On Monday night, during “The Bachelor: The Women Tell All” special, the show ended on a different note than in past seasons.
Host Chris Harrison called out former “Bachelorette” Rachel Lindsay to read a variety of tweets and messages both she and other cast members have received on social media.
Lindsay, who made history as the first black “Bachelorette”, warned the audience of the “graphic” nature of the messages.
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“I’m really nervous right now, and I think it’s because the issue we’re discussing today is sadly something a lot of us have experienced… online harassment and hate,” Lindsay said as she took the stage. “It’s so unfortunate because people have become so comfortable being mean.”
“When I was asked to be the ‘Bachelorette’, I knew it would be hard. I knew I would get even more hate and criticism, but I wanted to pave a way for women who look like me, who hadn’t been represented in this role, on this show,” she continued. “But sometimes I feel like my efforts are in vain, because it seems to just be getting so much worse. …You have no idea what it is, and the only way I can actually make you feel it is for you to see it.”
“They’re graphic, they’re explicit, and it’s shocking,” she warned the audience before reading some of the tweets out, which language will not be copied on ET Canada.
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Lindsay broke down while reading them out.
“I’m shaking as I’m reading this because it’s shocking, it’s uncomfortable. I know it’s uncomfortable for you to see. Just imagine how uncomfortable it is to get this in your comments and your DMs every day, every week, every month. And you guys, that’s just a tip of the iceberg,” Lindsay noted as Sydney also started to cry.
“You have to set your DMs to have filters for certain words so you don’t see them. It’s literally that bad… it literally brings you down,” Shiann added while Tammy revealed that she has had death threats sent to her work email.
“The things that I’ve had to go through in my life because of the colour of my skin and because of where I’m from, I’ve had to be really strong… and in moments where you don’t even know how to be strong, but you just have to do it, because if you don’t, you’re going to fall apart,” Sydney said. “When people attack you that way, and the way it makes my mother feel. It’s just like, when it comes to the point of attacking someone for who their mother and father is, and because of the colour of their skin, that’s where it has to stop.”
“None of us deserve this,” she added.
Fans online praised “The Bachelor” for calling out the hate in a public manner:
