Netflix’s new show Love Is Blind asks the question, well, is it? Is love blind? Or at the very least, can it be? Fifteen men and fifteen women begin dating in what the show calls “pods,” which are basically, tiny, yet comfortable rooms separated by a colorful door you can’t see through.
These men and women are dating each other without ever seeing one another, with the goal being that they don’t just date, but they fall in love and get married in the next four weeks. It’s like The Bachelor meets Malcolm Gladwell. And it’s great, well, for the most part.
Great: No Swiping!
We live in an age where finding a new partner is as easy as a swipe to the left. When it comes to dating, people are becoming more and more conditioned to judge a book by it’s cover, which, as the show points out, is not the key to a lasting and healthy marriage. Host Nick Lachey points out in the first episode, psychologists believe that an emotional connection is the key to lasting love, not physical attraction. The contests on Love Is Blind have also had all of their devices taken away, so there’s no cheating. They can’t look each other up on social media or judge a book by how many Instagram followers it has. Two of the biggest players in the dating game, looks and social media, are totally taken off the table for this experiment.
Not Great: Alcohol
The contestants’ pods are stocked with whatever they want and most contestants are drinking during their initial dates and the getting to know one another phase. Like any experiment, there are a lot of variables, some good, some bad. This variable is a tricky one because alcohol can hinder a person’s emotions so much, it could potentially make a difficult situation even more difficult or make someone a little too vulnerable. Some could argue that most first dates are over a drink, so why should this be any different, but the point is for this to be completely different from any other first date. All these people have in this experiment are their thoughts, feelings, and words. Alcohol can effect those three things and not always in the most positive way.
Great: No One Can See Each Other, Or Smell Each Other
Dating through a wall, not only takes physical attraction off the table, but it creates a safe space where no one feels judged by their appearance. By day two, a lot of the contestants are in their pods, wearing comfortable clothing, with little to no makeup on, lounging like they would if they were home alone, curled up on their couch. They’re comfortable. They don’t have to worry about their breath, or sitting up straight, or even if they’ve showered that day. That comfortableness and ease makes their safe space even safer and really allows everyone to open up and feel right at home from the very beginning.
Not Great: People Get Hurt
All thirty contestants are initially dating each other, leaving the potential for multiple connections with the same person to be made, and that happens. We see a few girls falling for the same guy, and a couple of guys falling for the same girl, and it quickly makes things very messy. There’s a very Bachelor-like moment in one episode, where one of the men has to choose between two women. The woman he doesn’t choose gets hurt, obviously, and because things move so quickly in the pods, she leaves empty-hearted, wondering what she did wrong or what she could’ve done differently. It’s hard to watch. That kind of heartbreak can leave someone feeling extremely vulnerable, even more so than in a conventional dating situation.
Great: There Are No Distractions
A lot of people look at the timeline for this show and think there’s no way two people can meet, fall in love, get engaged, move in together, and get married in such a short amount of time, but if that’s all you have to do, if you don’t have to go to work or take care of everything in your normal day-to-day life, it’s probably very easy to fall for someone that quickly. It’s like saturated dating. Your only purpose for the next month or so, is to meet the person you want to marry. Take all of those normal life distractions out of the equation, and it is totally do-able.
Not Great: Only Six Couples
This experiment started with thirty contestants total. Fifteen men and fifteen women signed up for and participated in the initial experiment. One would hope that would mean fifteen couples are formed, but that wasn’t the case. Only six couples total are created in the pods.
Six out of fifteen, which is forty percent. Can an experiment with a forty percent success rate be considered successful? Would we trust anything that only works forty percent of the time? Obviously, this experiment needs to be done a few more times before any conclusive findings can be made, but so far, it’s not looking too good.
Great: Strict Rules
These contestants can talk about whatever they want and ask whatever questions they want. If someone wants to know what the person they’re speaking to looks like, they can ask them to describe themselves and that wouldn’t be against the rules. Free will and willpower play into the experiment in a really interesting way because not many contestants do ask questions about their date’s appearance, or at least, none of the contestants who end up finding someone do. These contestants are really committed to the experiment and want to stay as true to it as possible because they genuinely want to know if love is blind.
Not Great: Everyone Sees Each Other Eventually
After the couples get engaged, they’re whisked away to Mexico for a little rest and relaxation. Unbeknownst to the couples, they’re all at the same resort. This is problematic for a couple of reasons, the biggest being, they all just dated each other. Days before the romantic getaway, these people weren’t with who they’re with now and some of them were thinking about being with someone else, and those someone else’s are now at the same hotel. This is really where the cliche reality TV drama comes into play. If the couples had been whisked away to different destinations, it could have kept the experiment more pure and taken one of the unnecessary, drama-inducing variables out of the equation.
Great: Not Overly Produced
Most reality television these days is so heavily produced they might as well hire a writers’ room and call it unscripted-light. The contestants on this show really don’t seem to be getting much from their producers. Disingenuous moments are few and far between because this show is so much more of a human psychology experiment than it is just another trashy dating show.
Viewers are made to feel smarter and more insightful as they follow these contestants on their journey to love because not only are these contestants in uncharted territory, but the audience is as well, and we’re all learning new, pretty awesome things about our fellow humans.
Not Great: They Participate In Each Other’s Wedding Plans
This could easily plant a seed for regrets later down the line. Every girl and a decent amount of guys (regardless of what they say), dream about their wedding day. Planning the wedding is part of that dream. Who wants to plan their wedding with five people they met two weeks ago, who at one point, dated their fiancée? The contestants are allowed to have some friend and family input, but it’s selective. For example, when the women go dress shopping, they’ve each brought one friend or family member with them. Everyone else there was someone they just met. When these contestants look back on their weddings and everything leading up to it, they could potentially wish for a do-over due to the fact that they had to share their dream wedding with so many strangers.
