Amateur love variety shows have been broadcast for a long time, there are many love texts about women, and what are men who have been on the show doing? I met with four "male guests" who had participated in romance and talked about how it was like to be watched. Compared with women of the same age, they showed me less marriage anxiety, and they were on the show more out of novelty. At the beginning of the game, they are full of confidence, but things slowly change.
Game
In the winter of 2018, in Beijing, at a French restaurant, Zhou Hong appeared in a woolen coat, ready to have dinner with the beautiful opposite sex. Slightly different from an exciting date, he sat in front of three girls, surrounded by dozens of cameras. The headlights shone so hard that he could hardly open his eyes, and under the nervousness, he didn't remember what anyone looked like.
Zhou Hong, 27 years old, one meter eighty, a handsome Chinese character face, algorithm engineer, seems to be a sought-after object in the blind date market. In this love variety show that aired a few years ago, he is the "fourth guest" - a dangerous competitor to other male guests who appear a few days after the other guests have already checked into the cabin.
After dinner, he drove to a villa in the suburbs, where guests involved in the romance gathered every night after work and on weekends to complete the interaction for a month. The villa was specially adapted for filming, and many walls were lined with compartments in which the photographer ran around, and the lens protruded through a layer of black cloth on the wall. In addition to the black cloth, all the glass in the house is also to be wary of. The camera is the eyes of the audience, and the guests can't see these eyes, but the eyes can see you.
Three male guests crowded at the door to welcome him. He carried his luggage to the second floor, but found that he was going to live in a single room, close to the girls' dormitory, and the other three boys lived at the other end, he drummed in his heart, wondering if this was intentional by the program team.
Before participating in the recording, he specially watched the original Korean show of this romance show, and the role was played by a man who "the whole person is glowing". It made him feel stressed.
The next day, the guests went to work, and he asked the company for leave because of gastroenteritis. While wandering around the empty villa, he suddenly found that there was still someone in the kitchen, a girl named Cissy was cooking porridge, and asked him if he could drink it. That day, she happened to have no job, and the two had a lot of time together. She took him around the mall and taught him to let go of his tension. He felt she was a kind girl.
That night, he voted for Sisi. According to the rules of the program, everyone writes a letter to a favorite object every day.
For the next few days, they were all trusting each other. The show does not allow guests to contact privately with mobile phones, and they meet every day but cannot send messages, which makes people feel tormented, and it is not until the writing time of the letter every night that the feelings pour out. At that time, Zhou Hong was doing supply chain algorithm research in a large factory, and the company recorded in the South Sixth Ring Road of Beijing, 60 kilometers away. After a day of working in the company, he had to pick up his spirits and enter the camera to interact when he returned to his residence, with only five hours of sleep left, exhaustion loosened his rationality and defense mechanisms, and he gradually got used to the existence of the camera.
At this time, the letter became a source of warmth, "Every day when we finished recording the material and started writing the letter, it was late at night, and her letter was full of front and back of the letter every time. ”
In order to ensure recording time, he had to minimize overtime and other social interactions, and gradually, his attention was taken away from reality, "I remember that winter was very cold, you seemed to enter a utopia, slowly, you want to go back early every day after work and see her." "His immersion in this game-like system is stretching.
The next level of the game is the dating session. Every time he dated Cissy, they would prepare gifts for both parties and create surprises, and his director became his love wisdom tank, "I don't really take the initiative to pursue girls, but the director team can help me with advice." In this month, any imaginative romantic scene, they will give you a reality. For example, arrange for us to dive in the aquarium, how can you usually go diving in the aquarium? The addition effect of these beauties on love is very large. ”
This is a much stronger love experience than in reality, "In reality, you will worry a lot, but in that month, you don't have to worry about anything, this is the four girls selected by the program team from tens of millions of people, even if you don't want to talk, the director team will create a variety of favorable times and places for you, so that you can immerse yourself in it." ”
Most of the men and women in the cabin interact in an ambiguous atmosphere, and love is the only target center of this game, and it is difficult to get alone. "Sometimes I come back from work and I'm tired, and sometimes I want to hide in my room and take a break, and I'll get a reminder from PD to go out and make contact."
