Are you saying that's part of the definition of harm? Are you saying that you've explicitly qualified harm as targeting individuals based on inherent characteristics when you argued that it's the separator between free speech and hate speech? Because none of those is true, and I can't find any other interpretation of the bolded sentence that makes sense.
How and why is harm, as a qualifier of hate speech, not intentional and targeted?
As to your actual point: As far as I can tell, this is the definition of harm for purposes of libel: "A statement is harmful if it seriously shames, ridicules, disgraces or injures a person's reputation or causes others to do so." Is this the definition of harm you have in mind? If not, do me a favour and tell me what it is rather than wait four days and eight posts in the discussion to bring it up. Once you have confirmed what you actually mean, I'll argue relevance to free speech and Eich's case in particular.
An interesting, close summation. However, intention needs to be mentioned as intention needs to be proved. For the sake of expediency, "A statement is harmful if it is intentionally created to seriously shame, ridicule, disgrace or injure a person's reputation or causes others to do so.” As per New York Times Co. v. Sullivan intent has to be proven.
Group Libel thus requires a group of persons to be intentionally targeted based upon common characteristic. In this case the common characteristic is an inherit characteristic (sexuality).
Entrapped as in "the act of government agents or officials that induces a person to commit a crime he or she is not previously disposed to commit"? I don't see how that applies.
Very sloppy wording on my part, mea culpa.
People not liking a decision is not equivalent to a hostile work environment.
As long as there is no hostile work environment created or encouraged by it, any employee or employer has the right to contribute to political causes, even if those causes are so badly on the wrong side of history that we are looking at months, or a few years at most, to when they will be rendered moot.
His action created prerequisite conditions which resulted in dedicated opposition among employees and half the board members outright leaving when he it was inevitable that he would become CEO.
Such did not occur when he was a member of the board. I assumed that people would ask why.
Arbitration. A board member can be overruled by other board members. It is possible to do the same to the CEO despite the appearance of representing the company. Because the board members who opposed his nomination due to his previous actions left, the question of who would act if he acted upon his hatred remains legitimate. The ensuing conflict and explicating targeting of homosexuals is enough to create a hostile work environment due to a perceived, credible threat with no means of arbitration.
Firing people because of public outcry against their personally held beliefs and outside-of-work activities is something that cuts both ways. I lost a couple of jobs (in the '80's and early '90's) because my employers discovered I was gay and a progressive who attended rallies and protests for various causes, not just LGBTQ rights. Their stated "reasons" for firing me was because my political activities could get me arrested and my name and workplace might be mentioned by the press. And because they were "family oriented" businesses. So yeah. I don't wish that kind of abuse on anyone, even a person who is my socio-political "enemy". Because this is supposed to be a free country. It will never be a free country if you are only free outside of work.
Firing you because of your inherit characteristic (sexuality) is outright discrimination. You did not pose a creditable threat to that company because
I assume that you were not placed in a unique position to represent that company (CEO) with no possible arbitration.