If You Don't Support Gay Marriage, You Don't Deserve a Job
Apparently, Brendan Eich did not get that message. He’s the former chief executive officer at Mozilla, the technology group that gave us the Firefox Web browser.
Eich resigned under a firestorm of controversy after it was revealed he had donated $1,000 in support of California’s Proposition 8, a ballot initiative that protected traditional marriage.
It’s unclear who outed Eich. But that really doesn’t matter. Once his donation was revealed, supporters of gay marriage launched all-out war.
The Wall Street Journal reported that OKCupid, the popular online dating website, asked its followers to stop using Firefox. The wireless company Credo Mobile gathered more than 50,000 signatures on a petition calling for Eich to resign.
OKCupid posted a letter denouncing the Mozilla CEO, The New York Times reported.
“Those who seek to deny love and instead enforce misery, shame and frustration are our enemies and we wish them nothing but failure,” the letter stated.
Why not demand that those who oppose gay marriage relinquish the right to own property? Why not take away their right to vote? Why not take away their children? Why not just throw them in jail? Why not force them to work in chain gangs? Why not call for public floggings? Or better yet, let’s just strap them down on gurneys, stick a needle in their arm and rid the world of these intolerant anti-gay bigots once and for all.
Eich won’t say he was forced to resign, but based on the company’s press release, it’s safe to say his days were numbered.
“Mozilla prides itself on being held to a different standard and, this past week, we didn’t live up to it,” Mozilla Executive Chairwoman Mitchell Baker wrote in a statement.
“We know why people are hurt and angry, and they are right: It’s because we haven’t stayed true to ourselves.”
She went on to opine about freedom of speech and equality. In her estimation, one trumps the other.
“Equality is necessary for meaningful speech,” she wrote. “And you need free speech to fight for equality. Figuring out how to stand for both at the same time can be hard.”
No, not really, Ms. Baker. Our Founding Fathers sort of worked that out in the Bill of Rights.
I write about this very issue in my upcoming book, God Less America. There are pages and pages filled with stories of workers and business owners who’ve either lost their jobs or faced public floggings for their support of traditional marriage.
The left does not believe people who oppose gay marriage should be allowed to engage in the democratic process. And they have a proven track record of intimidating and bullying those who do.
Just ask Angela McCaskill, the chief diversity officer at Gallaudet University. She was suspended after she signed a petition in her church to put a gay marriage referendum on the ballot in Maryland.
Just ask Scott Eckern, the former artistic director of California Musical Theatre. He resigned under pressure after he gave money to support Prop 8. As one activist told The New York Times, “I do believe there comes a time when you cannot sit back and accept what I think is the most dangerous form of bigotry.”
Just ask our nation’s top military officials. They were called into President Obama’s office and told that if they could not support “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” they should resign their commissions.
“We were called into the Oval Office and President Obama looked at all five service chiefs in the eye and said, ‘This is what I want to do,’ ” said Coast Guard Adm. Robert Papp in remarks reported by Buzzfeed.
The road to political correctness is littered with the bodies of folks like Brendan Eich sideswiped by the tolerance and diversity bus.
I trust there are rational and reasonable individuals within the gay rights community who understand the dangers of stifling free speech and expression. But the voices that are winning the day are those who believe gay rights trump everyone else’s rights.
I know this may sound old-fashioned, but gainful employment should not be determined by where you put your reproductive organs.
Gay rights 'anti-bullying' activists: The biggest bullies of them all
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-mozilla-brendan-eich-gay-rights-activists-biggest-bullies-0140406,0,3050179.story#ixzz2yggRbRfY
Brendan Eich has stepped down as CEO of Mozilla following protests over his support of Proposition 8 in California. (Darcy Padilla / Associated Press / April 6, 2014) |
Hey, gay rights activists: Why are you doing your best to make everyone hate you?
