Lack of diversity on Love Island


With less than two weeks left of the summer show and this season racking up the most viewers for the ITV2 programme it begs the question; can we complain about the lack of diversity on Love Island if we persist to watch it?

Season one of Love Island started
in 2015
For seasons there has been complaints from Love Island viewers about the lack of racial and body diversity on the show. At the beginning of the fifth season viewers once again complained about the lack of racial diversity especially as black British contestants Yewande Biala and Sherif Lanre struggled to find love. Sadly, Yewande similarly to Samira Mighty from the 2018 season of the show broke down in the confessional about not being wanted for who she is.

And the little racial diversity that the show had didn’t last too long as Sherif ended up leaving the villa for breaking rules and Yewande was the first girl to leave once she was left single by Danny Williams who choose to couple up with Arabella Chi.
Another concern of the British public was the fact that there was no body diversity in previous seasons. It is thought that the casting of Anna Vakili seems to be a failed attempt at getting more body types on the show but it is still believed that she represents an unrealistic body type.

But as more islanders came in the lack of job diversity came into question as well, since many of them are models. This list includes Danny, Jordan Hames, Jourdan Riane, Arabella and new girl India Reynolds who state modelling as their primary profession, along with Maura Higgins and Lucy Dolan have also had modelling stints. For some fans this called into question the motives of the islanders as it is well known now that appearing on the show can significantly raise the social media presence of the contestants and open them up to many opportunities in the entertainment industry.

Moreover, as it continues to be revealed that many of the shows current and previous contestants know it each other, the idea of it Love Island being fixed becomes more believable.

Graph created by the BBC to show the
viewing figures of the ITV2 show
Regardless the show continues to trend every night on Twitter as fans tweet about what they loved and hated and as the viewing numbers for the show rapidly grow each season it becomes less likely that ITV will care about the complaints about diversity. Also, producers of the show state that they are driven, above all, by personality and watchability when casting.

As one of the few shows nowadays that people will make sure to tune in when it first comes out Love Island has a unique grip on audiences during our digital age. This grip is tightening as the show has just expanded into the USA after already having success in Australia and Germany, two of which are accessible to UK audiences.

Personally, I don’t expect the show to be socially representative and watch it as pure entertainment however; watching people who don’t fit the (blonde) mould of beauty struggle to find love and feel loved themselves does make it hard to watch at times. Still I find it difficult to comment on aspects of diversity because as a regular viewer of the show my view to extent portrays support for ITV's failures in diversity.

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