Standards

I see that Mozilla fired its first black CEO this week, because he was against gay marriage six years ago. At least, I assume he was black, since support for Prop 8 was highest among the black community.

What? Oh, not black?

Well, doubtless they'd have handled it the same way if he had been.

Break.

Some say the opposite of love is hate. Others say the opposite of love is indifference. Indifference isn't a bad thing, though. Generally you should beware of the move off indifference that comes from forcing people to care about you. They may not care about you just the way you'd hoped.

I'm inclined to indifference about other people, but I have very certain opinions about being forced to do anything.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

What tore it for me was the reaction of the "gay activists" to Prop 8.

California already had a domestic partnership law that conferred the SAME RIGHTS on a registered gay relationship as on a a registered marriage, which was between an adult man and adult woman.

There even was a California Supreme Court decision that stated that Prop 8 would not affect gay rights, or anybody else's.

That wasn't enough for them.

This was not and is not a civil rights issue. It is about a bunch of exhibitionists that want to shove their private lifestyle down the throats of people who don't want to know.

Valerie

DL Sly said...

"...but I have very certain opinions about being forced to do anything."

I have an instinctively visceral and violent *gut* reaction to being forced to do anything. One reason why my folks could never get me to consider the military in any way, shape or form as a viable option after high school.

Gringo said...

Would the PC people refrained from going after Eich if he were black?

Judging how prominent blacks whose politics veers from the left, such as Condaleeza Rice, Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, and Senator Tim Scott, I would tend to doubt it. Apparently they merit an extra dose of opprobrium for straying off the liberal plantation.

Grim said...

Usually the way this works is that conservative blacks get slammed because they deviate from the commonly-held views of the black community; where blacks tend to be conservative (i.e., on social issues), they are given a pass by the Left because they are too important to the Left's coalition to condemn as a community. If you catch a black man or woman deviating from the ordinarily common position of the black community, you can punish them for being conservative; but where the community as a whole is, they (but only they) are permitted to be.

Thus 'the first black president' allegedly held the same view in 2008, and skated on it.

Grim said...

Valerie,

I agree that most of what is wanted is perfectly acceptable, a kind of Aristotelian 'society of friendship' that has every potential to be virtuous. The only thing to object to, really, is the conflation with marriage. That's a bad idea on several counts: for one thing, it requires a formal union between male and female to operate under exactly and only the same rules as a union between two people with only male natures, or only female. That can't help but degrade traditional accommodations, developed over lifetimes, that help men and women live together well.

But they are determined to claim that it is irrational even to consider these ideas, and that only hate can be a progenitor of resistance to their reforms. Well, I am indifferent to the people, whom I do not know, but not to the ideas: the ideas are bad.

If I am to be pushed off indifference with force, though, it won't be in a happy way. Sly and I are similar in certain respects, although for me the military was something I was happy to choose for myself. I don't mind being subject to discipline, so long as I elect the discipline for reasons that seem to me to be wise and honorable.

DL Sly said...

I have no problem with discipline, else I would have been hard pressed to be as accomplished an athlete and firefighter as I was. What I have a problem with is being told what to do, when to do it, what color it's has to be and where it is to be done.

Ymar Sakar said...

Dl, some military members feel the same way, that's why they turn out like Major Gant or go into Special Forces or intel work. Areas which require some individual judgment that the brass may not tolerate, but will ignore if it produces results that boost career goals.