Speaker 1: Welcome to the first episode of the Downfall of Married
Speaker 1: at First Sight Australia, an investigation by the Math Funny
Speaker 1: podcast hosted by me Joshua Fox trigger Oning. This investigation
Speaker 1: will cover topics such as anxiety, depression, domestic violence, misogyny,
Speaker 1: homophobia and suicidal ideation. What you're about to hear will
Speaker 1: shock you, infuriate you, and upset you as I revealed
Speaker 1: the outrageous truth behind the biggest show in this country.
Speaker 2: Just reading up on this new television show, Married.
Speaker 3: At First Sight.
Speaker 1: Married at First Sight, What a great show it's been
Speaker 1: over the last couple of months on Channel.
Speaker 3: Nine, Australia's biggest TV blockbuster.
Speaker 4: This season was the best ever and I don't know
Speaker 4: if they'll be able to top it.
Speaker 1: From negligence at the highest level, repeated failures in duty
Speaker 1: of care, the lack of background checks, cast members being
Speaker 1: pushed to the point of wanting to end their own lives,
Speaker 1: the enabling of domestic violence, etc, Etc.
Speaker 2: Etc.
Speaker 5: Now, I was eagerly awaiting Sunday nights all weekend to
Speaker 5: watch Maths.
Speaker 6: Last night on Maths every season, you go, it can't
Speaker 6: get more drama, it can't get bigger and then it does,
Speaker 6: and I say the true award goes to the producers
Speaker 6: for creating that.
Speaker 1: Every year, cast members of this show always come forward
Speaker 1: blaming their edit, blaming the producers, and trying to share
Speaker 1: their truth and just defend themselves.
Speaker 6: The show is edited, and main thing with my eduit
Speaker 6: was we all know that you only see one percent.
Speaker 7: Almost questions who you are?
Speaker 2: You look in the mirror?
Speaker 3: Is that the real me?
Speaker 1: And also every year, us the fans of this show,
Speaker 1: we just instantly roll our eyes, thinking, here we go again,
Speaker 1: and we'll comment things like, well, you said what you
Speaker 1: said and no one made you do what you did.
Speaker 8: You can't edit your bad behavior. You can't edit what
Speaker 8: came out of your mouth. And it's like, here you
Speaker 8: can it, and they're really good at it.
Speaker 1: And we immediately disregard these rode posts and interviews from
Speaker 1: whoever has become the latest victim of the show, because
Speaker 1: we have whatever is just unfolded on TV in our
Speaker 1: minds as we make those instant judgments.
Speaker 3: How do you react when your public enemy number one?
Speaker 7: Now, yeah, look, if we're being honest, I've taken absolute
Speaker 7: beating plus given how fast this show moves, how relentless
Speaker 7: the twenty four to seven news cycle is, and how
Speaker 7: every hour something new and something more.
Speaker 1: Shocking takes the spotlight and steals our attention. We forget
Speaker 1: these isolated incidents and interviews and we just move on.
Speaker 1: But when you compile what every cast member has said
Speaker 1: across every season for nearly ten years now, it isn't
Speaker 1: quite easy to just disregard that. I've spent weeks reading
Speaker 1: hundreds of articles and interviews, and I've listened to hour
Speaker 1: after hour of podcasts with cast members. I've spoken to
Speaker 1: participant after participant after participant, and well, one person claiming something.
Speaker 2: Against production is an accusation.
Speaker 1: Two people making the same claim could be seen as
Speaker 1: a coincidence. But an endless stream of people all sharing
Speaker 1: similar horror stories across an almost ten year period, well,
Speaker 1: to me, that's a pattern.
Speaker 2: That being said, in this.
Speaker 1: Series, I won't be focused on specific participants and their
Speaker 1: individual issues. I'll be focusing on the show as a
Speaker 1: whole and the people who pull the strings behind the scenes.
Speaker 1: Those people are now the main characters they were always
Speaker 1: destined to become, and the biggest star amongst them. Former
Speaker 1: executive producer and current director of Content Tara McWilliams.
Speaker 9: My first impressions of Tara were pretty good. I'd met
Speaker 9: her on a zoom chat, had a chat with her.
Speaker 9: Seemed like she was really nice and very open about
Speaker 9: the experiment.
Speaker 8: When you meet her, you want her on your good side,
Speaker 8: like you want to impress her. It's just like something
Speaker 8: about the way that she carries herself like that.
