Nonprofit sees Comcast funding yanked, restored after critical Tweet (updated)

Comcast saw fit last week to defund a nonprofit it supported after a critical tweet and at least one Comcast employee thought it was the right move. ReelGrrls, a nonprofit for teenage girls supported by Comcast, have had its funding pulled, and then reinstated, in the last few days after it expressed incredulity at former FCC Commissioner Meredith Baker’s new job at Comcast after she had helped approve its merger with NBC.

Comcast and Baker have come under scrutiny for Baker’s juxtaposition of actions, not least by ReelGrrls, a nonprofit to which Comcast had pledged to give $18,000 for its summer program. A member of ReelGrrls tweeted on May 12 an expression of indignant surprise at Baker’s hiring, a move that did not go unnoticed by Comcast.

A short time later, the Seattle-based nonprofit received an e-mail from Steve Kipp, a vice president of communications for Comcast based in Lynnwood, WA, stating that he "cannot in good conscience continue to provide [ReelGrrls] with funding—especially when there are so many other deserving nonprofits in town," given that "[ReelGrrls] is shaming us on Twitter."

Thursday afternoon, Comcast spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice said that this had been Comcast’s mistake, and they did not intend to defund ReelGrrls. “At the corporate level, we had no information on this action taken by a single employee in Seattle,” Fitzmaurice told Ars. In a released statement, Fitzmaurice noted that Comcast apologized sincerely for the “unauthorized action” of their employee.

Update: Reel Grrls is saying “thanks, but no thanks” to Comcast. Saying that Comcast’s funding revocation and subsequent reinstatement raised “serious questions” about how corporations are able to “stifle public discussion,” the nonprofit group is cutting ties with the cable giant and will go after other funding sources.

"We appreciate Comcast’s desire to rectify this situation and hope to encourage them to craft a corporate policy that clearly defends freedom of expression in order to ensure that this situation does not arise again," said Teresa Mozur, administrative manager of Reel Grrls in a statement. "[I]t is exactly this type of public debate that can be squelched by mergers that threaten to raise the price for access to information, limit consumers’ choices in entertainment and news and give large media corporations the power to decide which opinions will see the light of day."

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