This post is to clarify Mozilla’s official support of equality and inclusion for LGBT people, and to outline a series of actions we are taking to reaffirm this position.
I read the whole post several times and did not find a single concrete action, let alone a series. On the other hand, I am aware of one concrete action undertaken by Brendan Eich that is directly counter to all the feel-good rhetoric spouted off by this post.
If the best candidate for the head leadership role of your company is a divisive figure because of documented bigotry, then the entire board has failed the rest of the company.
That's because there is no need for concrete actions. Mozilla as a foundation/corporation never discriminated anyone, and they already have guidelines that promote equality.
And then there's the part where they made someone who is absolutely, positively against the concept of gay people having the same rights as everybody else the figurehead of the organization.
I'm not saying that was a right move - But this is Brendan private view on the matter, which don't reflect the view of Mozilla, as stated by that post (and their guidelines). And Brendan already said that his private views won't get in the way of the views of Mozilla.
I understand that some people want Brendan to step down from his position (and I'm going to guess he probably will soon-ish), but he was elected because he was considered the right guy for the job, and I don't see Mozilla firing him anytime soon, at least without giving him a chance.
I'm saying that, while that might fly as CTO or any other role of the organization, CEO is a role analagous to President. The personal views of the chief executive very much influence the entire organization, and therefore it should not be surprising that their personal life becomes part of their professional one.
Considering Gay Marriage and Programming are about as far away as 2 issues can get, I really doubt it will be a problem.
They don't want to alienate anyone against gay marriage or anyone gay. Since this isn't possible because of how sensitive everyone is, they just chose the best person for the job.
Note the the Mozilla Corporation is controlled by the Mozilla Foundation. So the position of CEO of Mozilla is in fact under that of the chairperson of the foundation. If something is analogous to "president", it would be the latter one (held by Mitchell Baker), not the CEO.
For example, at Mozilla-wide gatherings (e.g the summit that happened last fall) the CEO of the Mozilla Corporation is the one who typically gives some sort of talk about general strategy, market positioning, product plans, but Mitchell Baker is the one who gives a talk on overarching organizational goals: things like what Mozilla stands for and which issues Mozilla should be trying to address as an organization.
And so it is in day-to-day operation. Mitchell sets the "moral tone" much more than the CEO does; the CEO's largely involved with executing the Corporation's strategy.
There is no real analogy to the US or other national government I know of here; the organizational setups are very different. I've been trying to think of something that would be somewhat similar, and so far all I've got is Moses and Aaron in the Book of Exodus, with Mitchell as Moses and the CEO as Aaron. Not a perfect analogy, but way closer than anything involving a President.
If both Senate and House pass a bill on gay marriage with absolute majority (say overwhelmingly over 80%), a President who chooses to veto such bill is to seek political suicide. Congress can then veto the President's veto.
If Brendan Eich today discriminate gay employees or volunteers he will be under a public crisis and he will lose his hard work.
Please put down the worry. If you keep on worrying, you will never stop. Anyone who disagree should be ready to answer questions like "what if he's against abortion? against H1B visa? against tax payer money to pay for college tuition, whether people should live with free software only or not?".
You will never be able to find anyone who will agree with you on everything.
> If Brendan Eich today discriminate gay employees or volunteers he will be under a public crisis and he will lose his hard work.
The reason why he is receiving so much criticism right now is that a lot of people don't think the date of the donation makes any difference. He should not be CEO of an "inclusive" organization.
Here we are telling you to ignore his personal opinion. He is not going to commit a career scucide. If a President wants to get re-elected he will not veto on a bill that is overwhelmingly supported. If most Mozillians believe in marriage equality then Eich will not oppress the majority opinion and discriminate the gays as CEO. He can continue to do so as a citizen of US and as a resident of California.
> He should not be CEO of an "inclusive" organization.
You will get never that inclusiveness. Never. I am sure among the gays there are people who are pro-life over pro-choice and thus "discriminate" those who believe they have the right to freely choose what to do with their fetus.
Supposed Eich is pro-gay but pro-life. Now he will be seen as non-inclusive by the pro-choice community.
You are looking for someone who share the same view as you and those agree with you. What about those who disagree with you?
> Here we are telling you to ignore his personal opinion.
I don't know how to argue with that. You seem to think I'm the lone person who disagrees that his "opinion" is irrelevant, and that is demonstrably false.
Are you telling me that you have never ever put some of your belief to yourself in favor of some other majority belief which you don't agree with personally?
If Mozilla was working to develop marriage laws, this would be totally relevant. But they aren't.
I believe in marriage equality. I think Brendan's support of Prop 8 shows a stunning error of belief, and if he were being given a position of power over marriage laws, I would be part of the picket line against his appointment.
But I do not require that all people in the world share my opinions on all subjects. Holding differing opinions, even those that offend me, and acting in support of those opinions, is not a crime. If he uses his position at Mozilla to oppress, then we should fight that. But he's stated that is not his intention: in much the same way that I respect his right to hold an opinion, he has stated he intends to respect Mozilla's commitment to equality.
I'm not sure what that part of the blogpost refers to, but one relevant act is mentioning and re-affirming the Mozilla code of conduct, as done here, which guarantees fair treatment for everyone.
I know some will be skeptical about this, and that words alone will not change anything. I can only ask for your support to have the time to “show, not tell”; and in the meantime express my sorrow at having caused pain.
