What does ‘Bachelor’ star Matt James think of Chris Harrison’s comments?
Is The Bachelor empire finally crumbling to dust as it tries to survive through the constantly changing cultural conversation of 2021? The series, to which all other dating reality shows are compared, is having a hell of a time this season.
The least woke show of all time seems to be finally reaping what it sowed, as fans are calling The Bachelor on its b&!!$#*t, something the people behind the show seem willfully unprepared to do.
Rose revisions
The drama all began last fall with Clare Crawley’s botched mini-season of The Bachelorette this past October. Crawley picked Dale Moss as her choice for the show within the first few weeks, and she was quickly replaced by Tayshia Adams within the first four episodes of The Bachelorette’s 16th season.
The replacement was nothing fans had ever seen before in Bachelor history, and Crawley’s replacement by Tayshia Adams, the second black bachelorette to ever appear on the series in sixteen seasons, seemed a rather convenient choice.
Producers gave us a black bachelorette just a few months after protests flooding the U.S. in response to the murder of George Floyd and the powerful response from the BLM movement forced many Americans to face their country’s history of racial injustice head on. Many fans found the choice to abruptly switch leads mid-season was obvious pandering to any critical fans of the consistently white-washed show.
Any fans who thought the switch to Tayshia in the fall was a hail-mary by ABC only rolled their eyes further when they chose their first black bachelor in twenty-five seasons with Matt James.
Let’s face it: The Bachelor is the most unwoke show of all time, and watching its producers scramble to fit the show’s archaic heteronormative values into a 2021 landscape is hilarious to watch – we simply love to see it. That’s why the recent folly of Chris Harrison, the dark lord & host of The Bachelor, is like icing on the cake and perhaps an indication The Bachelor franchise is living on borrowed time.
Matt & Chris
Matt James appears to be fully aware of the plight of The Bachelor. As PopSugar reported in an article this week, he stated that Chris Harrison’s recent cancellation is “a clear reflection of a much larger issue that The Bachelor franchise has fallen short on addressing adequately for years.”
Chris Harrison has recently decided to step down from The Bachelor franchise as host, after seemingly defending Bachelor contestant Rachael Kirkconnell’s photos capturing her actions taking part in a racist “Old South antebellum-themed party” (A.K.A. slave plantation themed).
James took to Twitter & Instagram to address Chris Harrison’s actions, and expressed they were “devastating and heartbreaking” to hear, and it appears Matt James is behind the plethora of fans supporting the decision to have Chris Harrison step down as host.
The conversation which erupted such controversy and put a spotlight on The Bachelor was one between Chris Harrison & Rachel Adams, the first black lead on The Bachelorette, only after twelve seasons of the series had passed.
Now that the lack of representation that’s plagued The Bachelor since its premiere has been addressed, fans wonder how much time the franchise has left.
Next season
The Bachelor champions the values of a time long gone; the show presents the “unquestionable” importance of heterosexual marriage & Christian values where men are masculine, women are feminine, and the varied life experience held by people of different colors & backgrounds are seldom explored.
Fans who reject these values love to watch the circus of The Bachelor like a train crash they can’t look away from, while those in line with these values relate to the show that’s put on display. It’s hard to say what will become of The Bachelor now that it’s being sociologically unpacked on a grand scale, but for now, we know Matt James stands with critics of the show, as well those condemning Chris Harrison’s recent comments.
