Advertisers and sponsors of the Bachelor should be “alarmed” about the program's all-Caucasian cast, the host of SBS show The Feed Marc Fennell and founder of Media Diversity Australia Isabel Lo have warned.
Fennell, who admits he has never been a massive fan of The Bachelor and doesn't represent its target audience, says that in 2017, cultural diversity in TV shows isn't just a 'nice to have', it makes commercial sense.
“The demographics of Australia are changing, such as who buys beauty products and the sorts of things that get advertised on that show,” Fennell tells AdNews.
“If you have a show that makes you feel like you don't belong and you don't fall under a category of beauty, why would you be interested in the products that advertise around them?
“If I was an advertiser on that show I'd be really concerned...if that show is excluding or being willfully ignorant of the changing demographic in Australia, I'd be alarmed as an advertiser.”
The 22 Bachelorettes.
Lo, who set up Media Diversity Australia to promote a more balanced ethnic representation in the Australian media, believes the cast clearly shows casting directors “don't prioritise diversity, and that it's not an issue for them”.
“How will advertisers react to that? I don't have the numbers, but I am hoping they're thinking: "this isn't really capturing the full range of our audience, and that's a problem. People of colour also like to spend money, you know."
“It just goes to show how little progress we've made in media in trying to be more representative of what Australia looks like today.”
Media Diversity Australia's team, including Fennell (second from left)
and Lo (second from right). Photo: Newspix.
Fennell, who is also a creative director at Media Diversity Australia, said he wouldn't be drawn to comment on what motivated the lack of diversity, but believes it's lazy casting at best.
“It's like the media industry is saying this is the image of beauty in Australia and it has a very specific shade,” he says.
“We know that the demographics of Australia are changing, we know that what Australia looks like are changing and it seems very, very backwards to not represent this in 2017. Surely it wasn't that hard to find people of different ethnicities.”
He believes there will “clearly be some people annoyed by it”, but is curious to find out if The Bachelor's core viewership really cares.
“It would say a lot about Australia if it didn't,” he says. “If they don't it says to me we have a lot more work cut out for us than we previously did.”
Ten are not unfamiliar to criticism over the ethnic make-up of reality TV casts. They received criticism over the line-up for the first season of I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here.
The second series showed a marked improvement and some of their other tent pole shows, such as MasterChef have always embraced cultural diversity, unearthing super cooking talent from all sorts of cultural Asian backgrounds.
"The capacity is there, it just requires the will to make a chance,” Fennell adds. “Somebody has to decide it's important to make your casting call for a show look like the country it represents.”
This may well come from outside Ten from advertisers and sponsors dismayed by the show's inability to represent its target audiences.
Check out AdNews journalist Arvind Hickman's verdict on the cast: TV shows like The Bachelor can ill afford to whitewash in 2017.
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