Are we ready for a bisexual bachelorette?
By: Lacey-Jade Christie
Tags: TV, Brooke Blurton, Reality TV, The Bachelorette, Bisexual

Am I the only one that’s a little nervous about having a bisexual Bachelorette? Don’t hate on me, hear me out because this isn’t a perfect world and having a bisexual Bacehlorette has the possibility create some pretty big controversy. Having Brooke Blurton as the Bachelorette also brings with it an increase in viewers from a number of marginalised communities so the pressure is on for Channel 10 to get the delivery right. Will they?

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past week, let’s get you up to speed.

Last week Channel 10 announced that Brooke Blurton (of Bachy season 6 and Bachelor in Paradise fame) will be Australia’s 2021 Bachelorette resulting in a flurry of media attention. The announcement was also met by overwhelming support from those who have been calling for more diversity in the Bachelor mansion for years.

“What makes Brooke so special?” I hear you ask. Well, as a Carnarvon-born Yamatji- Noongar woman Brooke will be the first Indigenous Bachelorette as well as the first Bisexual/Pansexual (she idetifies as either) person to be giving out the roses.There’s aslo going to be a bi-gendered mansion (bi because as if Channel 10 will cast a non-binary peerson, baby steps).

I am an advocate for diversity and inclusivity in mainstream media and I am excited to watch Brooke make history and hopefully find the person of her dreams but I can’t help but I can’t help but be a little concerned about a few things including what the public reaction will be and how, if at all, Channel 10 plan on using this as a moment for education and increased representation.

Chanel 10’s motives are clear: increased ratings and who can blame them? Comparatively the Nine Network is lightyears ahead in the ratings with MAFS beating out both The Bachelor (Channel 10) and Big Brother (Seven) and after the dumpster fire that was Elly and Becky Miles’ season of The Bachelorette Channel 10 needs a ratings cash cow. So casting Brooke makes perfect sense. She’s going to bring the LGBTQIA+ community, the Indigenous community as well as the creepy old blokes who want to see a little girl on girl (but we’ll get to them later).

So Brooke is great, we stan Brooke and want to see her finish the season happy and in love (with the likes of Allira Porter or Abbie Chatfield please!). What I am not looking forward to seeing are the worst corners of the internet and Australian culture that we like to pretend don’t exist. The trolls, homophobes, biphobes and racists; you know it’s going to happen.

When progressive moves like this are made in mainstream culture there is always going to be backlash and negative public opinion. It’s so predictable, if it weren’t soul destroying, it would be laughable:

“Won’t somebody please think of the children.” This season will bring with it a multi-gendered mansion meaning, that the gay agenda has finally permeated the walls of your home and there will be same sex romacing and physical contact on your screens.

There will always be people on the internet who are going to tell us that Channel 10 are promoting an indecent lifestyle, that they’re sick of the media shoving homosexuality down their throats and that seeing two women kiss on prime time TV is setting a bad example for the next generation. When in reality, seeing people live authentically and happily is a gift that could change the lives of so many people, especially young people.

Plus if you want to talk about setting a bad example, can we talk about all of the ridiculous and degrading challenges that the women have to complete while conforming too on the Bachelor? They’re all conforming to heteronormativity. Watching women chase after a soccer ball in giant inflatable bubbles while competing for the chance to be on a date with a random man is not really setting a great example for the young people in your life. #feminism.

Next up you have the religious commentators, it is easy to forget just how many people in Australia are religious, until you look on the internet. The people who comment will advocate that same sex attraction is not inline with the god that they believe in and that the women on the show are an abomination. It’s usually these people who are also keen to slut shame any woman who might be the slightest bit sexually confident. Remember Abbie Chatfield and the savagery that followed her around after dry humping that guy on season 7 of The Bachelor?

And then there are the creepy sleazy men in their corner of the internet. They’re the kind of men that are just going to watch in the hope that they’ll see two women kiss. The women cast on The Bachelor are tall, leggy, beautiful women (who are multidimensional and more than their bodies but not to some types of men) so for some men certain scenes in The Bachelorette will be like watching the intro to high-end porn in a socially acceptable setting. This is not an excuse for you to harass the women on the show or make vile comments about them, their sexuality or any physical contact that gets aired. Yet, they still will.

Finally there’s the media. For the sake of simplicity let’s split the media up into two categories: the reporting media and the production team. Both have very different roles but are just as vital to what can go right or wrong in such a controversial TV show.

The Production team has a job; it’s to create scandals and storylines that keep you coming back. Scandal makes for good TV. The issue comes when these scandals take advantage of vulnerabilities and expose minority communities (such as the LGBTQIA+ community) to negative tropes and falsehoods.

Both Brooke and Liam Cooper (MAFS) were forced to come out in situations that were embarrassing and out of their control making it seem like they were hiding something, they they should be ashamed, rather than acknowledging that a lot of LGBTQIA+ people have experience trauma around coming out and might want to do so when they are ready.

This secrecy and forcing someone to profess private information before they are ready is deliberate. The production team a) orchestrates a situation that forces someone to come out and then b) pairs that moment with shocked looks and dramatic music. When we choreograph a situation like this and twist the truth you are perpetuating the narrative that being LGBTQIA+ isn’t normal and coming out is earthshattering when it shouldn’t be. Now we should think of the children, the ones who are viewing the shock and often negative reactions to someone coming out and considering what this negative portrayal might be doing to them if they are also in the LGBTQIA+ community.

Of course all of this tension and ‘secrecy’ leads to great click bait headlines and peake interest. Thus the production team and the reporting media feed each other.

Liam Cooper is a great example of how damaging the reporting media can be as an openly bisexual man. What was an amazing opportunity to increase representation of not only bisexual men, but more masculine bisexual men, was tunred into somewhat of a circus and continues to be. Liam has already called out biphobia in the media and has spoken openly about his experience with the Australian media and their constant use of the term ‘bisexual groom’. Let’s hope this doesn’t happen to our ladies of The Bachelorette.

Having a LGBTQIA+ Bachelorette is a huge opportunity for Channel 10 to educate and show the LGBTQIA+ community in a mainstream light. Will they do this? Probably not. We can already see some signs of Channel 10 taking the easy road rather than the informative road by saying that Brooke is the Bisexual Bachelorette rather than the Pansexual Bachelorette. Was this a branding decision because alliteration is more marketable or is bisexual just an easier term to promote so that you don’t need to explain to people what pansexual means?

By taking on a season with so much representation Channel 10 now has a responsibility to deliver this season of The Bachelorette properly. Let’s educate and empower; educate Australians who might not know much about the LGBTQIA+ community and empower those in it to feel more comfortable and look for love in places they might not have considered before. At any rate, I’ll be tuning in because I’m a sucker for a good love story and some trash TV so get the popcorn ready.