: I grew up with a limited perspective. I saw marriage only as an expensive party and a legal contract.

Now I know this isn't the whole story. The idea of allowing gay marriage is deeply offensive to people only because it is perceived to destroy the integrity of their tradition and cultural heritage. I wouldn't take it too lightly, what gay marriage is asking of those who maintain that heritage, because in their hearts it isn't heritage, it's truth.

That's how it seems to me now anyway.

[belovedeagle]

I agree that it's a shame that some people think that a certain group of people—those who supported prop 8—in society who do not deserve to be treated the same as everyone else.

I don't really care if they change their opinion or not; I too have an issue with people who go out of their way to prevent other people from having something—such as a CEO position, or from believing something—when it costs them nothing.

If there was any sort of reason why making opposition to gay marriage a thoughtcrime was economically beneficial or caused no [I suppose you meant] tangible harm to any group of people, then it would be 'live and let live', but at some point, they decided to attempt to prevent prop 8 supporters from holding high-profile jobs for no reason other than what effectively comes down to spite. That's not really someone I trust in my society.

[nine_k]

I personally suppose that seeing someone as an idiot because of difference in opinions is more debilitating than having an arbitrarily wrong opinion.

World is not black and white, and has never been.

[untog]

I personally suppose that seeing someone as an idiot because of difference in opinions

Are there any other reasons?

[coldtea]

Yes, the canonical reason is because he has a reduced mental capacity, something that can (possibly) even be measured in standardized tests.

Not because he has a different stance on moral issue X.

[Confusion]

Funny you should say that, as you are interpreting the comment you are responding to in a decidedly black-and-white fashion. When someone says someone else 'is an idiot', that usually means: "he's an idiot concerning this issue, which is actually surprising, since he mostly holds sensible and defensible opinions". It's not either black-'someone is an idiot in every aspect' or white-'someone is awesome in every aspect'.

[nine_k]

I'm sorry: I take words by their direct meanings, as long as the resulting sentence makes sense.

I understand that various (probably arbitrary) interpretations can be attached to a sentence by assuming metaphorical, implied, contextually altered, ironic, humorous, etc meanings of words. I still prefer to assume as little as possible: pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitas.

[GuiA]

As a CEO, you live, breathe and sleep for the company. While the personal/professional division can be easily made for an employee far down on the org chart who does his job for 8 hours and then goes home, can the same be done for a top level executive, let alone the CEO?

[coldtea]

>As a CEO, you live, breathe and sleep for the company

You'd be surprised. That's just a myth we have, to justify crazy salaries.

In fact, there have been tons of CEOs with golden parachutes who could not give a flying duck for the company that hired them. Nokia's recent-ish management comes to mind.

[macu]

This sort of question, in fact the entire uproar, presumes that Brendan Eich is a hateful bigoted person with an agenda, or at least that he has some kind of dangerous impulse we should worry about. Do you think his stomach turns when he's around gay people? I don't believe it for a moment. If anything he probably just feels afraid that someone's going to attack him and accuse him of bigotry.

Homophobia and opposition to gay marriage are in my opinion completely different issues, even if they involve many of the same people. We can't automatically hold someone accountable for both.

[GuiA]

See my other comment in this thread that touches on this point: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7476046

I don't think that Brendan's stomach turns when he's around gay people or anything like that. However, I do believe that as the CEO of an entity (especially Mozilla), his beliefs will necessarily influence his actions; and that the particular beliefs highlighted by this action are at odds with Mozilla, thus making him ill-suited for a CEO role.

[macu]

I agree in general. So long as humans partake in decision-making, decisions will be made according to the minds involved.

I would worry about the possible impact of Brendan's personal beliefs if I thought that he truly has a heartfelt disdain for whole classes of people, but as far as I can tell, he doesn't.

The question of whether to support gay marriage doesn't always reduce to bigotry and homophobia. In Brendan's case, although no one seems to know, I think it comes down to a simple and specific commitment to a traditional idea of marriage, and it probably doesn't have the far-reaching implications that people assume.

Of course, his donation could have been motivated by complex ideologies. In that case, if we're going to hold people to such a high standard on the moral checklist, then I would worry more about the things that we don't know than the little glimpses we have into the inner lives of our leaders.

It's interesting to see where all this public discussion is going.

