[1] some things left unsaid

After an LPN owner was accused of domestic violence, I expressed concerns to the LPNers heading ‘SPUN’ (a show on missing women+, where I appeared monthly)--I was asked to leave. These are my thoughts

Watch the free video version of this post here
If you haven’t checked it out, here’s E.J. Dickson’s Rolling Stone article on the Last Podcast Network. Sara Benincasa, who came forward with her own story about Ben Kissel, wrote about coming forward in her Substack,

Saratonin

NOTE, 10/15: All references to Ben’s most recent ex and accuser have been edited at her request, and all named references changed to ‘T.’ For her story in her own words, you can refer to the above article.

~

Do you remember those pressure cooker bombings in Chelsea in like 2016? Maybe only if you lived in NY. Nobody died. But it was a thing; that night I was on the subway below Chelsea with my cousin Emma (she was my IDOL in the way only a big cousin can be). Our train was held there for a lonnng while, cause of the bomb, and that evening she gave me one of her little white-wired ear pods so we could kill time with one of her favorite shows. “Last Podcast on the Left” (I didn’t ‘get’ podcasts, but I was game to like her likes). It was loud, even through one ear & train noise. It was kinda funny and very crude (I think they were yelling over the 9-1-1 call from when that chimp ate a lady’s face?)

A year later— I was freelance writing about stuff for Elite Daily to supplement my limited funds and social circle in law school— I got the chance to profile Last Podcast’s Ben Kissel. He was running for office in Brooklyn, so I interviewed him. He also needed campaign help, and my cool cousin thought he was cool, so obviously, I did that. Then, his friends needed interviews for a documentary about his campaign, so I did that and the rest, as they say, is history. 

…Actually, I was so stoked to have some new friends. Since moving to NY, I had only really met other law students (and was too burned out during school days to effectively socialize), and the little creative freak in me felt really malnourished in the legal world. Plus, my cool cousin had moved away. Here was a group of creative freaks, and ones who actually seemed professionally successful AND engaged in politics. Wayy better than I would’ve expected from the killer-chimp hollering— I felt I’d maybe found a social circle AND a fulfilling direction in which to take my eventual career in one fell swoop. 

By the campaign’s end (in Ben’s defeat, sorry for the spoiler), I’d developed growing friendships with many of LPN’s New York cohort. The network was bi-coastal, but has since migrated its entirety to LA.

For the better part of a decade now, my personal and professional bonds with LPN have continued to deepen. I still, I will always, feel so much gratitude and nostalgia for so many things … many indelible memories with many people. The affection I still feel may sound implausible but god help me, it’s true.

Over the years I’ve been a guest on 21 LPN programs (20 podcast or streaming episodes, and the Twitch Subathon) including “Some Place Under Neith” (‘SPUN’), “Fraudsters,” “Page 7,” and the Last Podcast Network channel. All of my work with them has been unpaid, but I still was (and am) grateful.

These balances don’t tip immediately or overnight-- for a long time, I was mostly ‘gruntled! For the experience, exposure, & what I’d hoped was mutual respect and friendship. Jackie wrote me a recommendation for my Master’s program. Natalie and I were together (at When We Were Young fest!) when my grandma died-- during MCR’s “Helena,” no less. Two co-owner couples have let me stay at their beautiful homes. I dated and fell in love with their former producer, Travis Morningstar, and he moved in with me when quarantine started in 2020.
Because of Brooke, (and thus b/c of Last Podcast), I got to find and meet my late uncle’s partner who nursed him until his death from AIDS. Carolina joined us for a cautiously celebratory beach trip post-COVID, when two girls were swept out to sea right in front of us… we all sprang into action, but only one girl was found alive.

Even Ben could be so very kind and warm. Ben at his best is welcoming, silly, protective, and encouraging. He didn’t always reply or show up, but when he did, he was often the first to be amiable, loyal, and inclusive to me. He was the one who made the biggest misstep(s) here, but one reason (of many) driving me to write this is to clarify that-- in my opinion-- he is more one straw (of many) that broke the camel’s back than he is one, aberrant bad apple spoiling the bunch. Oof. That’s enough metaphors for now.

