Just B Rant: You’re Not Alone

The events of the Danny Masterson story have left many people feeling uncomfortable, vulnerable and angry… and Bethenny is no exception.

The result, is one of her most honest and vulnerable Just B rants ever, and definitely one you need to hear. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:11):
The Danny Masterson of it all. I've had an education
on something I knew nothing about. I've thought all about this.
I've thought about so many aspects of it. I knew
Danny Masterson as a name who was on a show,
and then in the background a guy who was accused
of rape. So all of a sudden, the headlines are
saying that he's convicted of raping multiple women. And then

(00:37):
started seeing headlines about Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher, which
I'm now learning made the convictions bigger, like they brought
more attention to something that might have gone away in
a few days. They got killed and dragged because they
wrote a letter to a judge to reduce a sentence,
along with Billy Baldwin and some other people, because Danny

(01:00):
Masterson's mother asked this of them. I don't I know
that Ashton was a very close friend of Danny Masterson,
maybe a best friend. They've worked together, they ran together,
they dated girls together. They were in the same bro
pack that I guess I'm now hearing at tof for Grace,
who I love and interviewed, was not in So people

(01:21):
are speculating as to why Mila and Ashton would get involved.
And I initially thought, I understand why the mother reached out,
and I initially I didn't think that deeply into it, thought, oh,
he's kind of reaching out because maybe his friend he
believes will have been punished and suffered and pay the price.

(01:44):
And I kind of like almost understood it. I wasn't
really paying that much attention. And then I humanized it
and personalized it daughters of mothers and future mothers, and
like I was with Paul and he was reading it
to me, and I thought, what the hell. I started
digging down into the timeline and then thinking about them,
thinking about this guy free for all of these years,

(02:04):
with a kid and a wife, going to Starbucks, living
his free life for twenty years while they knew this,
and they were, or at least some of them were,
in scientology and kind of being told they would handle
it behind the scenes and not through law enforcement, and
that they had one of them had to meet with
Danny Masterson and it was all like hush hush, and
it's so Hollywood, hush hush. It's like very Harvey Weinstein,

(02:25):
very nda, very paid people off, very belittling, very entitled
Hollywood money man, power, and like, I got really angry,
and it triggered me, and it made me think of
so many things in my own life and in my
own childhood that I've never discussed, and I would if
I were those And I didn't know how rare convictions are,
but of course they are, because it occurred to me

(02:47):
how often people won't even say something because they know
no one will believe them, And then if someone does
believe them, which they won't, or belittles them, how are
they going to prove it? How are they going to
get a conviction? And then I started hearing about how
rare it is to get a conviction, the odds of
getting a conviction, and that like, then these girls who
are human beings, who were raped and held a gunpoint

(03:07):
and drugged with vomiting their hair, that they saw a
conviction and after all these years they feel a validation
and a freedom and a vindication after having to suffer
with this man paying no price, and with his wife
and then his wife's siblings husband Billy Baldwin, because Shina
Phillips is married to Billy Baldwin and China is Biju Phillips,

(03:28):
Danny's wife's sister, I know that was long winded, but
who cares? But so writing letters and this guy just
walk in the streets and then they have to hear
this really powerful couple that like are an architectural digest
and have hundreds of millions of dollars who were part
of his bro pack write letters to like belittle the

(03:50):
sentencing and what they went through. It's effectively belittling that.
It's a belittling the justice system that they fought so
hard to make work for them, that they thought would
never work for them, and that they were in the
scientileogy culled it all is crazy. So Lea Remedy wrote,
spoke out, and then I thought about what she said,
and when Christina Ricci said about just because these douchebag
grows that are sometimes nice to us doesn't mean that

(04:11):
they're not pieces of shit. And if I were those girls,
I'd want him to die and suffer and rot, not
just like go to jail, but to suffer, and every
day I'd want him to suffer more like that's the truth,
not really any compassion, just complete wanting him to suffer.
And so and I know that because I was and
this is I need to put a period at the

(04:33):
end of the sentence and start a new sentence. I
was abused for ten years. I was emotionally, verbally, mentally tortured,
hundreds of emails to the point where there was a TRORO,
there was an arrest, and for years lawyers and people said, well,
you know, I don't think he can prove it because

(04:54):
he's not like putting cigarettes out on you, and it's
just that someone being a complete asshole and a dick.
It ruled my life. It ruined my life. It doesn't
matter that I had money. You can't make judges move
more quickly or lawyers do things more quickly because you
have money. And if you have family involved in a situation,
you have to tread more lightly than if you're just