Since link aggregators exist, and most discussion of blog posts occurs on them, the only thing adding commenting to your own blog does is invite people to hijack your blog as their own soapbox, reusing the blog's audience as their own.
You can run an "open" nonprofit, and still not want people handing out pamphlets on your front lawn.
The first paragraph makes it sound like Eich's appointment as CEO stirred some controversy around LGBT inclusion. Did I miss something? I haven't seen anything about this yet. Barring some event like this, I think it's stupid for Mozilla to make a politically charged statement just for the heck of it.
While I do support LGBT people, I fail to see how my browser's CEO should take a stance on this. You may call me short sighted if you want, but I fail to see how caring about the employee's personal values have anything to do with Mozilla's products.
There are plenty other fields where personal values can be reflected on your work, but Mozilla? I can't even find sarcasm on how they could make a prejudice.
I know that people called him out on twitter, but this whole story is going nowhere.
To be honest, I suspect Brendan Eich probably has some pretty fucking stupid opinions about homosexuality. But what does that have to do with software? And shouldn't he have the right to hold those opinions, offensive as they may be, without worrying about their effect on his career?
On one hand, corporate "position statements" (which declare opinions like cells declare osmotic pressure) like this are pretty sickening. On the other hand, I think it's a bit silly that the tech community has required Mozilla to make this one.
he has the right, but his job is to foster cooperation and in many cases to have people work for him and if the community doesn't accept his leadership, that pretty much means any period of time that he's in charge is a waste of time at best and a regression at worst.
Opinion, yes, but that is not what this is. We know with absolute certainty that he donated a non-trivial amount of money to block gay marriage legislation in California. That is an action solely intended to deprive a people of the rights granted to everyone else, not merely an opinion.
$100k is a pretty trivial amount of money to anyone whose career made them a billionaire.
The amount, as a donation to deprive people of the rights that others have, is non-trivial to me, although it may very well be trivial to many others. Now that is an opinion.
So we're in agreement that it was a trivial amount of money. Materially maybe it could have helped make ~60 protesting signs? Will you edit your original comment to cut the non-trivial bit?
I'm wondering what amount is trivial to you as a "donation to deprive people of the rights that others have"? My prediction: 3d9bfbc7789889002dc71f36cdce8af8fa93be7edb1ef6561c10181cc9c4e7a4
> And shouldn't he have the right to hold those opinions, offensive as they may be, without worrying about their effect on his career?
Since you are bringing this to the table, let's turn the question around: Should he? Why? I agree that he should have the right to hold an opinion, but what earns him the right not to have his public exhibition of it affect his career?
If public outrage becomes so effective at creating a policy to not hire people with certain opinions, and to purge people who are discovered to hold certain opinions, indeed purging people from entire professional fields to which they may have devoted significant portions of their lives mastering, then we are condemning those people to a kind of economic death. This is only marginally better than actually condemning them to death (which doesn't seem beyond some of the "die x-scum die" types).
You're esentially asking why he shouldn't be publically bullied out of a position in which he's the most qualified because of his (assumed) belief that marriage can only be between a man and a woman (a belief that the majority Californians who voted in 2008 also held.)
I don't agree with that belief, but the comments here and around the web have been absolutely disgusting: comparing him to the KKK and the Nazis, claiming he hates gays, calling him a bigot, etc.
More likely, his belief stems from ignorance instead of hate or bigotry. Why shouldn't the public exhibition of his opinion affect his career? Because people should be taking the moral high ground and empathize in a way that Eich obviously didn't when he made that donation.
Perhaps, instead of shitposting on HN or parading around Twitter about his (assumed) opinions when people haven't actually met Eich, they should reach out and offer their perspective by sending him a personal e-mail detailing how his actions have harmed people. He might even see it your way and change his deeply held belief.
> You're esentially asking why he shouldn't be publically bullied
Read again. I am asking why his public opinion shouldn't affect his career.
> Because people should be taking the moral high ground and empathize in a way that Eich obviously didn't when he made that donation.
As far as I'm concerned his position affords him wealth and political influence in the organization, so his opinions, especially when they are not in line with those of the organization he represents, reasonably will affect his career, as much as they will affect the public opinion on Mozilla. Empathizing with him and calling for his resignation are not mutually exclusive.
> which declare opinions like cells declare osmotic pressure
I got a good laugh out of this, well put!
Brendan Eich has the right to hold those opinions and whatever other opinions he wishes to hold. He has the right to publicly express them in the form of spoken or written words, campaign donations, or any other number of legal rights guaranteed by the first amendment. Here's some rights he does not have:
1) The right to unconditional employment, or a constitutional right to be the CEO of Mozilla.
2) The right to freedom from criticism of his beliefs.
3) The right to freedom from social consequences of his beliefs.
Remember that criticism is not censorship, those are different things entirely and when they are conflated it's almost always to protect people with those aforementioned pretty fucking stupid opinions. His opinions about homosexuality are offensive and disappointing to a lot of people. Why shouldn't they be able to express that to Mozilla? And if Mozilla feels like enough people are upset with their decision, they have the right to respond to market demands.