In short, I’ve lived a strange and wonderful lifetime with these people, and I feel so conflicted as I write this. When I contemplated whistle-blowing up my life-- between Natalie’s first two suggestions that I stop asking about Ben or consider leaving SPUN, and her final directive that I must go--  I reached a sinking realization.

The allegations of abuse (that to me sounded credible and known to leadership for longer than the two weeks that’d already passed since T went public), and then LPN’s public silence on the abuse allegations for too long, the vague “rehab” story with ‘coincidental’ timing, the behind-the-scenes lack of clarity, and seeming lack of PR or legal directives or other signs of an adequately coordinated, formalized effort… it all fit a pattern that for years, I’d tried not to see. Remember, in ~2020, Ben himself was deputized as the LPN “HR department.” As someone who’s too abnormal for traditional workplaces myself, I hate arbitrary norms, but some formalities have become norms because they protect people. 

As LPN faced an opportunity to make a definitive turn (towards growth, accountability, and transparency), I watched each successive, lagging misstep with such dismay.

LPN’s silence and inaction had already yielded tangible harm to someone-- T’s business and personal platforms had been targeted by LPN fans for weeks, gotten consequently deleted twice over, and she was posting videos pleading with leadership, in tears and obvious terror, to help her. And all I got “behind the scenes” when I asked Natalie was…the Ben’s-going-to-rehab (for 4 weeks) line. She asked me to “understand that Ben going to rehab is a much larger reason than [T],” and called T “miserable” and “a train wreck,” before asking me not to bring Ben up to her or Henry again.¹

While her quick default to anger was not quite new to me, this was too much to digest from the woman I knew as a host of a victim’s advocacy show, on a true crime network co-owned by her spouse.

My only choices were (1) say nothing, fall in line, and protect what remained of my unpaid role on the network (because to me, the already imbalanced friendship element had faded), and on a show whose victim-advocacy mission felt increasingly hollow. At this point, T-- previously a stranger-- had seen my comments of support and reached out through a mutual contact, then called me very upset, asking for my help getting through to LPN to call off the fans. Nobody at the network had spoken to her or about her in the over two weeks since she went public. She couldn’t work, she feared for her safety, and even her landlord had been contacted.
Choice (2) thus was voice my discomfort with LPN’s handling of the allegations (and later, of my questions and open support), and leverage my relationship with the network and relative “credibility” as a lawyer to take a public stand for T, one that would be harder to ignore. But I KNEW, that if I did that, I would have to do it full-throatedly to make any difference. I couldn’t leave quietly, I couldn’t be obedient and wait hopefully to be let back in, I couldn’t excuse behavior or stay neutral…the only way to call attention to a troubling pattern was to fully, loudly detail the troubling pattern. Harm-reduction felt impossible.  

Though I made the decision I did, I know from personal experience^ how easy it is to stay in a holding pattern, even if you know parts of it are “troubling.”

I don’t think any LPN-ers are bad people (even Ben). If any factor had tipped--if anyone at LPN had reached out to me with kindness OR a professional remedy (to this point, none have since my first video & most of LPN and friends unfollowed me en masse); … or if they’d acknowledged T or their own accountability earlier; hell, if I’d been under paid contract, potentially-- I might’ve made the decision to stay in the phalanx, too.

They took chances on me, and it turns my stomach to know they likely regret letting me in. But outside my own paradigm, it’s another kind of disappointing that, by all appearances, their only reaction to my actions, treatment, comments… is regret for ever letting me in. Ultimately ya know, nobody has a come-to-Jesus moment on someone else’s timeline. I can at least appreciate that, the night after I pushed Natalie about my concern for T and she asked me definitively to leave SPUN, LPN posted their first acknowledgement of T and her harassment (albeit in an Instagram story).²

Before plunging into my “why,” &more specifics, I’ll reiterate that I’m not T’s lawyer, I’ve never been T’s lawyer, and I’ve never been involved with anyone at LPN in a legal capacity. In fact, to my knowledge & as of last week, T has not initiated any civil or criminal litigation with anyone at or adjacent to LPN. I was not compensated for the Rolling Stone piece.
None of my guest appearances on LPN were under any employment/consultant contract & I was never paid for anything I did for/with LPN. (The more I learn about financials and pay disparities from different folks, the more that…irks me).

