I was watching “The Bachelor” last night. Let me explain myself, please. This guy is from the UK and no matter how stupid a show is, or how demeaning it is to women, I’ll watch it if there is a hot Brit saying…well anything with that accent. The other reason I watched was because I saw in the previews women were singing. (Also, it was on after “Dancing with the Stars” which is actually good.) And I always find reality show singing like a car wreck I just can’t look away from. I’m embarrassed for these women but I can’t look away.
And sadly, my demographic is what makes the show even possible. How many men do you know of who religiously watch “The Bachelor” who are straight? It’s a show where the sole purpose is to degrade women and treat them like cattle, and it’s watched primarily by women. And I was one of them.
I am trying to understand the psychology of a woman who allows herself to be put into this situation. Even a woman who wants a man with money can surely get one without appearing on a reality television show where her odds are severely crippled due to the 24 other gorgeous women competing with her. Maybe it’s vanity. Some women for some reason “need” to know they “beat other women” to get a particular man.
Maybe it’s the lure of marriage at the end for the winner. So many women “want to get married.” I have no idea why. Really girls, aside from Social Security and health benefits, there’s nothing you can get from marriage that you can’t get outside of it. Unless of course you plan to divorce later and take half the assets, in which case, congrats on thinking ahead.
But these women are fighting over the one man. Sure he’s hot and rich and…omg BRITISH this time…but damn, go to the UK if you want a Brit. There’s no need to demean yourself on national television and act like a big tramp to get your dream boat. Frankly I’m not sure I would want to be with a man who had no trouble “dating” 24 other women at the same time while he was making out pro and con lists about me to decide if he was gonna give me a rose and mercifully let me stay another round.
Not only that but the Bachelor swaps spit til the bitter end with the remaining girls. When we’re down to two women and he’s still making out with both of them…he either A. doesn’t know which one he’s gonna pick (which I don’t believe) or B. Wants to have his cake and eat it too while he still can. After all, this is likely the closest to a threesome he’ll ever get. And on the off chance he doesn’t yet know which one he’s gonna pick…does the woman who wins really want to become married to a man for whom the choice to be with her was a “down to the wire” choice between her and another woman. Really?
The only cool “Bachelor” season was where the winner didn’t accept the proposal. Then she got to be “The Bachelorette” and in the end didn’t pick either of the two guys she’d narrowed it down to. People called her a picky bitch, but I think she rocks for not settling. I mean it’s reality TV, and at the end of the day, who you marry is about your life, not the entertainment value random strangers get out of the union.
So anyway…this all makes me think about the romance novel. I wonder if we are demeaning our heroines. Sure, we want them to find love. We want them to have great sex. And while relationships don’t complete women, the romance genre is about relationships. I wonder though if sometimes we put our heroines through ridiculous and demeaning situations so she can win the “prize” at the end. And I wonder if the hero is really such a prize, or if we just wrote him that way. What if after the book ends and their happily ever after begins she’s stuck in the bed with a guy who has smelly beer farts and picks his nose while watching televised hockey?
Just wondering.
