The Bachelor 20 - Ben Higgins - General Discussion - *Sleuthing - Spoilers* #3

sparkler wrote:I didn't watch the aftershow. I never liked them after BIP so I skip these. I barely remember the date with JoJo because it was so short. Overall the episode was kind of lackluster. I am not interested in Becca again although I loved her on Chris's season. We already know her story and she is trying way too hard. With Amber and the rejection and all the crying i think it goes deeper than just being rejected on this show. I remember her as emotional on BIP. Just how I see it. Thanks again for the thoughtful perspective on the episode JBF.

I like Becca. In fact, I like all of the contestants on this show. I know my comments above do get "windy" and most readers are probably disturbed by on my "avant garde" sense of humor. Yet I always mean well and only mock the EDITS of people and not the people themselves.

I do not think we need to hear about Becca's "virginity" over and over again... and Ben questioning if it all because of her "faith" or whatever. I personally don't care about peoples' religious beliefs any more than I care about whether they have played soccer, gone sky diving or experienced any other "sporting activity"... behind closed doors... as long as they are concerned about proper hygiene. Heck, silly me STILL suspects Nick and Kaitlyn did-the-deed BEFORE her show and they just needed a "story", but there is no point debating and speculating history. I just hope if Becca ever was to be the Bachelorette, find her husband and decides to marry on the show, that we don't get another Consummation Station like Sean/Catherine's. Fleiss & Co. is totally INCAPABLE of handling certain topics with any subtly. By the way, I also thought it was stupid last season for Kaitlyn to even ask Ben if HE was a virgin... and , of course, he has to remind us AGAIN that he is not THIS season! Is that something required on a resume?

^ Loved your summary @JBF. I too like Becca too and totally get mocking the edits/contestants rather than the people themselves. Who really knows them anyway. It's all good fun and I laugh at the obvious snark/mockery even with those I like or dislike. :Nod:

I don't know where to post this so I'm putting it in this thread. I got involved in this forum because I know Caila and her ex (not close friends, just acquaintances).  I haven't watched The Bachelor before, but am watching this train wreck now because I'm curious about how my generation of women got reduced to this kind of representation on TV. I don't know many women like Caila or the other women on the show. Women who quit jobs to sell themselves to a show that doesn't care at all about them just so they can go on national TV.  I don't understand women who give away their dignity for the attention they get being treated like sister wives. IMO it's kind of like the saying that any attention for these women, even negative attention from a misogynistic show like The Bachelor, is better than no attention. IMO that's exactly what these girls are doing.  Yeah, yeah, I know these women asked for it. And I know some of them will parlay this 15 minutes into a website hawking themselves or products. All the smarts in the world don't make up for attention-seeking narcissists these women seem to be. I read a quote by Carrie Fisher after the new Star Wars movie. People made fun of her because she hadn't "aged well."  She said something that struck me and that IMO applies to all these girls that aspire to be made famous by a show like The Bachelor.  She said, “Youth and beauty are not accomplishments, they’re the temporary happy by-products of time and/or DNA. Don’t hold your breath for either.” These women need to learn that. Maybe in 40 years Mike Fleiss will have another show "The Divorced Middle-aged Bachelor" and he can call back all the women he gave 15 minutes of fame to and let them try again. Or we can have a show, "Former Bachelor Contestants and their Plastic Surgery Disasters"  in 10 years. Or "Former Bachelor Contestants confront their Daddy Issues." The list can and will go on and on. In the meantime, sad but true, I'll still be watching this season's train wreck.

Keep in mind Mike Fleiss did Chainsaw Massacre (movie) before this along with Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire. 
This show is not supposed to be about a love story. It was initiated as a dating experiment. If love happens great. If drama and hysteria happens even better.

IA with a lot of your post @bostonugirl92 but don't think all of these people are the worst thing ever. There's plenty narcissistic people in this world who never go on reality TV.

So while I don't think all those who go on Reality TV are raging narcissists, I do think, especially after 30+ seasons of Bach/Bette US shows, that a lot of the people who choose to go on this show are flirting with narcissistic tendencies.

