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[Eagleon]

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.

Fair enough, I didn't read too much into it. Some of these campaigns can gloss over little facts like when things actually happened. I don't care much for protest in the form of personal attacks, in any case - if you disagree with an organization, don't give them business, and change people's minds rather than lighting sacrifice fires or whatever. But if a situation is affecting donations and public image, it's sometimes reasonable for a non-profit (which survives on donations and public image) to move to remedy that situation.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

The CEO is not an employee in the way you use it. Management is a separate group from the employees, politically and economically. It is assumed that an employee will not have much impact on corporate direction, while a manager will - especially the CEO, the highest level of manager in the company. CEOs are, like it or not, public figures like politicians.

You do not get to create a powerful organization that has an impact on the public and still remain anonymous and private.

Whether Mozilla qualifies as that isn't the point; Mozilla is a company that puts itself forth similarly to other large companies and has filed paperwork with the government to achieve some kind of official business status.

Let's look at this from the protester's perspective. Let's say a person is gay but the company that produces his web browser has an anti-gay CEO. Maybe he thinks that sucks, so he stops using the browser. Do you really expect him to feel compelled to continue using the browser or other Mozilla products, if any? Maybe he decides to blog about it, and discovers a lot of people have the same feelings. Again, is it a better outcome that these people all just shut up and keep using Firefox?

If we don't like that a politician is clearly anti-gay, we can refuse to vote for him and we can talk about it with other people and try to convince them not to vote for him. As customers we all vote with our wallets; if we don't like a company's practices or who they employ we can stop buying their shit / donating to them, and talk to other people to try to get them to do the same.

In the end, though, I think he's just a crappy guy and I don't want his life to be enjoyable. He can find a job in a company with customers who don't care.

[Leafsnail]

Part of the job of a CEO is to keep a company's finances in good order.  If his personal actions are causing mass boycotts then he's failing to do his job.

[nenjin]

-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.

So business has no moral or ethical imperative as long as they make money? Is that the argument I'm getting?

[Bauglir]

-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.

So business has no moral or ethical imperative as long as they make money? Is that the argument I'm getting?

Sure they do, but his political views, held outside a job he didn't even have at the time, aren't business. It's absolutely okay to argue with the guy, but that's a different thing from "He shouldn't be allowed to have a job."

[nenjin]

He voluntarily resigned, at least as far as he's chosen to say.

That is distinctly different than what you're arguing.

And, again. We've empowered corporations as people. Therefore, corporations can have opinions that directly impact a) how they run the business and b) how they use their influence. Just like a politician.

So if the pinnacle head of a corp doesn't like gays, I'm well within the scope of what SCOTUS said to attribute that belief to the corporation as a whole. And that's exactly what his employees object to, is their company being associated with the beliefs of its most powerful member.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

-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.

So business has no moral or ethical imperative as long as they make money? Is that the argument I'm getting?

Sure they do, but his political views, held outside a job he didn't even have at the time, aren't business. It's absolutely okay to argue with the guy, but that's a different thing from "He shouldn't be allowed to have a job."

Again, nobody is saying he shouldn't be allowed to have a job. What's happening here is a bunch of people boycotted because they don't like the figurehead and the company decided to change figureheads to stop the boycott. He can go do another job. Worst-case scenario he can't be a CEO. Oh BOO FUCKING HOO. He can go work for a living.

[kaijyuu]

Now now, CEOs do work and work hard, it's just that they get paid far far far far more than that amount of work would imply.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

Now now, CEOs do work and work hard, it's just that they get paid far far far far more than that amount of work would imply.

Let's just say I don't have a personal assistant do all my scheduling, I don't take lunch / dinner / golfing trips to court business on the company dime, and the amount of vacation time I get per year is probably illegally low in some European countries.

[Bauglir]

@nenjin
He "voluntarily resigned" after three managers resigned in protest and other businesses started taking actions to impact Mozilla's income because they don't think he should be allowed to have the job. What I'm arguing is that that pressure shouldn't have even been applied to  begin with.

I wouldn't say a Neo-Nazi neighbor ought to be evicted, either, which is exactly what you're arguing. Having a feud with the guy, up to and including mowing my lawn in the shape of a giant Star of David visible from his front porch, would be perfectly okay. Encouraged, even.

@Leo
So he can't be allowed to be in any leadership position whatsoever (because otherwise it'll be assumed his views determine policy), nor should he be in contact with any customers (because his view might offend them, whether he shares them with customers or not), nor should anybody be aware that he's supporting whatever service or product he does (because they might prefer not to support a bigot), nor should he be employed by anyone who doesn't agree with every political view he might ever express (because they might be forced at any time to assume responsibility for any political view of an employee or lose business)?

I agree that he's paid too much, but this is a totally different thing.

[Mr. Strange]

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.

This sums up my views on his resignation pretty much.

I don't agree with the proposition he was donating for, but I can't believe that it's okay to make him lose his job for an opinion his is entitled to have, even if you disagree with him.

[nenjin]

He "voluntarily resigned" after three managers resigned in protest and other businesses started taking actions to impact Mozilla's income because they don't think he should be allowed to have the job. What I'm arguing is that that pressure shouldn't have even been applied to  begin with.

