One day before Love Island announced the contestants for this year’s show, they implored us all to ‘think before you post’. It was a pointed and welcome statement after so much loss linked to the show and the trolling that ensues because of it. Then they posted their full teaser for the series, and it all went out the window.
‘You would really think there were fit men in the city but there really aren’t, most of them are married or have girlfriends so they’re off-limits… they’re not really off-limits,’ Chloe Burrows, a 25-year-old financial marketing executive was captured giggling.
That’s all we get to see of Chloe in the trailer, a part from a line at the end about how she ‘just wants someone fit and funny, it’s not too much to ask.’ Naturally, people have therefore drawn conclusions about her character.
The individual interview for her, later posted on Love Island’s Instagram, has only added fuel to the fire - with the majority of her teaser focused around her penchant for married men.
‘I mean I’m partial to a married man,’ she’s seen laughing, with a tone of voice that seems as though she’s answering a question. ‘I did meet someone at work, I thought it was love at first sight, until my manager reminded me of his wife and kids. Doesn’t mean I don’t drunk call him most weekends.’
‘Any girl should be wary of her man, but I mean definitely around me,’ Chloe continues. ‘But it’s always his fault, I’m not going make a move who’s really invested in his girl, but I mean yeah if I like someone then I like them.’
It’s worth noting here that Chloe hasn’t actually admitted to having an affair, beyond the comment about being ‘partial’ to married men that could’ve easily been a joke. In fact, she says the opposite – that she thought she met someone she liked UNTIL she found out he was married. She also adds that she would never make the first move. Yes, the comments about drunk calling him don’t sit well – but they certainly don’t warrant the intense backlash she’s already getting.
‘The Chloe on love island seems like a scruff boasting about messaging married men,’ one tweet read to hundreds of likes. ‘Openly advocating to cheating? She’s going to go down well with the public,’ another comment stated with near 3,000 likes.
Essentially, the entire comment section of Love Island’s Instagram post about her is filled with thousands of people calling her classless, lacking in self-respect and saying she’s already the most hated contestant.
But there’s a few asking a more important question.
‘Love island put [Be Kind] all over Facebook/Instagram then do a "Meet Chloe" video where she says no man is off limits even if they have wives or girlfriends and kids and you can imagine the comments on it,’ one follower commented. ‘How about you don't post videos of her saying something like this and you won't get hundreds of comments in minutes that are not kind!
This being the first thing viewers know about her is purposeful.
‘This being the first thing people know about her… it’s what you want people to listen to and see to get your ratings up,’ the viewer continued. ‘People are going to form opinions and be mean and it's obviously going to affect her when she comes out. As well as her friends and family reading them right now, knowing her and what she's really like and not what this 30-second clip makes her out to be.’
Former Love Island contestant Laura Anderson appears to agree, saying: ‘I’m scared to read the comments. Let’s give her a chance everyone.’
Now, let’s be clear, Love Island are always going to create drama and in order to do that they will cast villains or create certain narratives about cast members. It’s true that it’s on all of us to understand that, and be kind to the real person behind that knowing the power of editing. But it’s also clear that not all people do.
There are a thousand factors that go into making these Love Island interviews. Producers seek to make them comfortable on camera, creating a friendly atmosphere so they can show their true personalities. They will ask questions, and when funny quips or sensational lines are made, picking up on those is a must for those hoping to create ‘good TV’. Then the clips will be edited together, and one cheeky story or line is now your entire character reference for millions of people.
In that interview, Chloe might’ve felt like she was joking around with friends, she might’ve made one comment that she was asked for more details on, that she then ran with and regretted talking about afterwards. I’m assuming a lot here, but it’s also important to think of all of the different scenarios that would put someone in a situation where they admit to seeking out affairs on such a huge TV show, knowing the trolling of contestants that has come before.
Chloe could spend half her life chasing after married men, but it's also possible that she's been cast in a certain light to create suspense around the show’s resident ‘man-stealer’. So when it comes to thinking before you post, as Love Island so desperately wants us to do, it’s not just about stopping yourself from commenting something mean.
It’s also about understanding that this is TV created for our entertainment, these are real people being edited into caricatures of themselves so we tune in and watch them cause havoc. Even if they appear to be a bad person, you don’t always have to tell them that online when actually, we have no idea who any of these people are - even watching their entire summer play out on our screens.
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