Let's veer wildly into strawman territory here. Let's say that instead of Brendan Eich, let's say Mozilla found some other extremely talented technologist to take the reins, but they were coincidentally an active, avowed white supremacist. Would you still think he has the right to hold those opinions without worrying about their effect on his career? What if he believed that non-Muslims should be put to the sword, or that women should be the property of their husbands, or any number of other horrible, backwards beliefs. Still cool with him as the CEO of Mozilla? If not, then we're really just disagreeing over how horrible someone's opinions have to be before they disqualify them from the position as the head of the CEO of a company that prides itself on inclusiveness and equality.
Would you describe someone who made a single monetary donation to a white supremacist cause 6 years ago and didn't say anything about it to anyone at the time, such that it took 4 years to discover the donation had even been made, an "active, avowed white supremacist"?
I'm not saying there are easy answers here, but I think that your hypothetical assumes someone who lets their horrible backwards beliefs affect their professional actions.
So let's consider the counterfactual that more closely models the current situation: someone who made a single donation to a white supremacist cause 6 years ago, has not publicly expressed any white supremacist views other than making the donation, routinely works with non-white colleagues in a reasonable way, and supports workplace involvement in Black History Month activities is appointed CEO. What should happen? I want to say I'd be OK with this, but it's hard to predict visceral reactions ahead of time. :(
As another interesting counterfactual, say that instead of donating to a white supremacy organization they donated to Nation of Islam. Otherwise, assume it's all the same: works fine with Jews and whites, doesn't speak out on race/religion issues in day-to-day interactions. I want to say I'd be OK with this too, though personally I'd have more skin in the game here than in the other cases, and I suspect people would generally be more OK with this situation than with the person who donated to a white supremacist cause...
(As an aside, would you consider Nation of Islam as an organization that believes "non-Muslims should be put to the sword"?)
Edit: I think at the heart of the issue is that people have a really hard time accepting that someone might make such a donation but be OK working with the sort of people the organization they donated to is against. I know _I_ have a hard time imagining anyone who donates to a "women should be the property of their husbands" organization interacting well with women in a workplace environment. It doesn't help that I don't know any people who would make such a donation, leaving me guessing at the reasons why one would, and Occam's Razor would say be that they hold deep-rooted beliefs about women being inferior. I've tried to come up with some other reasons someone might make such a donation while being OK working with women, but they all seem contrived to me. If faced with an actual example of a person who made such a donation but works well with women, I would be _very_ interested in talking to them to find out where they're coming from.
As a result, people are operating from assumptions which don't actually match reality as well as they should in this case. Your counterfactual of an "active, avowed white supremacist" more closely models how people are perceiving this situation, based on their knowledge about the donation only, and no knowledge about Brendan's day-to-day interactions with LGBTQ colleagues, than do my counterfactuals. But mine more closely model what's really going on...
I have to admit that this whole episode had given a small doubt on if my company can have an inclusive environment.
I have very conservative religious and political views - but I recognize that people have good and amazing attributes regardless of my opinion on their personal lives.
I enjoy being working (and friendships) with diverse people who challenge my beliefs, and who I can help in meaningful ways despite our differences.
My pause comes from my wondering if the company develops a significant group of people who won't let my own personal beliefs remain separate from the work environment.
I'll hopefully forget this sad episode in a few short weeks, so I doubt anything will change in my heart for the worse.
Having personal beliefs is fine. Taking away the freedom of others is not. You don't have to back proposition 8 to believe homosexuality is immoral, just like you don't have to outlaw pork in order to keep kosher.
Telling someone that they can hold views that differ from yours as long as they never show those views or act in support of them seems like one of the very arguments that the equal rights movements are fighting against.
Mr. Eich and others are completely free to act according their views on homosexuality, vis a vis their own sexual activities and the way they may choose to raise their families. Restricting the freedom of others is where their freedom to act ends.
That is pretty dramatically false. He has the same freedoms you have: to participate in the political process, to express his views, and to obey the laws. He didn't go out and beat up people who he dislikes, he donated money to a political cause that you and I disagree with.
Furthermore, while 95% of us on HN (including me) support gay marriage, the fact is that over half the population of California had the same opinion as Eich, back in 2008.
He supported a very mainstream position. Even if it is not mainstream on HN or in silicon valley or on tech news sites, it is mainstream when you look a little outside.
I oppose that position as I said above, but because it is held by about half of the population, we can't just refuse to work with anyone holding that position.
>over half the population of California had the same opinion as Eich, back in 2008.
Well, over half of the population that voted had the same opinion. Voter turnout was around 60%, iirc.
Additionally, even if 60% of people held the same views, it's still possible to choose not to work for them.
Some political views are unacceptable. If you think that the government should prevent people of different ethnicities from getting married, I don't want to work with you. If you don't think the matter at hand falls in the same bucket, I don't want to work with you.
We're not talking about disagreeing on tax policy here.
I accept that some some political views are unacceptable to you.
Do you do background checks on people you might work with to see whether they hold such views? Or do you just avoid working with people about whom you found out by accident that they hold such views?
That is, are you actively making sure that none of the people around you hold the views you find unacceptable, or is it more of a don't ask don't tell kind of policy, where you don't care if people have unacceptable views as long as they don't mention them in your hearing?
Are you saying you consider the political views of almost all Republicans "unacceptable", and you wouldn't work in the same place as them?
Because - sadly, because I agree with you that they are wrong - over half of California opposed gay marriage in 2008 (and while things have improved somewhat, they remain far from where they should be).
They are wrong, but their position is a mainstream one. I'm not sure refusing to work with them is practical. (It might be in a small company, especially in ideologically uniform regions like the bay area, but not in general.)
