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Reality Show Relationships

Reality television shows about romance really seems to strike a chord with audiences, but do these shows have anything to do with love? Are all couples that appear on-camera together doomed? Here's the reality of reality TV romance.

There’s no doubt about it: producers hit gold with reality television. It’s cheap, easy to put together, and we love it. Even though reality television may be past its prime, there’s still no shortage of shows featuring ordinary people doing supposedly ordinary things—traveling with a loved one, losing weight, working for a tyrant in a black suit.

But what really get us are the shows about love. From “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” to “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?” and “Newlyweds,” never has television spent so many hours examining the lives of couples—how they meet, fight, and, more often than not, break up.

And in the wake of Nick and Jessica, Carmen and Dave, Travis and Shanna, and the media frenzy that surrounded these breakups, can we trust reality television to have any positive role in creating or documenting committed couples? Unfortunately, reality dating shows seem bent on creating hilarious drama at the expense of happy relationships.

Dating Shows: Helping People Fall All Over Themselves for All the Wrong Reasons

The most common format of reality dating shows is to feature a group of people competing for one member of the opposite sex. Not only do they get the “prized” guy or girl, winners are usually promised an additional reward—the security of marrying a multi-millionaire, the celebrity of a dating rock star, something to make their efforts even more worthwhile.

Whatever the payoff, reality-show contestants seem to be motivated by everything but the quest for true love. They seem to be vying for notoriety, money, a shot at being on TV and creating drama for a willing public. And, hey, sometimes it works. A few contestants go on to get their own show later (à la runner-up Tiffany “New York” Pollard of “Flavor of Love” fame).

So these contestants battle it out to keep themselves on the show for one more episode, creating lots of humor and drama for viewers. But by the end, the goal—being in a normal, committed relationship—is lost amid the fighting, name-calling, and chaos.

And the numbers play this out. In 11 seasons of “The Bachelor,” for example, 10 out of 11 romantic conclusions resulted in hasty breakups, reneged engagement plans, or simply no engagement at all. Some of the losing contestants even went back to their “exes” once the episode was over, because hey, it was all just a game! The show’s creators like it that way, because they bet we’ll prefer the chase to what happens after the catch.

Not only the contestants, but usually the “catches” too are hard-wired for a bad time and an early divorce! When we look at the behavior of Brett Michaels, Flavor Flav, Tiffany Pollard, or Scott Baio, the last thing we think is that he or she is a healthy choice for long-term relationship success. It’s this very instability that drives us to keep coming back for more, not any glimmer of hope that these relationships will be successful.

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