Lin Qiang, another guest of the romance show, fell in love in the process of writing letters to girls, he said that he found that the content of the letter written by the female guest was similar, "You will find that there is indeed a tacit understanding, and you will fall into a special emotion." ”
Indeed, sometimes falling in love is the same as falling into a game. Rules full of rewards accelerate the warming of love – it amplifies feelings. "Every day, it feels like the task is accomplished, and today I get another letter and I feel like I'm upgraded again, which is a mechanism of the love show. For 21 days, you put any two people together, and your subconscious will tell you that you are going to fall in love and that sooner or later you will be together. Lin Qiang recalled.
"In this kind of link of letter writing, when men and women choose each other successfully, it will bring a positive psychological cue." Wang Ligang, who used to be the head of the love variety show, told me, "Because there are only a few people in the cabin, you will find that among such a few people, the mutual selection is successful, just like making a game, and the positive psychological hints it brings are different." Slowly, he will go in the direction of longing for love. ”
A few days after the recording began, Zhang Ruoyu, a guest of another romance show, was also addicted. What keeps him emotionally trapped is an annoying competition that is deliberately created. The broadcast of the program shows that he likes a young and cute girl, they originally have a good feeling for each other, but another strong opponent always takes a step ahead of him and gives her courtesy. Due to visual blind spots, coupled with the fact that the show does not allow male and female guests to contact privately, he sometimes feels that girls have intentions for him, and sometimes suspects that he is self-inflicted, plus the director always encourages him not to give up, Zhang Ruoyu gradually feels that he has lost his judgment of reality. Once, according to his agreement with the girl the night before, Zhang Ruoyu needed to prepare dinner for everyone with the girl, but before returning, he was taken by the director to buy vegetables, and after returning, he found a boy taking his cooking seat, and the kitchen of 3 people became crowded and full of competition.
Appropriate fog and blind spots exist in the game, and the director who has mastered God's perspective sits in the information room, gathering clues one by one for micro-invisible traction, and people in the game follow the clues in front of them to start action. "At first I could understand it, but then I couldn't understand it. There are many things I learned about after the show aired. His whole energy was lost in the dismantling of the fog. "This is where the program team succeeds, there is no script, but we will unconsciously go to the plot."
"We really don't have a script." Wang Ligang told me. "In reality TV, we have a script, but no script, everything is done by you. We just design some rules to stimulate their desire to win or lose, their emotions. At most, our PD will only encourage that since you came to this cabin, do you cherish such an opportunity and don't let yourself regret it. ”
He found that in the show, some men will be unwilling to pursue because of friendship or face when they like a girl at the same time as a male guest who has a good relationship with him, which is a unique situation for male guests, "Boys will be very outgoing expression, but they will be more introverted for feelings." In this case, the program team will encourage them, "Since you like it, you chase it, don't have regrets." ”
However, perhaps because reality shows have sufficient addiction mechanisms, when people leave the show and wake up from immersion, the psychological gap will become huge.
On the day of the recording, Zhou Hong quickly returned to high-intensity work. During the recording period, he left a lot of work, the performance appraisal at the end of the year was about to fail, coupled with the spread of layoffs within the company, too busy work and long-distance problems caused contradictions. After returning to reality, the two began to argue frequently, "only to find that our life circles and concepts are very different." "The relationship only lasted a few weeks and they broke up hastily.
Because of participating in the romance, Zhou Hong registered on Weibo. In addition to an unsuccessful relationship, there are hundreds of thousands of fans. Perhaps there is also a gaze and anticipation. I asked him, although you didn't answer the ad, I noticed that you had a lot of selfies on Weibo.
"I'm grateful to some of the fans who have been with me for so long just after watching the variety show once. I would like to give some responses to these people who are still caring about me in good faith. ”
People and people
After the recording, Zhou Hong once thought that the story was over, and half a year later, he changed his city life, changed his job, and had a new girlfriend. After that, the romance series began to broadcast. One morning, he opened his mobile phone and found that small red dots appeared like broken Weibo private messages. "Fans sent me a picture in private messages, all asking, is this you? You've collapsed. ”
In the photo, it is Zhou Hong's new girlfriend holding him and walking through the streets of a busy city.