While I do traffic in legal commentary, this story (and my opinions thereon) bears repeating for other reasons, like illustrating where/how law & policy can fall short. Knowledge of those gaps and their human costs help us learn to make effective progress.

I want to be really clear that none of my statements here should be taken as accusations of criminal or civil liability. I want to emphasize this, because some phrases (like ‘domestic violence’ or ‘willful blindness’ or ‘reckless’) can hold legal AND conversational meaning. Here, I always mean the latter

I want-- as I wantED whenever I had prior discomforts w/ LPN, but worried expressing them would just get me booted for making waves (hah) -- to be wrong, still! My own feelings are still hurt, sure, but that’ll heal on its own (like 75 ppl in my family have died recently, so I have bigger emotional fish to fry these days).

The fact remains that the true crime genre bears a unique ethical responsibility. Shows like “Last Podcast on the Left” and “Some Place Under Neith,” respectively, tell stories of famous (usually male) murderers and their victims (often female, often sex workers or domestic partners), and stories of missing women. If hosts of LPN shows like “Page 7” or “No Dogs in Space” had been the ones speaking and acting in ways so anathema to survivor wellness, respect, and protection, I likely wouldn’t be writing this. Comedians speaking about everyday fare don’t have to be trauma-informed. Comedians speaking about, and making a LOT of money on, victims’ stories must do better.

&I keep getting stuck on the ol' Watergate question: what did they know, and when did they know it? (by ‘know’ I also mean ‘should have known,’ because those in power have a level of responsibility at odds with willful blindness). In her Rolling Stone article, E.J. Dickson reported speaking to 13 people who, over the last decade, had either been alleged victims of Ben’s physical transgressions or were aware that he had a reputation of hurting women. So many other questions flow from there. If LPN could comment³ vaguely and publicly last week, right after Rolling Stone asked for comment, that they were parting ways with Ben… why couldn't they say that immediately after they learned of this abuse? Their comment came a month after T went public, and made no mention of her or her allegations. Why couldn't they have started whatever supposed extrication process, privately, when they learned, and made that vague parting-ways statement then? Were there other abusive workplace/work-event incidents that never went public, and were thus tolerated (that I can partially answer, as -I- know there were there were plenty of other instances⁴ of behavior that would've gotten the offender removed from virtually any other workplace; and I know there are legal ways for majority owners to remove an abuser from a workplace without publicly naming a victim) --

basically, if they could do this now, they could've done this long ago.
And if they didn’t choose to do that, I struggle to think of a better explanation for continuing to platform and enable an abuser than... money. I similarly wish I could think of a better reason for prolonged silence and ambiguity than preventing financial sponsors and stakeholders from finding out that an abuser was facilitated in their midst for so long. Thus, I keep yelling.

This’ll likely be a multi-part thing, and it’ll likely incur more wrath from some. I’m still scared of that, because while I am a lawyer, I’m also millions of dollars lighter and a decade younger than the LPNers…and some fans can be downright terrifying. But my motivations are not vitriolic ones. I hope folks can walk away with a greater understanding of

(1)  Unethical practices; which are a greater concern in a true crime network that profits on victim’s stories.

(2)  Inequities and power imbalances: treatment according to gender, money/class divides, age, family relationship

(3)  Hypocrisy & a mismatch between preaching and practicing

(4)   A workplace culture of silence and willful blindness (in a multi-million dollar business still run like a friend group)

Power differentials are too tricky to suggest a clear “right” and “wrong” even in JUST social, or JUST professional, situations, so take all I have to say on them with a hefty grain of salt.

But, it’s risky to blend professional and social worlds-- especially without the structure, differentiation, or official oversight that could make power imbalances more safely navigable.

