Opinion: TV dating show contestants may claim to be there for the 'right' reasons, but it's more for social media profiles and profits
By Gráinne O'Hare, Newcastle University
The finale of ratings juggernaut Love Island airs on Monday next, after eight weeks of captive psychological torture (for both contestants and viewers). Following a public vote, one lucky couple will be crowned as the villa champions and burgeoning-brand-ambassadors-supreme of 2022.
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From RTÉ Radio 1's Today with Claire Byrne, journalist and podcaster Orlaith Condon on this year's Love Island
Yet before the credits roll, the showrunners continue to insist on the same bizarre addendum as previous years: will the winning couple choose to share the £50k prize money, thus showing themselves true of heart, or will one party claim it for themselves, proving they were in it for the money all along?
The answer to this absurd share-or-steal conundrum is a no-brainer for any canny reality television star. As memorably described by journalists Sirin Kale and Pandora Sykes, the show is an ‘influencer sausage factory’. Now on its eighth season, contestants are acutely aware of the money-spinning possibilities available to them outside the villa.
For the savvy Islander, the show can be a platform that launches their celebrity - or at least keeps them in teeth-whitener promo campaigns and mid-range panel show appearances for years to come
Kem Cetinay has had numerous television appearances since winning season three, and now co-presents official Love Island podcast The Morning After, as well as co-owning popular Essex restaurant Array. Amber Gill, winner of season five, is reportedly worth £2 million. She launched fitness brand Amber Flexx in January 2021 and followed this up with her debut novel Until I Met You this month. As of March 2022, season five runner-up Molly-Mae Hague is reportedly a millionaire, having become creative director of online fashion brand Pretty Little Thing in August 2021.
For the savvy Islander, the show can be a platform that launches their celebrity, or at least keeps them in teeth-whitener promo campaigns and mid-range panel show appearances for years to come. In spite of this, though, reality dating show producers insist on perpetuating the idea that contestants can be separated into those who have entered into the reality TV process with wholesome motives to find love (apparently blinkered as to the career opportunities that may be afforded them post-villa), and those who nurse more insidious intentions of building an online following in order to sell branded sportswear and hair extensions.
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From RTÉ 2fm's Jennifer Zamparelli show, former Love Island winner Greg O'Shea on making your passion your career
Love Island is far from the only example of this imagined dichotomy. US dating programme The Bachelor premiered in 2002, with its sister show The Bachelorette launching the following year. Perhaps in their early years, it was plausible to maintain that contestants were taking part ‘for the right reasons’—a chance at falling in love and getting engaged. The casts were full of earnest dental hygienists who largely fell out of the public eye once they were eliminated from the show. After all, Instagram did not yet exist and influencer culture and sponcon had yet to be spawned.
Yet in the last decade, the evolution of social media platforms and the emergence of further ‘Bachelor Nation’ spin-offs such as Bachelor in Paradise (a Love Island-style bevy of rejected past contestants) has bred a savvier class of player. In a group of 30 people vying for the lead’s attention, the odds of making it to the very end of the process are decidedly unfavourable.
Having weighed up these odds, a contestant might subtly direct their energies towards securing lower-hanging fruit such as creating a personal brand, securing a spot on Paradise, building a social media following and public capital, and furthering their career. This was writ large in a conflagration of conflict in season seven of Bachelor in Paradise. Brendan Morais (The Bachelorette, season 16) and Pieper James (The Bachelor, season 25) were filmed having a rare fourth-wall-breaking conversation about how many social media followers they had gained from tabloid coverage of their alleged pre-Paradise relationship.
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From RTÉ Radio 1's The Business, Clare O'Hanlon from Publicis on why advertisers and sponsors rush to attach themselves and their brands to the show
Morais and James’s faux pas was arguably clumsy given the expanding record of Bachelor alumni accused of entering into the process ‘for the wrong reasons’. In season 25 of The Bachelorette, the men unionised against their fellow contestant and shared nemesis Thomas Jacobs, accusing him of courting Bachelorette Katie Thurston insincerely, with secret designs to become the next Bachelor.
Having been made aware of the men’s suspicions, Thurston sent Jacobs home with the dramatic declaration ‘your Bachelor audition ends tonight.’ This zero-tolerance approach is perhaps understandable given the outcome of season 15 of The Bachelorette, in which Hannah Brown accepted a marriage proposal from suitor Jed Wyatt, whom, it transpired, had an unresolved prior relationship, as he had ostensibly only entered the process to promote his music career.
The ‘right reasons’ trope is embedded deep in the culture of reality dating shows despite its arguably waning relevance and plausibility. The 2021 series FBoy Island divided its contestants into ‘FBoys’ (unrepentant womanisers there for the prize money) and ‘self-identifying nice guys’ (earnestly looking for love).
We watch these shows to be entertained by their dramatic twists and interpersonal politics, not because we want to watch people pure of heart fall in love
Both ITV2’s Ready to Mingle and Channel Four’s The Love Trap featured contestants who were either single or in a relationship, but their status was unknown to the series lead. The moral here was that those who were single were therefore trustworthy and pure of motive. NBC’s unhinged Regency-blend The Courtship swapped out ‘right reasons’ for ‘good intentions’. Yet it is now surely impossible not to view reality dating show contestants through the lens of aspiring celebrities and content creators seeking a public platform upon which to promote themselves.
It is unreasonable to expect Love Islanders to be on the show ‘for the right reasons’ and perhaps just as unreasonable to dictate that they should be. After all, the viewers are not beholden to the same ‘right reasons’. We watch these shows to be entertained by their dramatic twists and interpersonal politics, not because we want to watch people pure of heart fall in love. It is past time that reality dating shows stop keenly peddling the notion that the only sanctioned and acceptable motive for entering into such a process is to find a soulmate, and instead credit both their contestants and viewers with at least enough discernment not to believe this pretence.
Gráinne O'Hare is a PhD researcher in 18th century Literature at Newcastle University
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