He remembered that before the broadcast, the director team sent a message to himself to be careful when going out, "You will not be amateurs immediately." But when shopping with his girlfriend, Zhou Hong's appearance had not yet been broadcast in the romance, so he just wore a mask. "I didn't know the show was going to be like that. I still don't know who took the photo, after it was photographed, it was never released, and by the penultimate episode of the show, I was sprinkling sugar with the female guest, and when it was particularly sweet, the photo was released. ”
"The director team was very angry, they said, the broadcast effect is very good, the finale is about to be broadcast, you have a great impact on the show. In a hurry, at the suggestion of a friend, I posted on Weibo that the photos were from previous years. As a result, netizens quickly went to pick up the billboard on the background of the photo, saying that it was not from previous years at all, and the clothes I wore that day were clearly new. My stupid lie was quickly debunked. ”
"That week was really painful, wondering how to explain it. Zhihu and Douban have appeared on the 'scumbag Zhou Hong's ten deadly sins". According to the agreement, before the finale, Zhou Hong could not reveal that he had broken up with the female guest on the show. At the end of the show, he posted a Weibo defense for himself, posting screenshots of conversations with female guests talking about breaking up. "It's actually quite naïve. The director team persuaded me that if you don't explain, explain it again, it will seem that you are a very tasteless man. I can't help it, the emotions are there. ”
Under the turmoil, Zhou Hong gradually broke off the idea of becoming an Internet celebrity, "This matter let me know that my personality is not very suitable for being a front-of-house worker." ”
Zhou Hong was scolded, perhaps because he destroyed his "personality". The broadcast program shows that Zhou Hong has been fiercely offensive against Xixi since he entered the program, and has never wavered, this is a special lover he unintentionally set up for himself, how can such a person fall in love with other women in a blink of an eye?
Recalling this sudden incident a few years ago, as his friend, Wei Zhenzhen also had palpitations. On the show, all the male guests underwent strict scrutiny of appearance and conduct, some had face slimming injections, and Wei Zhenzhen became more careful in speaking. When we met, I lifted the kettle to pour water, and he was so shocked that he stood up while saying sorry, "The kettle is quite heavy, you can handle it." After that, he apologized to me again, "Isn't it bad to say this about girls." ”
When he joined the show, he was 25 years old and engaged in business analysis, and he recalled to me that he was also attacked by private messages because the audience felt that he showed his heart and dedication to a female guest in the show, but he was hesitant at the confession stage and chose the "open ending", which was confusing.
Last year, Wei Zhenzhen claimed on his personal Weibo that he had never been "moved" on the show. He told me that because he had to write to one of four girls every night, he used to write to a Wall Street financial media person. "I think two people have similar occupations, have a common language, and talking about work is a safe option that doesn't cross the line." He also always chooses her to meet on dates, and he is happy to take on an empathetic role - sometimes, he comforts other sad male guests, or plays games to enliven the cabin atmosphere, after all, he often does in life.
In the finished film that was broadcast, he seemed to have some suspected ambiguous interactions with this female guest, giving the audience a certain amount of imagination. Wei Zhenzhen has a baby face, a beautiful face, and an active personality. In the barrage, people call him a little milk dog, and his "sister-brother love" with this female guest has been loved a lot.
"But frankly speaking, my heart has not moved, it is only the editing of the program team, the atmosphere of the post-production teacher, and I was guided to do something I didn't want to do, so that some clips have traces of heartbeat." He explained to me. He is not dissatisfied with the guidance and editing of the reality show, the only thing that minds is that many fans comment that he is not confident enough.
"They want to give their sister a reason for not being able to hold hands, like I don't dare to climb a successful woman." I have great respect for women who have a successful career, but in the matter of love, career success occupies very little weight. ”
Similarly, he was very helpless about the title of "little dog", "Do you think I am?" He asked me with a smile.
Back to the criteria for choosing a mate
I met with the fourth male guest, Lin Qiang, via video. Opening the video, I first noticed a beautiful white sculpture under the golden wall of his study, reminding me of rumors about wealthy businessmen in the top luxury building in the first-tier city where he lived. He and a female guest also "flashed points" after the show, and also because the show was broadcast in a time lag from reality, and some of his seemingly irrational coping methods, he also encountered a round of online violence, but these hot searches had little impact on his life.
