Married At First Sight Australia Trailer Sexist

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An Australian TV channel has come under fire for releasing a trailer in which a male reality show contestant says he wants to be "obeyed" by women and respected "as the man", and that men are “getting whipped by their women.” It's almost as if #MeToo never happened.

The man named Dean, who features in the new series of Married at First Sight on the country's Channel 9 network, prefaces his views by saying: “It’s hard to say without sounding sexist or something,” before reeling off the qualities he's looking for in a woman. Sadly for Dean, it appears he was born several decades too late.

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Dean wants to be loved, honoured… And obeyed. ? #9Married pic.twitter.com/Lei4aGCXwG
— Married At First Sight Australia (@MarriedAU) December 14, 2017

"I like a girl that is a girl and is girly and knows that I'm the man and that I'm in charge," he announces. "Also I want someone that listens to me. I want to be the alpha male and she needs to respect me as the man. I think that's a traditional role that still exists in a lot of other countries in the world and Australia's lost that.

"A lot of guys are just afraid to be men and and they're getting whipped by their women. I don't agree with that, I don't know why that's happened. I want to bring it back."

In the show, which has a British counterpart on Channel 4, eight single people are matched into couples by a panel of "experts" and are made to enter a civil union before even getting to know each other.

Critics condemned the trailer and Dean's views on social media, claiming they would have been more at home in the 1950s and that the tone of the whole thing was particularly offensive at a time when women's allegations of sexual harassment and abuse have finally started to be taken seriously.

who decided to put a show from the 1950’s on tv https://t.co/vilJGmOXtn
— green bean? (@bricorine) December 14, 2017

This is appalling, #Channel9. It’s not edgy, it’s not ‘controversial’. It’s straight out offensive, and in this #MeToo world it’s insane. Shelve it immediately https://t.co/YHOH80qTWg
— Stuart Page (@stupafication) December 14, 2017

It’s amazing that you haven’t learnt a damn thing from 2017.
— Ivana Kovac Kuti (@IKKsays) December 14, 2017

It's like he's reading from the domestic violence red flag list https://t.co/OgfG0wJI0K
— Jess Hill (@jessradio) December 14, 2017

Any man who needs to force a woman to respect and obey him is both a coward and a bully.
— Clementine Ford (@clementine_ford) December 14, 2017

Gee, what an exceptional character to give air time to so he can spread his Neanderthal messages - well done, @MarriedAU ?
— Kelly McIntyre Hill (@KelmacHill) December 14, 2017

Bloody hell, this is like a domestic violence campaign ad. https://t.co/15fJrNS2Gl
— Petra #ChangeTheDate Starke (@petstarr) December 14, 2017

Channel 9 must've missed the news that "feminism" was named 2017's Merriam-Webster's word of the year. Did they really think viewers would just be passive in the face of such overt, outdated sexism?

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