Like the rest of the country, I have been absolutely shook by the events of last night’s finale of The Bachelor Australia. In case you missed it (and, like…how? Do you live under a rock mate?), Bachie Nick Cummins aka the Honey Badger chose absolutely no one. There was no winner, only losers in this tale. And the country has been very quick to drag him to hell and back for it.
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I admit, I was one of those people who immediately reacted with anger. I have watched (and recapped!) most of the episodes and grew to enjoy the final two, Sophie Tieman and Brittany Hockley, very much. I thought either one of them would have had a nice little relationship with Nick had he chosen either one of them to be the winner. It was a strong top two. So I, like so many other people watching, was like “NICK YOU ABSOLUTE JERK WHAT A WASTE OF MY TIME, THEIR TIME AND THE COUNTRY’S TIME”.
Especially because he didn’t give a proper explanation to either girl about where his feelings were at and why he made the controversial decision. That wasn’t cool, Sophie and Brittany deserved more. In fact, he was so reserved with his feelings during the show that Brooke Blurton straight up walked outta there in the second-to-last episode. So after the finale, the country was like “Yep, just another Aussie fuckboy who can’t deal with commitment or feelings”.
But after having a few hours to stew on it, I now think that I might have reacted unfairly. Take the 2014 season of The Bachelor Australia, where Blake Garvey proposed to Sam Frost in the finale and then everything went to actual shit. Then the whole thing imploded. It was revealed that Blake had dumped Sam two weeks before the finale aired, moving onto third-place getter Louise Pillidge who he dated for 18 months.
That, my friends, is fuckboy behaviour. That’s something we can get mad about. Would we rather Nick had chosen Brittany only to dump her a few weeks later having never felt “that way” about her? The man clearly wasn’t feeling strongly enough about either girl to embark on a very public relationship with them, and really, he shouldn’t have to just because we all wanted him to.
We’ve seen other Bachie couples “get together” only to break up within 12 months of the show ending: think Sophie Monk and Stu Laundy who lasted a couple of months, Richie Strahan and Alex Nation who dated for just under a year, and Sam Frost and Sasha Mielczarek who dated for around a year. There’s been whispers of “contracts” and “fake relationships”, and it leaves fans of the show and of these people feeling a little cheated.
Nick clearly decided this life wasn’t for him. Sure, you could argue that he did The Bachelor Australia to help push his other ventures — he has a book out, he’s the co-host of Netflix‘s Ultimate Beastmaster Australia, and he’s the face of Tradie undies — and that he was never there for the right reasons. But you could also argue that Sophie did the same thing when she was Bachelorette, and Soph was treated like an Aussie hero and Nick is getting absolutely dragged for it. The truth is, only Nick knows why he went on the show, and all we can do is speculate.
What we can’t forget is: it’s a TV show. A lot of the women who applied probably went on there for “the wrong reasons” — to build their profiles or to promote their jewellery brands (Cat, I’m looking at you). A lot of them went on there to find love, and it didn’t happen. That’s life. We don’t always get the fairytale ending.
Sure, we’ve got some really happy Bachie couples out there like Tim Robards and Anna Heinrich, Sam Wood and Snezana Markoski, Georgia Love and Lee Elliott, and Matty Johnson and Laura Byrne. It’s great that they’re all happy. But life doesn’t work out that way for everyone, especially in a situation as unreal as The Bachelor or Bachelorette, where you have limited time to get to know people and you’ve got a camera in your face 95% of the time.
I admit I actually loved watching Nick as the Bachie. He was funny and entertaining, full of personality, and seemed like a really nice guy. So maybe I’m a little biased, but today, I’m actually thankful that through his actions (if not his words) he was honest with himself, with Sophie and Brittany and with everyone watching.
Whether you’re a guy, a girl, on TV in front of thousands of people or on a date you’re just not feeling, true love can be really hard to find, and it’s not fair to anyone if you settle for anything you’re not 100% sure on.