So he's got the right to believe what he wants with no strings attached, but no one else does? And since when is "doesn't want to do business with your company" equal to "U SHOULDNT HAVE A JOB!!!" Business is not neutral in any way shape or form, and anyone that thinks so is entitled to as much broken Free Market rhetoric as they can stomach before their skull caves in under the weight of cognitive dissonance.

I wouldn't say a Neo-Nazi neighbor ought to be evicted, either, which is exactly what you're arguing. Having a feud with the guy, up to and including mowing my lawn in the shape of a giant Star of David visible from his front porch, would be perfectly okay. Encouraged, even.

You're straw manning me. No one where did I say he didn't have the right to own a home. Your example is actually relevant though. It's not "Your neighbor doesn't deserve to live", it's "I won't associate with him, go to his barbecues, buy his kid's lemonade or send him a Christmas card." Only in the business sense. It's a refusal to enrich someone whose point of view you disagree with.

But let me put it this way. If he'd had the courage of his convictions, he wouldn't have resigned and would have had to been voted out by the board. In which case you could make a bizarre anti-anti-discrimination argument. What happened, instead, is he had to face up to the public reaction to his personally held beliefs. And guess what. He ran and hid.

And again, no one "made" him do anything as far as has been reported.

[GlyphGryph]

Now now, CEOs do work and work hard, it's just that they get paid far far far far more than that amount of work would imply.

Let's just say I don't have a personal assistant do all my scheduling, I don't take lunch / dinner / golfing trips to court business on the company dime, and the amount of vacation time I get per year is probably illegally low in some European countries.

And I would completely back you boycotting donating to or supporting Mozilla for it's fucked up corporate clusterfuck or a management scam.

I'm not so keen on doing so to try (and succeed) in punishing someone for holding political beliefs you disagree with.

[nenjin]

Now now, CEOs do work and work hard, it's just that they get paid far far far far more than that amount of work would imply.

Let's just say I don't have a personal assistant do all my scheduling, I don't take lunch / dinner / golfing trips to court business on the company dime, and the amount of vacation time I get per year is probably illegally low in some European countries.

And I would completely back you boycotting donating to or supporting Mozilla for it's fucked up corporate clusterfuck or a management scam.

I'm not so keen on doing so to try (and succeed) in punishing someone for holding political beliefs you disagree with.

And what about when said business uses its wealth and power to push a social agenda? Still ok to let them do that and continue using their product, increasing their market penetration and empowering them further, because there's such a clear distinction between their business and their beliefs?

IMO, this thing is a perfect example of a real Free Market. Except it's not just about what you make, how you market it, how much you charge for it or which 3rd world country you export labor to. It's also about what you believe and what you do with those beliefs.

[Bauglir]

So he's got the right to believe what he wants with no strings attached, but no one else does? And since when is "doesn't want to do business with your company" equal to "U SHOULDNT HAVE A JOB!!!" Business is not neutral in any way shape or form, and anyone that thinks so is entitled to as much broken Free Market rhetoric as they can stomach before their skull caves in under the weight of cognitive dissonance.

Absolutely not. Everyone else has the right to believe what they want with no strings attached. I don't think everything they believe is relevant to making business decisions, though, and because businesses do have moral and ethical dimensions, I think it's perfectly acceptable for me to say that a business decision is wrong. In this case, the decision was to boycott Mozilla for promoting somebody who, 8 years ago, expressed a political opinion in his own time and with his own money. I think that decision was wrong. Given that it was made, resigning was the correct choice, because failure to do so would've been making a business decision, costing other employees their own livelihood, because of his own beliefs that aren't relevant to the business. I don't know where you were going with the rest of the paragraph, though, so I can't respond to it. It sounds like a response to some caricature who isn't me.

I wouldn't say a Neo-Nazi neighbor ought to be evicted, either, which is exactly what you're arguing. Having a feud with the guy, up to and including mowing my lawn in the shape of a giant Star of David visible from his front porch, would be perfectly okay. Encouraged, even.

You're straw manning me. No one where did I say he didn't have the right to own a home. Your example is actually relevant though. It's not "Your neighbor doesn't deserve to live", it's "I won't associate with him, go to his barbecues, buy his kid's lemonade or send him a Christmas card." Only in the business sense. It's a refusal to enrich someone whose point of view you disagree with.

You indicated that it would be unreasonable to give the neighbor "the same pass" for being a neo-nazi. The pass in question is remaining employed despite holding beliefs I can't stand. Chances are, the neo-nazi requires a job in order to have an income. Chances are, the neo-nazi requires an income in order to pay the bills. Chances are, the neo-nazi needs to pay the bills in order to keep a home. That's why I picked that particular analogy, since you picked home ownership as the relevant identity, and I wanted to link the situations more firmly. I agree that, as a private individual, you have a right to boycott people for whatever the hell you want.

A business is not, in any way, neutral. The actions they take have implications. If absolutely nothing else, they have financial implications for the employees of a business. When you make a business decision, you're responsible for that. But that doesn't mean that literally every decision you make in your life should be a business decision, just as every decision a school teacher makes shouldn't be an educational one. I strongly disagree with your conclusion about conviction - he made the correct choice in the face of an unfair decision. He put his employees' welfare above his own beliefs, which is absolutely the correct way to run a business.

And what about when said business uses its wealth and power to push a social agenda?

But that isn't what happened.