Ben Smith Accused of BenSmithing BuzzFeed Employees: ‘Co-Workers Keep Disappearing’

It looks like what we have here is another case of, “Who are you going to believe, sleazy Ben Smith or your lying eyes?” Like thousands of BuzzFeed posts, BuzzFeed employees are apparently disappearing without any kind of explanation. The left-wing site is consolidating two of its verticals, people are being let go, and according to reporting from Yahoo News, “some were not told why they were being fired.”

Four former BuzzFeed employees, speaking to Yahoo Finance on the condition of anonymity, say that this is commonplace at the nine-year-old company, where management has continually reorganized to accommodate growth.

BuzzFeed claims there were no firings; these former employees are examples of “regular attrition.”

Nevertheless, according to Yahoo, in a public forum where employees can submit questions, BuzzFeed employees have repeatedly complained to editor-in-chief Smith about a phenomenon where, “My co-workers keep disappearing.” Smith responds with, “That doesn’t happen here, anyone who is let go has gone through months of performance reviews, they’ve been put on notice, they know why they’re being let go.”

These employees respond with “That is just not true.”

And yet, in a internal memo obtained by Yahoo, Smith appears to contradict himself, “What we try to do, and will try to get better at: Make sure things don’t come out of a blue sky, and if things aren’t working, that you know from your editor that there’s an issue and you’re trying to fix it.”

Multiple sources told Yahoo that people continue to disappear without warning.

With the possible exception of Washington Post fact checker Glenn Kessler, there is no one in the media with less credibility than Ben Smith.

And now it looks as though after he is done physically BenSmithing his own employees out the door, he BenSmiths an explanation to cover it all up.

 

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC