This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at UCD chapter.
Disclaimer: This article is purely based on my opinions regarding Season 25 and its recent controversies. Oh, and also, spoilers ahead!
If you’ve been keeping up with Bachelor Nation, you know that it’s been burning down in flames. The Bachelor has been notorious for bringing on mainly white contestants in all their seasons. This has resulted in the Bachelor franchise becoming extremely limited regarding people of color. This season was supposed to bring revolutionary change to the show. For the first time ever, a Black man, Matt James, was chosen to be the Bachelor. He had never been on any previous shows before, but he did have extremely close ties to big names in the franchise such as the beloved Tyler Cameron and previous bachelorette Hannah Brown. I was extremely surprised but not entirely impressed that Matt James had been picked. My eyes were set on Mike Johnson, another fan favorite from Hannah Brown’s season.
Courtesy of ABC
Regardless of my lack of impression, I decided to sit through this season of the show. It was “unlike any other season yet” but dare I say, in one of the worst ways possible. I am not even going to start with the racism present this season (as I will address it later) that has recently come to light. I am going to start with the clear bullying that has been happening all throughout the season. We can see this bullying in “Queen Victoria” when she calls the five new women that come in later in the season “slores,” Anna when she starts a rumor that Brittany was a hooker, and MJ who created a divide between the old and new women by proposing that the original women were “on varsity” and the new women were “JV.” Another extremely inappropriate situation occurred when all the women teamed up to outcast Sarah. They were unaware of her situation with her father and while she could have navigated the situation with Matt better, the other girls should not have acted so cruelly.
ABC/Craig Sjodin
Now, it’s time to address the racism. The Bachelor franchise has always been inherently racist. Their actions to cast a Black Bachelorette and Bachelor seem extremely performative and they have not handled the recent allegations with grace. On Rachel Lindsay’s podcast, Chris Harrison was asked to speak on Rachael Kirkconnell, a current contestant who has allegedly attended a Southern Antebellum party in 2018. She has been seen liking racist posts on social media as well. Chris Harrison asked Rachel Lindsay if attending this party is bad in general, or just a bad look in 2021. His quick defense to Rachael Kirkconnell was implicitly racist and sparked outrage. After this interview, Rachael Kirkconnell was coincidentally quick to release a statement on Instagram apologizing for her racist actions in the past. Needless to say, the bullying and racism associated with this season are bad — not just in 2021, but in general. The entire Bachelor franchise must reflect on the events of this season, as bullying and racism are not tolerated at any time nor any place. I hope that in the future years, The Bachelor is able to reform, and I am looking forward to hopefully being able to watch the show and seeing people of my race being represented more.