[aestra]

>traditional idea of marriage

Ok, I have a question. What exactly do these people think a traditional marriage is? Marriage is always and has always evolved with the times, culture, and societal norms and thinking. It wasn't until recently that we even married for love (love marriages) or selected our own spouse. Previously, marriages were more like a business transaction. A transfer of property from father to husband. It used to be that a woman's family paid a bride's dowry and we had the concept of bridewealth and coverture. In the UK, it wasn't until the Married Women's Property Act 1870 when a married woman was allowed to own property. Divorce was at a time uncommon, maybe even forbidden, now it is relatively common. Very few people are even going to blink an eye at a divorce. Even 20 years ago, people married much younger. Previously, a child born out of wedlock was called a bastard and avoided at all cost, and had different rights than their legitimate siblings, now close to 50% of births in the US are born to unwed mothers. The shotgun wedding is less common. Step families are common. Interracial marriage?? Illegal in parts of the US until Loving vs. Virgina. (1967!!) The court case came out of Mildred Loving and Richard Loving being sentenced to a year in jail for getting married. The original judge said in the verdict "Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix."

Even these traditions varied with culture, religion, time, and family. They continue to today. Arranged marriages are common and even the norm in some areas. Today.

There is no such thing as a traditional marriage. There never was.

[bane]

To be honest, most social conservatives would be shocked and mortified at a proposal to establish the forms of traditional biblical marriage that are actually in the bible.

But they will defend to the death the need to uphold the pagan Roman tradition.

[macu]

More to the point, Brendan's "traditional view of marriage" would be relative to whatever context he grew up in, and the traditions at the time. That's how I believe the term is meant in general.

[iSnow]

>Homophobia and opposition to gay marriage are in my opinion completely different issues

In the same way as Racism and support for Apartheid are completely orthogonal.

Come on...

[foolinaround]

I am not the OP, but you have a point, they are not completely orthogonal.

For instance, I do know many people who oppose gay marriage but are not homophobic.

[iSnow]

I doubt this. Opposing gay marriage makes you homophobic in my view like voting for Apartheid makes you a racist.

There is no "I have nothing against them but they should not have equal rights". If you opt not to support equal rights for any given group of people you believe their way of life is not as valid as yours.

[cookiecaper]

The difference being that "a way of life" refers to behavior, and race refers to an unchangeable physical characteristic that is constantly visible and constantly present. Even if we claim that homosexuality is an unchangeable inborn physical characteristic (which is highly dubious), there's not necessarily a mandate to allow (or, in the case of marriage, reward) the behaviors that those biological impulses promote. The case that we must allow a behavior simply because of a biological compulsion is a fallacious appeal to nature.

A person with sexual attraction to the same sex can restrain his behavior and not engage in sexual activity, despite his attraction. A person with a skin color cannot restrain his skin color, and cannot ever not "act on" his skin color, no matter what choices he makes. Homosexuality is not externally visible, but race is. It is not automatically shown at all times despite the behavior, wishes, or intention of the person, but race is. Someone who makes judgments based on willful sexual behaviors is fundamentally different from someone who makes judgments based on involuntarily hereditary attributes.

This is the difference that must be realized when we talk about racism as it compares to "homophobia". Homosexual behavior, and homosexual marriage, is a thing people choose to do, whatever biological or psychological forces may or may not be at work in the promotion of that behavior. This is completely different from visibly possessing certain levels of skin pigmentation.

"Homophobes" are not the same as racists. Whatever your opinion is, you must acknowledge that "homophobes" oppose a sexual behavior, whereas racists oppose the existence of a class of persons, no matter what choices they've made. Whether you think homosexuality is OK or not, there is a clear difference here.

Please acknowledge the failure of your analogy.

[lawl]

What do you expect from an answer from me on this? Obviously I'd say yes....

[GuiA]

I'm just trying to understand exactly where our reasoning diverges.

[techwatching]

The issues in my mind are the thought processes that lead him to hold his opinions. Those processes generated a prejudiced world view - one held strongly enough to affect behaviour to extend of spending money to bolster that prejudice.

Are those the thought processes you want in control of one of the world's most impactful technology companies?

[Tobu]

He's arguing for compartmentalisation[1]. This is how most religious people handle clashes between religious beliefs and the world: some topics are tagged for a religious worldview (whose defining feature is unassailable dogma), other topics aren't. In his case there's probably a jagged line that separates his professional duties to LGBT people in the tech community vs his political act against other LGBT people via Prop 8. People who are at the intersection (rarebit) threaten this world view, and the best he can do is handle them case by case[2] while trying very hard not to draw more general conclusions.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compartmentalization_(psycholo...

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

[badman_ting]

I agree, and I think that's all fine. I'm sure Brendan will be a great CEO, and I love the programming language he created (warts and all).

But I still think the reaction to rarebit pulling their app was problematic. Brendan can have his personal opinion, and rarebit can decide that they don't want to do business with the company whose CEO has that opinion. The "mixing personal opinions and business" crap is just that, crap. Everyone decides their limits, everyone decides who they are willing to do business with.