She might not have been everyone’s biggest fan on this season of The Bachelor, but that does not mean that Olivia Caridi deserves to be bullied the way that she does.
“I was a news anchor before this so as a public figure I thought ‘okay, this [the bullying] can’t be that bad.’ But I was pleasantly surprised,” Caridi told HerCampus exclusively at the premier of the new film Little Miss Perfect. As a contestant on The Bachelor, Caridi got a lot of hate for some of the things she said and did. But in today’s society of social media and cyber bullying, words still hurt, regardless of where they’re coming from.
“I cried every day for a long time, it was weird. I kinda got desensitized to the comments almost, like I looked at ‘you’re a b word’ and I thought ‘oh what a great morning,’” she admitted. Moments earlier, we were discussing how, no matter how strong we are, we are not super women and the things that people say behind computer screens are not okay, regardless of what prompted the hate.
To some people, it may not be seen as bullying. In fact, as they are typing, they think that their words are funny. But they are not to the people reading it. Women who go on The Bachelor put themselves in a very vulnerable position being on camera all the time and living in a house with other women, all vying for the same man. Conflicts obviously arise no matter what, but things may not always be exactly as they seem.
Caridi explains how many times scenes are are pieced together to deliberately create conflict instead of showing the real interaction between the women. This then creates the image of a ‘villain’ even if the person may not actually be one, much like what happened to Caridi on this season.
“And even I admit I have considered ‘what would life be like if I wasn’t here’ because of this stuff, honestly,” Caridi says. The words, comments, memes… all of that hurts and many times people forget that celebrities are people, too, and just because you’re public figure does not mean that you are immune to bullying.
Regardless of all the hate that Olivia Caridi has dealt with from being on the show, she has not let it bring her down. “It has empowered me in a sense,” she says. And with that, we applaud Caridi for advocating against bullying and for not letting the haters impact who she is. The world needs more strong, confident women.