Call it irony, or poetic justice, perhaps, but the idea of a dating site exponentially expanding awareness of an anti-gay internet titan sounds just about right.
As you no doubt know, last Monday Mozilla, the maker of the popular Firefox internet browser, promoted Brendan Eich to become its CEO. Eich is the company’s co-founder, a huge name in the tech world, and a supporter of California’s Prop 8 ban on same-sex marriage. Shortly thereafter, one software company, started by a binational same-sex couple harmed by Prop 8, quietly announced a boycott.
LOOK: Mozilla Employees Ask New CEO To ‘Step Down’ Over Prop 8 Support
The news percolated all week, but yesterday, the online dating site OkCupid — which last month had over 910 million page views according to internet traffic company Quantcast — alerted its users to the issue by blocking traffic from all Firefox browsers with the below message, which labeled Eich “an opponent of equal rights for gay couples,” and noting that “roughly 8% of the relationships we’ve worked so hard to bring about would be illegal” if same-sex marriage were banned.
“Equality for gay relationships is personally important to many of us here at OkCupid. But it’s professionally important to the entire company. OkCupid is for creating love. Those who seek to deny love and instead enforce misery, shame, and frustration are our enemies, and we wish them nothing but failure.”
“We would therefore prefer that our users not use Mozilla software to access OkCupid,” the message says. Firefox users who insist on not changing to another browser can still access the site via a small link at the bottom of the page.
Shortly after the block went up, many news outlets reported on it — and thus, Eich’s anti-gay position. Buzzfeed, the New York Times, CNN, Forbes, the Washington Post, and countless others told of the OkCupid block, and, by way of background, Eich’s $1000 donation to support Prop 8, causing even more headaches for Mozilla.
Three of Mozilla’s six members of its board of directors quit over the weekend, because of Eich’s promotion to CEO, although the company claims their departure was not related to his anti-gay stance.
And, of course, those on the right, like NOM co-founder Maggie Gallagher, are claiming that “a growing number of people who face threats to their livelihoods unless they support gay marriage.” Of course, in the next breath, others on the right have been demanding the firing of World Vision‘s leadership team, after that billion-dollar international children’s Christian charity — for a 48-hour period until the pressure became too great — said it would hire people in same-sex marriages. They were pounded into the ground by the religious right and have lost an unknown but likely considerable amount of funding.
See how it works on the right?
Previously:
Firefox And New CEO Respond To Anti-Gay Charges By Totally Not Addressing Them