'Bachelorette' Jenn Tran highlights why women of color deserve better on reality TV

“The show has been running for many years, especially 21 years, and each season there are several people competing for the role. It's never really you until you are. I came back from filming and there was a lot of people wanting someone else or wishing I was American.” Tran said on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast.

In fact, Tran's Vietnamese-American and Buddhist identities made for some of the best moments in the franchise's recent history, as she was able to learn about other cultures and teach the men she dated about their culture.

But even though she led the season, it seemed like Tran was still an afterthought.

She was “on cloud nine” when she greeted the men in the first episode, but toward the end of the episode she became emotional when she realized she was the Bachelorette.

“It was really hard for me to believe that I was everyone’s first choice,” she said in the scene. “I felt like I was in someone else’s shoes.”

Unfortunately, the men would do nothing but disappoint her.

Contestant Sam McKinney, who provided the first impression, rose to prominence and appeared to be a potential finalist for much of the show. approved live on air During an appointment with Radio New Zealand, he said he was disappointed to see Tran cast as the Bachelorette.

“This girl is not my type,” he said as he got out of the limo that first night. “I thought the Bachelorette was going to be Daisy or Maria.” McKinney was sent home in the same episode and said in a confessional that Jenn brought “very boring” energy.

And in what has been called “the most dramatic finale” in franchise history, Tran was left sobbing on stage as she had to hold back her marriage proposal, which ended in heartbreak. Her ex-fiancé Devin Strader “ghosted” her just weeks after their engagement and called off the engagement months before. And she revealed that Strader followed Georgas on Instagram the day after they called off their engagement.

“He said he didn’t love me anymore,” Tran said at the finale. “He denied ever being in love.”

Over the course of the season, Strader had made enemies of his male competitors because he often pursued Tran aggressively and showed no consideration for the other men.

Weeks after the finale, it also emerged that one of Strader's former girlfriends had one issue an interim injunction The question arises as to why the candidates, particularly the lead actors of color, are not vetted more thoroughly.

Her other finalist, Marcus Shoberg, couldn't even tell her he loved her in the days leading up to their possible engagement.

“Watching the current season of The Bachelorette felt like a horror movie to me. “Men are fighting over ownership of Jenn Tran instead of, I don't know, talking to Jenn Tran,” NPR podcast host BA Parker said on an episode of “Code switch” which was about race and romance on reality TV.

Tran also only had one Asian admirer, who spent more time blowing his chest than, as Parker said, pursuing Tran.

“I can’t really comment on the casting process and the decisions that were made,” Tran said in an interview interview with Glamor Magazine: “But it's unfortunate that there weren't many Asian men this season.”

To put it simply, Tran was set up to fail from the start. Their men were hoping for another woman, especially a white woman, as were many of the spectators. She received no support from production or fans, and her most devastating moments were presented to viewers as drama.

During the time it took for her to choose a husband, it seemed as if none of her men had chosen her.

A simple – and practical – solution would be for UW-Madison and the city of Madison to ban these men from ever setting foot in this city. a la Becca Kufrin's home state of Minnesota. But what's far more difficult here is to question the reality of how women of color are treated on reality dating shows. While this incident was absolutely heartbreaking for Tran as an individual, it was only a microcosm of the struggles so many others faced.

“The Bachelor” franchise in particular continually fails to protect its colorful footprints. In [year]When Matt James was announced as the Bachelor in the midst of the Black Lives Matter movement and just weeks after the show promised a more diverse cast, the woman he proposed to (and continues to marry to this day) was is together). discovered Attending a plantation party in college themed to the Antebellum South. James, a Black man, called the photos “incredibly disappointing” at the time and urged then-host Chris Harrison, who stepped down from his role after defending the photos against the “woke police,” to reconsider the racist history of the antebellum era -South.

Rachael Lindsay, the franchise's first lead of color, has continually advocated for a more diverse cast within the franchise, especially after it was revealed that one of the contestants on her season had made racist comments on social media in the past. Additionally, she said that some of the men of color on her season have never dated black women in the past, which led her to call for a diversification of people behind and in front of the camera.

This situation is not only observed in bachelor country. Love Island USA winner Serena Page and her finalist JaNa Craig, both Black women, faced multiple microaggressions throughout the season.

During the “Casa Amor” mid-season, where men and women are separated and introduced to new singles to test their contacts in the villa, many of the men were unfaithful. When Kenny Rodriguez and Kordell Beckham Jr., who were dating Craig and Page, respectively, brought back other women at the end of the week, Craig and Page were rightly upset and angry.

When Page swore at Beckham, several men in the villa asked him if he wanted a potential future wife to act like it was an overreaction if she was angry that he was betraying her trust. Page was immediately pushed into the racist stereotype of the “angry black woman,” even though other participants were allowed to respond in the same way without criticism.

And for Craig, the validity of her relationship with Rodriguez was constantly questioned, as if she was somehow unwanted or unworthy of his love. Earlier in the season, the man she was dating had left her for a woman much easier than her, and then made fun of Craig with the woman he was now dating.

It was just further confirmation that women of color on reality TV are damned if they do and damned if they don't. Their white counterparts are allowed to be fiery and messy and implicitly understood as attractive, while women of color must fight to show that they are deserving of love.

Jenn Tran deserves love. Jenn Tran deserved so much better than what she was given. And future women of color in reality TV deserve more.