I don’t agree that this relationship was handled tastefully. As Demi was trying to find herself, Christian was brought in. At that point she joined the cast, not as a contestant but as an adjunct cast member. The two became a couple and at that point their presence became kind of an oddity. They were not playing the game like everyone else. They were set aside. Their relationship was, in a sense, turned into an exhibition piece. Not sensitive by my standards to single them as the odd ones out.
5
Hallmark can’t even handle actual pagan or witch stuff in a show called The Good Witch!
I am waiting for the first gay couple to appear on the Hallmark Channel. That would be a feat.
10
It is a waste of love between two people of the same sex.
Looking at the accompanying photograph, it would be so much more pleasing and normal to replace one of the women with a male companion.
Whoever heard of a magnet with two north poles or two south poles?
Whoever heard of two male sperms or two ova being able to produce a viable offspring?
Don't try to outwit Nature.
1
Is this your very first encounter with same-sex couples? Does it really sound that strange and ab-normal to you?
I will, however, be pondering the expression “a waste of love” for a while. I don’t think it applies to same-sex couples. But I’m still trying to think of when love is ever a waste.
63
Perhaps they don’t give a fig what you find “pleasing and normal”? Just a thought.
50
@Andrew
Good thing you are here to judge.
14
Of course they find two gorgeous women. To be expected.
11
That's show biz.
4
Good luck to them as the First Couple of Lesbian America, which is obviously the appellation they're aiming for. Did anyone actually watch this thing progress? One of them had gotten herself into a "relationship" with a male contestant in "Paradise." She begins to have qualms about it because of the woman she'd been dating at home. At which point, the gal in question- who had never been a contestant on The Bachelor- suddenly shows up, provoking the required element of suspense for the "surprised (!)" bachelorette and leading to the kind of de rigeur happy ending that encompasses everyone except that guy she'd been dating on the show. And even he reluctantly gives his blessing as he drives off into the sunset. Just like real life! (And it will still be a cold day in Heck before this franchise casts a suitably hot gay man or woman as its leading "character.")
5
Fall in love? Who would go on nationwide tv to explore a real relationship? These are just more attention seeking narcissists, gay, straight, whatever- watch if that's what entertains you.
13
"As two slim, white, traditionally beautiful 20-something women, Burnett and Haggerty fit the show’s rigid beauty standards to a T. "
Of course, two blond bombshells.
This is not Reality TV, it's Fantasy TV.
To borrow a popular anti-drug marketing phrase: "This is your brain and this is your brain on TV."
12
So many questions:
How would a gay/lesbian version of Bachelor work?
Do they revisit past season Bachelor couples to see how these marriages work out?
Do they always end in engagements? ...that lead to a real marriage?
Do they show the weddings?
Do heterosexual men watch Bachelor?
1
Okay, let me help.
Yes, these shows typically end in real engagements. This season of Bachelor in Paradise ended with three engagements, including Kristian and Demi.
Yes, the weddings are shown on the show. They are often officiated by the host, Chris Harrison. Half the guests are people from "Bachelor Nation."
Yes, they do check back. On last night's finale, they had three married couples who met on Bachelor in Paradise. Two of the couples have children, the other, newlywed couple is "trying." All three of their weddings were part of the show.
Yes, heterosexual men watch The Bachelor shows. I watch with a straight, cis male friend (I'm a straight cis woman) and my brother watches it with his wife. I actually don't know any gay men who watch The Bachelor because there's absolutely nothing in it for them. I think your question is pretty old-fashioned and homophobic. Just because something is campy and romantic doesn't mean that only gay men and women will watch it.
21
The vulnerability and conflicted feelings expressed, especially by Demi, were so authentic. We remarked that it was beautiful to see this lesbian relationship develop and grow. We always enjoy the show for the psychological reactions of the participants, but this was extra special.
10
I don’t understand the concept of “hate-watching”. I don’t have time to watch even good stuff.
Best of luck to these two ladies!
13
Fantastic. Now how about an interracial couple? I suspect THAT is a bridge too far, even in 2019.
9
Actually, Rachel Lindsay, the first black Bachelorette, just married Bryan Abosolo, a man of Colombian descent (whom she met on the show).