Speaker 9: Then meeting her in person, I guess I really did
Speaker 9: believe her that everything.
Speaker 2: Was going to be good.
Speaker 1: Tara single handedly made Married at First Sight the monster
Speaker 1: we all know it as today, and anyone who's worked
Speaker 1: with Tara has their own way to describe her pursuit
Speaker 1: to the top.
Speaker 2: Ruthless, that woman.
Speaker 8: You know that telling her no is going to be
Speaker 8: one of the worst things that you've ever done in
Speaker 8: your life.
Speaker 4: The only person you ever hear in this whole process
Speaker 4: is Tara.
Speaker 8: She gives this vibe that if you tell her no,
Speaker 8: She's going to make your life a living hell.
Speaker 1: Tara took Married at First Sight to such new heights
Speaker 1: that the show's newfound level of success was credited for
Speaker 1: nine's four billion dollar merger with Fairfax Media in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 5: She would scream at you she would manipulate it.
Speaker 4: I've heard Tara say, I don't care if you're happy.
Speaker 4: We just need your story to evolve. You're here, you've
Speaker 4: signed a contract.
Speaker 3: Your ass is mine.
Speaker 4: I've been told that my ass belongs to her so
Speaker 4: many times.
Speaker 1: A quick Google search of Tara will bring up articles
Speaker 1: calling her a mastermind from the most powerful woman in television,
Speaker 1: or because of how her work and what she's achieved
Speaker 1: led to that four billion dollar merger.
Speaker 5: Can you deal would bring together television, radio, print, online
Speaker 5: and streaming on demand.
Speaker 6: You know, we'll certainly be reaching more than half of
Speaker 6: Australia every day.
Speaker 3: This is good for the public.
Speaker 2: But at what cost did that come up?
Speaker 4: Making money from someone's misery to their personal mental demise.
Speaker 4: I don't think I could do that on.
Speaker 5: A six foot five hundred kilo professional fighting athlete, and
Speaker 5: even that woman scares me. I've got sweaty palms just
Speaker 5: thinking about it. When this eventualates and evolves, I guarantee
Speaker 5: you my fine will be ringing and she'll be on
Speaker 5: the other end of it saying I'm so disappointed.
Speaker 1: Now, before I really deep dive into Tara, how she
Speaker 1: operates and the extremes she has to go to in
Speaker 1: order to ensure that every episode of Married at First
Speaker 1: Site continues to generate million after million after million.
Speaker 2: Let's take things back to the very start.
Speaker 1: Married at First Site first launched in two thousand and
Speaker 1: first seen in Denmark, and it quickly became a global
Speaker 1: franchise with spinoffs in Sweden, the Netherlands, the UK, America
Speaker 1: and Australia, with our first season launching here in twenty
Speaker 1: fifteen on Channel nine. That first season had four couples,
Speaker 1: it was only six episodes long, and it was less
Speaker 1: car crash reality show and more Fly on the World documentary.
Speaker 2: Take a listen to this.
Speaker 9: I am looking for someone to settle down.
Speaker 6: With roughly the same age as myself, someone who makes
Speaker 6: your heart beat three times faster than it ordinarily should.
Speaker 3: I've always wanted to get married.
Speaker 10: Eight Aussie singles are set to tie the knots. There's
Speaker 10: just one catch. They'll meet for the very first time.
Speaker 3: On their wedding day.
Speaker 1: But then over time, that wholesome premise and approach has
Speaker 1: morphed into this right And if you're wondering how that happened,
Speaker 1: that's the Tara effect, which I will get to. But
Speaker 1: before that, we must also ask why that happened. Well, well, us,
Speaker 1: the consumers, we're kind of responsible. Since Married at First
Speaker 1: Sight launched in Australia in twenty fifteen, how we watch
Speaker 1: TV has changed, how we consume content has changed, and
Speaker 1: while society has changed, our attention spans have become shorter.
Speaker 1: Short form content on social media has taken over, and
Speaker 1: seventy five percent of people now admit to scrolling on
Speaker 1: their phones while watching the TV, which means traditional TV
Speaker 1: networks have had to continually go to new extremes just
Speaker 1: to compete and also to try and keep people engaged,
Speaker 1: which is something that neuroscientist Andrew Huberman has talked about previously.
Speaker 11: When we first get on social media after a war,
Speaker 11: for the first time, or after a long period of time,
Speaker 11: the amount of dopamine that's released, we think is quite substantial.
