I strongly doubt there is anything insidious going on.
That’s not the issue. The issue is not what the organizers of EAG are doing in secret, but that they are doing stuff in secret.
I had a hard time finding what “government house utilitarianism”
The idea behind government house utilitarianism is that there is stuff that is morally acceptable to do in private that is not morally acceptable to do in public. Because if it was done in public, people would know about it, and that would lead to bad consequences. (See here).
That’s not the issue. The issue is not what the organizers of EAG are doing in secret, but that they are doing stuff in secret.
The idea behind government house utilitarianism is that there is stuff that is morally acceptable to do in private that is not morally acceptable to do in public. Because if it was done in public, people would know about it, and that would lead to bad consequences. (See here).