The new bachelorette for the Bachelor Nation franchise has just been announced, and she’s the first Asian American lead in the 20 seasons the show has aired. Unfortunately, bachelorette Jenn Tran was let go from a group of the last six women along the ride of bachelor Joey Graziadei’s journey to love. Now, audiences are calling into question who received a call before her.
The bachelorette race appeared to be between two white women with fierce online fan clubs: Maria Georgas and Daisy Kent. Georgas was let go after hometowns, but she made her mark on the show with her blunt personality, witty sense of humor, and sleek and sexy fashion sense.
Others pulled for runner-up Kent because of her sweetness with what she did in the finale and for her story of overcoming a health scare. Production set both of these women up to look like they’d be coming back out onto the couch as the next bachelorette. This left an uncomfortable silence when Jenn’s announcement came.
So, was Jenn only chosen to fill the diversity quota? That’s what social media seems to be saying. TikTok and Twitter are flooded with, “we all know why they chose her.” Others have proudly posted their disappointed reactions to her announcement. They’ve gone as far as to mistake her with the only other Asian woman from this season.
This method of thinking in itself is problematic. The conversation of a “diversity quota” takes away from the autonomy of Jenn’s decision to accept the opportunity. Ultimately, it takes the value she has to be seen as America’s sweetheart.
Even Asian viewers are worried that Jenn is being set up to cleanse the franchise’s image. This concern comes after a contestant on the 28th season, Rachel Nance, had horrible racist attacks all season towards her and her family. During her hometown, audiences mocked the expression of her Filipino culture and traditions. Nance poured her heart out at the Women Tell All about the struggle it brought to her beautiful family.
The broadcast then had a quick verbal message to stop the online bullying of all the women. I don’t know about that one. Reducing brutal, blatant racism to “bullying is bad” does not make up for the actual big issue that the franchise has.
Regardless of whether Jenn was further down on the list for production, Reality TV has a problem with racism. In season 2 of Love Island USA, a Kenyan woman was played by a light-skinned man who got audiences to vote for him by picking the “undesirable” dark-skinned woman. After winning the prize money, he was found to have had a white girlfriend waiting for him at home.
Similarly, this recent season of Love is Blind has reassured the narrative that the Black women on that show will always be sexualized by the hosts, contestants, and viewers. This issue is a two-way street year after year. Producers and editors make ignorant edits, and audiences get resentful and share ignorant opinions.
Sure, a lot of these people sign up to have their behaviors watched, but there’s always a trend of small things becoming big conversations. Audiences think someone acting embarrassing for ten seconds on reality TV is an excuse to expel their internal racism.
Congratulations to Jenn Tran on being the next bachelorette. If only people were rooting for her before the beloved white women from the season had to go to their own social media and hype her up to the Bachelor Nation audience. Still so much more work to be done.