As I am starting to write, I have no answer in mind.
The Bulgarian Ergen is our national version of the American reality TV show The Bachelor– a show that runs on a fundamentally offensive premise. Namely, that a plethora of drop dead gorgeous women need to audition for one single male, who ultimately decides which one he wants to marry. In this fabricated TV environment, women tend to transform into these unwatchable, needy, kiss-assy creatures, while the male is portrayed as a God to be put on a pedestal.
Bachelor Move GIF
Small caveat – the Bulgarian Ergen Season 4 was not like the other girls, it wanted to be special. So, they found not one but three mediocre emotionally immature bachelors! I can’t imagine how difficult that must have been. Set out to thus be less sexist and give more choice to the women, it actually changed absolutely nothing in the concept as all the women were separated in three cohorts each geared towards one God-male.
Yet, despite all this evil, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, I religiously watched every new episode the moment it came out … So, I couldn’t help but wonder – truly, why?
I am an educated modern woman living in France. I call out dudes that mansplain to me why my dog eats grass. One of my favorite philosophers is Luce Irigaray who centered her thesis around dismissing Lacan and Freud’s stupid phallocentrism. In short, in my day-to-day I get angry about way less and ideologically speaking, I am disgusted by the Bachelor.
And yet, I kept on watching…
I would have loved to be able to say, like most of my friends claim, that I just watch to ridicule the participants. But I believe there is something more enchanting to it, something – or combination of things – that overpower my natural frustration as a self-respecting woman (or just as a women-respecting human). I am hence compelled to find words for that something.
Maybe let me start with the first obvious piece of the puzzle that could constitute the reality show’s appeal – the many glamorous and radiant women… as well as the one decent-looking man (even though they were supposed to be three this season, I stand behind “one decent-looking man”).
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold. — Shakespeare, As You Like It
Staring at most of the female contestants I find myself either mesmerized as a pure admirer of beauty, or anxiously caught in the trap of comparing myself to the people who were selected chiefly because of their conventional prettiness. Now, before you dismiss me – maybe not all girls on the show are super models. Some of them were set up by the production to stir drama, serve as comic relief or storytellers. Yet, overall the cast is a collection of conventionally attractive, effortlessly skinny and lavishly well-dressed women – certainly not the worst sight. While this isn’t the main reason I was hooked, I believe the pure eye-candy factor cannot be denied its proper place!
But if it is not that, then I am thinking – what is it in the storyline that makes my blood boil? Could it be a subconscious desire to be in that, I can’t stress this enough, horrific plot?
Whenever I get obsessed with any story, be it a book, film, or even real-life, my ego-centrism leads me to imagine myself as the main character in it. I thus fuel my infatuation with scenarios to daydream about in the waking hours that I am not watching or reading said story. On account of that tendency, in my head I have starred the humble roles of Arya Stark, Katniss Everdeen, Temari, Harry Potter, Yennefer of Vengerberg, Vanya Grigorova and many others.
When it comes to the Bachelor, who would anybody like to be? The obvious choice is the Bachelor, the correct one is absolutely nobody. But I admit, I sometimes daydream about being a contestant… who is an undercover journalist writing a book about all the horrors behind the set!
That being so, well, I obviously wouldn’t want to be one of the contestants who gets kicked out after one week – that just wouldn’t give me enough content for my book! Nor would it be a great ego-boost… So then I fall into the trap of imagining myself as one of the rather “successful” participants, thereby performing humiliating rituals such as waiting to be called by the only available dude in sight and given a rose that allows me to “keep fighting for the Bachelor’s heart”!!!
It is also incredibly difficult and unrealistic to imagine oneself as both the favorite of the man, and as being well-liked by the other women! It takes me a lot of delusional brain power to adjust these scenarios because, as we have already established, I am pro-women! Ergo, I wouldn’t wish to be disliked by my sisters in Stockholm syndrome.
Here, I believe I am getting closer to establishing some form of conflict, which could explain my fondness of the show – my psyche is stimulated because of this divide. The Ergen production both steps on my toes with its blatant unfairness to women, but it also allows my imagination to run wild in so many directions! I could also get my romance wish-fulfillment imaginary going with an adjusted bachelor to my liking – an emotionally mature climber-reader golden-retriever-personality-polyglot-with-a-trust-fund! But I could also keep my feminist self-perception by imagining myself as somebody who is there to expose the injustice from within, to thrive within a solidary sisterhood that stands together.
And last but not least we cannot ignore the more concrete inter-personal drama that was often entertaining. In my eyes, what kept the Season 4 watchable was mainly the controversy around one of the bachelors – Martin (the rich 40-something clown), and his favorite contestant – Daniela, who is the author of a Bulgarian self-help book called Million Dollar Baby (basically the Bulgarian version of Why Men Love Bitches, that instructs women how to attract quality men, duh!).
One could argue that the love game between Martin and Daniela was very much a by the book chasing game, where Daniela was the only one who was playing hard to get, therefore the Alpha-male-hunter-narcissist mobilized all effort to win her over. And as her book would have predicted, it worked. Men are simple creatures, we are told…
I haven’t read her book because I value my time and I don’t want my eyes to bleed out from the bullshit… but if I do one day (out of curiosity and fairness) I’ll be sure to write about it. That being said, the ideology that her TV persona disseminated was strictly anti second-wave feminism, pro men being the sole financial providers, as well as pro traditional gender roles of real men being strong and real women only serving as beautiful muses to inspire them to work and provide! One would expect that she would be a trad wife influencer, but she was actually like:
I do not cook or clean. You give money for us to hire a cook and cleaner, and eat at expensive restaurants![to be read in a heavy Eastern European accent]
For which… I guess slay!
I wouldn’t have thought that the Bachelor would be so meta, but it actually is. First, the show already conceptually valorizes men for their success (implying at least intelligence and other qualities) and women principally for their beauty. Then, it shows us a woman who makes explicit this same ideology – I will sit and be pretty supporting you while you provide luxury for me and our future children. In translation – men hold value and subjectivity through various qualities and active experiences in the world, while women hold value only as their reflected Other, only existing to passively inspire them as subjects.
That being the case, in my view, it was fascinating to see the moral lynching of Daniela by all of the participants, because well, Hello!!? You are all already part of the same game!! In fact, ideology is more dangerous when hiddenly permeated in cultural signifiers rather than explicitly stated.
As confusing as it was for me, I empathized a lot with Daniela even though I myself value my independence and don’t require a partner to be rich (it’s just a bonus! ;)). However, I’d argue she was more feminist in some other ways than all of the others… For once, she didn’t bully other women and she didn’t immediately glorify a man. Really, she was until the end extremely skeptical of him – as we all should. Most men suck. Moral of story? Why not, it’s not a bad moral.
In the end, did I answer myself the big Why? Why I watched the Bachelor, why would I do that with my one wild and precious life? In line with my recent reflection on Doing Less, Worrying More, it seems highly unlikely I will wake up one day in my old age thinking “Oh, how I wish I spent more time watching the Bachelor, instead of going out and talking to people!” But I guess now that I have written about it, I can officially console myself that Hey! I was an undercover journalist after all…
I hope you enjoyed my poorly structured stream of consciousness, the product of my intense restlessness to share how I feel.