The Bachelorette veteran Rachel Lindsay and artist Travis Mills’ new MTV reality series Ghosted: Love Gone Missing is facing backlash ahead of its premiere after social media raised concerns over its promotion of stalking. The series, set to premiere on the network on Tuesday, Sept. 10 at 9 p.m. ET, follows in the footsteps of Catfish and sees individuals tracking down friends, family members, and past flings after they were ghosted.
The premise of the series, however, has raised plenty of red flags, with some accusing it of promoting unhealthy behaviors such as stalking and forcing people to unwillingly revisit potentially toxic relationships.
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“Yes! Let me have a major entertainment channel and all its resources to assist me in nationally exposing the person who suddenly cut off my online advances despite my texting and emailing each and every hour for six months,” one person wrote on Twitter.
“Could you imagine someone leaving behind a toxic relationship/friendship, healing, and then an MTV camera crew shows up in your face with that person,” another added. “That would be super traumatizing for a lot of people.”
“[MTV] promoting stalking and abuse for entertainment and ratings. What could go wrong?” a third added.
“This is frankly the worst premise for a show imaginable. Simply awful,” wrote another. “There’s a reason (good or bad) someone ghosts: they don’t want you in their life. That’s not a cue to stalk them (with the help of MTV!) to get answers. You won’t get any. Move on and live your life.”
“MTV’s new show [Ghosted] definitely promotes stalking,” a fifth commented. “A person does not HAVE to stay in touch with people whom aren’t their ‘real friends’ if they don’t want to.”
Another person even called for the series to be cancelled, writing, “as much it sucks to be ghosted you have to understand that people just lose interest and while you may want an explanation hounding them down for one isn’t gunna make them reappear. The only thing I see this show promoting is stalking.”
However, as Alicia Lutes pointed out, the realness of the series is likely more blurred than many would think. According to Lutes, who explored a similar topic regarding Catfish in a piece written for Hollywood.com back in 2013, both parties, meaning the ghoster and the ghosted, would likely have been contacted and agreed to do the show before any “tracking” could be done. Legal forms would have to be signed and both parties would have to agree 100 percent ahead of time.
Neither MTV, Lindsay, or Mills have responded to the backlash.
Ghosted: Love Gone Missing premieres on MTV on Tuesday, Sept. 10 at 9 p.m. ET.