I'm talking about the forced resignation of Mozilla Corp. CEO Brendan Eich. Because six years ago as a private citizen -- I repeat, six years ago as a private citizen -- he contributed $1,000 -- I repeat, $1,000 -- to the campaign for Proposition 8, the approved ballot measure that changed the California Constitution to say that marriage between a man and a woman would be the only kind of marriage that the state would recognize as legal. (The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals later ruled Proposition 8 unconstitutional, and the state of California, under Gov. Jerry Brown, refused to defend the measure, so the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013 let the 9th Circuit decision stand.)
Who cares that Eich happened to be a co-founder of Mozilla and was also the inventor of JavaScript, the most popular programming language on the Internet? Who cares that Eich, after assuming his new role as CEO in March (he was promoted from his position as chief technology officer), wrote a heartfelt statement on his personal blog affirming his commitment to "ensuring that Mozilla is, and will remain, a place that includes and supports everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, age, race, ethnicity, economic status, or religion"?
Nope, the important thing was that Eich opposed, and may well continue to oppose, same-sex marriage. That means he must be publicly denounced, as others who hold views such as his are denounced, as a "homophobe" and "anti-gay." He also must be driven from his well-earned position as head of the successful company he started -- and indeed from the company itself -- and consigned to ignominy. Nearly 70,000 people signed a petition demanding that Eich be ousted; the online dating site OKCupid temporarily blocked users of Mozilla's Firefox browser; Mozilla employees tweeted their shock that Eich hadn't apologized for his 2008 position; and Mozilla board Chairman Mitchell Baker issued an Orwellian statement: "Mozilla believes both in equality [the code word for gay marriage] and freedom of speech. Equality is necessary for meaningful speech." That was the end of Eich.
If this reminds you of China's Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, except without the official involvement of any government entity, you're on target.
What's significant is that this isn't the first time that gay rights activists have tried, sometimes successfully, to destroy the careers and livelihoods of those who don't happen to believe in gay marriage. These activists have launched impressive anti-bullying campaigns to protect gays, lesbians and other LGBT types from physical and verbal abuse. But at the same time, they have made same-sex marriage a litmus test for deeming who is for gay rights and who is against them, and they have ruthlessly punished those who flunk the test.
You can oppose gay marriage on religious grounds; you can oppose it on grounds of tradition (no human society ever recognized marriage between two members of the same sex until quite recently); or you can oppose it on practical sociological grounds: that traditional marriage provides important legal recognition for the stable raising of children by their biological parents. You can wholeheartedly support -- as I do -- civil unions, domestic partnerships or any other arrangement that allows people who love each other to enjoy the same easy transfers of property and other rights as married people. You will still be brutally denounced and ostracized. The "anti-bullying" crowd turns out to be the biggest bullies of all.
The bullying of Proposition 8 supporters began nearly the day after the measure passed. Owners and managers of businesses and nonprofits who had donated to support Proposition 8 were threatened with boycotts and in, some cases, pressured to resign. Mormon Church places of worship were vandalized -- because the Latter-day Saints oppose same-sex marriage. More recently, the gay rights organization GLAAD threw its weight behind a 2012 boycott campaign against the fast-food chain Chick-fil-A just because its president, Dan Cathy, opposes "marriage equality" and has contributed to traditional marriage organizations. And most recently of all, A&E briefly suspended “Duck Dynasty” patriarch Phil Robertson for expressing his Christian belief that homosexual activity is sinful. The Chick-fil-A and Robertson campaigns proved unsuccessful only because their socially conservative customer bases aren't so susceptible to gay rights intimidation as liberal Silicon Valley.
The only good thing to come out of Eich's forced resignation is that a number of prominent liberals have been horrified that someone can be ousted from a job merely for expressing his views politically as a private citizen. The openly gay Andrew Sullivan wrote:
I'm talking about the forced resignation of Mozilla Corp. CEO Brendan Eich. Because six years ago as a private citizen -- I repeat, six years ago as a private citizen -- he contributed $1,000 -- I repeat, $1,000 -- to the campaign for Proposition 8, the approved ballot measure that changed the California Constitution to say that marriage between a man and a woman would be the only kind of marriage that the state would recognize as legal. (The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals later ruled Proposition 8 unconstitutional, and the state of California, under Gov. Jerry Brown, refused to defend the measure, so the U.S. Supreme Court in 2013 let the 9th Circuit decision stand.)
