THERE IS ABSOLUTELY no doubt that Love Island’s Samira Mighty is very good-looking.
For weeks, viewers have been frustrated by the fact that every lad who enters the house looks past her and goes for one of the other girls and this frustration is compounded by the degree to which Alex is babied by his housemates for being in the same position.
When no girls choose Alex, everyone in the house rallies around him to help create situations where he’s alone with a female housemate so he has an opportunity to make a move. When none of the boys choose Samira… Well, life goes on.
Each time a group of new girls has entered the villa since the show started, there’s always been one who has expressed an interest in Alex.
Both producers and contestants know that the public wants to see Alex coupled up with someone, and they’re trying to give viewers what they want. However, there hasn’t been one guy sent into the house who has said “I like the look of Samira” in their entrance interview.
Last night, six new lads entered the villa. There wasn’t a single one who was interested enough in Samira to put her in their top three most attractive girls in the house.
For many viewers, this was the last straw.
It’s not a coincidence that of the ~16 men who have passed through the villa, zero have wanted to couple up with Samira. Over the last few weeks, there have been countless opinion pieces by black women who say that Samira’s experience is “all too familiar“, and that it highlights the real-life struggles of dating as a black woman.
As Yomi Adegoke pointed out in The Guardian, black women on dating apps are “less likely to receive responses to messages than any other ethnic group.” Many viewers have said that watching Samira’s experience “stings“.
If you scroll through the Love Island hashtag on Twitter, it only takes a couple of seconds to see how infuriating and disheartening many viewers are finding this.
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This year, Love Island has been bringing some very important topics into everyday conversation.
For example, when Women’s Aid released a statement on Adam’s treatment of Rosie – something many women have experienced, and accepted as normal. Many people are learning now that Adam’s behaviour was completely abusive, harmful and unacceptable.
Let’s hope that we can all learn something from Samira’s experience on Love Island, too.