Speaker 11: The dopamine quickly wanes and then you find that you're
Speaker 11: just sort and we've all been there. You're scrolling like,
Speaker 11: why am I doing this? This isn't that interesting? That
Speaker 11: isn't this isn't that interesting? Now, the algorithms that they've
Speaker 11: incorporated function on the most powerful way to keep people
Speaker 11: doing a behavior or an animal for that matter, is
Speaker 11: intermittent random reward or random intermittent reward that you don't
Speaker 11: know when you're.
Speaker 3: Gonna hit the jackpot.
Speaker 11: So you're scrolling your going and then you see something
Speaker 11: a riot or a person that is jump based, jumping
Speaker 11: off of building, and then what happens is you start
Speaker 11: getting the system working for that next dopamine hit that
Speaker 11: you don't know when it's gonna come. It's just like gambling.
Speaker 11: If we were to look at ourselves through the lens
Speaker 11: of an experiment like we would an animal experiment, we
Speaker 11: think that animal is sick. If you saw an animal
Speaker 11: digging in the corner, looking looking, looking, looking for a bone,
Speaker 11: the dog is looking looking, looking, looking, looking, looking, looking, looking,
Speaker 11: you'd think that's really sad.
Speaker 1: That's us Getting someone to sit in front of that
Speaker 1: TV for an hour is no longer enough. TV networks
Speaker 1: are no longer just up against each other. They're competing
Speaker 1: with our news feeds, declining attention spans, and I personally
Speaker 1: curated algorithms, which means the reality of a reality show is.
Speaker 2: Also longer enough.
Speaker 1: Producers can't rely on having one big moment each episode
Speaker 1: and giving us one big dopamine hit. They almost need
Speaker 1: to give us one hit in every ad break. Alongside that,
Speaker 1: the bosses of these shows also need to ensure that
Speaker 1: each of those spikes doesn't just captivate us, but compels
Speaker 1: us to them want to engage with it on social media,
Speaker 1: share it to our followers, talk about it, and work
Speaker 1: the next day. They need to make sure that we
Speaker 1: cannot escape what they are creating, which is why in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, endemill Shine Australia, who create Married at First Sight,
Speaker 1: brought in Tara McWilliams as the show's new executive producer,
Speaker 1: and in no time at all, Tara supersized the wholesome
Speaker 1: format we were all now familiar with, and she introduced
Speaker 1: sex scandals, cheating storylines, and weekly dinner parties full of drama.
Speaker 4: Pregnancy obsession.
Speaker 8: Isn't Married at First Sight Australia and in two episodes
Speaker 8: turns into three episodes, just.
Speaker 10: The way that it's filmed, the way they it's edited.
Speaker 6: The TV show I'm currently watching is Buried at First
Speaker 6: Sight Australia.
Speaker 10: A friend of mine sent me like a couple of
Speaker 10: episodes I've Married at First Sight Australia and those.
Speaker 2: It's intense, man, it's a vibe.
Speaker 1: But how did Tara ensure that each scene went to
Speaker 1: such an extreme that it gives the dopamine hit our
Speaker 1: brains and our trains to want more and more of
Speaker 1: And not just that, but how did Tara, with her
Speaker 1: successes Molly and Alex by her side, then increase this
Speaker 1: year on year despite the fact that in real life
Speaker 1: and the fact this was meant to be reality TV
Speaker 1: reflecting the lives of these real people just doesn't have
Speaker 1: those constant spikes of drama. Here's someone for Mozi from
Speaker 1: season nine answering that very question.
Speaker 12: Yeah, so I was on Maths like three years ago
Speaker 12: and I remember this dinner party like it was yesterday.
Speaker 12: I would be like, this has actually been amazing. No
Speaker 12: one screamed, no one's cried, no one smashed anything, like
Speaker 12: it's fine. The head producer comes out and she goes,
Speaker 12: how are you guys going? And I'm like, oh, we're
Speaker 12: having a great time, Like this is awesome. Well I'm bored,
Speaker 12: and Australia is going to be bored, Like what do
Speaker 12: you think you guys are here to do? We're here
Speaker 12: to make TV and this is boring and you guys
Speaker 12: are not leaving until something exciting happens, and.
Speaker 1: If you don't, then deliver the drama that Tara wants.
Speaker 1: Michelle Curen from season seven claims that she has a
Speaker 1: file full of secrets on each cast member and she
Speaker 1: isn't afraid to use it.
