I'm only pointing out the inconsistency in your description of the encounter. Your whole stance here seems to be "I'm just describing facts" when asked to stop, so I would think it's important to you to know when you're apparently not doing so.
And even if it is the facts or true, is it important to share your experience? Is it important to counter someone's good experience with your own bad experience?
FWIW, I know nothing of Zig or anyone in this thread: hiding behind "it's just the facts" to be unkind I find is unhelpful. ("But I'm not being unkind! We're just having a rational discussion!" I hear you say. I disagree. It's never just that.)
Edited to add: I'm leaving this here as-is, but I regret posting it. I should have recognized that this would be fruitless and adds nothing to the thread, and should have never engaged.
There are (at least) two different conventions when it comes to titling: headline and sentence. It's a matter of taste and something that changes over time. I'm not sure if there's a reason deeper than that. In general, I think it's good practice for a publication (or site) to have a style manual for consistency, but just as there are separate AP[0] and Chicago[1] style manuals, it's unlikely you'll see one global style.
Thanks for clarifying. I read your comment as to mean mods updated the content of comments. All of the items you mention are actions the mods engage in in their role as moderators, which they themselves have described elsewhere.
Would you elaborate on this? What are your examples? Mods are known to update submission titles (in accordance with the guidelines), but I'm unaware of any other content changes they make.
I've been fortunate that I haven't had to deal with this firsthand, which is exactly why I'm asking. Thanks for taking the time to get back to me. I appreciate it.
I'm sorry if I wasn't clear in my comment. I'm not taking a position on what happened in with respect to Brendan Eich in particular. As I wrote, I think figuring out how to balance this is a difficult issue. Given the amount of discussion this instance in particular and similar situations, I think it's far from settled for a lot of people. At least there's not wide agreement.
You bring up good points regarding the training and the costs of replacing people. Those costs are balanced against the value brought to the company, right?
One of the reasons I think it's difficult to discuss as when people start giving examples as to what should be tolerated and what shouldn't, some people are going to think it's absurd, and take issue with the discussion as a whole.
For the sake of argument, I'll try.
Let's say one of the goals of the company is to provide honeymoon packages and the target market is gay couples. An employee makes a donation in support of something like Prop 8. Is there a conflict there? Are they a good fit for the company? If not, should they look for someone else? Perhaps the person shouldn't have been hired in the first place. Should the company be able to make that decision based on knowing the candidate made such a donation? Should the candidate look elsewhere and not consider a position at the company? Can a company's goals change over time? Can a company's goals include those broader than just the product they market?
You mention "let him do his job of managing a technical company". I think there's tension here, as well (independent of the situation at Mozilla). People are not purely rational beings. How people get along in the workplace is important to its overall effectiveness. What's acceptable in one workplace is not going to be acceptable in another, similar to how people have different circles of friends. Should companies be able to hire for fit? Fire for it?
I think there are some very real questions there. And a lot of contentious issues. Please don't assume my answers to all of these questions, either. You're guaranteed to be wrong as I haven't come to a firm conclusion on all of them :)
If toleration of political opinion is a settled issue for you, please share :) Can you think of a political position that should not be tolerated?
The whole "what's legal is not necessarily moral or ethical" is another kettle of fish, which is the point I was making initially. Your point about what's moral for some people and ethical for others points to some agreement on your part, doesn't it? Perhaps one difference is whether or not we agree that a company can or should have an ethical purpose or should reflect the ethics of the people who own the company or work of the company. Or do business for the company, for that matter.
I don't expect you to have answers to all of these questions. I'd be surprised if you did. If you don't think these are valid questions, I'd be interested to hear which ones are invalid and why.
Cool. I can see that for the purposes of this discussion. Is this only a workplace issue in your mind? At least for right now? Other aspects on my mind is what kind of heuristic do you use to determine if the political opinion is fireable? Or rather, it's not only what the opinion is (there are a lot of controversial political issues), or the opinion itself, it's the expression of it, right? For example, something said (some sort of speech act), or some other behavior.
"Purging people based on political opinions is exactly how democracy is supposed to function."
What does "purging" mean to you in this case? You've now provided two examples: firing and voting. What level of political disagreement justifies what actions? I don't think there's widespread agreement, and it's something I'm trying to figure out for myself.
I mentioned in my first comment that I think there's a lot of uncharitable parsing and cherry picking going on, all around. I think that's going on here, just as I think that's going on in a lot of political discussions, and it's obscuring a lot of very real issues that people generally agree on and increasing polarization.
I'm getting that impression from you in this discussion as well. Given the email as a whole and his follow-up, I don't get the impression of a CEO that would have someone fired over either of the T-shirt examples you've given. So far in this thread, that's been implied by your argument, and that's the only thing you've put forth. I also don't think that's everything you have to say on the topic, and I'm not going to assume what that is. Building straw men is in no way a useful exercise for constructive discussion.
I think there's a lot to be said for your statement:
"Social commentary on the current attempt to render expressions of affinity for one's "cultural background, language, and heritage" as socially unacceptable, and indicative of regressive and/or antisocial mindset"
I also don't see that being fairly applied across the board by a lot of people making arguments like this.
As stated before, I don't know that much about GrubHub or the CEO. If there is other evidence based on his behavior or experiences at GrubHub, that would add to this discussion of the letter and its affect on GrubHub. As I don't have any, I don't have anything more to say on the topic.
showdead can also be be useful if you're new to participating so you can see what types of comments get banned and determine what the community generally finds unacceptable.
"I would agree that they are distinct, but very much related."
Sure. If they weren't, you wouldn't have put forth the example you did.
"how about this t-shirt of Mickey/Heart/Flag:"
I don't understand what you're getting at (nor am I interested in defining the working attire policy of GrubHub). My point was that there can be a meaningful distinction between nationalism and wearing a "I <3 America" T-shirt, which it looked like you were equating. If you have a point, please make it.
"Will wearing a t-shirt with "I heart America" get you fired at GrubHub? It's on Matt's list of no-nos: nationalist."
Nationalism and expressing love or pride in one's country (patriotism) are two different things, I think. They can be felt simultaneously but can also be expressed separately. Nationalism focusses more on cultural background, language, and heritage, which "I ︎<3 America" doesn't necessarily convey.
I don't know how all of this will shake out at GrubHub. The most I've heard of the company has been around this incident. There's a lot of close and sometimes purposefully uncharitable parsing of language and cherry-picking going around in general.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Berners-Lee