Here's his summary of the relationship:
"It was undoubtedly a very special experience in my life, but I must admit that I deeply regretted putting my feelings into such a state of limited time and space, and the experience I can recall now is the bondage and the rules of the game that I have to follow. Behind this game, with the blessing of traffic, everyone has subtly become a consumer product, and feelings are a thing that cannot be consumed. I've always thought so. The decision to separate if it is not appropriate seems normal to me, but because of such a decision, I also realized that your 'energy' chose to end when it was not consumed, and those who were not satisfied may devour you in turn. ”
Talking about the view of choosing a mate, he hopes that the life situation of the other party is compatible and comfortable, "In my opinion, our enthusiasm for life is greater than anything else, and being able to really live for life (without being affected by social media) is the state I envision." ”
When he met the female guest who touched him, Zhou Hong had just returned to China for a year after graduating from graduate school, and his entire life was occupied by the Internet company located in the suburbs of Beijing. In those 1 month, he rushed to the villa every day after work, finished eating with the guests, and by the time he wrote the letter, it was early in the morning, and in his sleepiness, some long letters relieved him, "She would fill the front and back of the stationery, share with me what she saw on the road, the cake she made today, the dance she practiced in the afternoon, and the snail on the leaves she saw, and the sunlight that sprinkled." ”
At that time, in order to balance work and program performance, he was often in extreme tension because of his anxious personality. Sometimes, when the two of them didn't have time to meet each other for a day, she would add in letters to her life for the day, "She shines on me like a little sun." ”
Today, Zhou Hong has left Beijing to work as a data scientist at a foreign company in Shanghai, earning a good income. The path of being a programmer was chosen for him by his father, a native of Jiangxi, who started from scratch and brought his whole family to Shanghai, "They took my small family to a higher level, and I have to take it to a higher level." I have to show my dad. ”
Even with a large income, he was still occasionally ridiculed by his father, who exercised a repressive education on him since he was a child, "Once the people around me affirm me, I just want to be happy, he will immediately extinguish my happiness, he feels that people cannot be happy, happy can float." He always said, what is it that you are a little wronged? This society is full of grievances. ”
These experiences may also have influenced his view of mate selection, "As a man, I think I have to take on more responsibilities in marriage. For me, a girl who has a successful career, is knowledgeable, and understands the world, and another person who is not so good in the eyes of girls, but has a lively personality and can illuminate others like a little sun, the latter will make me feel more happy. In fact, I really want to admit that I am also a person who loves life, and I hope that life can be more than just working and making money. ”
"I like girls who are easier to get along with. Since work and life are already so tiring, I hope that everyone will be easier in marriage. "Wei Zhenzhen told me that he had a girlfriend who was four years younger than him, but this relationship was not easy to get." When I first got off the show, I often had girls approaching me, but I quickly learned from mutual friends that the other party wanted to try to fall in love with the so-called Internet celebrity and satisfy a little vanity, and some people felt that the Internet celebrity could make a lot of money. And my current girlfriend has been studying abroad for a long time and doesn't know much about romance, and if it weren't for a friend, she might never know that I had participated in the show. ”
In the romance show we talked about, the fair-skinned and beautiful lively girl won the choice of most male guests. As an audience member of countless romances, I asked, why are the kind of "strong women" women always not chosen? How does a man view this?
"I understand that maybe the new generation of girls aspire to become a big heroine like her who can control her career and love, and hope to see such a person reap love." If she can reap a good result, it will be a comfort to many women. Wei Zhenzhen said.
However, "To be precise, the big heroine's personality may not be very suitable for me, the girls I participated in were very independent and successful, I would be friends with them, but I would not think about love." ”
"But maybe it's just because we're not strong enough." He immediately added, "Maybe the kind of man who is particularly strong, like Wang Shi, or a real little milk dog, will like the 'big heroine'?" ”
As he speaks, his back muscles are straight and his head is not shaking, as if there is still a camera in front of us.
(In order to protect the privacy of interviewees, the characters in the article are pseudonyms)
Interview, written by: Liu Chuchu
Editor: Wang Jingyi
Vision: aube
Illustration: Song Chi
Operations Editor: Xintong
After watching the story of the male guest of love
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