Ella May Ding called out after comparing cheap labour to ‘hustle culture’ at PLT event
She also admitted to loving the Joe Rogan podcast… yikes
MAFS Australia star Ella May Ding is being publicly dragged after she made a shocking comparison between “hustle culture” and minimum wage workers during a PrettyLittleThing event. Ella May Ding was invited to be a keynote speaker at the event, called Becoming a Girl Boss, during which she spoke about making her way up the ladder to become a corporate girlie.
However, she’s now facing huge backlash after making various controversial comments during the event. According to news.com.aus, she described to the audience how she learned the importance of being a “girl boss” after opening a call centre in Asia where the staff “weren’t getting paid a lot” and wouldn’t ask questions.
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She told the other girls at the event: “Up at sunrise, home at dawn, no questions asked – and they’re getting paid not a lot compared to what we were getting paid. So I really respected their work ethic. … I’m big with the hustle culture.”
According to SoDramatic!, one attendee even claimed Ella was “boasting” about underpaying her workers. They admitted: “Ella said she opened the call centre in her early 20s in the Philippines. She was boasting about how she underpaid and overworked her staff, who worked 12-hour days, seven days a week for basically nothing.”
Another source claimed: “[Ella] was really proud of how she profited from cheap labour”, and used her call centre as an “inspiring example” of how we all need to “hustle more.” They added: “She had no idea how problematic it sounded. She boasted about it as if it were some big achievement to be proud of. She’s seriously so uneducated.”
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To make matters worse, Ella even apparently admitted to “loving” the Joe Rogan podcast, declaring: “I love Joe Rogan. I listen to podcasts that a lot of these women wouldn’t listen to. He gets people on to talk about things that are very controversial that lots of people don’t agree with. That’s what podcasting is!”
Fans have been quick to call Ella out for her comments on her Instagram page, with one user writing: “Getting paid off the backs of hard-working people in third-world countries shame on you you’re not hustling you’re exploiting.”
The reviews for her podcast with Domenica Calarco have also been bombarded, with another fan writing: “Find it totally hypocritical that this podcast endorses the position of exploiting women in Asia when setting up the call centre. Absolutely shameful and not cool to boast about earning your fortune off the back of other women when you have had such privilege.”
For all the latest MAFS Australia news and gossip about Ella May Ding, like The Holy Church of MAFS on Facebook.
Related stories recommended by this writer:
• All the messy MAFS Australia 2024 cast drama that’s gone down since the show finished
• First MAFS Australia 2025 bride revealed as fitness blogger and influencer Rhi Disljenkovic
• Ella May Ding is being called out after using an ableist slur in an Instagram story
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