I'm a trained nuclear physicist, and a biblical literalist.
You're probably a talented, hard-working, good person. I wish you no ill. In fact, all else equal, I'd prefer you to lead a happy, successful life.
But I'm as likely to hire you as I am to hire a believer in alien abductions. Such beliefs are evidence of a person's thought patterns and general mental stability. Even if otherwise competent, hiring would be risky. If ever "social fit" were an excuse not to hire, this would qualify.
I'm sorry if that sounds bigoted or close-minded, but beliefs affect behavior. This is true no matter how much one tries to keep quiet at work.
Edit: I realize this is religious discrimination, which is illegal in the US. Obviously I would never tell the person the true reason for not hiring. To those who think this is abhorrent: Would you hire a Scientologist? How about a member of the Westboro Baptist Church? We all draw a line somewhere.
I'm an atheist (like I assume you are), but what you just described is straightforward religious discrimination, which is illegal in the US and many other places, for good reason.
We do? I certainly hope we don't. Discrimination is wrong regardless of whether its on beliefs or attributes. Maybe you meant another word than "discrimination" here, or I am misunderstanding you somehow?
I'll give an example of what I mean by discrimination: If someone is a 9/11 conspiracy theorist, you probably don't want to hang out with them. You might avoid talking to them. If said conspiracy theorist ran a donut shop, maybe you'd go so far as to walk another block to buy donuts. That's the sort of discrimination I'm talking about: simply avoiding interaction with someone.
What if they're a 9/11 conspiracy theorist who doesn't ever mention their conspiracy theory unless you explicitly ask them what they think happened on 9/11?
You seem to think that people who have deeply held beliefs spend all their time trying to foist those beliefs on others around them. That's true in some cases, not in others.
If a person says they believe something but it never affects their actions, is it really a belief? It would probably be closer to a belief in belief (http://lesswrong.com/lw/i4/belief_in_belief/).
I'd probably buy donuts from your hypothetical closeted 9/11 conspiracy theorist. There's certainly a selection effect, but I think such people are extremely rare. I hardly ever ask people what their beliefs are, but they tell them to me anyway. Of course, I'm no different.
People are typically much more passionate about their unusual beliefs. Every young-earth creationist I know of, I've found out about their belief within an hour of meeting them. I've never had a friend, acquaintance, or coworker who I discovered to be a biblical literalist only after several months of interactions. These beliefs are so important to these people that they simply can't avoid expressing them.
Likewise, they have a hard time avoiding the secondary beliefs stemming from their conviction. It's eerie how similar their opinions are on gay marriage, women's rights, obscenity laws, circumcision, and teaching evolution in schools. I have no qualms avoiding interactions with these people.
A side note: I'm glad this article was buried. The replies to my comments have been quite civil and well-reasoned, but most of the other discussion in this thread has been unproductive to say the least.
I'm more interested in the case of people whose beliefs don't affect their actions in a professional capacity, as opposed to people whose beliefs never affect their actions. I agree people who have strong beliefs but are able to set them aside to some extent in part of their life are rare. They do exist, though.
As a case in point, from my personal interactions with Brendan, I can assure you that he is not the sort of person who will tell you all about his thoughts on gay marriage within an hour of meeting him. In fact, I don't know what those thoughts are (short of trying to guess based on the donation thing), and I've known him for years. Mitchell Baker has known him for even longer, and worked with him more closely, but see the next to last paragraph of https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2014/03/26/building-a-global...
Ok, that's not what I think is generally meant by "discrimination". "Discrimination" is usually taken to mean what you earlier said: that you wouldn't hire someone to work for you if they were a biblical literalist. That is illegal, and should be.
Employment has some amount of state regulation - you can't not hire someone because of their religion or the color of their skin. It isn't fair for people of a certain religion or ethnic group to not be hire-able, and beyond that it is also just impractical in a country like the US. If no one hired anyone but their own ethnic group and religion, the economy would be completely stagnant, because the US is so diverse.
You make it sound like people are born with a religion, which can never be changed. Discriminating based on immutable characteristics such as ethnicity, sexual preference, or gender is wrong and I'm glad many such forms of discrimination are prohibited.
But beliefs can and do change. Moreover, beliefs are the reasons why people do what they do. Choosing to avoid interacting with people who express certain beliefs seems totally fine.
I doubt the economy would suffer much if religious discrimination were allowed. First, it already happens (especially against atheists). Second, most people (including myself) are willing to overlook the vast majority of differences in beliefs. There's only a fringe who end up with slightly lower wages.
I knew my opinion was controversial, but I didn't expect this reaction from people. I guess I stumbled onto something you can't say.[1]
I didn't say a person's religion can't change? Obviously people change religion all the time. But that is not the reason why discriminating based on religion is wrong.
Again, the first reason is moral. Imagine if catholic people were the majority in some area, and on average wealthy, and wouldn't hire muslims which in that area were a poorer minority. That's just not fair - why shouldn't all people in that region have the same employment opportunities?
The second reason is practicality. There are so many religions and ethnic groups in the US, everyone has to work with everyone else. Otherwise we are losing out on a huge amount of economic potential. Let the best people work at the best jobs, even if their religion doesn't happen to match their employer's. It's a job, not a place of worship.