9
@John there were interracial couples. Many of them.
12
People will watch two women but they will never watch two men in a romantic moment. Don't know why but the ratings will sink.
6
@Julia So true! I often think about that. Heterosexual men will even find two women together titillating, but then (at least pretend to) be repulsed by two men. Crazy in this day and age.
12
More fake love from a fake reality show.
America loves this kind of stuff.
Should help goose the ratings a bit which is what it's all about anyway.
8
So trendy (eye roll).
6
other than the initial LUST of hetro 'relationships' the long term is really a friendship. And same-sex or not that is what is more important.
5
Don't be too quick to write off reality TV shows. We now live in an era where the boundary between TV reality shows and real life have blurred to the point where they cannot be distinguished from each other. Many lasting relationships and real families have sprung from the Bachelor series and the executive branch of our government is now essentially just one big reality TV show.
10
While it's true that men are attracted to lesbian couples for obvious reasons (there's no denying it, a whole subset of the adult entertainment industry revolves around it), it's also true that most people that aren't prejudiced bigots will react positively when they see a true love relationship blossoming between two people, regardless of the sex. The respect and appreciation shown towards these two women is a very refreshing and positive thing to witness. Sometime even trash reality TV can have a positive side.
29
If any part of the real world is reflected in media then credit is due. For it is in seeing and hearing how the world is that we know wherefore we go.
7
Good for them, but for real ratings they need to find a baker who refuses to make the cake!
(just kidding, of course, but this is television . . . )
15
Re: "...of a live audience and gave Burnett a ring of her own. “The hate is drowned out by all the love,” Burnett later said..."
I didn't see this cause I / We DON'T watch, (so, called), 'reality' programming, but by, all means, 'N, on behalf of my Significant_Other, I/We want to express 'best wishes, congrats, 'N, many, more!!' to this couple / all engaged couples, thruples, etc.!
I / we encourage a long, wonderful lmarried life!
4
Two women- no big deal.
Now if it were two guys, I might be impresssed.
24
@bobw
Exactly. Two women kissing on screen is still acceptable, because the patriarchy is generally ok with it. Two men? Forget about it.
2
@bobw Typical. It isn't real unless it's male, huh?
4
The Producers can spin and pitch this however they want.
The bottom line is that the show is another glossy soap opera filled with bloated drama and forced shock filled moments and cliffhangers.
The women were used to jump the ratings.
America cringed.
America cheered.
America screams yay!.
America screams oh no!
America says that’s real!
No, that’s TV and drama in “Paradise “.
20
Too many other fake "reality shows" on television to watch any of them.
5
For some reason--and we all know what that is--two women together are better accepted--and sometimes celebrated by males--than two males. I would like to see the reaction to the show if these two were a male couple.
36
@npog99. Or how about women who don’t meet the traditional beauty standards? Or who are the more traditional stereotype of lesbians?
5
@npog99
OK, I live avross the pond, so perception may be different because of that, but I actually feel a lesbian couple is perceived less ....convenional than a gay couple.
But it is easier to fly under the radar in plain sight as women are more commonly seen walking around and hugging or sitting on each others lap (OK...."women" as in females. There may be a difference amongst age groups...).
2
You have to be careful with this.
While including people other than straight white men or women is desirable, fair and healthy, overkill is not, not just in this case.
What I mean for this is flooding the airwaves with all sorts of minorities, painting straight whites into a corner, insist that straight whites must embrace the minorities ASAP and forever atone for not accepting them is not the way to go.
Progress is best done surely but slowiy.
For a long time if you read the NY Times wedding vows column you would not know there was such a thing as a straight marriage.
When you do the above you help elect an ego maniac demagogue like Trump as a backlash and put progress in jeopardy, instead of a leader like Lincoln or FDR who advanced the country greatly but slowly.
14
@Paul
Progress is best done slowly but surely, I agree, but it doesn't happen fast enough to give a good life to the people living here and now. White straight middle-class has been the norm in our society for so long we've gotten used to being the standard of society, and this is what has to change. (I am straight, white, middle-class, college-educated, loaded with privilege -- although I am a woman, one strike.) It's hard, but we have to bite the bullet and admit that being human is the ONLY standard.
