In recent years, Love Island USA has distinguished itself from the sea of tropical, horny reality dating shows, to become something of a longform sociological study in heterosexual dating. Going deeper than the mere interpersonal drama that seems to consume most of its contemporaries, the Peacock hit series offers lots of fodder for public commentary about modern dating, and especially how it intersects with misogyny, race, colorism, and class.
In a way, Love Island USA is the heterosexual Hunger Games, the villa is the arena, and we, the viewers, are all peering into the panopticon each night, rooting for our victors and voting out our villains based largely on how they interact with and embody these systems — and of course, we also do pay attention to how genuine their connections seem.
While the “boys versus girls” gendered divide between contestants has always been a tension point on Love Island, as it is in many reality dating shows, this season especially has sparked conversation about how much worse many of the men seem to be behaving toward the women they pursue. Indeed,here isn’t just one stand-out “villain” acting egregiously while their fellow islanders look on in horror, but rather a litany of offenses that viewers at home have been listing off.
Let’s recap: Zach appeared to sow the seeds of doubt in men like Bryce and KC about their connections. He also omitted information about his Casa Amor connection being removed from the villa from his Kayda, saying he would have chosen her over Alannah, even though he had no option but to return to the villa alone. Corbin said he would be tossing Kenzie “out the window” after being presented with a bombshell he eventually coupled up with. KC called his initial connection, Aniya, “grandma” for not having sex with him after three weeks of him complementing her, in addition to making comments about whether both Aniya and his new connection Tierra “Titi” has earned his affection when choosing between them at the Casa Amor recoupling. Not to mention, Sincere’s litany of lies to his primary connection, Melanie, along with the false promises made to other women he explored like Sol and Amora, which left even the men speechless. Even brief connections exhibited this concerning trend in behavior, with Casa Amor bombshell Gal accusing his three-day romance Jen of being “aggressive” for saying more affection would make her feel more secure in their exploration. The theme that united these individual instances of negative behavior was an unspoken “boy code” in which the men would lie to the women, only to reveal their true feelings in conversations with the other guys.
The closeness between the boys this season has even led some viewers to speculate about the sexualities of some of the contestants, but that’s a topic for another article. What I’m concerned about is the fact that misogyny seems to be the primary order of gender politics in the villa. Questions of sexuality aside, the men of this season seem to have prioritized their connection with and approval from other men over the women they are ostensibly trying to pursue.
Overall, the villa seems overrun with ambient rhetoric about men needing to be considered the “prize” women need to compete over — language that seems to be ripped straight from the Manosphere, a nefarious pocket of the internet made up of male content creators, podcasters, and influencers, all preaching misogynistic ideas about how men need to obtain “high-value” women by earning money, getting extremely fit, and increasing their societal status.
Marlee Liss, founder of Survivors 4 Justice Reform, posted a slide show on Instagram, speculating about how much, in her opinion, each of the men could be indoctrinated into the Manosphere based on their comments and actions. While it’s impossible to know any of their media diets for absolute certain, the show certainly warrants this conversation. When Cosmopolitan‘s Beth Gillette published her expert breakdown of the show’s infamous Movie Night, in which contestants had to watch what people said behind each other’s backs, I realized my observations weren’t just worst-faith misinterpretations of straight dating culture. All across the internet, people are drawing the same conclusions. I would not be surprised if many of these men have the worst kind of Kick streamers in their ears.
The Manosphere has been around for over a decade, but while the misogynistic talking points aren’t new, its influence and reach is expanding. It’s no secret that the Manosphere’s slow ascent from fringe online subculture made up of incels into the upper echelons of power in the United States has drastically shifted culture and regressed progress made by feminist organizers in the name of women’s rights. It’s no surprise that we’d start to see it in mass culture, too; in the interactions between ordinary people thrust together on a dating show.
Indeed, what makes this season particularly alarming is that this is the first cohort of male Islanders who were raised in the belly of the Manosphere. Many of these young men were at vulnerable and formative teens and pre-teens when Donald Trump was first elected, which helped propel the fringes of the misogynistic internet into the mainstream. In many ways, young boys of this age group who had access to the internet were unable to avoid the Manosphere, as algorithms led them back to it in recommended videos and targeted content. With the generational divide in mind, it’s no surprise that some of the season’s favorites, like Carl and Bryce are elder Gen Z and millennials who grew up on an entirely different internet than their younger Gen Z, fellow islanders.
I am no expert on heterosexual dating. As a queer, trans person peering through the looking glass, Love Island USA has actually become more my primary exposure to straight people rather than a lens for dating tensions I see in my daily life. That’s why, when I spoke to my straight younger sister last week — who falls into the same age range as the early 20s men on the show — I was shocked by her response. When I asked her if the show was reflective of the actual way young straight people date, she didn’t take offense. “I honestly feel like yes,” she texted back. The confirmation was sobering.
I’d encourage us to refrain from condemning any of the individual men on this show, as we only get snippets of their days, conversations, and actions edited down by a team of producers. Their actions are fine to critique; they are adults who have signed up for this experience, after all, and their words have a cultural impact that needs to be dissected. But I worry that when we get lost in critiquing any one contestant, we miss the forest for the trees. This season of Love Island USA is a worrying warning sign about a generation of young men raised by cultural actors worse than Joe Rogan — one that anyone invested in straight romance should be sweating about.
As a trans person, I usually am not someone who engages in the heteropessimist read that all straight men brought up in a culture of misogyny are doomed. The Manosphere hurts people of all genders alike, and if vulnerable young men are susceptible to falling prey to the ambient misogynistic ideas it espouses, it’s bad for everyone. Rather than abandon all hope, the way forward seems to be trying to reform the thinking of a generation of men who have involuntarily grown up ingesting this toxic content, with the help of other men who call out the behavior. That’s the only way we heal — and it’s also the only way Love Island can be bearable to watch again.
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