-Ben’s time was used to tell Tayshia about his past. He tells her he’s feeling a connections he’s never felt in his life before and it scares him. With the life he’s lived, he thinks it’s different than what Tayshia assumed it was. He had an eating disorder for 15 years. He thought girls didn’t like the fat kids, so he lost over 80 lbs, suffered from bulimia for 10 years. Him disrobing was him showing her all of himself. He cares but says it’s hard for him to let out. Tayshia steals a line from Clare saying Ben “showed up for her” tonight and gave him the rose. I’m beginning to think that unless you have some sort of awful, tragic backstory, you basically can’t win on this show anymore. It never used to be that way, but seemingly, if you’re just a regular guy or girl, had a normal upbringing, no real tragedies in your life, you’re happy and content with everything currently happening, you almost come across as uninteresting. Why is that so? Look, we know they LOVE exploiting people with tragic backstories. But after a while, it gets to be a bit much. Props to Ben and Zac for overcoming what they did. This isn’t about them individually. Just collectively as a show, this gets tiresome that it seems they love to exploit storylines like this. While it’s ultimately on each guy to share, we all know they were coached into doing so.
-After Tayshia gives the group date rose to Ben, she addressed Bennett and Noah specifically saying, “Something is going on, and I’m gonna get to the bottom of it.” Wonderful. Can’t wait. Bennett and Noah’s “feud” couldn’t be any more tame if they tried. You put guys, or girls, in the same location for x amount of weeks fighting over one person, of course not everyone is gonna get along, personalities are gonna clash, etc. We’ve seen this numerous times over past seasons. While I think Bennett and Noah are at two different places in their lives and maybe wouldn’t necessarily be BFF’s outside of this show, they’re making this out to be so much more than it really is. And we’ll see that once their impromptu 2-on-1 date begins.
-Well, what happened next. Oh yeah, Eazy had a 1-on-1. Tayshia sent him home. The End.
-Now onto to more important things, which is the cocktail party before the rose ceremony. Wait, first JoJo addresses the guys that morning saying Tayshia will still be holding a cocktail party, but not right away, she sees tension between Bennett and Noah and would like to see both of them together during the cocktail party where one will get a rose a one won’t. Bennett doesn’t seem the least bit worried and is confident he’ll get the rose, which ultimately means he won’t. In Bennett’s words: “I crush life under pressure.” Look, this show has made it pretty clear what Bennett thinks of himself. Who knows if he’s really like this in real life, BUT, from just the edit we are seeing of him, Bennett comes across as a narcissistic, self-absorbed, pompous asshole. Great, you think he’s hot. His personality, at least on this show, is nauseating.
-Clearly production got inside Bennett’s head, because I don’t know any guy in their right mind, when being put on a 2-on-1 date, would sit there and bring a “gift” for the other guy, basically explaining how much better he thinks he is than him. Nothing about that scene of Bennett giving Noah his gift made him look the least bit likable. Sorry. Giving him a book on emotional intelligence and saying he’s deficient in 3 of the 4 traits. First off, emotional intelligence I thought had 5 traits to it – Self awareness, self regulation, Empathy, Social Skills, and Motivation? Unless I read that wrong on the internet which, I guess, is entirely possible. But if it’s correct, doesn’t that make Bennett more of a boob as he’s talking down to a guy, yet, isn’t even correct in what he’s talking down to him for? And then to say, “I’m not trying to belittle you, I’m trying to love you up.” Ummmm, everything about giving him that gift and telling him you think he’s deficient in 3 of the 4 emotional intelligence traits is belittling. If anything, BENNETT is the one that has zero self awareness right now. He looks like a buffoon during this whole scene.
-When you really break it down, what exactly has Noah even done to warrant this type of response from Bennett? Jumped the fence on the wrestling date, when ANYONE could have? That’s not his fault. Telling Tayshia the guys ganged up on him after that, I mean, they did. I think Noah’s biggest mistake was last week when he insinuated that Tayshia gave him the rose to stir things up, which then led to her outburst at the rose ceremony. Definitely a mistake on his part. But that was never part of Bennett’s argument last night. I don’t remember it being brought up once. Bennett is older and went to Harvard. He sees a guy 11 years younger than her getting attention and he feels threatened. There’s your easy answer. And considering Bennett even used the 11 year age difference IN his argument with Noah kinda shows where his head is at. No, a 36 year old arguing with a 25 year old isn’t even close to the same as a 25 year old arguing with a 14 year old. Seriously? A Harvard grad thinks those are equal? The polished, calm, slow talking demeanor is offset by the stupidity that seems to consistently be coming out of his mouth.
Next week, we’ll get the resolution to this nonsense, but you’ve seen my spoiler by now I’m sure. She gives Noah the rose over Bennett. And then seemingly eliminates 3 more guys at the rose ceremony judging by that picture on page 1. So we’ll have 7 guys left after the next rose ceremony if that picture includes everyone. 5 episodes left total with 7 guys. Now the math is starting to add up this season, when for the longest time, it didn’t. Adding those two Monday shows on the 14th and 21st changed everything.
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