There's actually a quiz that TIME magazine posted last week: Quiz: Are You A Narcissist?
http://time.com/3136687/narcissist-quiz/

A score of 17/40 = indicates narcissism.
Actors = 18/40
Reality-TV stars = 19.45/40

.. it's no surprise to me really that someone that wants to be on this type of TV show may perhaps score at or above the narcissism range.

These people are not so bad when you comparing them to other crazy show's out there. I caught one last night, Fit to Fat to Fit. WTH? the trainer gains weight, like 40 -50 - 60 pounds so he can train someone who is over weight, understand what they go through, and loose weight with them. Now that's messed up IMO.

Or June what's her name, the Tierra and whatever show, I don't watch any of them but there are a lot more worse ones than this franchise IMO.

As bad as some of these contestants are, there is some good that comes out of it. Trista/Ryan and all the other married couples, Jillian Harris and her success, even Ali F who I am guilty of accusing all she wanted was fame. Well she did, sort of, that was her passion to be on TV and she's done well.

ITA, GA. I think Bach/Bette as crazy as it is, is still pretty tame and dare I say even classier than some of the reality tv shows out there. :shocked!:

I think most people on this show are surprisingly normal, or perhaps we just don't get to see them enough to notice their narcissistic tendencies. Attention seeking for sure, since no one who doesn't want attention would go on TV in the first place, but some do seem to realise the attention isn't all that it's cracked up to be, whether positive or negative. That's a sign of a healthy mind to me.

mindless wrote:I think most people on this show are surprisingly normal, or perhaps we just don't get to see them enough to notice their narcissistic tendencies. Attention seeking for sure, since no one who doesn't want attention would go on TV in the first place, but some do seem to realise the attention isn't all that it's cracked up to be, whether positive or negative. That's a sign of a healthy mind to me.

IA with this. However, I don't think all those who don't continue with TV or in the limelight indicate that they are not narcissistic - they just may not get opportunities to do so onscreen or in public.

I think that most of the cast members leave (overall) either a positive or neutral impression on viewers. If for some reason they don't, there are multiple opportunities for them to fix that, through WTA, BiP, aftershows, interviews, tweets, or through invitations to come back to do another series. IMO the show's viewers are a forgiving bunch, and if a cast member gives him- or herself a metaphorical smack on the head, and pleads temporary insanity, in most cases viewers will cut that person a break. Plus, most cast members develop fans so that if some don't like you, others will.

The show does open a lot of doors for cast members, both personally and professionally. What they do with those opportunities is up to them. I call The Bachelor/Bachelorett/Bip "the gift that keeps on giving." It is similar to Dancing With the Stars in that manner. In most cases it is a positive to have appeared on the show.

And it sure beats the heck out of the lousy, go-nowhere jobs that *I* had at their age! Why not have a little but of fun, adventure, and travel? There are worse ways to spend your time.

If the twins get an invitation to BiP, as I hope they will, the pay will likely more than cover their schooling.

GuardianAngel wrote:These people are not so bad when you comparing them to other crazy show's out there. I caught one last night, Fit to Fat to Fit. WTH? the trainer gains weight, like 40 -50 - 60 pounds so he can train someone who is over weight, understand what they go through, and loose weight with them. Now that's messed up IMO.

Or June what's her name, the Tierra and whatever show, I don't watch any of them but there are a lot more worse ones than this franchise IMO.

I know what you mean. Granted, some of the performers such as Donald and Sarah at least had previous experience on other shows like The Apprentice on NBC and Palin's Alaska on the Discovery Channel. Overall they have their acting skills better toned than other contestants such as Ted, Marco, Mike Huckaboo-boo, Carly, Jeb! and Doctor Carson. Personally, I would rather re-watch a marathon airing of Jake Pavelka's season along with his tit-for-tat with Vienna on Harrison's couch followed by their ongoing saga on Bachelor Pad all over again than listen to Mike Huckaboo-boo have another of his "stock" hissy fits over cross-dressers using the wrong bathroom. The editors of the show keep repeating the same joke over and over even though it isn't particularly amusing. I did, however, like the tit-for-tats between Donald and his rivals Jeb! and Ted. Not the greatest TV, but it had its moments. Bet the show will get better once we see how the entire cast reacts to either Bernie or Hillary succeeding Barack in the White House.

Oh... wait a minute. Are we talking about the same Reality TV shows?

JBF, it is better than realitytv, I tell you.