Also, I never said you can't say what you said. Only that I and the law disagree with you, on this topic. But I wouldn't hold what you said against you - not employment-wise (I would still potentially hire you) and not in any other way actually (if we met in person, we'd probably get along just fine). Disagreement doesn't need to be the end of the world.
How is this argument different from the arguments of people who want to draw the line at hiring transgendered people or hiring women or hiring people who are over 6 feet tall? The only material legal difference, as far as I can tell (IANAL) is in whether you are discriminating against a protected class or not, and what constitutes a protected class seems to be largely a political decision. And religious affiliation is definitely explicitly protected.
These are, of course hard issues. It's _hard_ for all of us to not discriminate against people based on our prejudices. For you it seems to be hard to not discriminate against Scientologists. The right moral response is to realize your prejudices and fight them. The laws actually make that a bit easier in some ways (e.g. it's illegal for you to ask prospective job candidates whether they're Scientologists).
Whether it's a social fit problem depends on two things. The first is whether the person's private beliefs affect their workplace behavior. Obviously in some cases they do and in others they don't. People are pretty good at compartmentalizing.
The second social fit problem is whether the person's co-workers are so outraged by the fact of the beliefs existing (or the person's gender being "wrong" or their hair being red, or whatever these people happen to have personal hangups about) that it affects _their_ behavior. This is pretty common, obviously, and the fault in such cases lies in the co-workers not the hire. There may still not be a good "social fit" as a result, but this situation is cause to look long and hard at the "society" that's not being fit into...
I would like you to also consider a concrete example. You say you won't hire a believer in alien abductions. Would you hire a "tin-foil-hat" type who believes the NSA is spying on everyone? Would you have hired such a person two years ago, or would you have considered them paranoids whose "thought patterns and general mental stability" would preclude a good "social fit"? Clearly your priors have updated since 2 years ago, but it's always worth evaluating whether your priors might be wrong and whether a reasonable person might come up with different priors.
While it might be incompatible with an action he once took, (1) that was many years ago, and (2) on the other hand in this statement and on his personal blog he voiced support for inclusiveness and fair treatment of everyone, and to follow that up with actions.
Excuse me, but is this a settled issue? One opinion is OK, a different one deserves being ostracized, losing one's job? When did this happen? I don't think I got the memo.
I am so bored of seeing this over and over again. There is absolutely no ties between someones professional and personal life. As is, between a foundation/corporation and the views of any of their employees - yes this includes chairman. Give it a rest for crying out loud.
The Mozilla Foundation (and Corporation) are in a difficult position here, because they are being blamed for someone else doing something unethical, but it would also be unethical for them to do (or have done) anything differently in response to it.
Brendan Eich's behaviour in 2008 in trying to take the choice away from couples to marry just because they happen not to be straight is a despicable step to interfere with the rights of others. His apology this month (https://brendaneich.com/2014/03/inclusiveness-at-mozilla/) didn't express regret for making the donation, only for "having caused pain"; nothing in the apology suggests that he has actually changed his views. It fits the classic pattern of an apology for how other people reacted to what he did, rather than for what he did.
As abhorrent as I find his personal actions, it would not be appropriate for Mozilla to take political activities into account when making employment decisions, such as about promotions or dismissals. If employers could fire people for their political views or activities outside of work, it would be a net loss to our civil and human rights, even if in some cases such laws shield advocates for stripping away freedom and non-discriminatory treatment under the law.
The Mozilla Foundation has acted entirely fairly and appropriately here, and it is not fair to blame Mozilla for the actions of Brendan Eich or for not discriminating against him on the basis of his political beliefs.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 101 ms ] threadI read the whole post several times and did not find a single concrete action, let alone a series. On the other hand, I am aware of one concrete action undertaken by Brendan Eich that is directly counter to all the feel-good rhetoric spouted off by this post.
I understand that some people want Brendan to step down from his position (and I'm going to guess he probably will soon-ish), but he was elected because he was considered the right guy for the job, and I don't see Mozilla firing him anytime soon, at least without giving him a chance.
They don't want to alienate anyone against gay marriage or anyone gay. Since this isn't possible because of how sensitive everyone is, they just chose the best person for the job.
For example, at Mozilla-wide gatherings (e.g the summit that happened last fall) the CEO of the Mozilla Corporation is the one who typically gives some sort of talk about general strategy, market positioning, product plans, but Mitchell Baker is the one who gives a talk on overarching organizational goals: things like what Mozilla stands for and which issues Mozilla should be trying to address as an organization.
And so it is in day-to-day operation. Mitchell sets the "moral tone" much more than the CEO does; the CEO's largely involved with executing the Corporation's strategy.
There is no real analogy to the US or other national government I know of here; the organizational setups are very different. I've been trying to think of something that would be somewhat similar, and so far all I've got is Moses and Aaron in the Book of Exodus, with Mitchell as Moses and the CEO as Aaron. Not a perfect analogy, but way closer than anything involving a President.
If both Senate and House pass a bill on gay marriage with absolute majority (say overwhelmingly over 80%), a President who chooses to veto such bill is to seek political suicide. Congress can then veto the President's veto.
If Brendan Eich today discriminate gay employees or volunteers he will be under a public crisis and he will lose his hard work.
Please put down the worry. If you keep on worrying, you will never stop. Anyone who disagree should be ready to answer questions like "what if he's against abortion? against H1B visa? against tax payer money to pay for college tuition, whether people should live with free software only or not?".
