Love Is Blind contestant JP has been branded a ‘walking red flag’ after he told his new bride Taylor Rowe that she looked ‘fake’ because she was ‘covered in make-up’ when they first met.
The 32-year-old firefighter – whose full name is Jared Pearce – angered viewers when he unleashed his honest opinions while trying to discuss why their first meeting in person was so awkward, even though he had previously made a connection in the pods.
Jared revealed he wasn’t a fan of Taylor, 26, wearing make-up, and accused her of putting on a completely different face.
Speaking to his bride in bed on their honeymoon, he said of their first face-to-face meeting: “I understand you tried to present yourself and look the best you could, but I feel like if you presented yourself that way.” [naturally]Without any makeup would have been better.
“So the way you looked made you communicate differently?” “You felt like a fake,” Taylor asked, prompting Jared to snicker savagely.
Taylor then asked: “Is that why the connection was cut off?”
“That’s how it started,” Jared continued, revealing his thoughts. You had a lumpy face [and] Fake eyelashes. I’m being honest and I’m sorry that’s hard to hear.
“I did fake stuff… a lot of makeup… I was putting makeup on my jacket.”
Feeling hurt and frustrated by his brutal remarks, Taylor stood her ground and doubled down on her makeup, telling him she would continue to wear it no matter what he thought.
She defended her use of beauty products, saying: “You don’t know what I look like, and I wanted to feel and look my best when I see you for the first time.”
“Women wear makeup because they want to feel beautiful. A lot of girls and women do that.
Soon after, Taylor’s kindergarten teacher explained that she would be staying in a different room — away from her future husband.
The next day, she decided to end their engagement, stating that Jared was “not the person I fell in love with.”
“For centuries, it was real,” she explained. “Here, I feel so uncomfortable, I feel so forced. I keep having to take things away from you, and the whole makeup thing isn’t why our romance goes out the window.”
Love is Blind sees singletons enter a series of pods and communicate with potential suitors through a wall before choosing whether or not to mate and meet face-to-face.
Angry viewers were quick to stand by Taylor and flooded social media with supportive comments after the uncomfortable scenes.
One person said: “GB is literally a walking red flag, I can’t stand him,” while another commented: “So proud of you for standing your ground, knowing your worth and walking away!”
Another said: “You are stunning with and without make-up because he was trying to control you with make-up and feeling like your best self was weird.”
A fourth wrote: Oh my god, you are so beautiful!!! The episode where JB says ‘I don’t like you wearing make-up’ and you base that on why he can’t talk or open up to you…that’s so shameful, I’m sorry you had to go through that!’
“You deserve better and you know it, thank God!” The fifth commented.
Speaking about her decision to call it quits with JB, Taylor told Variety: “I had one foot in the door, one foot out, and no one deserves that.”
He added: “Everyone deserves someone who cares 100% about them, and I also know that he wasn’t 100% into me.”
“You don’t completely change the way you act based on the way someone looks.”
The current season was thrown into chaos when contestants Lydia Velez Gonzalez and Uche Okoroha revealed that they had previously dated.
The bombshell fell when geologist Lydia, 32, instantly recognized 34-year-old Uche’s voice during their first meeting in the pods, prompting producers to intervene and move them to separate rooms.
After speaking to the couple individually, it became clear that neither party was interested in exploring a relationship with each other and they were allowed to continue with the show – on the condition that they did not reveal to their fellow contestants that they knew each other.
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