Now my readers know how much I like Reality television programs. One of my favorites to watch is The Biggest Loser. I’m not really sure why I like it so much. Some reality shows I like to watch simply to see them fail or say something stupid. With Loser, I like to see what these people can accomplish – even if some of them are losing weight just to win money in the end. Would I call this show reality? Probably not. The average person does not have an expert trainer training them for an entire day, 7 days a week. We don’t live on a “ranch” with no outside distractions to pull us away from working out.

Part of why I like to watch the show is to see the relationships people have within a group and also to see how they change from the beginning of the season until the end. Last season on Biggest Loser was a great example of how some contestants completely changed from the beginning to the end. This season it has been nice to see that so far the majority of the contestants have focused more on the fact they are changing their lives rather than on the money. Then there is Joelle – who we don’t know what she is thinking.

Let me back up a little. On the first episode of this season it was revealed that, for all but two of teams, each team would send one person home while the other stayed at the “ranch”. After 30 days, they would return to the ranch if their partner had not been eliminated. The Silver team, Carla and Joelle, decided that Joelle would stay at the ranch. I was puzzled by that. At 379 pounds, Carla is the heaviest woman to have been cast for the show to date. Apparently, Joelle felt the need to “prove to family and friends that she could do it.” I think Carla gave up trying to fight with her and agreed to let her stay.

You may be thinking, why am I talking about these two people? As a heavy person myself, I know how important it is to lose weight. Being cast for the Biggest Loser is such an immense opportunity. I, like thousands of others in America, wish I could go on a show like that where you live in a bubble and only have to concentrate on losing weight – with people telling you what to eat and what to do. It would be nice to just be a weight-loss robot and not have to think about anything but the diet and exercise. I would love to know how someone like Joelle was able to get cast for the show. I’m sure they didn’t know what kind of drama this woman would cause once on the ranch – that was just a bonus for the producers.

I am angry that she was on the show. This woman was able to hang around giving 50% effort compared to the others there. She still thinks that she gave maximum effort in the gym – yet we see multiple times that she is wandering around the gym aimlessly as others are sweating and puking from the extreme efforts they are putting forth. The only week she really put forth an effort was the week after a handful of people voted to keep her around – only because they knew her partner, Carla, needed the training time on the ranch. She managed to avoid elimination only one week because of her effort. The only other time she wasn’t in the bottom two was because of penalty pounds to other contestants. The week that Carla and the others came back, Joelle believes she gave that supreme effort and had no idea why Carla and the others continually challenged her desire to be there.

During this week’s episode, it was revealed that not only did she not work out very hard but that against the wishes of the producers and cast, she left the ranch to vote in Detroit. She had sent in an absentee ballot but learned it “got messed up” and she snuck off the ranch to go home to vote because “it was historic”. She did all these fully knowing that people were sick of her excuses and that in doing this she was sealing the team’s fate if they fell into the bottom two at the weigh-in.

Now, I know most people don’t want a play by play of a silly television show but I wanted to say all this because it made me very angry. This show has helped a lot of people extend their lives and has inspired thousands of people at home to better their own lives. If I wasn’t disabled, I would audition for the show myself as I have a terrible time trying to lose weight myself. It makes me sick that some ignorant fool would take the spot of someone who truly wants to change their lives and not just give up because “it’s too hard.” What is even sadder is that Joelle not only ruined this for her partner but now they are not even friends because Joelle has the audacity to think that Carla is the one who doesn’t have a clue.