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[GlyphGryph]

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/mozilla-ceo-resigns-calif-gay-marriage-ban-campaign/story?id=23181711

Eich, who became the CEO of the nonprofit company behind Mozilla Firefox on March 24, had donated $1,000 for the successful Proposition 8 ballot measure that passed in the November 2008 state election.
[...]
After the announcement that Eich would become CEO last week, some Mozilla staff protested his appointment while three of Mozilla's directors resigned. OKCupid protested by refusing to allow users to run the dating website with the Firefox browser.
[...]
"I have decided to resign as CEO effective today, and leave Mozilla," Eich said in a statement provided by Mozilla. "Our mission is bigger than any one of us, and under the present circumstances, I cannot be an effective leader. I will be taking time before I decide what to do next.”

The whole situation leaves a bad taste in my mouth, and unsure how to feel about it. One the one hand, yeah, this guy did something I see as pretty damn bad. But on the other hand, I'm a strong believer that what you do with your time and money outside of work is your own business, and boycotting companies because of political activism of its employees, no matter how important those employees are, is a bad thing.

[Sonlirain]

Yep it's terrible that in a seemingly democratic society less than 5% can terrorize the 95% because of political correctness.
(removed)

It's bad enough that israelis can ruin someones carrer by pointing their fingers at someone and yelling ANTISEMITE! Now homosexuals can do that as well!
Damn those are dark times to be a straight indeed.

Also hitting the company where the emploee is working is easier than hitting the person himself as it forces the company to either weather the (unjust) onslaught of criticism and marr the company name or kick the "bad" worker out for having his beliefs that have NOTHING to do with the company itself.

[kaijyuu]

* kaijyuu is assuming the post above his is satirical.

Anyway, remember that employees represent their company. Image is huge these days, and if the public associates your CEO with homophobia, then Bad Things will happen.

It's exactly the same in concept as expecting bank tellers to dress appropriately, or to have certain hairstyles.

[Putnam]

Yep it's terrible that in a seemingly democratic society less than 5% can terrorize the 95% because of political correctness.
(removed)

It's bad enough that israelis can ruin someones carrer by pointing their fingers at someone and yelling ANTISEMITE! Now homosexuals can do that as well!
Damn those are dark times to be a straight indeed.

Also hitting the company where the emploee is working is easier than hitting the person himself as it forces the company to either weather the (unjust) onslaught of criticism and marr the company name or kick the "bad" worker out for having his beliefs that have NOTHING to do with the company itself.

sorry did you just accuse people of alarmism when this guy literally funded a vote to ban gay marraige

[LeoLeonardoIII]

People can boycott for whatever reason they want. The company can give in or not. Not spending money, and protesting, are just about the only actual powers to cause change that we have anymore.

Also, he didn't decide to resign. His board of directors voted and he got the chance to tell everyone he was resigning before they fired his bigoted ass. Mozilla doesn't care about him or human sexuality. They care about their corporate image and profitability.

[Sonlirain]

* kaijyuu is assuming the post above his is satirical.

Anyway, remember that employees represent their company. Image is huge these days, and if the public associates your CEO with homophobia, then Bad Things will happen.

It's exactly the same in concept as expecting bank tellers to dress appropriately, or to have certain hairstyles.

It would be a good point if that guy was an activist in some neo nazi group or openly declared that he hates homosexuals.
In his case however he only donated some money as a private person to a project he believed (whatever it might have been) in without doing much of a fuss about it.
Quite honestly i'm sure someone dug this up just to get rid of him for one reason or another.

sorry did you just accuse people of alarmism when this guy literally funded a vote to ban gay marraige

That's the thing. he funded a vote not some mass gay execution project. And from what i hear that vote didn't pass anyway.

[Graknorke]

They care about their corporate image and profitability.

Mozilla is a non-profit organisation.

[GlyphGryph]

* kaijyuu is assuming the post above his is satirical.

Anyway, remember that employees represent their company. Image is huge these days, and if the public associates your CEO with homophobia, then Bad Things will happen.

