Software, especially open-source has an over-representation of people that identify as LGBTQ. Brendan openly signaled that he thought a good subset of his employees did not deserve the same rights as others. I don't see how he could have been an effective CEO after doing that.
"Brendan openly signaled that he thought a good subset of his employees did not deserve the same rights as others."
Why is this such a bad thing or such a big deal? We CONSTANTLY allow this to happen to identity groups that we feel its justified against. For example, our society (U.S.) thinks that the identity group of younger workers should not enjoy the same protections against age discrimination as the identity group of older workers.
Another example of this type of discrimination is that its OK to charge someone a 'cover' to enter a bar based on the immutable characteristic of their gender but not the immutable characteristic of their race. Society finds it normal, acceptable, and moral when Men are discriminated against as an identity class but when that same standard is applied to race? Well, we all know how that goes...
It would've been a huge liability for Mozilla. An employer is not allowed to discriminate on sexuality. Fire any LGBTQ employee, and there's now a decent chance that Mozilla will now have to prove in court that it didn't have anything to do with the CEO openly hating gay people and creating a hostile work environment.