You will never be able to find anyone who will agree with you on everything.
The reason why he is receiving so much criticism right now is that a lot of people don't think the date of the donation makes any difference. He should not be CEO of an "inclusive" organization.
Here we are telling you to ignore his personal opinion. He is not going to commit a career scucide. If a President wants to get re-elected he will not veto on a bill that is overwhelmingly supported. If most Mozillians believe in marriage equality then Eich will not oppress the majority opinion and discriminate the gays as CEO. He can continue to do so as a citizen of US and as a resident of California.
> He should not be CEO of an "inclusive" organization.
You will get never that inclusiveness. Never. I am sure among the gays there are people who are pro-life over pro-choice and thus "discriminate" those who believe they have the right to freely choose what to do with their fetus.
Supposed Eich is pro-gay but pro-life. Now he will be seen as non-inclusive by the pro-choice community.
You are looking for someone who share the same view as you and those agree with you. What about those who disagree with you?
> Here we are telling you to ignore his personal opinion.
I don't know how to argue with that. You seem to think I'm the lone person who disagrees that his "opinion" is irrelevant, and that is demonstrably false.
I believe in marriage equality. I think Brendan's support of Prop 8 shows a stunning error of belief, and if he were being given a position of power over marriage laws, I would be part of the picket line against his appointment.
But I do not require that all people in the world share my opinions on all subjects. Holding differing opinions, even those that offend me, and acting in support of those opinions, is not a crime. If he uses his position at Mozilla to oppress, then we should fight that. But he's stated that is not his intention: in much the same way that I respect his right to hold an opinion, he has stated he intends to respect Mozilla's commitment to equality.
Another relevant act is
http://lukasblakk.com/ascend-project-kickoff/
a hacker school-type thing for LGBT and other underrepresented minorities in tech.
I know some will be skeptical about this, and that words alone will not change anything. I can only ask for your support to have the time to “show, not tell”; and in the meantime express my sorrow at having caused pain.
Since link aggregators exist, and most discussion of blog posts occurs on them, the only thing adding commenting to your own blog does is invite people to hijack your blog as their own soapbox, reusing the blog's audience as their own.
You can run an "open" nonprofit, and still not want people handing out pamphlets on your front lawn.
edit: shortened since the parent deleted the comment i was replying to
Not sure why I'm getting downvoted for asking for more information, but such is HN I guess.
Those are probably the "big" two threads about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7459529 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7475627
For more, you can just search his name on hn.angoia.com and sort by date: https://hn.algolia.com/?q=brendan#!/story/sort_by_date/0/bre...
There are plenty other fields where personal values can be reflected on your work, but Mozilla? I can't even find sarcasm on how they could make a prejudice.
I know that people called him out on twitter, but this whole story is going nowhere.
On one hand, corporate "position statements" (which declare opinions like cells declare osmotic pressure) like this are pretty sickening. On the other hand, I think it's a bit silly that the tech community has required Mozilla to make this one.
The amount, as a donation to deprive people of the rights that others have, is non-trivial to me, although it may very well be trivial to many others. Now that is an opinion.
I'm wondering what amount is trivial to you as a "donation to deprive people of the rights that others have"? My prediction: 3d9bfbc7789889002dc71f36cdce8af8fa93be7edb1ef6561c10181cc9c4e7a4
Since you are bringing this to the table, let's turn the question around: Should he? Why? I agree that he should have the right to hold an opinion, but what earns him the right not to have his public exhibition of it affect his career?
I don't agree with that belief, but the comments here and around the web have been absolutely disgusting: comparing him to the KKK and the Nazis, claiming he hates gays, calling him a bigot, etc.
More likely, his belief stems from ignorance instead of hate or bigotry. Why shouldn't the public exhibition of his opinion affect his career? Because people should be taking the moral high ground and empathize in a way that Eich obviously didn't when he made that donation.
Perhaps, instead of shitposting on HN or parading around Twitter about his (assumed) opinions when people haven't actually met Eich, they should reach out and offer their perspective by sending him a personal e-mail detailing how his actions have harmed people. He might even see it your way and change his deeply held belief.
Read again. I am asking why his public opinion shouldn't affect his career.
> Because people should be taking the moral high ground and empathize in a way that Eich obviously didn't when he made that donation.
As far as I'm concerned his position affords him wealth and political influence in the organization, so his opinions, especially when they are not in line with those of the organization he represents, reasonably will affect his career, as much as they will affect the public opinion on Mozilla. Empathizing with him and calling for his resignation are not mutually exclusive.
I got a good laugh out of this, well put!
Brendan Eich has the right to hold those opinions and whatever other opinions he wishes to hold. He has the right to publicly express them in the form of spoken or written words, campaign donations, or any other number of legal rights guaranteed by the first amendment. Here's some rights he does not have: 1) The right to unconditional employment, or a constitutional right to be the CEO of Mozilla. 2) The right to freedom from criticism of his beliefs. 3) The right to freedom from social consequences of his beliefs.
Remember that criticism is not censorship, those are different things entirely and when they are conflated it's almost always to protect people with those aforementioned pretty fucking stupid opinions. His opinions about homosexuality are offensive and disappointing to a lot of people. Why shouldn't they be able to express that to Mozilla? And if Mozilla feels like enough people are upset with their decision, they have the right to respond to market demands.