Who cares that Eich happened to be a co-founder of Mozilla and was also the inventor of JavaScript, the most popular programming language on the Internet? Who cares that Eich, after assuming his new role as CEO in March (he was promoted from his position as chief technology officer), wrote a heartfelt statement on his personal blog affirming his commitment to "ensuring that Mozilla is, and will remain, a place that includes and supports everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, age, race, ethnicity, economic status, or religion"?
Nope, the important thing was that Eich opposed, and may well continue to oppose, same-sex marriage. That means he must be publicly denounced, as others who hold views such as his are denounced, as a "homophobe" and "anti-gay." He also must be driven from his well-earned position as head of the successful company he started -- and indeed from the company itself -- and consigned to ignominy. Nearly 70,000 people signed a petition demanding that Eich be ousted; the online dating site OKCupid temporarily blocked users of Mozilla's Firefox browser; Mozilla employees tweeted their shock that Eich hadn't apologized for his 2008 position; and Mozilla board Chairman Mitchell Baker issued an Orwellian statement: "Mozilla believes both in equality [the code word for gay marriage] and freedom of speech. Equality is necessary for meaningful speech." That was the end of Eich.
If this reminds you of China's Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, except without the official involvement of any government entity, you're on target.
What's significant is that this isn't the first time that gay rights activists have tried, sometimes successfully, to destroy the careers and livelihoods of those who don't happen to believe in gay marriage. These activists have launched impressive anti-bullying campaigns to protect gays, lesbians and other LGBT types from physical and verbal abuse. But at the same time, they have made same-sex marriage a litmus test for deeming who is for gay rights and who is against them, and they have ruthlessly punished those who flunk the test.
You can oppose gay marriage on religious grounds; you can oppose it on grounds of tradition (no human society ever recognized marriage between two members of the same sex until quite recently); or you can oppose it on practical sociological grounds: that traditional marriage provides important legal recognition for the stable raising of children by their biological parents. You can wholeheartedly support -- as I do -- civil unions, domestic partnerships or any other arrangement that allows people who love each other to enjoy the same easy transfers of property and other rights as married people. You will still be brutally denounced and ostracized. The "anti-bullying" crowd turns out to be the biggest bullies of all.
The bullying of Proposition 8 supporters began nearly the day after the measure passed. Owners and managers of businesses and nonprofits who had donated to support Proposition 8 were threatened with boycotts and in, some cases, pressured to resign. Mormon Church places of worship were vandalized -- because the Latter-day Saints oppose same-sex marriage. More recently, the gay rights organization GLAAD threw its weight behind a 2012 boycott campaign against the fast-food chain Chick-fil-A just because its president, Dan Cathy, opposes "marriage equality" and has contributed to traditional marriage organizations. And most recently of all, A&E briefly suspended “Duck Dynasty” patriarch Phil Robertson for expressing his Christian belief that homosexual activity is sinful. The Chick-fil-A and Robertson campaigns proved unsuccessful only because their socially conservative customer bases aren't so susceptible to gay rights intimidation as liberal Silicon Valley.
The only good thing to come out of Eich's forced resignation is that a number of prominent liberals have been horrified that someone can be ousted from a job merely for expressing his views politically as a private citizen. The openly gay Andrew Sullivan wrote:
"Will he now be forced to walk through the streets in shame? Why not the stocks? The whole episode disgusts me -- as it should disgust anyone interested in a tolerant and diverse society. If this is the gay rights movement today -- hounding our opponents with a fanaticism more like the religious right than anyone else -- then count me out. If we are about intimidating the free speech of others, we are no better than the anti-gay bullies who came before us."
Perhaps this is a sign that the current witch-hunt may be wearing itself out -- although too late for Brendan Eich.