7
@Paul- so in other words, you advocate that society slow down in promoting equality and mutual respect because to promote such principles will make the racists uncomfortable? Just "progress" at a rate that the homophobes find acceptable? Tell the marginalized and disadvantaged that while in principle they may deserve respect and equal access, that they cannot actually be granted either because granting them may risk election of a Trump? That's not progress Paul, and it not courage. That's cowardice -- letting the ignorant, the racist, the homophobes dictate society we live in out of a fear of consequence. It's not right, it's not fair, and it's a recipe for remaining mired in the status quo.
18
@Paul So what you're saying is 'boil the white frog slowly.' Gotcha.
5
Two women together isn't bold on tv anymore.
It's a ratings ploy, especially when they're both extremely attractive.
52
There’s truth to what you say, but I still give these two young women some credit. It may not have seemed like a risk for the show, but they did take a risk. If you watch the show, their conversations are a lot less cloying than what we usually see. It seemed very real to me.
64
The sequel will be called The Honeymooners!!!!
No offense, but these so called reality shows are incredibly boring. IMO, most of these "reality" shows have certainly contributed to the dumbing down of Americans.
42
Any depictions of romance beyond girl meets boy is an expansion of cultural consciousness and a win for every color of the rainbow. I suppose it’s only natural that the first toe dip in the pool would be two slender blondes. ‘Girl on girl’ is about as acceptable in the heterosexual world as beer and football. I realize it’s progress and not perfection, yet I can’t help but thinking that two attractive blonde women falling in love for a straight audience is a bit of the old frat boy fetish and a self serving one for the network. As someone who works in reality tv the producers so obviously knew about the prior relation and the turns the narrative took were almost as clunky as a soap opera. The Vietnamese franchise was more powerful because of its actual authenticity and the fact that the romance arose from the ranks and not a producer. I give it an A for progress but would like to acknowledge that two seemingly straight men who ended up falling in love after rejecting their girlfriends would never fly...and until it does I’m not going to stop griping.
29
@Ian @Independent American was talking about reality shows in general, not this slice of "reality." Personally, I have never watched this, or any other so called reality show, with one exception: The Amazing Race, and then only for the scenery, not the "drama"
1
@IAN, @LesISmore is exactly correct! My opinion has nothing to do with sexual content or orientation in these shows. I find the premise of each of these "reality" shows simply lack entertainment value. Therefore, are boring. Additionally, there is nothing intellectual in these shows, either. Ultimately, when it's all said and done, these shows aren't based on reality. They're based on silly premises for the sake of station ratings. Hence, the dumbing down of America!
2
as an almost 60 yo lesbian I have watched, over the years, my tribe become an 'in group' from a literal afterthought in relation to gay men.
the author does not detect the straight male gaze in the program, but when will we see gay men on the show? that is the next hurdle. you can't disqualify the straight male gaze just yet.
34
@cindy consider this show is one guy and a bunch of women, having more than one guy would kind of take the "surprise" out of it. I suppose they could do an episode where the "Bachelor" was a bisexual man and the competitors were both men and women. That could actually be very interesting.
2
Are we supposed to be happy that gay relationships are now being simulated on TV by the same Barbie/Ken aesthetic as hetero ones have always been? When social progress is steeped in such calculated inanity ( that photo - seriously?) whatever good might have come from it is so compromised it’s more a step sideways than forward: so now our gay sisters have now been co-opted by The Man. Whoopie.
16
@James do you have a problem with two gay women are both extremely attractive in a conventional sense? Guess what...there are lots of them out there. Lesbian couple are not just androgynous or butch/femme. You may not "see" them because unless they kiss or something publicly they just look like two straight women out shopping or something, but they really do exist, in far greater numbers than many people assume because they don't look, dress or act any different from stereotypical straight women
6
Well, it does sort of dispel the idea that lesbians are basically unattractive women ( at least to men) . While there are some who do not fuss w/ hair and make-up as some of their straight sisters do, many are quite beautiful and attract both men and women. Nice to see on primetime TV.
