Opinion | ‘Finding Prince Charming let us all down, and here’s why’

This summer, when it was announced that that there would be a gay version of the Bachelor called Finding Prince Charming, I, like pretty much everyone else out there, was excited. “It’s a testament to how accepting society has become!” “A chance to show the wider world that us gays date like everyone else!” These were some of the reactions to the announcement. Well, after having forced myself to watch through the entire season of Finding Prince Charming, I am thoroughly disappointed. A fourth place at the Olympics level of disappointed. And here’s why.

If you wanted a TV show that portrayed the gay community in a positive way, this, to paraphrase Obi-Wan Kenobi, “is not the show you’re looking for.” If you wanted a TV show featuring catty, vain, self-obsessed and at times downright horrible men, however, then gurrrrl, did you hit the jackpot. From five minutes into the first episode, there was bitchiness, vanity and desperate behaviour on display. Obviously reality TV producers deliberately cast people who stir things up to make the show more interesting, but I was genuinely appalled by the way in which some of these men behaved. I’m talking childish tantrums, I’m talking bullying, I’m talking spitting at each other (Seriously, who does that?). You’d hope that on a so-called ‘trailblazing’ show, the contestants would want to show the best of the community that they represent; not the dregs of it.

However disappointing the contestants may have been, it’s beside my main point. Thirstiness is thirstiness: Finding Prince Charming was a dating show after all and if you lock 13 hot-blooded men in a house together, all vying for the affections of one man, drama is bound to happen. The fact that it’s the first ever gay dating show means that the participants are under a much higher degree of scrutiny that their straight counterparts would be – maybe unfairly so. But the thing that I actually take issue with is the star of the show; Mr Prince Charming himself, Robert Sepúlveda Jr. Except I don’t think he should be calling himself Prince Charming at all.

In all honesty, I thought that he came across as a massive hypocrite. From the very first episode, I watched him goad his suitors into bearing their souls to him while in return he sat there like a brick wall, or replied with something pithy and meaningless. Something that I also picked up on was that week by week the guys that he kept in began to blend into one. He got rid of the guys who didn’t conform to conventional beauty standards, all the while weakly insisting that he wasn’t interested in the looks of his suitors.

The most hypocritical thing that he did however, was that he would say he didn’t care about perfection and that he wasn’t searching for perfection. It was incessant; it was like a mantra or something. Funny that he should say that because to me, it seemed like every single detail of his appearance had been sculpted to, erm, perfection. There was not a single hair on his head that wasn’t where it shouldn’t have been and his blemish free skin looked like it had been frozen into perfection by who knows how many gallons of Botox.

But why is this so bad anyway? So what if a reality TV contestant is fake and a hypocrite? It’s just a TV show so it’s not a big deal, right? Is it really worth wasting breath moaning about him?

The answer is yes, and here’s why. There will have been thousands of young gay men out there coming to terms with their sexuality who will have watched this show, to look for people like them and to look for a role model. As the main character in this reality show of this nature, you become a role model, whether you like it or not. If you get rid of the less attractive guys and only care about the ones with the six-packs and the biceps, what kind of image of gay relationships are you sending to the future generations? You’re showing them that only the most attractive are worthy of love; that if you aren’t hot then you’re not worth anything to anyone else.

What does that do to a teenage boy coming to terms with being gay when he sees that? Although it may be unfair that Finding Prince Charming, as a gay dating show faces a higher level of expectation and scrutiny than a straight dating show might, it’s not a good idea to one-sidedly portray someone as the ultimate gay ideal simply because he’s good looking, and not take his character into account.

It can’t be denied that the Finding Prince Charming did have positives: I applaud the producers of the show for the positive and progressive way in which they portrayed the suitor who had been HIV positive for 10 years and the ex-homeless cocaine addict who had turned his life around. Despite this, I felt let down by Finding Prince Charming, and Robert Sepúlveda Jr in particular. Like I said, here was a chance to show that gay people are just like everyone else, but this chance was ruined by its star who it seemed was more concerned with how his hair looked rather than the responsibility that his role gave him.

I do think Finding Prince Charming has potential, as do the people who renewed it for a second season but in order for the show to succeed, it needs to learn from its mistakes, take the way it might portray the gay community into consideration and most importantly, cast a much more suitable Prince Charming. Robert Sepúlveda Jr. may look like a Prince, but he behaved like an ugly stepsister.

Words: George Brett

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