Kim Kardashian is already facing backlash for her business advice for women, and it doesn’t look like the backlash is ending there.
After coming under fire for her tone-deaf comments on how women can succeed in business, another issue has come to light.
Kim claims that “nobody wants to work these days,” and a former intern came forward to call out Kim and perhaps the whole Kardashian-Jenner family.
Although the Kardashians moved to Hulu because “money always matters,” apparently it didn’t occur to them that money might matter to their interns and employees.
Former unpaid intern and former employee put Kim Kardashian on blast over ‘nobody wants to work’ comments
Celene Zavala is a programming director at CNN now, but she used to be an unpaid intern and assistant for Kim Kardashian. When the Variety interview came out, Celene was quick to notice one small problem.
Celene took to Twitter to voice her comments, writing, “I worked my little college a** off for free for Kimberly. So I better get some addendum in here saying ‘except Celene, she was amazing.’”
After her tweet, Celene has locked her Twitter account and her tweets are private. However, she isn’t the only person who sent out a message regarding the Kardashians’ harsh treatment of their interns and employees.
Jessica DeFino’s Twitter bio says that she is now a beauty critic for publications such as The New York Times, Vogue, and Slate. She also writes The Unpublishable newsletter, which is described as “What the beauty industry won’t tell you, from a reporter on a mission to reform it.”
Jessica added her own experience, writing, “I was an editor on the Kardashian apps in 2015 in La, worked days nights & weekends, could only afford groceries from the 99 Cents Only Store, called out ‘sick’ more than once bc I couldn’t put gas in my car to get to the office, & was reprimanded for freelancing on the side.”
Jessica goes on to say that her job with the Kardashians showed her how famous women are pushed into impossible beauty standards and how those women push others to “keep up.” After this, she says she “pivoted to beauty media because I want to change the industry & quickly realized how f***ked up and exploitative *that* world was.”
She finished by saying that all of that is the reason she does what she does now with The Unpublishable, where she critiques the beauty industry and reports on how harmful beauty culture is.
Although Celene and Jessica have offered firsthand accounts of their experiences, there’s more proof where that came from: An old internship posting from Jenner Communications.
Jenner Communications internship ad from three years ago revealed
Reddit user Pizzatraveler12 posted three years ago about an internship post that they found “appalling.”
The post in question shows a listing for Intern – Talent Management for Jenner Communications out of Woodland Hills, CA. While that may seem innocent enough, the listing quickly goes downhill.
The listing reads that they are looking for a part-time errand runner and that the job entails running local and city errands, organizing in the home, wrapping fits, and helping with toys and motorized cars.
The requirements include being enrolled in school as a student, and explicitly state “this is an unpaid internship & will receive credit thru school only.” Other requirements are having a car, a preference for people who live in Los Angeles full-time, “not just for the summer,” and the ability to work Mondays and Wednesdays from 9:30 am to 6:00 pm.
Although the post is from three years ago, the website the post is from still exists. EntertainmentCareers.Net appears to be a real and valid place for people to search for internships and jobs.
At present time, there don’t appear to be any listings for Jenner Communications.