ABC Logan Palmer, Gabby Windey & Rachel Recchia.
Fans of season 19 of “The Bachelorette” have seen a lot of crazy drama, both in front of and behind the scenes. When suitor Logan Palmer decided to stop dating Bachelorette number one, Rachel Recchia, and switch to Bachelorette number two, Gabby Windy, producers probably thought the drama meter would hit the top of the scale.
But that game-changer paled in comparison to the conspiracy theories that permeated social media after it was suddenly announced that Palmer had to leave the show because he tested positive for COVID-19.
The pandemonium amped even higher when “The Bachelorette” creator and producer, Mike Fleiss “liked” a tweet that read, “So let me get this straight: 1) Logan was on the group date. 2) Logan tests positive. 3) NO ONE else does. 4) The cocktail party is canceled. 5) But the rose ceremony isn’t. 6) Logan now is permanently gone. I SMELL A CONSPIRACY.”
A Reddit user who posted an image of the “liked” tweet captioned it with “They are totally trolling us. They knew we would smell bulls**t from a mile away with the ‘COVID’ excuse and the weird, unspoken dismissal. Something else definitely did happen and they also definitely love that we’re speculating over it.”
Is ABC Trying to Hide Something?
Shortly after Windy decided to accept Palmer’s about-face and allow him into her pool of suitors, host Jesse Palmer (no relation to Logan Palmer) told Windey that Logan had to leave because of testing positive for COVID-19. However, when he told the other men that Logan was gone, he described the reason for his exit as “a situation.” The host never mentioned anything about COVID.
This was very suspicious to Bachelor Nation fans, as was the fact that no one else had tested positive, and that the rose ceremony went on as scheduled. According to Monsters & Critics, “There are many conspiracies, including inappropriate relations with an outsider, drugs, and/or something else morally wrong.”
The outlet also reports, “Some fans have heard rumors that Logan had some inappropriate relations with a woman on the cruise ship, which is why they didn’t want to make it public…the alleged rumor was that he did some shady things with a hairdresser who worked on the cruise ship and/or a producer working with the show.” None of these rumors have been substantiated.
What Do Viewers Say?
Fans have offered a variety of potential alternate truths for Logan Palmer’s unexpected exit, ranging from the plausible to the outrageous. One Reddit user speculated, “I feel very confident that he caught a food borne illness like salmonella, Hep a, Ecoli, etc from the cruise ship and their contract did not allow them to say anything that makes the ship look bad. Gabby probably knew so they staged the Covid talk.”
Another viewer posted, “My unfounded conspiracy: I see lots of ‘he got high’ rumors… but what if he got high, snuck into Gabby’s suite to share with Gabby (or did so during the missing group date evening portion), they both got caught, and someone from the ship / production supplied the weed? That would make Gabby’s weird mood at the rose ceremony make sense, and it could also be why they’re trying to cover up the whole thing. Gabby’s phone case has a pot leaf on it so it’s not a huge stretch to think they might relax with some legal weed.”
One fan commented, “Okay my theory is that the conversation with gabby and Jesse was shot later to fit the Covid narrative which is why she’s in that outfit and we’ll see it later on this season. They didn’t show the evening date portion because the outfits would’ve been different and it would’ve been obvious something was up.”
Another added, “They should have made up a different story, the COVID one was dumb. They could have said he had a situation at home or something.” Someone else claimed, “Just got a message from a reliable source that it was 100% not because of Covid!” No other details were provided by this poster.
Some fans think the only reason Fleiss “liked” the conspiracy post was to stir things up on social media. One person posted, “Fleiss definitely likes to stir s**t, but if the rumor is true that whatever happened would reflect badly on cruise ship company and showing it on national TV would break their contract, I could see Fleiss being pissed they missed out on drama for the show.” Another agreed, remarking, “Pro Tip: if Mike Fleiss ever does anything on twitter it is always and only to stir the pot.”
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