(05:16):
a normal solo person. And you get put on gag orders.
People use like gag orders so you can't speak and
NDAs so you can't speak and say things that have
happened to you. And many people, including myself, get intimidated
and think that like, you can't speak your truth about
what's happening to you because there'll be some sort of ramifications,

(05:36):
and you have to be able to speak your truth
if you're being abused, and I don't know why. I
was told by so many successful lawyers that I had
to keep quiet about certain things happening to me because
I was under an NDA and a gag order. And
it's like an abusive power And often when a person

(05:58):
isn't doesn't have MONE and they're dealing with someone who does,
it's often the person who feels like they're not in
the power position, so they'll do anything and by any
means necessary, get the power position. I've been told, you're ugly,
you're old, you're a hag, you're disgusting. I've had a
person crawl into bed next to me and stare at

(06:20):
me and refuse to get out and do and follow
me and hack me and email ad nauseum people around
me to the tune of multiple seas and desist And
had to get law involved in hundreds and hundreds of
abusive emails and texts and anti semitism and just abuse

(06:43):
and taunting and trauma and in front of you know,
there's certain things I don't want to say because of
my position as a parent, but like real mental trauma.
And I had notebooks with sections, different sections about different
types of abuse, and I was extremely organized and had
copious notes, and I did it myself. I got that

(07:05):
all together. I got that all organized, and I was
threatened and I took it to the police, and it
went all the way to the district attorney, and it
was a tro and it was an arrest, and I
was abused. And I don't talk about it enough because
it helps people to know that someone like me, who
has power and influence and money, was tortured and tortured

(07:29):
because I'm a public person, and that I would be
that this person would have me in a corner crying
and my publicers would be crying because blackmail and took
all these emails that were hacked into that we're going
to use against me, Like it was a nightmare. And
the reason I say this is that I know that
some of you know this that like it affects you
for years after, like you have a like a flint reflex.

(07:52):
You think like there are certain things that you were
told to you about how disgusting you are, and how
like certain things that when someone abuses you for so long,
you kind of even though you know it's wrong, it's
been repeated so many times that you like feel like
it's true. And it's the upside down also, where you
just you're trained to be treated a certain way and

(08:14):
told that, and then you have inability to trust other people.
You're just always waiting for someone to fuck you over
and be abusive, and you really have a lack of
ability to trust. And I grew up in a household
where I've seen like wrist slashing, the cops at my
house all the time, a woman be dragged down the
hall and beaten with a phone, you know, and called

(08:36):
the sea word, and had you know, knife fights and
punching of fists through glass and like just crazy stuff
that I've seen, like really bad. I've seen guns. I've
had the mafia chasing after members of my family, like
I've seen cocaine use and like gambling to another level.
And I never say it out loud, Like the way

(08:59):
I was raised is despicable. I shouldn't have been at
nightclubs at thirteen. I shouldn't have been alone. Yeah, at nightclubs.
I shouldn't have been alone with men that work as
gamblers or jockey agents or bookies at the race track
as my caretakers. I should That puts you in a

(09:20):
sexual position that is not appropriate. And will damage you
for the rest of your life. And I shouldn't have
been dropped off with horse grooms to live at their
house for weeks to come. I shouldn't have seen violent
physical abuse to the point where it would end up
in hospitalization. And then you'd see the same two people
having sex and hear it and be around it. Like

(09:41):
if this stuff fucks you up the rest of your life,
like sexually, emotionally, all of it. Like, it's just we
are such fragile yet also strong and survivor creatures, but
you have to fight. And the fact that these women
had to fight for themselves. They had to go and
prove it. It was on them. It was on them, the

(10:01):
burden of proof of them to provide emails and evidence
and and and people they told and what happened that
night and vomit and drugs and guns, and like they
had to prove it. I'm sure many people said they
were sluts and liars and all the shit, and that
the guy that, oh, but he's just a bro, he's
just a player. He's just like all the shit. It's
just the onus is on us, and it's often women,

(10:23):
and it's it's it's a nightmare. But you stay the course,
you be organized, you have your shit and you pull
it together, you figure it out, and there is a
way to get justice. And they got justice. So I
was wrong to think that it made sense that a
mother was gonna call Ashton and Mila. I put the
whole puzzle together, and I was dead wrong, and I

