Last night, Love Island issued a statement to viewers ahead of the third episode airing. It was a warning, essentially, to the people that are posting abusive and hateful messages about contestants - including sending them death threats – that their actions do not go unnoticed.
‘Last night’s episode created strong reactions but some viewers post where wholly unacceptable,’ the statement read. ‘We take these matters extremely seriously and will support cast members and their families in reporting such posts.’
Now, 'Love Island death threats' is a breakout search term on Google Trends as people seek to know more about the vile behaviour of certain viewers.
Over on Instagram, Chloe Burrows family issued the same warning. ‘We hate to introduce ourselves under such circumstances but we’ve had enough, after just three episodes,’ it read. ‘We all have thick skin but the amount of trolling Chloe has been receiving is absolutely disgusting. This morning we woke up to yet another DM encouraging Chloe to kill herself – there have been hundreds.’
‘Chloe does not deserve to DIE because Shannon had to leave the villa,’ it continued. ‘All the advice we get is to “ignore it” and “block the trolls”, sometimes it’s not that easy.’
Reading their statement, it’s a shocking moment for most viewers – the fact they had to clarify that Chloe does not deserve death for coupling up with someone on Love Island, it’s ludicrous that even needs to be said. But clearly, it’s necessary. Because the reaction to Love Island putting out their statement says it all.
‘Do you expect us to support every person that walks in the villa?’ one person responded to the tweet. ‘Don’t prompt islanders to go down certain directions and edit [them] to be portrayed in certain ways then?’ another questioned. ‘Constructing a certain narrative for real people for a bit of drama is what leads to this online abuse.’
Essentially, the comment section of the statement is filled with people blaming producers for creating villains and editing the show in a way that produces drama. They’re not wrong, producers clearly do that – but we already know that. And we have full control of how we choose to respond to those scenarios.
Listen, we’ve had a lot to say about the manipulative and concerning tactics used to create certain narratives on Love Island. There’s no doubt that producers have, in the past, been made us uncomfortable with the situations they put emotional or vulnerable contestants in. We should be examining the way they create heroes and villains on the show, but we shouldn’t be using that as an excuse for viewers sending abusive tweets and death threats to contestants.
At the end of the day, we’re all very well aware of what Love Island producers do to create the very show we get sucked into every year. It’s because of their editing, the drama they create through so-called manipulative tactics, that the show becomes so interesting for viewers to watch. Without shock dumping’s, savage challenges and villains – viewers would equally complain that the show is too boring.
In fact, they already have been. Despite the shock dumping of Shannon Singh two days into Love Island, despite the challenge where a man was dared to kiss the woman he fancied the least, despite Chloe being brought in late to steal another contestants man, the overwhelming reaction to this year’s show is that it’s not entertaining enough.
Now that could all be down to the casting – no one contestant appears to have grabbed viewers enough to be invested in their Love Island journey just yet – but the Islanders have already been chosen, and when we constantly tweet about how boring the show is, producers are going to listen and liven it up the best way they know how… by creating shocking drama.
To complain of how boring the show is, but then blame producers for creating the drama that leads to online abuse misses the point. It completely relinquishes accountability from the people that are actually sending death threats. Because no matter what producers do, whether they cast villains or have people emotionally castrate each other on camera, no one should be sending contestants messages that they should die or deserve abuse.
No one is saying you can’t dislike certain people, you just can’t tell them to kill themselves because they kissed someone as a dare.
It may be that some people have taken the statement incredibly personally, that they’ve interpreted it as them not being allowed to have any negative opinions on the show or its contestants – that is simply not the case. No one is saying you can’t dislike certain people, that you have to condone their behaviour or cannot make jokes about them online. You just can’t tell them to kill themselves because they kissed someone as a dare as part of a reality game show.
Love Island viewers may be majority the generation that grew up sharing absolutely every inner thought online, but watching this show should act as a staunch reminder that there are the things we think but don’t say out loud and there are things we say in the group chat but don’t post online. Bitching in the comfort of your friendship group is one thing, but posting something online is like screaming it with a megaphone – contestants could leave and read your words at any moment, and even while they can’t their family and friends certainly can.
If we can recognise that Love Island casts people in certain lights, and manipulates them into behaving in ways they might not normally then we should be able to recognise that not all judgement of them needs to be posted online. Just because Love Island producers may be looking to stir up drama, doesn’t mean you have to descend into the worst version of yourself and post hateful or abusive tweets in response. It’s on all of us to #BeKind.
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