Love Is (Not Politically) Blind

A digression on dealbreakers and censorship in reality TV dating shows

Hi close friends!

I was going to skip this week’s newsletter to give me more time to finish reading Sally Rooney’s new book, Intermezzo, (more on that next week!) but the most recent drop of Love Is Blind (US) episodes were too spicy not to discuss. So here we are.

If you haven’t ever watched, the premise of the show is equally simple as it is deranged. Around thirty contestants enter “the pods,” rooms where they can only hear each other through the walls, and speed date for 10 days to find their most compatible match. If they decide to propose and get engaged by the end of the experiment, the pair will then have a reveal where they see each other for the first time. At that point, normally around 5-6 couples get to continue the experiment for another couple of weeks — going on a honeymoon vacation with the other couples, living together in a joint apartment back in the “real world”, meeting friends and family — and in one final test to supposedly prove whether love is truly blind, decide whether they’ll commit to each other and say “I do” in a legitimate wedding ceremony. Yes, you read that correctly.

I love the overheard camera pan of the pods, because it's like where do you store this set while traveling from city to city (in a warehouse? a gym?) and how do you get this same shot every season?? a girl (me) needs to know!

This season (7) takes place in Washington D.C. and from what I have heard from friends, the dating pool there is notoriously a struggle for straight women. While I was expecting to see the capitol hill devotees and as one of the contestants Taylor puts it the “corporate girlies,” I was more surprised by the number of ex-military members that were in the cast. Of course on second thought, it totally makes sense that would be a large section of the workforce in the literal capital of the United States. Growing up in the midwest, the military has always conjured up a specific association for me (read: conservative and personally not a part of my dating pool lol), especially when I lived in predominantly white areas. It’s a big part of the culture, for better or worse. So it was fascinating to see it explored in such a new sociological context for me, and coming from the perspective of multiple POC voices across the spectrum from pro to anti-military.

---

**WARNING: Spoilers ahead for episodes 1-9! In case you’re planning on watching.**

---

One love triangle in particular, involves 2 men, Bohdan, a Ukrainian immigrant and refugee who served in the US marines and overseas in the Ukraine war, and Ramses, a Venezuelan immigrant who we later find out is very anti-military for reasons including, but not limited to the relations between the US and Venezuela. They vie for the same woman, Marissa, who grew up in a military family on a base and later served in the US Navy. Both Bohdan and Marissa bond over both the meaningful time they spent in the military, the opportunities, experiences, and pride it gave them, and also the fact that they felt like anomalies in the community for being more liberal, even going as far as saying it’s ironic coming from them, but agree that it’s a bit of a yellow flag to hear if someone was in the military when they go out and date, because of all the connotations it comes with. At another point, another contestant Tim shares a similar reflection about his time serving when meeting his partner’s family, saying something to the effect of it being the best decision of his life to both join and leave the military.

While Marissa ends up choosing to get engaged to Ramses — propositioned as the opposite of every other military toxic masculine guy she’s been with before — the military having been such a big part of her life becomes a point of contention for the two of them as they leave the pods and delve deeper into the topic, including how they want to raise their kids. We see one such conversation over dinner, and later with Marissa’s friends. My mouth actually dropped open when I heard Ramses mention “Palestine”¹ and “US imperialism” by name to explain his position, speaking candidly about how he believes that your politics are tied to your ethics and that while he respects her past, if she ever actively joined the military again, it would be a deal breaker.

Ramses and Marissa chatting away in the pods

One gripe that I’ve had over the years with various reality tv dating shows is the end commitment of the show being so serious like a marriage, and yet we see no actual connection developing between contestants to explain them getting to that point besides them both trauma dumping about their individual lives. Rather we see them talk about their connection developing, almost as if narrating in the third person. The Bachelor is notorious for this, having developed an entire lexicon of the stages to falling in love, almost as if marking off a checklist or playbook, and then hiding their important potential “dealbreaker” conversations about how to raise kids, moving to a different city, handling being in an interracial relationship, politics, etc. for when the cameras go away, often leaving it till the fantasy suite overnight date where for the first time contestants get uninterrupted time to actually get their questions answered.

Even in seasons past of Love Is Blind, we see topics like political affiliation, for example, hinted at — such as JP last season exclusively wearing some form of the American flag or red, white, and blue — but not confronted head on through dialogue. This season however, it’s part of quite a few conversations, if not between every single contestant. Stephen talks with Monica in the pods about how he voted for Trump back in 2016, but then Biden in 2020, after regretting his prior decision. In relation to his change in political opinion, he delves into how he thought he was completely white, but later was shocked to learn he has a percentage of Black heritage (albeit a quite small percentage, lol) after taking an ancestry test. Monica finds his story touching, speaking about what it was like growing up mixed race, sharing an anecdote of her own about how she didn’t know what box to tick re: race when filling out forms as a child taking standardized tests.²

The environmental context of the show taking place in DC and 2024 being an election year feels like these types of conversations were potentially for the first time unavoidable for producers to show, as many were essential to the plot line and development (or devolvement) of these relationships. And it’s so refreshing to hear them unadulterated, without being tiptoed around or censored by a generous amount of editing after the fact, because it reflects what real conversations in dating look like today out in the world and off-screen. Don’t get me wrong, 95% of these people are still unhinged and bring the drama that comes with being desperate to find love by any means and being put into circumstances designed to make you become even more desperate. However, seeing all the different points of view actually made me really reflect on and investigate more deeply my own thoughts about the US military (for coincidentally the second time in recent weeks³) and how I might handle that type of situation, and led to an interesting conversation with a friend about their own opinions, using Ramses and Marissa as a jumping off point.

Yes, I love my escapist reality tv, but I also love when it offers compelling anthropological observations. The duality of man!

P.S. FYI, there’s a new spinoff for Arab singles called Love Is Blind, Habibi, and you know I’m about to eat that up. I can’t wait to see this show play out in a dating context where arranged marriages are part of the norm. Inshallah!

1. Part of why this caught me off guard as well was because until the October 7th attacks last year, Palestine felt like it hadn’t entered the mainstream American consciousness to the degree it has now, but according to this article, this season started filming in early 2024 which makes a lot of sense.

2. Stephen also jokingly calls Monica a “mutt” after she tells her story, which I find so insanely wild, but that’s a whole other conversation…

3. The first time was because of my day job working in marketing for a media company, which led me to reflect on the moral quandary of what it means for self-proclaimed feminist and progressive brands to take on advertising client partners like the US military and/or political campaigns.