Let's veer wildly into strawman territory here. Let's say that instead of Brendan Eich, let's say Mozilla found some other extremely talented technologist to take the reins, but they were coincidentally an active, avowed white supremacist. Would you still think he has the right to hold those opinions without worrying about their effect on his career? What if he believed that non-Muslims should be put to the sword, or that women should be the property of their husbands, or any number of other horrible, backwards beliefs. Still cool with him as the CEO of Mozilla? If not, then we're really just disagreeing over how horrible someone's opinions have to be before they disqualify them from the position as the head of the CEO of a company that prides itself on inclusiveness and equality.
I'm not saying there are easy answers here, but I think that your hypothetical assumes someone who lets their horrible backwards beliefs affect their professional actions.
So let's consider the counterfactual that more closely models the current situation: someone who made a single donation to a white supremacist cause 6 years ago, has not publicly expressed any white supremacist views other than making the donation, routinely works with non-white colleagues in a reasonable way, and supports workplace involvement in Black History Month activities is appointed CEO. What should happen? I want to say I'd be OK with this, but it's hard to predict visceral reactions ahead of time. :(
As another interesting counterfactual, say that instead of donating to a white supremacy organization they donated to Nation of Islam. Otherwise, assume it's all the same: works fine with Jews and whites, doesn't speak out on race/religion issues in day-to-day interactions. I want to say I'd be OK with this too, though personally I'd have more skin in the game here than in the other cases, and I suspect people would generally be more OK with this situation than with the person who donated to a white supremacist cause...
(As an aside, would you consider Nation of Islam as an organization that believes "non-Muslims should be put to the sword"?)
Edit: I think at the heart of the issue is that people have a really hard time accepting that someone might make such a donation but be OK working with the sort of people the organization they donated to is against. I know _I_ have a hard time imagining anyone who donates to a "women should be the property of their husbands" organization interacting well with women in a workplace environment. It doesn't help that I don't know any people who would make such a donation, leaving me guessing at the reasons why one would, and Occam's Razor would say be that they hold deep-rooted beliefs about women being inferior. I've tried to come up with some other reasons someone might make such a donation while being OK working with women, but they all seem contrived to me. If faced with an actual example of a person who made such a donation but works well with women, I would be _very_ interested in talking to them to find out where they're coming from.
As a result, people are operating from assumptions which don't actually match reality as well as they should in this case. Your counterfactual of an "active, avowed white supremacist" more closely models how people are perceiving this situation, based on their knowledge about the donation only, and no knowledge about Brendan's day-to-day interactions with LGBTQ colleagues, than do my counterfactuals. But mine more closely model what's really going on...
I have very conservative religious and political views - but I recognize that people have good and amazing attributes regardless of my opinion on their personal lives.
I enjoy being working (and friendships) with diverse people who challenge my beliefs, and who I can help in meaningful ways despite our differences.
My pause comes from my wondering if the company develops a significant group of people who won't let my own personal beliefs remain separate from the work environment.
I'll hopefully forget this sad episode in a few short weeks, so I doubt anything will change in my heart for the worse.
He supported a very mainstream position. Even if it is not mainstream on HN or in silicon valley or on tech news sites, it is mainstream when you look a little outside.
I oppose that position as I said above, but because it is held by about half of the population, we can't just refuse to work with anyone holding that position.
Well, over half of the population that voted had the same opinion. Voter turnout was around 60%, iirc. Additionally, even if 60% of people held the same views, it's still possible to choose not to work for them.
We're not talking about disagreeing on tax policy here.
Do you do background checks on people you might work with to see whether they hold such views? Or do you just avoid working with people about whom you found out by accident that they hold such views?
That is, are you actively making sure that none of the people around you hold the views you find unacceptable, or is it more of a don't ask don't tell kind of policy, where you don't care if people have unacceptable views as long as they don't mention them in your hearing?
Because - sadly, because I agree with you that they are wrong - over half of California opposed gay marriage in 2008 (and while things have improved somewhat, they remain far from where they should be).
They are wrong, but their position is a mainstream one. I'm not sure refusing to work with them is practical. (It might be in a small company, especially in ideologically uniform regions like the bay area, but not in general.)
I'm a trained nuclear physicist, and a biblical literalist.
You're probably a talented, hard-working, good person. I wish you no ill. In fact, all else equal, I'd prefer you to lead a happy, successful life.
But I'm as likely to hire you as I am to hire a believer in alien abductions. Such beliefs are evidence of a person's thought patterns and general mental stability. Even if otherwise competent, hiring would be risky. If ever "social fit" were an excuse not to hire, this would qualify.
I'm sorry if that sounds bigoted or close-minded, but beliefs affect behavior. This is true no matter how much one tries to keep quiet at work.
Edit: I realize this is religious discrimination, which is illegal in the US. Obviously I would never tell the person the true reason for not hiring. To those who think this is abhorrent: Would you hire a Scientologist? How about a member of the Westboro Baptist Church? We all draw a line somewhere.
I'm fine with my own anti-religious views being cause for not hiring me. (In fact, it's perfectly legal for employers to do so today.)
We do? I certainly hope we don't. Discrimination is wrong regardless of whether its on beliefs or attributes. Maybe you meant another word than "discrimination" here, or I am misunderstanding you somehow?
You seem to think that people who have deeply held beliefs spend all their time trying to foist those beliefs on others around them. That's true in some cases, not in others.
