We all know that what we see on Love Island is a heavily-edited version of what really goes on in the villa. It has to be, of course, because we’re only seeing one hour out of 24. However, Sharon Gaffka has revealed that some of the most interesting conversations she had in the villa ended up being cut from the show.
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Sharon’s cut conversations
Sharon told The Tab:
We were talking about as a mixed race woman, as an Asian woman, and as a black woman how hard it is to date, if you use dating apps for example. Sometimes, especially in a heterosexual environment, it’s very hard because your race is very much fetishised, especially because of what modern pornography is like. Interracial pornography and Asian pornography is very much hyper-sexualised and fetishised a lot.
However, the chat wasn’t shown at all on screen, and Sharon speculated that this may have had something to do with Tinder being one of Love Island’s main sponsors. She said:
In terms of commercial routes it’s probably not great for them to have that part of the show, but I do think there’s a lot of people that do really relate to those experiences.
Diversity on Love Island
Sharon admitted she doesn’t feel producers have gone far enough to improve diversity on the show. While she praised the fact that the starting lineup of Islanders was more diverse in terms of race, she pointed out that other aspects of diversity—such as weight and height were not addressed.
She also echoed many fans concerns about diversity when it comes to Islanders’ ‘types,’ saying:
Where they might have picked more diverse people to be in the villa, people’s types were not diverse. It’s all well and good having myself, Shannon and Kaz if the boys only prefer white girls... sometimes I was sat there being like, well, what’s the point of me being here if everyone’s type is blonde, because I’m not.
