If you support the traditional view that marriage should be between a man and a woman, could that cost you your job? The intolerant left says the answer to that question is a loud and emphatic “Yes!”
Their latest victim is Brendan Eich, an inventor of JavaScript and the co-founder of the Web browser Firefox. Back in 2008, Eich donated $1,000 to the campaign for Proposition 8 in California, a ballot measure that said, “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.”
Recently, when Eich was named CEO of Mozilla, the company that oversees Firefox, that 6-year-old contribution cost him his job. We’re told that half of Mozilla’s board of directors resigned to protest Eich’s appointment. But that leads to a question: If half the board opposed him, how the heck did he get the job?
The wireless company Credo Mobile launched an online petition demanding that Eich either renounce his beliefs or resign. The petition quickly acquired nearly 75,000 signatures.
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OKCupid, a popular online dating service, urged its followers to boycott Firefox to protest Eich’s selection. The company posted a letter denouncing the CEO, stating: “Those who seek to deny love and instead enforce misery, shame and frustration are our enemies and we wish them nothing but failure.”
Those are pretty harsh words against a person who, in 15 years at Mozilla, had never been accused of demonstrating any prejudice against gay employees — or anyone, for that matter. In one of his few statements on the subject, Eich said: “I don’t want to talk about my personal beliefs because I kept them out of Mozilla all these 15 years we’ve been going. I don’t believe they’re relevant.”
How he performed on the job didn’t matter to the gay and lesbian brigade. They wanted his scalp. And they got it.
After Eich agreed to resign, Mozilla Executive Chairwoman Mitchell Baker issued a statement that said in part, “We know why people are hurt and angry, and they are right: it’s because we haven’t stayed true to ourselves.”
So forcing someone to resign because of a private donation made more than six years ago is how you demonstrate that you’ve “stayed true to” yourself? Remember, not a single person claims that Eich did anything on the job to demonstrate any kind of anti-gay bias. By all accounts, he was scrupulously fair to everyone.
And bear in mind that, at the time, most of the public said they agreed with him that marriage should be between a man and a woman. Proposition 8 passed easily in California, one of the most liberal States in the Nation, although it was later overturned by the courts. It won the support of a substantial majority of blacks and Hispanics.
In fact, let me mention two prominent Americans who also opposed same-sex marriage back in 2008: Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama. Of course, both now claim that they’ve had a change of heart.
More than 35,000 people donated to the campaign for Proposition 8. Thanks to a court ruling, the names of all the contributors — and in some cases, their addresses and the name of their employers — have been made public. I wonder how many more will become targets of angry and intolerant gays.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas warned of this possibility four years ago. In a 2010 dissent to a court decision requiring such disclosure, he wrote:
I cannot endorse a view of the First Amendment that subjects citizens of this Nation to death threats, ruined careers, damaged or defaced property, or pre-emptive and threatening warning letters as the price for engaging in “core political speech,” the “primary object of First Amendment protection.”
Not every gay person agrees with the angry intolerance Eich witnessed. Andrew Sullivan, a well-known gay-rights activist, wrote:
If we cannot live and work alongside people with whom we deeply disagree, we are finished as a liberal society….
What we have here is a social pressure to keep your beliefs deeply private for fear of retribution. We are enforcing another sort of closet on others. I can’t believe the fanaticism.
Just how bad will this latest form of bigotry get? On Sunday, during an appearance on ABC News’ This Week, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said what we’re witnessing is the left’s “new fascism.” He warned:
This is just the most open and blatant example of the new fascism, which says, “If you don’t agree with us 100 percent, we have the right to punish you unless you’re like Hillary and Barack Obama and you recant….
I think the question I’d ask yourself is: Are you willing to live in an open and tolerant society, or do you have to impose your views at the cost of people’s jobs?
One of the most ironic statements on the controversy came from the gay-rights organization GLAAD. President and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis said: “Mozilla’s strong statement in favor of equality today reflects where corporate America is: inclusive, safe and welcoming to all.”
Yes, the GLAAD’s leader actually said “welcoming to all.” What she meant, of course, was welcoming to everyone who will march in lockstep with GLAAD. If you dare to disagree with the gay rights brigade and they find out about it, watch out. They’ll go after you, your family, your job and your employer.
If you’re a Christian photographer who’d prefer to not to cover a gay wedding, they’ll go to court and force you to do so. If you’re a baker who has religious objections to a gay marriage, you’d better not decline to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple or you might get sued.
It seems that it is only traditionalists who must demonstrate “tolerance” these days. Apparently, the gay-rights activists can be as bigoted and intolerant as they want.
Welcome to the Brave New World of America in 2014. If you don’t like it, you’d better do something about it.
Until next time, keep some powder dry.
Chip Wood was the first news editor of The Review of the News and also wrote for American Opinion, our two predecessor publications. He is now the geopolitical editor of Personal Liberty Digest, where his Straight Talk column appears weekly. This article first appeared in PersonalLiberty.com and has been reprinted with permission.
