Dating for Black singles is a challenge. Anyone who would argue to the contrary is either not being honest or has never dated before. For this reason, many Black singles are entertaining more outside-of-the-box methods of finding love, and it doesn't get any more out-of-the-MFing-box than Married At First Sight (Lifetime).
Married At First Sight, now in its 14th season, matches and marries ten strangers for a dating social experiment. Couples are matched by a small team of experts, including a pastor, a marriage and family therapist, and a sociologist. What could go wrong with such a kick-ass team? A lot, it seems. Black singles on the show are often mismatched, and their relationships rarely last beyond Decision Day.
Recently, cycle 12 contestant Ryan Oubre spoke out about the difficulties of being in an interracial relationship on the show. A recent Instagram post describes his experience:
"You can't truly be open to marry another race and not want to marry their culture (or at least at the minimum understand it). The black experience and black culture are not monolithic, there's no one size fits all shoe. It's ever-evolving and changing with time. What I can say is: walking into a family gathering and not speaking to anyone and scrolling through your phone will never fly and declining food (outside of a food allergy or avoidance) because you don't like the way it looks won't help either. My brother is a pescatarian and my sister in law doesn't eat pork and we've made every family gathering work just fine.
By marrying into a different race/culture you inherently adopt parts of their identity. Most importantly, your kids 100% will, and your kids will need you to help navigate it. They all need you to help teach, train, and understand as best as you can - a systematically racist system. Choosing not to attempt to understand and educate yourself is a red flag. "
Not enough consideration has been made to how dating as a Black single is quite different than our counterparts. Last year, RELASH hosted a Dating While Black Town Hall with the nation's top dating experts to discuss how racial bias and systematic racism create unnecessary challenges for Black singles. It's high time that networks considered the Black dating experience and its differences by casting experts whose experience with matching Black singles is credible.
Of course, I'm biased, but I'd love to see more dating shows where more Black singles win than lose. Everyone deserves love, so why not put some respect on it. Cast a Black matchmaker and see what you get. #BlackLoveMagic.