3
@James
It is a step forward. I would rather see a gorgeous same sex couple on a program like this than not have them. The straight people on these programs are not indicative of the norm, 70% of Americans are overweight, yet the men and women on these shows are all buff/slim/skinny. in the context of the unreality of this show, having two women get together is a step forward.
The mirror of this is why should gay couples automatically be different in presentation? Why should a lesbian couple be 'non traditional' in appearance to be authentic, there are more than a few lesbians and gay men who are very happy to be traditionally attractive, they don't count because why? If you want to argue it would be great on these kind of programs to see people more diverse, where the men aren't all gym buffed, the women not all blond hair and tanned curves and the like, I agree, but claiming that a same sex couple doesn't count because they look like the rest of the contestants is idiotic.
15
I watched the first episodes of 'Bachelor' years ago when it first came out and thought it was so cheesy and gross (I hated seeing all those Barbie like women debasing themselves for the attention of a man) that I never went back.
As a gay woman, I would have loved to have watched this season of the spinoff, Bachelor in Paradise (which I never heard of, despite watching network TV) to see a lesbian love story. That this happened on American TV is miraculous.
22
What gorgeous women!
5
@Paul Kramer what ia loss ?
This show is only about the most beautiful and perhaps it serves to encourage people to express themselves and begin same sex relationships, but the format is neither realistic not much more than a fairy tale.
The truth lies out in real life where people are beginning to experience this opening of a forbidden door. If that is their wish, I say "more power to them."
3
Bachelor is my trashy tv indulgence, no doubt. It’s where I go to unwind and a healthy source of gossiping. I’ve been very torn with Demi’s “journey,” to use the jargon. The show runners have pitted the positivity of representation against the ills of exploitation, with the latter taking the wheel more often. It’s an overly-produced show, and the framing and editing for Demi was about as contrived and obvious as Bachelor ever gets (think Arie dumping Becca-level). And it sickened me more than uplifted me to see the slick, opportunistic cliches of the show used as tools of self-congratulation for the producers.
4
Finally some reality on TV. Now, if it could just make it to the News.
6
I watch the show in part to make fun of it, but I found myself moved at times to tears by the way these young people—Demi, but also Derek and Christen—handled their situation with such maturity and empathy. They made the show something more than mere entertainment. They changed minds and made many people feel less alone. The Bachelor franchise has recently been embracing cast members’ decisions to push back against the show’s structures, and I hope they continue to do so.
36
On the one hand, hooray. On the other, though I haven't seen the show, it saddens me that so much careful spoon feeding is required to defuse prejudice and bigotry, and that hearts and minds will be coaxed open when everything is handled tastefully. It's like adding a new gender fluid character to Sesame Street. But like heterosexual coupling it's not always going to be this photogenic and air-brushed. All I can say is it's better than nothing and I'm all for it if it makes people lighten up and actually consider why the existence of gay love bothers them in the first place.
43
I noted, “the pair was not presented as some sort of sideshow...”
Really?
As lee are reminds us, once on TV nothing is real life. How sad that the article describes an exhaustingly contrived situation as spontaneous self discovery with an overdose of sanctimonious analysis.
11
@CWB It is sad. We live in a culture where life imitates "art" and tv/movies/etc shape people's ideas of what's normal. So even if the show is contrived fantasy, it has power in shaping reality. They seem to have handled this power well.
5
i’m not a resident of ‘Bachelor Nation’ and have passing familiarity with the show. But I know its significance in pop culture can’t be dismissed. So I applaud all of positives cited in this article and the benefits to society. Please remember that ‘reality tv’ is NOT reality, but, in the industry term, ‘unscripted tv.’ Even though there is no concrete script with lines, nothing that happens on reality TV is by chance. Everything we see, every expression, eye roll, awkward moment and, yes, tenderness and act of love has been edited, photographed and framed to tell a particular story. In this case, it’s a refreshing story and bit of a twist (and there’s always a twist). But let’s not get carried away.
29
@lee very true indeed, but for better or worse, they can be effective narratives (exactly because they are contrived) as pointed out in this story about Mark Burnett who "resurrected Trump as an icon of American success" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/01/07/how-mark-burnett-resurrected-donald-trump-as-an-icon-of-american-success
6
@lee well said
1