Comcast donated $18,000 to a non-profit filmmaker’s group, the ReelGrrls, dedicated to giving young girls a voice and more confidence through film-making. One of the members expressed concern over the upcoming NBC/Comcast merger on Twitter, stating her disbelief that the FCC Commissioner Meredith Baker just quit to move to Comcast after approving the merger.
Almost immediately one of Comcast’s media relations people, Steve Kipp, pulled the funding:
Given the fact that Comcast has been a major supporter of Reel Grrls for several years now, I am frankly shocked that your organization is slamming us on Twitter. I cannot in good conscience continue to provide you with funding — especially when there are so many other deserving nonprofits in town.”
Bang. There you go. Step on the dragon’s tail and you get the horns, right? Let that be a lesson to brave young women everywhere: be quiet or you won’t get the money.
Luckily, according to the Washington Post, someone higher up at Comcast contacted the group and, explaining that Steve was wrong, said:
“We are in the process of reaching out to ReelGrrls in Seattle and let them know the funding the organization has received from Comcast is not in jeopardy and we sincerely apologize for the unauthorized action of our employee,” Fitzmaurice said. “This is not the way Comcast behaves toward its nonprofit partners.”
All’s well that end’s well, it seems. However, this sort of ridiculous reactivity by a corporate sponsor, especially one as execrable as Comcast, is ridiculous and the back-pedaling shows just how poisonous most media conglomeration really is.