(10:46):
didn't know so much. So it was at one time
on social media where I really did experience a dialogue
and a conversation and learned a tremendous amount. I was

(11:07):
in a relationship where my daughter and I were in
a room when a family member overdosed on oxy and
dinner just went just continued as if nothing had gone wrong.
The person dropped dead, went to hospital, dropped dead. Shortly thereafter,

(11:28):
we found out that another family member had been arrested
by the FBI for being on underage girl pedophile sites.
And I kept all of this in when wanting this
to be something that wasn't to be around my child,
and I just felt like I was stifling things because
of a gag order. And it's hard when you have
a child to talk. My daughter doesn't listen to my podcast,

(11:51):
my daughter doesn't read headlines, thank God, But like, there's
I'm sure many of you have been in situations with
really challenging divorces, abusive situations, and you keep your fucking
mouth shut when you know you shouldn't because you should
be a person who uses your voice. But using your
voice isn't always easy because you have other elements. You
have family members, you have maybe parents. People protect people

(12:11):
protect parents that abuse them, People protect spouses or ex
spouses because of kids. Like, there's a million reasons why
people don't speak up. You guys are so right when
you say it's not that easy to speak out. It's
actually true. It's not easy because also you'll be criticized, scrutinized,
you go on you go on trial, and you have lawyers.

(12:32):
Then look at your character. So you wore a provocative
top and hold hell, the cocktail means you weren't raped, Like,
what the fuck? It's crazy. A lot has provoked me lately,
A lot has provoked me. This seems unrelated, it's not
in the same category. But that girl with Quel was
a person who cheated with a guy on a friend

(12:53):
it happened, then she was emotionally abused. Like that doesn't
make that okay. Either like there's just so many things
that are not okay, and I don't know why that
this like show, this podcast and interviews and something has
like broken me open lately, and I just feel like
I'm I'm not fully speaking my entire truth just because

(13:13):
I'm treading lightly. But I couldn't sleep last night. I've
been going to bed really early, and then last night
I was up till twelve. And it's something about this
Masterson thing and something about Christina Ricci like dipping in
and talking like about abuse adjacent to hers. Like we're
these women that are sort of like dabbling in it,
and we just we're not ready to just like open
our mouths and fully be about it because we have

(13:34):
to understand why, because not everything needs to be said.
But there's just like if it could help girls know that,
like you got to fucking fight for it, open your mouth,
take the heat, take the beating. It's worth it. You
could get a conviction, a vindication. But it takes a
lot of work and it takes fortitude. And so it's
correct that entitled celebrities asking for a reduction would be

(13:58):
a complete violation. I get that, And then you watch
these videos going down this rabbit hole of Ashton Kutcher
saying that he and the skuy Danny had a side
bet that he, who was nineteen years old, would French
kiss me Lacunis on the show, and they're all joking
about it, And I have a thirteen year old daughter
and they're joking about it because different shit was okay
back then. Different shit was okay back then, where like

(14:20):
it was okay to say nice twins to somebody at
an office about her tits. And you have any idea
how many producers have tried to sleep with me, how
many of my fathers, my father's horse trainer friends have
tried to sleep with me, have groped me, have actually
done inappropriate things to me as a young girl. That
like that was a different time, Like you just kept

(14:41):
your fucking mouth shut. And that's why me too was
so entirely powerful. There's a reckoning in many areas. So
it was you know, black lives matter and me too.
It's not over. It doesn't mean, oh yeah, we got
through that thing where like white men were the devil
and the enemies, and we like now we're onto a
new thing, Like no, we're going deeper. It's not fucking okay.

(15:01):
So it wasn't okay for two celebrities and I was wrong,
And it's not okay for a girl to be abused
emotionally on national intelligence, on national television, you know, and
people profit off of it. Sorry, it's not it's not.
When I started this podcast, I said, I checked my
bank account. I'm good. I have a voice, I have

(15:21):
a microphone, and my bank account. The checks have cleared.
So if I go down, I'm going down in a
fucking blaze of glory having said my truth and not
just stifling myself all the time for fear of cancelation.
And you signed up for this. These people didn't sign
up for all this shit. If you're being abused and
you're being treated poorly, you're not. You didn't sign up
for it, no matter what, no matter what you wanted,

(15:42):
no matter what fame you wanted, no matter what money
you wanted, no matter what, you didn't fucking sign up
for it.