By Rose Cohen ‘22
Staff Writer & Photographer
Anyone close to me knows that I’m a hopeless romantic who watches ABC’s popular reality dating programs, “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette,” to see love-crazed singles attempt to find their future spouses. I became interested in the franchise as a sophomore in high school, and I have been obsessed ever since. As a white viewer, I wasn’t focused on the shows’ lack of diversity even though the majority of contestants were white and the first Black lead, Rachel Lindsay, only appeared in 2017.
Three weeks ago, I began to question whether I could continue to watch the show after seeing longtime host Chris Harrison defend current contestant Rachael Kirkconnell during an interview with Lindsay on “Extra.” Pictures recently resurfaced online of Kirkconnell attending an “Old South” antebellum plantation-themed fraternity party in 2018.
“We all need to have a little grace, a little understanding, a little compassion,” Harrison said in response to a question from Lindsay about the allegations of racism made against Kirkconnell. “Because I have seen some stuff online — this judge, jury, executioner thing where people are just tearing this girl’s life apart.”
Vincent Finch-Brand ’21, whose roommates got them interested in the show this summer, said that Harrison’s “comments and choices to defend Kirkconnell’s blatant racism are inexcusable.”
The most recent “Bachelorette” and the second Black lead in both shows’ histories, Tayshia Adams, formed a friendship with Harrison outside of the franchise. During her podcast, “Click Bait with Bachelor Nation,” which she hosts with two franchise fan favorites, she shared that her jaw almost dropped to the floor because she sensed so much ignorance in the interview. “I definitely will say watching that interview, my eyes were wide open,” Adams said.
Harrison issued his first apology on Instagram shortly after his appearance on “Extra.” He explained that he realized sympathizing with Kirkconnell perpetuates racism.
“I have this incredible platform to speak about love, and yesterday I took a stance on topics about which I should have been better informed,” Harrison, who has 1.3 million followers on Instagram, wrote. He ended his post by thanking viewers for holding him accountable and promising fans that he would “do better.”
“How is Chris Harrison going to be better?” Lindsay asked in an episode of her biweekly podcast “Higher Learning”. “Can that please be the next tweet, the next post, of you telling me how what you did was wrong, because I need you to see it, and then how you’re going to be better.”
Four days after the interview, Harrison announced in another Instagram statement that he will be stepping aside from the franchise for an unspecified period of time.
Finley Severin ’22, who watches “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” for the drama, couldn’t care less about Harrison stepping aside. “I don’t have that much sympathy for him. I think he’s gross, and I don’t think he should have a platform if those are his beliefs, so I’m glad he’s stepping down,” Severin said.
I would have stopped watching the show if Harrison had not stepped aside. But his decision to leave the program is not nearly enough.
In 2012, Nathaniel Claybrooks and Christopher Johnson, who are both Black, filed a class-action lawsuit against the shows’ creator Mike Fleiss, ABC and the other production companies involved in both reality shows. Claybrooks and Johnson argued that “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” intentionally exclude people of color from the lead role.
“The absence of Bachelors and Bachelorettes of color suggests, to both white viewers and viewers of color, that interracial or non-white relationships are undesirable or unworthy of the nationally broadcasted platform of ‘The Bachelor’ and ‘The Bachelorette,’” the lawsuit reads.
District Judge for the Middle District of Tennessee Aleta Trauger dismissed the discrimination claims, stating that casting decisions are protected by the First Amendment.
In 2011, when asked by Entertainment Weekly reporter Lynette Rice about whether there would ever be a “Bachelor” or “Bachelorette” who is not white, Fleiss said that he thinks, though he could not confirm, that the lead of that year’s season, Ashley Hebert, is “one-sixteenth Cherokee Indian.”
“Sometimes we feel guilty of tokenism. Oh, we have to wedge African-American chicks in there!” Fleiss added. “We always want to cast for ethnic diversity, it’s just that for whatever reason, they don’t come forward. I wish they would.”
“I am conscious of the roles — rooted in racism and racist stereotypes — that Black contestants are encouraged and edited to occupy on the show,” Finch-Brand, who is white, said.
Robyn Jedkins, a Black woman who appeared on Sean Lowe’s season of “The Bachelor,” told HuffPost that producers pushed her to ask Lowe whether he had dated Black women before. Taylor Nolan, another former contestant, explained in the same interview that she felt that she was depicted as “angry” and “aggressive” because of her race.
It’s unclear what the future holds for “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette.” Harrison has not yet announced how long he will be stepping aside, and the actions the shows’ producers will take to combat racism in the franchise remain unknown. For now, my decision to continue watching will depend on whether the creators acknowledge the series’ shortcomings.