I'd probably buy donuts from your hypothetical closeted 9/11 conspiracy theorist. There's certainly a selection effect, but I think such people are extremely rare. I hardly ever ask people what their beliefs are, but they tell them to me anyway. Of course, I'm no different.
People are typically much more passionate about their unusual beliefs. Every young-earth creationist I know of, I've found out about their belief within an hour of meeting them. I've never had a friend, acquaintance, or coworker who I discovered to be a biblical literalist only after several months of interactions. These beliefs are so important to these people that they simply can't avoid expressing them.
Likewise, they have a hard time avoiding the secondary beliefs stemming from their conviction. It's eerie how similar their opinions are on gay marriage, women's rights, obscenity laws, circumcision, and teaching evolution in schools. I have no qualms avoiding interactions with these people.
A side note: I'm glad this article was buried. The replies to my comments have been quite civil and well-reasoned, but most of the other discussion in this thread has been unproductive to say the least.
As a case in point, from my personal interactions with Brendan, I can assure you that he is not the sort of person who will tell you all about his thoughts on gay marriage within an hour of meeting him. In fact, I don't know what those thoughts are (short of trying to guess based on the donation thing), and I've known him for years. Mitchell Baker has known him for even longer, and worked with him more closely, but see the next to last paragraph of https://blog.lizardwrangler.com/2014/03/26/building-a-global...
Employment has some amount of state regulation - you can't not hire someone because of their religion or the color of their skin. It isn't fair for people of a certain religion or ethnic group to not be hire-able, and beyond that it is also just impractical in a country like the US. If no one hired anyone but their own ethnic group and religion, the economy would be completely stagnant, because the US is so diverse.
But beliefs can and do change. Moreover, beliefs are the reasons why people do what they do. Choosing to avoid interacting with people who express certain beliefs seems totally fine.
I doubt the economy would suffer much if religious discrimination were allowed. First, it already happens (especially against atheists). Second, most people (including myself) are willing to overlook the vast majority of differences in beliefs. There's only a fringe who end up with slightly lower wages.
I knew my opinion was controversial, but I didn't expect this reaction from people. I guess I stumbled onto something you can't say.[1]
1. http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
Again, the first reason is moral. Imagine if catholic people were the majority in some area, and on average wealthy, and wouldn't hire muslims which in that area were a poorer minority. That's just not fair - why shouldn't all people in that region have the same employment opportunities?
The second reason is practicality. There are so many religions and ethnic groups in the US, everyone has to work with everyone else. Otherwise we are losing out on a huge amount of economic potential. Let the best people work at the best jobs, even if their religion doesn't happen to match their employer's. It's a job, not a place of worship.
Also, I never said you can't say what you said. Only that I and the law disagree with you, on this topic. But I wouldn't hold what you said against you - not employment-wise (I would still potentially hire you) and not in any other way actually (if we met in person, we'd probably get along just fine). Disagreement doesn't need to be the end of the world.
These are, of course hard issues. It's _hard_ for all of us to not discriminate against people based on our prejudices. For you it seems to be hard to not discriminate against Scientologists. The right moral response is to realize your prejudices and fight them. The laws actually make that a bit easier in some ways (e.g. it's illegal for you to ask prospective job candidates whether they're Scientologists).
Whether it's a social fit problem depends on two things. The first is whether the person's private beliefs affect their workplace behavior. Obviously in some cases they do and in others they don't. People are pretty good at compartmentalizing.
The second social fit problem is whether the person's co-workers are so outraged by the fact of the beliefs existing (or the person's gender being "wrong" or their hair being red, or whatever these people happen to have personal hangups about) that it affects _their_ behavior. This is pretty common, obviously, and the fault in such cases lies in the co-workers not the hire. There may still not be a good "social fit" as a result, but this situation is cause to look long and hard at the "society" that's not being fit into...
I would like you to also consider a concrete example. You say you won't hire a believer in alien abductions. Would you hire a "tin-foil-hat" type who believes the NSA is spying on everyone? Would you have hired such a person two years ago, or would you have considered them paranoids whose "thought patterns and general mental stability" would preclude a good "social fit"? Clearly your priors have updated since 2 years ago, but it's always worth evaluating whether your priors might be wrong and whether a reasonable person might come up with different priors.
It was OK for him to be President of the United states, while publicly opposing gay marriage.
But it's not OK for the CEO of a browser company to publicly oppose gay marriage?
Brendan Eich's behaviour in 2008 in trying to take the choice away from couples to marry just because they happen not to be straight is a despicable step to interfere with the rights of others. His apology this month (https://brendaneich.com/2014/03/inclusiveness-at-mozilla/) didn't express regret for making the donation, only for "having caused pain"; nothing in the apology suggests that he has actually changed his views. It fits the classic pattern of an apology for how other people reacted to what he did, rather than for what he did.
As abhorrent as I find his personal actions, it would not be appropriate for Mozilla to take political activities into account when making employment decisions, such as about promotions or dismissals. If employers could fire people for their political views or activities outside of work, it would be a net loss to our civil and human rights, even if in some cases such laws shield advocates for stripping away freedom and non-discriminatory treatment under the law.
The Mozilla Foundation has acted entirely fairly and appropriately here, and it is not fair to blame Mozilla for the actions of Brendan Eich or for not discriminating against him on the basis of his political beliefs.