It's exactly the same in concept as expecting bank tellers to dress appropriately, or to have certain hairstyles.

Here's the thing, though - I'm all about companies being able to control what people say and do on the clock, but not making their employment contingent on what they do on their own time. If he was using his position as a platform for his views, yeah, take him down - but this is more akin to a public school teacher being fired for attending a kink convention with her husband - a real thing that really happened and which I'm equally opposed to.

I am not comfortable with employment being contingent on hold the correct political or social views - at all.

People can boycott for whatever reason they want. The company can give in or not. Not spending money, and protesting, are just about the only actual powers to cause change that we have anymore.

Of course they can. That doesn't make it right. It doesn't make it not ugly.

[kaenneth]

I'd like to remind everyone to be cool to each other, as this is a hot topic.

Personally, I think it's a bad thing that he was forced to resign over this.

It's fair to try to convince someone of your views; it's not fair to punish them by making them lose their job because you disagree with them.

And this was an outright punitive attack, not an attempt to change anyone's opinion.

[Putnam]

CEOs tend to be the face of an organization; teachers aren't really a very good comparison.

[GlyphGryph]

CEOs tend to be the face of an organization; teachers aren't really a very good comparison.

Right - people actually realistically expect their teachers to serve as role-models for youth, and who's opinions and activities are likely to shape impressionable youngsters, while no expects that of a CEO.

And teachers are quite obviously the face of their organizations. Just like front-line clerks, they are the part you are most likely to see and interact with when working with the organization if you're a member of the public at large. If that's not being a face is, I... honestly don't know what it is.

Would you be comfortable with a teacher being fired for volunteering for a candidate that ran on an anti-gay-marriage platform? Would you be comfortable with threatening a school, saying you would switch your student out, unless that teacher were fired? Even if they didn't bring that viewpoint into work, and stayed strictly professional on the job?

[Eagleon]

They care about their corporate image and profitability.

Mozilla is a non-profit organisation.

Common misconception - non-profits still care about profits. At least the ones that survive do. If anything, a non-profit business depends even more on their image, rather than having the investments and long-term bankroll to weather the impact of unpopular public response with additional marketing.

I think the big issue here for me is that non-profits survive on donations and whatever product they put out, rather than soulless investors. CEO (which, presumably, is the highest-paying position within Mozilla, though that isn't always the case) is paid by donations. Donations are therefore in a somewhat round-about way going to banning gay marriage. I'm not saying he should have been fired, but I certainly wouldn't have donated to them knowing he'd put money into this, the same way I don't eat at Chick-fil-A.

[GlyphGryph]

The difference there is that Chik-fil-A, the organization, funded that stuff to the tune of many millions of dollars, as a core element of corporate policy.

Mozilla never did - an individual who worked for them donated $1,000 dollars, 6 years ago, and that individual later became CEO.

It's not really the same situation at all.

[nenjin]

I don't believe you get a pass on what you believe simply because you do it outside of the business you own.

See: Virtually every repugnant opinion/belief/policy you hate that is lobbied for by people like the Kochs, George Soros or any of the other massively wealthy corporate figures.

If people divorced their opinion from action, it'd be one thing. But it's not. Their success directly empowers them to change society by dint of the funds they spend.

Put another way: Corporations are people now, as are the people that run them. Treat them as such.

The difference there is that Chik-fil-A, the organization, funded that stuff to the tune of many millions of dollars, as a core element of corporate policy.

Mozilla never did - an individual who worked for them donated $1,000 dollars, 6 years ago, and that individual later became CEO.

It's not really the same situation at all.

So if your neighbor donated to a Neo-Nazi group 6 years ago, you'd give him the same pass?

No, you wouldn't.

This is a crazy world we're coming to, where people get held accountable for what they believe. Business loves social media when it spreads their message, but suddenly they don't like it when it's not in their interests.

[Graknorke]

-snip-

Bad analogy, you value your neighbour as a person but a CEO is valued for their ability to do their job as far as employment is concerned.