Anybody who’s seen so much as a single episode of The Bachelor or The Bachelorette is likely familiar with what it means to be accused of being there “for the wrong reasons.” A fair amount of any season consists of the lead trying to determine who’s there to fall in love and who wants to get famous and grow their social media following. Bachelor in Paradise Season 7 alum PIeper James is all too familiar with the attack, and she made a good argument about why a relationship shouldn’t be the only good thing allowed to come out of the show.
Pieper James, who was originally on Matt James’ season of The Bachelor, and her then-boyfriend Brendan Morais from Clare Crawley and Tayshia Adams’ season were effectively kicked off of Bachelor in Paradise back in 2021 after they were caught talking about how many Instagram followers they had. Furthermore, it was learned that they had been dating before filming started, adding weight to the accusations that they were only doing it for the ‘Gram. James spoke about the situation on Courtney Robertson’s After Reality podcast, pointing out how illogical the “right reasons” argument is. She said:
We can pretend like the ‘right reasons’ are to find love, and that’s obviously a good reason to go on the show, but if we’re talking about a Bachelor season, our season had 36 women. Like, one woman is gonna win. So the 35 other women, like, why shouldn’t they be able to start their businesses and sell their brands and promote things on Instagram? That’s like their consolation prize for going on a show that they’re not getting paid for. I think it’s unfair for people to say, like, ‘How dare you capitalize on an opportunity that you were given out of millions of people that applied? That’s crazy.’ Like, it would be crazy not to, come on.
Social media is simply part of the world we live in today, and Pieper James does make a good point, in that the cast members on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette are not paid for their time, and they often have to leave their jobs in order to participate in the show. That’s not to mention the money they spend on clothes and makeup either. If they’re able to parlay their 15 minutes of fame into something beyond the show, shouldn’t they be able to do that?
It’s a tricky argument, because if everybody’s just trying to promote their brand, how serious is anybody about actually getting married? Bachelor Nation has typically been wary of people whose intentions don’t seem sincere, and they definitely let Brendan Morais and Pieper James know how much they disapproved of their BIP antics, particularly how Morais had strung Natasha Parker along while he waited for James to arrive in Paradise.
Within three days of that episode airing, Brendan Morais went from 350,000 Instagram followers to 260,000 (today he stands at 182K). Pieper James, meanwhile, lost a little over 10,000 of her 88,000 following (and today has 64.2K). If we’re talking about the “right reasons,” though, Morais and James dated for two years after their time on Bachelor in Paradise, so maybe it’s true after all that you can find love AND followers on the reality dating show.
Wherever you stand on the issue, you can continue to watch Joey Graziadei’s journey to find love on The Bachelor, with new episodes airing at 8 p.m. ET Mondays on ABC and available to stream the next day with a Hulu subscription.
