What really troubles me about this conversation is that you are persistently trying to reframe attacking the basic humanity of other people as "disagreeing". This is far, far more substantiative than a disagreement. Eich and his weird tribe are welcome to believe, in their heart of hearts, that gay people are lesser and unworthy human beings. They do not get to hurt people who've done them no wrong. Eich decided it was his place to put his money on the line and fight against the rights of people who demanded them, and you don't get to call off a fight you picked and agree-to-disagree when the fight goes against you.
Pity the man. He's not allowed to be the CEO of Mozilla. At least we all agree he's a human being, even if he can't do that for the people he'd have had reporting to him.
I think most people agree that morality isn't defined by consensus. We're not talking about morality in the objective sense, to the extent that such a thing exists. We're talking morality as perceived by others and the very real consequences that can flow from remaining consistent in one's moral perspective, while the rest of the community's view shifts. When that view turns against you, is it really fair to say that you shouldn't be allowed to do your job anymore? You may be OK with economic martyrdom if it comes down to it, but it's unlikely you actually want that to disrupt your life.
You're acting as if there is an objective test that proves your perspective is moral by definition. No such thing exists. That's why people disagree on these issues and it's why it's important that we maintain decorum and civility while disagreeing -- good, moral people can have differing opinions. Very few people are truly evil.
It's extremely unlikely that Brendan Eich would argue gay people are "not human beings", or even that they are "lesser human beings". That is not the premise of Prop 8. The fact that you can't see it any other way just shows how effective gay rights advocates have been at radicalizing a substantial portion of the population.
Homosexuality is a behavior. Gay marriage is the question of whether the government should subsidize or sponsor that behavior in the same way it subsidizes and sponsors heterosexual behaviors. These aren't questions of identities, they're questions of practicalities. People can disagree on them and still be good people.
You understand that only a few short decades ago, your position would've been the one that got people fired, right? It's cool that you think it's objectively right, and it's your prerogative to believe that. But you should acknowledge that differing viewpoints on these matters should be tolerated as a valid form of free political discourse. Free speech means we tolerate the contributions of our fellow citizens, even if we strongly disagree. I would suggest that depriving fellow citizens of income they're currently receiving specifically because they disagree on a political issue, whether it's gay marriage or the humor in dongle jokes, is not respectful of the basic freedoms that allow a democratic society to function.
This conversation is great supporting evidence for the argument for anonymity when discussing any significant controversial issue. PG's essay "What You Can't Say" addresses this also; unless your life's goal is to rehabilitate the particular social taboos of your time (that is, unless martyrdom is your goal), it's probably best not to get directly associated with that rehabilitation effort.
I understand what you're saying, and I would certainly be outraged if Mozilla fired a CEO for supporting equal rights.
The problem is you seem to view everything as relative shades of gray worthy of equal merit. This is patently false. There is a such thing as clear, objective, unambiguous, right and wrong in this world. Slavery? Wrong. Misogyny? Wrong. Anti-miscegenation? Wrong. Segregation? Wrong. Bigotry over sexual orientation? Wrong. What do these all share? Immutable human traits that cannot be changed nor chosen, that harm no one. They're examples of hatred and derision, of treating others as "lesser" human beings instead of as equals.
Now if you want to discuss something like abortion ... we can have a really meaningful conversation, because there are no perfect solutions to these problems. One's rights trample on another's, and vice versa.
This is not such a case. I don't care what the popular opinion is at any given time, what Eich did was absolutely reprehensible.
> Gay marriage is the question of whether the government should subsidize or sponsor that behavior in the same way it subsidizes and sponsors heterosexual behaviors
As always, if it were about kids and reproduction, we wouldn't allow infertile and senior couples to marry.
The government should clearly not be subsidizing relationships at all, but since it is, it must do so fairly. Even our insane Supreme Court realized this vis-a-vis DOMA. The 14th amendment is very clear.
>I suspect the only taboos that are more than taboos are the ones that are universal, or nearly so. Murder for example. But any idea that's considered harmless in a significant percentage of times and places, and yet is taboo in ours, is a good candidate for something we're mistaken about.
Again, from his essay on taboos. [1] Most everything you've cited as an objective wrong was practically universally considered an objective good nary 60 years ago. The morality around slavery was so murky that a years-long civil war was fought between the opposing sides on that issue. Are we just supposed to believe that everyone that lived south of the Mason-Dixon line was naturally insipid, evil, and amoral? As PG states, unless it's universally regarded as evil across all (or nearly all) civilizations, it's very likely that a particular taboo does not cross into the "objectively evil" territory. Slavery has been pretty widespread throughout human history, so that should clue you in that there are possible morally sympathetic readings of it (which usually hinge on the belief that the enslaved group is naturally inferior and couldn't survive without the master group).
>As always, if it were about kids and reproduction, we wouldn't allow infertile and senior couples to marry.
I disagree based on two important elements. Heterosexual couples could become fertile at any time; you never know when infertility will reverse itself if the couple is otherwise healthy and under 40. Post-menopausal women or other permanently sterile heterosexual partners are OK because they are examples that reinforce the need for permanent heterosexual coupling and family structure, even if they are unable to produce children on their own, and secondarily, they can provide a natural parenting context with male-female parental duality, as biologically mandated, if they ever obtain a ward. Homosexual sexual activity can never result in reproduction and can not provide the male-female parental duality that is necessary to produce a child by natural means.
Marriage is really about all of society, and not really about the couple that gets married. It is fine for one to believe that gay marriage is beneficial, but it's not fine to pretend like there is no change in the behavior endorsed and that opposition is based solely on discriminatory motives. Whatever you say you are, or whatever you actually are, heterosexual coupling and homosexual coupling are two different behaviors that could have differing ramifications on society as a whole. Thus, the cost-benefit is worthy of some consideration, and differing opinions are fine, even using a standard that disallows all "discriminatory" rationale (which standard can't really be considered an objective good either).
I'm not really trying to escalate this into a debate on gay marriage, but I think it's important to delineate the logic that gay rights campaigners fight hard to obscure. Gay rights advocates don't want a conversation to get started; they just want everyone to believe that their opponents are naturally evil, so they go around and make a frowny face until it gets people like Brendan Eich kicked out of jobs, and they can then point at Eich and say "He was so evil he got fired! Only evil people would dare oppose us".
Perhaps you don't believe a male-female parental duality is important. Perhaps you don't believe that marriage is an institution that deserves state protection or benefits. Perhaps you don't see any meaning in the evolutionary imperative that children can only be produced by opposite-sex partners. All of this is well and good. You are welcome to your beliefs. The important thing is to accept that others are welcome to their beliefs too, even if they differ from yours, and that that doesn't automatically make them "lesser human beings" (or "bigots", the currently popular shorthand).
>The government should clearly not be subsidizing relationships at all, but since it is, it must do so fairly. Even our insane Supreme Court realized this vis-a-vis DOMA. The 14th amendment is very clear.
The 14th Amendment is anything but "very clear", and again, the fact that there have been so many differing interpretations of it is evidence that its meaning and implications are debatable by reasonable persons. It's a bad, broad law.
