Personally, I love a bit of reality TV. Yes it’s silly, yes it usually doesn’t hold much substance, but sometimes after a long day at work you don’t want to sit and watch something which involves too much mental energy in order to be entertained.
Love Island, as of the past few years, has been the nation’s summer mental retreat. For 8 weeks each year we all jump on twitter and share banter on the select few 20-somethings trying to find love and money through a variety of tasks and circumstances. We laugh and cry with (or at) contestants and eventually accept them back into U.K. society as influencers. Many have claimed it is one of the only times per year when ‘Black Twitter’ and ‘Fiat 500 Twitter’ unite. But as of late, I’ve found it difficult to engage in this mindless entertainment without being confronted with the serious issues our society seems to not want to address.
In 2018, Samira entered the villa. A beautiful, bubbly girl who just so happened to be black and just so happened to constantly be sidelined. For weeks we watched her being picked last, ignored, cry due to her perceived lack of beauty compared to other contestants, and eventually, when she did find someone who she had a connection with (Frankie), have the whole relationship (including her night in the ‘Hideaway’) completely cut out of TV viewing. We were all shocked and confused when we saw her balling all over the villa because Frankie had been kicked out, while having no idea that they were actually developing a relationship, thus giving the perception of a ‘crazy, angry black woman’. Samira later revealed that she dealt with depression after the show.
2019 now, we have another girl enter the villa. A model’s demeanour, elegant and intelligent, who also just so happens to be black, and who also just so happened to be picked last and seemingly sidelined for the whole first week of the show. It was only episode 6, after a load of tweets were directed at Love Island’s producers that Yewande was granted more screen time. Less than a week had gone by and we have already seen her needing support from others (Anton) in the villa. Samira recently commented on Yewande’s experience in the villa stating “It’s obvious what is happening. She is the only black girl, and has had little interest from the men, who seem to like blonde white girls with big boobs – or any screen time as a result.”
As someone who falls into the same demographic categories as these two contestants: 20-something, black, female and British; this is a difficult pill to swallow. It is hurtful to see people that look like you be so unwanted and sidelined year on year while the Lucies and the Meghans constantly gain centre stage from the moment they enter the villa. It is hard to see racist tweets resurfacing based on people who look like you no matter how many times you hit that ‘report’ button. And it is painful to think that you too are viewed this way by the society you reside in. The society you call your home. Some may claim that it is just a show, that it holds no bearing on the realities of life in Britain and should not be taken seriously. But it is hard to ignore the experiences of these women when the same story is repeated year on year on our screens.
‘Black twitter’ had been discussing solutions to this for some time now with answers ranging from having a separate ‘black love island’ to just not having any black contestants on the show at all. These answers were discussed more expansively when Samira stated “I was obviously the token [black woman] on the show, it was easy to work that out. I only had to look at the line of girls when I arrived at the villa.” The solution which has gained the most support is to have contestants with a range of preferences. Considering it is a game show centred around love, you would assume the producers would ask contestants prior to being accepted “what’s your type?” And as 85,000 applications which were submitted to Love Island in 2018 alone, it is difficult to believe that a range of preferences cannot be found amongst those applicants.
Personally, I think I will wait and see how the next few episodes go, but if things do not improve for the long term then I don’t think I can tune in any longer. If ITV truly want to appease the 3.7 million viewers which tuned into the launch episode on Monday night, it needs to work on its diversity in a major way. If tuning in results in me becoming angry and hurt about the experiences of people who look like me, I can’t and won’t be supporting it.
CillaHope_
cillahope 