Speaker 4: You know, she already knows what's going to push your buttons,
Speaker 4: because you've spoken to the psych you've spoken to the doctor,
Speaker 4: you've spoken to the babysitter, So she already knows what
Speaker 4: is getting fed back to them. So she knows what
Speaker 4: buttons to push and what's going to cause a reaction.
Speaker 4: So yeah, she's the puppet master and where the puppets.
Speaker 4: Like I was like vomiting nearly every like with nervousness,
Speaker 4: before every commitment ceremony, before every dinner party, like I
Speaker 4: was there, like physically vomiting, like just from nerves.
Speaker 1: In an interview with Get Real Entertainment on YouTube after
Speaker 1: his season finished filming in late twenty nineteen, Michelle's co
Speaker 1: star David Cannon elaborated on this further. This just and
Speaker 1: go him and his co stars fund working with Tara.
Speaker 5: She would scream at you, she would scream at you.
Speaker 5: She would she would manipulate you. She would talk about
Speaker 5: turn around and talk and say that we you know,
Speaker 5: this is what you signed up for. I believe Jonathan
Speaker 5: was was confronted by Tara and he was told to
Speaker 5: have a go at other cast members, and he didn't
Speaker 5: want to do it, and he ended up having a
Speaker 5: small episode of emotional trauma. She's very well practiced at
Speaker 5: at making you feel like you're the one that's doing
Speaker 5: everything wrong. It's very well practiced and making us feel
Speaker 5: like we're the bad guys, very well practiced. That She's
Speaker 5: obviously seven seasons, isn't.
Speaker 1: It Going into detail about just how dark things got
Speaker 1: for her during filming. Michelle explained in her twenty nineteen
Speaker 1: interview with Get Real Entertainment that she even contemplated ending
Speaker 1: her own life just to escape the experiments.
Speaker 4: Like when it got to the point where I just
Speaker 4: I couldn't cope anymore, and I said, look, if you
Speaker 4: want me to do this, like I just can't do it.
Speaker 4: Like I wanted to actually physically jump off the balcony.
Speaker 4: And then they said, oh no, so they locked the balcony.
Speaker 3: I said, okay, I'll.
Speaker 5: Just you wanted to physically jump off the really really
Speaker 5: had suicidal thoughts.
Speaker 3: Yeah I did.
Speaker 4: I really did. It's not even like not even pretend thoughts.
Speaker 4: It's like, I just this is an easy way out
Speaker 4: at the time, you thought that was your best option
Speaker 4: to get out?
Speaker 13: Did you think I need to reach out to somebody?
Speaker 5: And I did.
Speaker 3: I did ask.
Speaker 4: I asked for help. So I went to see a
Speaker 4: doctor in Sydney who, like I spoke to at length
Speaker 4: about the whole process and what was going on and
Speaker 4: if she could help me like just set on my nerves.
Speaker 4: And then I also spoke to their doctor because I
Speaker 4: needed some value and more medication because I just couldn't cope.
Speaker 4: And so yeah, he gave me some medication so I
Speaker 4: would be a little bit calmer and maybe not vomit
Speaker 4: every three seconds. But yeah, it was like very hard.
Speaker 3: But how bad did things get?
Speaker 4: Oh, it gets so bad that you just want to
Speaker 4: end the whole thing, like you are willing to commit
Speaker 4: suicide or like jump off the balcony to get out.
Speaker 1: In an email I sent on Wednesday, I asked Channel
Speaker 1: nine if they'd like to comment on this directly, as
Speaker 1: well as if they'd like to comment on so many
Speaker 1: other claims I've included in this podcast, and I have
Speaker 1: had no reply, but for the sake of journalistic fairness,
Speaker 1: Nine have previously shared this statement in regards to the
Speaker 1: mental health of the cast members. Nine and Animals Shine
Speaker 1: take their obligations in respect to the health and well
Speaker 1: being of the participants of this program extremely seriously. All
Speaker 1: participants have access to the show psychologists and welfare resources
Speaker 1: during filming, during broadcast, and once the program has ended.
Speaker 1: Nine also have an additional service for the participants, should
Speaker 1: they like or need further individual and confidential psychological support.
Speaker 1: This service gives participants access to clinics to support those
Speaker 1: involved in the program in relation to their experiences. This
Speaker 1: service is available to our participants for as long as.
