Demi Burnett is officially the first queer contestant to appear on The Bachelor franchise and most fans are totally here for it!
Demi, who originally appeared on Colton’s season of The Bachelor, returned this summer for Bachelor in Paradise season 6. Demi comes out as bisexual in the first episode and will eventually be joined by her rumored girlfriend Kristian Haggerty on the series.
Prior to the show starting, she tweeting out the news:
“Spoiler alert: I’m a queer queen.”
Since the announcement, Demi has been receiving mixed reactions with both a lot of support and, unfortunately, a bit of hate.
Demi has fired back at haters and luckily, she isn’t facing it alone as her fellow Bachelor alums have come to her aid.
Current Bachelorette Hannah Brown responded to Demi’s “queer queen” tweet with,
“And we all bow down. I love you always and forever.”
Hannah continued to show her support on the first episode of the show, where she appeared alongside Demi for a one-on-one chat. Demi told Hannah that she had been casually dating a woman and Hannah was nothing but supportive. She told Demi,
“You’re a fluid person. You’re not just this one thing, and I think you are like that, and that is totally, absolutely great.”
Since the show started airing, Hannah has continued to stand by Demi and recently defended her after former BiP contestant Tanner Tolbert publicly criticized Demi for going on the show while dating someone else. He even went so far as to compare her to Jed Wyatt.
Although he deleted the tweet amid the backlash, Hannah responded on Twitter by writing,
“One is my best friend, one is my ex-fiancé… I can tell you first hand, not the same.”
YAS!
It’s unclear whether Demi’s sexuality influenced Tanner’s opinion of her (a common stereotype of bisexual women is that they’re “slutty”), but either way, it was awesome to see Hannah stand by her BFF 1000%.
Meanwhile, Demi’s Bachelor in Paradise castmate Caelynn Miller-Keyes responded to Demi’s original tweet by writing,
“You are an absolute queen and I love you so freaking much ❤️”
Demi has yet to come out to Caelynn on the show but it’s clear that Caelynn will be totally supportive once she does.
Another Bachelor alum, Jason Tartick (who’s currently dating former Bachelorette Kaitlyn Bristowe), responded to a particularly homophobic tweet and wrote,
“The hate below is absolutely abominable! Bravo to Demi for breaking barriers in The Bachelor Franchise and on a National Network in the pursuit of love and happiness. Regardless of your sexual preference, love is love is love. I support LGBTQ today and every damn day! ?”
It’s nice to see that Demi is getting so much love even while facing such horrible comments. I can only hope that BiP will give Demi the respect she deserves and won’t exploit her relationship the same way they did with Colton’s virginity.
In addition to Demi and Caelynn, other BiP cast members include Hannah Godwin, Dean Unglert, and everyone’s favorite John Paul Jones.
Bachelor in Paradise airs on ABC on Mondays and Tuesdays.
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