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Reality TV shows like The Bachelor draw our attention and make us keep coming back for more for many reasons. Though many cast aside these forms of reality television as guilty pleasures, we argue that shows like The Bachelor reflect and re-produce culture, and are therefore worth analyzing. From rooting for your favorite contestant to watching because of the ridiculous notions of love, people have their reasons for watching the show. We tested this ourselves by conducting an anonymous survey for Midd kids. While some found the show to be very unauthentic and argued that the women on the show were simply seeking fame/publicity, some called the women brave/ courageous and even believed that finding “true love” was a possibility on the show. Opinions aside, the show does leave us learning quite a bit about how women are portrayed and makes us question the lack of diversity on the show. It plays into the stereotypical image of a woman desperate for love playing into the notion that women are always seeking “true love.” This desperate shot at love brings out a side in women that reinforces society’s notion of acceptable femininity since the women must navigate a process that is all about managing their behavior to an appropriate degree – they must express their feelings without being overly emotional, they should be sexy but not slutty, smart and driven but willing to drop everything for a husband and family. This creates easy opportunities for producers of the show to create certain characters like the perfect villain, the girl next door, America’s sweetheart, etc. This is problematic because it provides limited and outdated identities that women seeking romance fall into. Apart from this, the lack of diversity on the show reflects highly policed presentations of race in media that expect racial minorities to adhere to the dominant white middle class narratives of femininity.

References

Cloud, Dana. “The irony bribe and reality television: Investment and detachment in The Bachelor.” Critical Studies in Media Communication 27.5 (2010): 413-437.

Dubrofsky, Rachel E. “The Bachelor: Whiteness in the harem.” Critical Studies in Media Communication 23.01 (2006): 39-56.

Dubrofsky, Rachel E., and Antoine Hardy. “Performing race in flavor of love and the bachelor.” Critical Studies in Media Communication 25.4 (2008): 373-392.

Radway, Janice A. “Women read the romance: The interaction of text and context.” Feminist Studies 9.1 (1983): 53-78.