Speaker 2: They need it. It does not end. As shocking as
Speaker 2: that is to hear.
Speaker 1: I assume you are now saying, well, why didn't Michelle
Speaker 1: just leave? Why won't any of the cash just quit
Speaker 1: when things reach that point? And unfortunately that isn't quite
Speaker 1: as easy as it sounds. I've spoken to so many
Speaker 1: different cast members from so many different seasons over the years,
Speaker 1: and all of them pretty much tell me that Tara
Speaker 1: uses the same threat to them if they ever say
Speaker 1: they want to quit.
Speaker 2: As Michelle explains here, I wants to leave.
Speaker 4: So many times, and you can't. You just aren't until
Speaker 4: your story is told. Unless your value has diminished, then
Speaker 4: you do not leave. You leave when when like you're boring,
Speaker 4: or when you're like like when you have nothing else
Speaker 4: to offer. You know, I had a few girlfriends that
Speaker 4: I could call and speak to who had said, Michelle,
Speaker 4: this place is killing you. You need to get out,
Speaker 4: you need to get out. I'm just like, I've got
Speaker 4: a plan with Steve. I've got a plan with Steve.
Speaker 4: You know we're going to leave. We're gonna leave it
Speaker 4: the next one, and that would always come unfoiled, like
Speaker 4: some way, like we didn't get out. If you've worked
Speaker 4: in your life and you've established something to make yourself
Speaker 4: like and something for your children, then they use that,
Speaker 4: you know, against you, so that you know, you could
Speaker 4: lose your job, you could use your house, you could
Speaker 4: lose all your property, all your assets, because you've got assets.
Speaker 4: If you don't, then what have you got to lose.
Speaker 4: You've got to lose your dignity, your pride, everything else.
Speaker 4: So not only going to lose that because you've also worked,
Speaker 4: you're gonna lose all the stuff that you've hoped to
Speaker 4: leave to your children.
Speaker 1: The line about if you do leave, will ruin your
Speaker 1: reputation is one that Michelle's costar Poppy Jennings says terrified
Speaker 1: her when she made it.
Speaker 2: Claire, from the very start that she wanted out.
Speaker 6: You are told things like as Dred's gonna hate you.
Speaker 6: I was freaking scared, scared of being so hated if
Speaker 6: I didn't, you know, play to this.
Speaker 3: Part.
Speaker 6: I was pulled up a couple of days into the
Speaker 6: honeymoon and basically told you're the next Inness, You're treating
Speaker 6: him really badly. Just a whole lot of stuff that
Speaker 6: absolutely petrified me.
Speaker 1: Earlier this week season eight, groom Brace told me that
Speaker 1: this fret wasn't just used if you wanted to quit.
Speaker 1: It was also rolled out if you said you didn't
Speaker 1: want to take part in a certain task for whatever reason.
Speaker 9: So it turned for me when we had a task
Speaker 9: that involved writing a feedback letter for another couple in
Speaker 9: the experiment, and basically we've been asked to write a
Speaker 9: letter to Rebecca and Jake, and there was no secret
Speaker 9: that listening, I had a clear dislike and lack of
Speaker 9: respect for Rebecca due to her behavior towards us prior
Speaker 9: to being asked to do the task. We had no
Speaker 9: issue with Jake. We thought Jake was a good bloke,
Speaker 9: but we just didn't think it was gonna beneficial for
Speaker 9: us to write I let her or give any feedback
Speaker 9: to Rebecca and Jake on their relationship. Anyway, long story short,
Speaker 9: our couple's produced. I tried to convince this for about
Speaker 9: half an hour to write it. I refused, and then
Speaker 9: she dragged me outside of our room, had a bit
Speaker 9: of a gulp if not wanting to do the task,
Speaker 9: and then basically broke down in tears and then stormed
Speaker 9: off from our room because I said I wouldn't do it.
Speaker 9: Fifteen minutes later, she came back with a phone and said,
Speaker 9: Tara's on the phone and she wants to talk to me.
Speaker 9: So I spoked her for about five minutes, and the
Speaker 9: conversation ended by Tara saying to me that if I
Speaker 9: don't participate in the feedback task, that she would make
Speaker 9: me look like the worst human being in the country,
Speaker 9: and that she will make sure that when the show
Speaker 9: is put together that no one will like me and
Speaker 9: essentially serious pender as didn't. I guess she stuck to
Speaker 9: a word because we didn't want to do the task,
Speaker 9: which is the funny thing was eventually they sent another
Speaker 9: producer to our room, from a different couple, and we said, okay,
Speaker 9: we'll do the task and listen, I agree, just to
Speaker 9: fake it and write nice things about them, which we
Speaker 9: did and that's how it was shown on the TV.
