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The Internet Is Tolerant. Don't Agree? Keep Out
Townhall.com ^ | April 3, 2014 | Debra J. Saunders

Posted on 04/03/2014 4:04:07 PM PDT by Kaslin

Mozilla's new CEO, Brendan Eich, gave $1,000 to Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot measure passed by a majority of California voters to limit marriage to one man and one woman. The U.S. Supreme Court voided the measure, but the hate campaign against its supporters lives on.

There's a Twitter campaign to force Eich to step down. "I'm an employee of @mozilla and I'm asking @brendaneich to step down as CEO," one employee tweeted. Rarebit CEO Hampton Catlin and his husband announced a boycott against Mozilla Firefox applications. It will cost the business money, but, Catlin wrote, "as a gay couple who were unable to get married in California until recently," they "morally cannot support a Foundation that would not only leave someone with hateful views in power, but will give them a promotion and put them in charge of the entire organization."

More than 70,000 have signed a petition asking Eich to resign unless he renounces his former position. The message is clear: If you supported Prop 8, its opponents will go after you. Well, not everyone. That would be too messy and produce too many victims. So Prop 8 opponents will selectively target the occasional high-profile donor until he buckles or busts.

Eich has chosen to walk a tightrope. He told CNET's Stephen Shankland that when gay friends learned of his donation, he saw pain in their eyes, and he's "sorry for causing that pain." A Mozilla blog emphasized the corporation's belief in "equality and inclusion for LGBT people."

But Eich did not apologize for the donation. "I don't think it's good for my integrity or Mozilla's integrity to be pressured into changing a position," he told CNET. Making people pass a litmus test goes against Mozilla's quest for true diversity.

Eich wasn't a prominent pusher of Prop 8. He didn't mix his politics with business, in which case critics would have grounds to cite the nexus between Eich's personal beliefs and his corporate success. He wrote a personal check for $1,000. In tech circles, that's snack money.

Doesn't matter. Catlin wrote that Rarebit is boycotting Firefox because he and his husband "are personally affected" by Eich's actions. That's bunk. The courts upended Prop 8. Same-sex couples won.

Sadly, winning has made some advocates, like the Catlins, less tolerant, not more so. It's not enough that they won; they have to make opponents grovel in penance. No need for stockades in 2014 when you can dangle stock options and flame nonbelievers via Twitter.

It's like political time travel. Advocates demand that public figures renounce their 2008 opposition to same-sex marriage as illegitimate. If Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton could do it, surely soulless CEOs can do it, too.

Let me posit that there were some anti-gay bigots who supported Prop 8. But there also were a lot of Californians who wrestled with the issue but chose to stick with a more traditional conclusion. A yes vote didn't mean they hate their gay friends and family members.

So now the Internet has a sign that warns: If you don't support same-sex marriage, get out of the sandbox. If they beat Eich, the fear will spread, and the next dissenter will submit quickly. All hail tolerance and diversity.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: internet; privacy; samesexmarriage
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To: sand88
Using Opera now. Found a suitable replacement for NoScript to go with it.

I manage around a thousand desktops and recently started getting ready to deploy Firefox alongside IE.

41 posted on 04/03/2014 7:17:57 PM PDT by KEVLAR (Liberty or Death)
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To: sand88

Isn’t Chrome by Google? I refuse to use anything that is connected to Google


42 posted on 04/03/2014 7:19:18 PM PDT by Kaslin (He needed the ignorant to reelect him, and he got them. Now we all have to pay the consequenses)
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To: sand88

I will use Chrome occasionally but I do try to distance myself from Google as much as possible. You should look into their relationship with Mozilla. I’m currently using IE until I figure out how to use Opera.


43 posted on 04/03/2014 7:25:54 PM PDT by planter
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To: KEVLAR
Using Opera now. Found a suitable replacement for NoScript to go with it.

Does Opera have development extensions along the lines of Firebug? I don't want to be on Chrome long, but I definitely will not be using Firefox anymore.

I have had it with these leftists insulting Conservatives and destroying the careers of people who have a different opinion.

I will do my small part by throwing FF into the proverbial waste bin.

44 posted on 04/03/2014 7:31:09 PM PDT by sand88 (We can never legislate our way back to Liberty)
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To: Kaslin

I signed a petition at http://rightpetitions.net/ to show support. Had to go through many google pages to find a way to support him.


45 posted on 04/03/2014 8:01:00 PM PDT by Patriotic1 (Dic mihi solum facta, domina - Just the facts, ma'am)
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To: sand88

The Opera equivalent is called Dragonfly. It is built into the browser on all platforms. There is also a Firebug Lite available for Opera and Chrome.


46 posted on 04/03/2014 8:06:40 PM PDT by KEVLAR (Liberty or Death)
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To: bert
Like I said earlier...

"bert...you're a SAD little person!

Good luck with your wishful thinking on Walker or Perry.

Either/or will get beat like a drum on the national stage!"

47 posted on 04/04/2014 4:26:41 AM PDT by harpu ( "...it's better to be hated for who you are than loved for someone you're not!")
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To: planter; nascarnation; Kaslin
By dumping Firefox now you will speak out against the modern day browshirts. If not, then you’re saying that you don’t really care.

That's why I won't use the internet.

All kinds of 'gay' porn, 'gay' MSM reporters, 'gay' Hollywood Twitter comments.... the place is just infested with all kinds of 'gay' crap.

48 posted on 04/04/2014 5:56:51 AM PDT by UCANSEE2 (Lost my tagline on Flight MH370. Sorry for the inconvenience.)
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To: WhistlingPastTheGraveyard
I dumped my iPhone before I had a chance to do much with it.

Was it 'gay' ?

49 posted on 04/04/2014 5:59:23 AM PDT by UCANSEE2 (Lost my tagline on Flight MH370. Sorry for the inconvenience.)
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