A Feminist watches Love Island: episode 6 & 7 - should this man child be allowed to date?

So the drama has begun!

You know what I mean of course: tea-gate. 

Can you really call yourself a functioning adult if you cannot make a cup of tea and cannot make an omelette unsupervised? 

There was shock in the villa at Tommy's admission but not nearly enough.

It's time we stopped indulging this infantilizing behaviour in men. There are plenty of young women who can't cook either but this behaviour is definitely more accepted in young men who will go from mother to girlfriend, expecting their girlfriend to play the mother role in their life.

Food, clothes and shelter are the basic needs for a man’s (and a woman’s) subsistence. Cooking shouldn't be a gendered task, it's a human need.

The fact that Tommy can't cook means someone else (his mum of course) has been doing it for him.

Think about that for a second, Tommy expects a woman to hold herself responsible for feeding him at every point in life for every single meal.

In villa, we see the men also fulfilling this role but this is a dating show. We are expected to believe he is ready for a long term commitment but he clearly isn't if he is incapable of feeding himself. He wants a mother, not a partner. Girls, run. 

Aside from tea-gate with Tommy and Anton expecting a gold star for putting water and a teabag in a cup, the main drama was Danny and Yewande V Danny and Molly-Mae.

Yewande is being presented as the innocent naïve girl who needs protection from Molly-Mae who is going to "steal" her man.

I don't think it is quite that simple, Molly-Mae is being judged for talking to Danny when she already has men interested in her. Judgment we haven't seen Tommy suffer from as much. This judgment is clearly linked to the gendered ideas we have around women being more monogamous than men.

As a society there is a pervasive idea that monogamy is what women want (and should want) and it’s what men run from (naturally). Anyone who even slightly bucks that trend by, say fancying multiple men, will be judged. We saw it last year with Megan, we are seeing it now with Molly-Mae.

Also Molly-Mae is seen as going against "girl code" by trying to get with Danny when Yewanda likes him. Maybe her actions aren't very nice but why is the villa turning against her when so many men have done the same thing? It's the Anton special!

So I am willing to give a Molly-Mae a break (and call out everyone on twitter for all the nasty gendered words she is currently being called) , however there is one point that really gets my back up.

She clearly doesn't see Yewande as valid competition. She talks about "letting Yewande have him" without considering that he may choose Yewande over her. She has so internalised the misogynoir beauty standards of our society that she thinks her blonde hair and white skin automatically gives her the edge and entitles her to get first pick of the men in the villa.

Hell no.