Speaker 9: But yeah, I guess Tara just went through with her
Speaker 9: I guess promise of making me look like the worst
Speaker 9: human of the country at the time. And yeah, that
Speaker 9: was literally one of many examples I could give. But
Speaker 9: that was the first time I thought that Tara definitely
Speaker 9: didn't have our best interest at heart.
Speaker 1: Now, David, Michelle, Poppy and Bryce, we're all on the
Speaker 1: show a long time ago now, and since then, Tara
Speaker 1: has been promoted from executive producer to a production company
Speaker 1: and then We'll Shine Australia's director of content and in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, Tara's successors, Molly Harwood and Alex Spurway
Speaker 1: then took the reins as co executive producers. And although
Speaker 1: Tara's promotion meant she still oversees the show as a
Speaker 1: whole and is across everything that's happening. It also meant
Speaker 1: she was no longer their day to day so maybe,
Speaker 1: just maybe things started to get better. I recently asked
Speaker 1: Marena from this year's season if that line about will
Speaker 1: ruin your reputation and you'll lose everything you work for
Speaker 1: was ever used to her or any of her cast
Speaker 1: members this year, and she told me this.
Speaker 13: They sure did. How dare you threaten me that I
Speaker 13: will never work in Australia again? Guys, I know you
Speaker 13: put a lot of money into this show, but that's
Speaker 13: below the bell. I was counting the clock. How do
Speaker 13: I get out of here? I was looking for cameras,
Speaker 13: any opportunity I had to file away, I would.
Speaker 1: Marena went on to claim to me that she asked
Speaker 1: to leave several times during filming, but was obviously told
Speaker 1: that would not be happening. She says it was only
Speaker 1: as she then threatened to call the police and say
Speaker 1: she was being held against a will that they then
Speaker 1: orchestrated an exit for her.
Speaker 13: I said to them, I'm going to court your below.
Speaker 13: You're holding me against my will. This stops, This stops today.
Speaker 13: That's when I said, okay, she's really going to do it.
Speaker 13: I should have just done in hindsight, should have, could have,
Speaker 13: would have, should have. Instead, they wound me up and
Speaker 13: they said, look, we know you. You haven't had a
Speaker 13: good a good run with him. So they said, all right,
Speaker 13: let's let's plan this. We'll let you come on set.
Speaker 13: You can make this grand entry. And I promise this
Speaker 13: came out of Alex's mouth. I promise that the experts
Speaker 13: will not give you a hard time. I said, really,
Speaker 13: because they've given me a hard time on every commitment ceremony,
Speaker 13: every single commitment seminary. They have given it to me.
Speaker 13: So they said, nope, they're not going to talk. And
Speaker 13: guess what, they didn't talk. So the next day they producers,
Speaker 13: you ought to be ashamed of yourselves, but that's okay.
Speaker 13: You've got to live with what you've done. They accompany
Speaker 13: me to the lift because there's always a guard at
Speaker 13: the lift, and they just go bye bye, and I
Speaker 13: just went.
Speaker 1: What From what I've been told? The subject of police
Speaker 1: involvement is one of the only things cust members can
Speaker 1: say in order to be taken seriously, which was made
Speaker 1: up parent during the infamous season nine retreat, when Dominica
Speaker 1: violently smashed the glass during an argument with Olivia, which
Speaker 1: she may remember, I.
Speaker 2: Mean telling that mean that my voice isn't enough.
Speaker 12: You don't you remember someone?
Speaker 3: Why it's turning up? Why would you do that? Why?
Speaker 2: Because she's having a guy At my point.
Speaker 1: Olivia claims to me that after initially stating she wanted
Speaker 1: to pond the police regarding that incident, she was told that, well,
Speaker 1: if you do that, you're going to risk the jobs
Speaker 1: of the hundreds of people who work on this show,
Speaker 1: and almost guilty out of doing it. But as she
Speaker 1: then said, actually no, I do want to phone the police.
Speaker 1: I don't feel safe here. Olivia tells me what then
Speaker 1: happened next after the.
