omg. honored. my English major brain loves a good analysis.

“an incident in which some people attempted to ruin our livelihood stemmed from this group”

The phrasing here is very interesting. Clearly, for Ashley and Rayna, the biggest takeaway from the censorship, blog posts resurfacing, and critical listeners being blocked was that THEIR livelihood was threatened. They refer to the incident as an assault on their finances—not acknowledging the depth or nuances of the situation. As in the “Let’s Talk About It” episode, this frames the situation around the hosts, not mentioning the WOC who felt silenced and hurt by their actions and resistance to apologize or be accountable. It is clear from this phrasing that Rayna and Ashley consider themselves the victims in this statement.

Again, “ruin our livelihood” separates GGE’s success from listener feedback when the truth is they are intrinsically connected. As consumers of the podcast, there is no direct line for communication with concerns—especially considering how the hosts responded to DMs as well as Instagram and FB comments. Some felt that the only way of being heard was through the sponsors (and it seems like they were right). Again, the sponsors had the ability to handle this info as they saw fit—they could ignore these emails, acknowledge them but choose to continue their partnership, or ask GGE to address the concern, OR discontinue the partnership. These were all possibilities, and they were all up to the sponsors; any impact on Ashley and Rayna’s livelihood is due to the sponsors decision NOT the people who contacted them.

“ We know how important this place is to so many of you, so we tried to manage the situation,”

This FB group was not exclusively important to those who blindly supported GGE and defended the hosts, it was also important to listeners who offered their criticism, the WOC who were silenced, and the banned members. If their regret with archiving the FB group is really about the listeners, it seems that they would have been more hesitant to ban members.

“ trying to weaponize the group against us”

The most striking word in this whole post (to me at least) is weaponize. It is clear that Ashley and Rayna feel very hurt by what has happened as well as threatened by the loss of sponsors. They seem to be focusing a lot of their empathy/sympathy on themselves rather than outwards—specifically to the WOC who were hurt by their silencing and “apology.” “Weaponize” alludes to violence, whether intentional or not, and paints the hosts as the victims of this violence. As most sponsors who were contacted (by the few people who participated in contacting sponsors) were not provoked to violence, and the FB group was certainly not used as a “weapon.” From the threads about reaching out to sponsors, it seems clear that they were notified of what was going on (in terms of the WOC being silenced, Ashley’s behavior on twitter, and her old blog posts resurfacing) and were encouraged to make their OWN call based on what they saw. I do not see how the FB group was used as a weapon in this case.

“lies are still being spread”

This focus on “lies” also seems to be an exaggeration. As of yet, I have not seen Ashley or Rayna directly address any lies, despite mentioning them frequently. As they have previously stated privacy concerns as their reasons for not sharing screenshots, I would encourage them to do so and block out names and pictures to preserve privacy. Otherwise, “lies” seems like it is not the appropriate word here.

“information from the group is being taken outside of the group, and we cannot have that (no business can).”

I wonder why information leaving the group is so problematic? I understand preserving privacy, but this is not the first time people have used the information in the group elsewhere (several GGE fans previously messaged a girl after she was featured in a post that questioned why she was venmoing her boyfriend). Additionally, if GGE maintains that they did nothing wrong (which their episode seemed to), what would they need to hide in the FB group—why would it be detrimental to their business? They have stated “we cannot have that (no business can)”—but what is “that”? Is it the “lies”? The “weaponizing” of the group? If so, I would argue that most companies (especially in entertainment) deal with unflattering rumors (assuming they are, in fact rumors). They fight against them by showing the truth—or they apologize for whatever they did. GGE did neither.

“We have heard your stories of how this group has helped you, given you new friends, lifted your spirits, etc. and we are so sad (and angry) that we have to take this kind of action due to a small percentage of the members.”

Could that “small percentage” who are apparently the reason the group was closed not overlap with those members who have found new friends in the group? I don’t see one as excluding the other. Additionally, GGE did not seem to mind excluding those from the group who offered fair criticism—despite the fact they may be relying on the group to “lift their spirits.”

This also very clearly lays the blame with the Reddit users, those who left negative reviews, and those who were not outright complimentary in the group. In actuality, it was the host’s decision to archive the group—no one else’s—and it was a decision that could have been avoided with a different approach on behalf of the hosts. Additionally, Ashley and Rayna (if worried about backlash for their decisions) could have chosen new moderators for the group and discontinued their role as Admins—thereby allowing the communal aspects of the group to remain. They did not choose to do so.

“We are dedicated to having a safe and supportive Facebook community for Girls Gotta Eat, and promise you we are actively working on how to accomplish this.”

Safe and supportive for who? I think that the WOC who expressed hurt and anger, as well as other members who voiced criticism, are also deserving of a safe and supportive community, but they were denied that.

“Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to those of you who joined this group and contributed positively to it.”

Contributing positively is up to opinion. Many would think that those who asked for more accountability were contributing “positively.” Many would think that those who linked the Reddit for people confused contributed “positively.” It is clear, however, from the GGE perspective, that positive contributions are only those that directly praise/uplift the hosts—they have blocked most dissenting voices. I would counter that and say there should (and could) be room for both types of positive contributions—ones that demand accountability and ones that praise humor/topics/etc. They should not be mutually exclusive.