I’ll use myself as an example: I wanted to participate in the LPN Subathon, so when Natalie texted me two days before the event that they needed bodies, I made last minute plans to come out for the event. And it was an amazing experience, I loved it! It was even during my segment that LPN hit their financial subscription goal for the event (obviously I don’t take full credit for that, but maybe some?). Only… it cost me almost $750, and I wasn’t paid a cent.

Now, would I ever have sacrificed the experience if forced to choose between going and saving $750 (a big number for me)? Hell no!!! It meant fun and camaraderie with my friends, and professional exposure + useful contribution to the business. But there were parties to that event who had control over decision-making AND didn’t leave in a big financial hole (quite the opposite).

&I think it’s possible for a business to have more controls, be more careful, so that less-powerful contributors don’t have to make such difficult choices. Anyone in my position, or ‘lower tier’ with LPN, probably wouldn’t feel comfortable asking for a better deal w/o risking social and professional fallout.

New LPN shows are still just different permutations of the same straight, mostly male, mostly white friend group-- with nepotistic exceptions that prove the rule when the men in power cycle in their female family members. Ben’s ostensible replacement on Last Podcast is Ed Larson, another such network staple. Ed also hosted the recent LPN “Subathon,” and brought along the guest host, his cousin and network regular Jeff Ross (more on that later- for now, just Google Jeff Ross + 15-year-old).

The problem is not just the uniform demographics-- there are straight white men in power who stand up for marginalized groups, who have trauma-informed perspectives on victims, who pay all contributors equitably, who grow up and out of shitty paradigms.

When I was still convincing myself all was well, I justified that they, too, were the type who’d grown out of their shitty paradigms, because they’d come this far and they’d sure gotten better at not voicing the shitty things…

But beyond platitudes, where words must give way to actions, I’m not sure.

I’ve gotten so tired from the acrobatics required to keep extending these people the benefit of the doubt. At LPN, I fear those outside of family are disposable.

And hey, folks are entitled to operate that way in strictly social contexts.
But when social and professional are inextricably tangled, and the business side has no oversight or protections (like HR, a workplace legal dept or business manager…really anyone who can enforce standards of work behavior) disaster is inevitable.

~

I wasn’t surprised to hear about the allegations against Ben-- or that Ben had done something of enough gravity (and it had been fumbled and dropped for long enough) to threaten the company at large.

I haven’t been able to listen to Last Podcast since knowing the group personally. I tried to return to it, a number of years ago, and heard a bit about Ben not owning towels.
In her livestream, T remembered that they’d all joke about concerning habits, tips of icebergs, and she just couldn’t-- “it’s not funny,” she said through tears, “it’s just sad.”

It’s not funny, it’s just sad.

I’m not writing this with the goal of destroying beloved fandoms or making it hard for folks to return to listening, but if you leave here feeling too disillusioned to laugh with them anymore, I guess I’m saying I really, truly get it.
_________________

Paid subscribers can watch it all in videoooo that includes texts and such as reference-points, plz don’t share, I’m scared.

1. Friday, 9/15 (T clarified she hadn’t blocked anyone anywhere, but her instagram was disabled by fans— a deleted account can look like a blocked account on perfunctory search)

2. Mon. 9/18, I told Natalie “concerned about fans…I really am worried about ensuring [T]’s not targeted too much bc she seems pretty fragile.” Natalie then told me she was “extremely uncomfortable to have [me] on [her] show” (more details filling this out to come b/c there’s some detail-heavy back-and-forth, BUT) that evening, Last Podcast posted this in their Instagram story (not on a grid post).

3. Shortly after Rolling Stone reached out to LPN for comment (thus alerting them to the critical piece’s impending publication), Last Podcast posted this (underlines added by meee for particularly nettlesome language)

4. E.g.  bullying the network’s executive producer, Travis Morningstar (paid less than a quarter of a co-owner’s annual salary, by my understanding) into regularly breaking COVID quarantine in spring 2020 because the co-owner/podcaster never learned how to use his own recording equipment; getting belligerently drunk and lost on tour and missing engagements .. and these are just the ones I’ve vetted for public consumption.