Speaker 8: Glass smashing, like the next day she she had to
Speaker 8: drive down to Bargo from Sydney. And it must have
Speaker 8: been like my cycle, like my psychology was it called
Speaker 8: psychological evaluations and stuff that I am really really sensitive
Speaker 8: to authority figures like I can't. I have a really
Speaker 8: hard time sticking up for myself when it's figures of authority.
Speaker 8: And so that's why I think her, Molly and Alex
Speaker 8: all three like them isolated and cornered me in mine,
Speaker 8: in Jackson's bedroom, they wouldn't let Jackson be there because
Speaker 8: they knew that if he was there, he would probably
Speaker 8: stick up for me, And they knew that they had
Speaker 8: a better chance of getting what they wanted, which was
Speaker 8: me staying even though I felt unsafe, and me sort
Speaker 8: of sucking it up and shutting up and taking it
Speaker 8: like taking the glass mashing and all that sort of
Speaker 8: shit and not saying boo. They knew that they would
Speaker 8: be able to shut me up if the three of
Speaker 8: them sort of cornered me in my bed and shamed
Speaker 8: me for that.
Speaker 1: Again, for journalistic balance and fanness, I must state that
Speaker 1: although so many participants have shared similar stories like the above,
Speaker 1: Sarah from season eleven last year did re state that
Speaker 1: when she attempted to quit, no one threatened her reputation, career,
Speaker 1: or you know, the loss of everything she's ever built
Speaker 1: for herself. Instead, Sarah tells Yahu Lifestyle that this was
Speaker 1: the response she received when I.
Speaker 14: Did try to leave, like packed up my stuff and went.
Speaker 14: I had producers coming in constantly.
Speaker 3: What do you need?
Speaker 14: What do you need us to do? If you don't
Speaker 14: want to do this, you don't have to do this.
Speaker 14: Please just go talk to Tim or do this, like,
Speaker 14: I promise it it'll work out. They just they like
Speaker 14: pretty much tell you it's going to be okay, and
Speaker 14: then you kind of go, okay, well, if this is what.
Speaker 3: You're saying, I'll stay.
Speaker 14: They would have been like, we know exactly what's going
Speaker 14: on in your head, Like what you think about him
Speaker 14: is what we see and that's what the world is
Speaker 14: going to see. And that's how they convince them. That's
Speaker 14: what they said to me. They're like, we see what
Speaker 14: you see.
Speaker 12: I was like, oh okay.
Speaker 1: And in case you're wondering, well, did people end up
Speaker 1: seeing what Sarah saw? No, she ended up becoming hated
Speaker 1: Australia sided with her husband instead, and everything that that
Speaker 1: producer told her did not happen. And to me, that
Speaker 1: is just another clear example of manipulation. Having heard all
Speaker 1: of this, I imagine you're now thinking, well, why does
Speaker 1: anyone still go on these shows? Why would anyone make
Speaker 1: that decisions despite everything out there saying don't do it?
Speaker 2: And that's a very valid point.
Speaker 1: But as I've recently discovered, like most things with this show,
Speaker 1: how they get people on it isn't as straightforward as
Speaker 1: you'd think. It's actually quite shocking. And if you're also
Speaker 1: now thinking, well, hey, at least the cast of the
Speaker 1: experts back in them, right, you know, supporting them and
Speaker 1: looking after them and having their best interest at heart,
Speaker 1: you know, because they spent months back and forth with
Speaker 1: them during the application process and all those interviews with
Speaker 1: John Mel Alessandra.
Speaker 2: Not quite No, I'm sorry. I came to you for advice.
Speaker 3: What should I do? No? No, no, no, no, I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: I'm not here to tell you what to do.
Speaker 13: You're not here to give me advice.
Speaker 1: The things I've encouraged relating to those three the apparent
Speaker 1: experts will also leave you speechless. Episode two of the
Speaker 1: Downfall of Married at First Sight Australia will be live
Speaker 1: on the Math Funny podcast next Sunday at eight thirty pm.
Speaker 3: Oh, We've heard everything we need to hear from you.
Speaker 1: And this time John Mel and Alessandra, I think it's
Speaker 1: time to public learn the truth about you three.
Speaker 3: The way you're talking right now, don't do that.
Speaker 1: If you've struggled with some of the topics discussed in
Speaker 1: this episode, please call Lifeline on thirteen eleven fourteen. There's
Speaker 1: always somebody there to talk to, and if your life
Speaker 1: is in immediate danger, please call triple zero