Televised romance

I can't believe the results of last night's episode of "The Bachelor." How could Jason let Jillian - the beautiful, stylish, intelligent and sincere Canadian girl vying for a chance to be his wife - ride away in that ominous limo like she was a curdled protein shake?

It can only mean that Jason is looking for a tacky, uninteresting, mildly pretty American girl to be his missus and the step-mother of his three-year-old son, Ty. And that's precisely what he'll get, no matter which of the two remaining contestants he chooses during the final rose ceremony, scheduled to air two weeks from yesterday.

The anger I felt towards Jason after last night's episode wasn't justified. He didn't love her (Jillian) and you can't blame a man for that. I guess what bothers me is that he can talk seriously and candidly about the things he wants in the woman he marries, but when Jillian, basking in the romance of a picnic atop a jagged New Zealand mountain, expresses her desire to "marry her best friend," Jason says they're getting ahead of themselves. Double standard, you say? Rage!

Plus, what sort of unjust world do we live in if a a girl like Jillian can't win the heart of a successful, handsome, perfectly spray-tanned, "Aw, schucks" bachelor?

It also bothers me that both of the remaining women are only 24 years old. Their relative youth (Jillian is only 29) is not their fault, but it irks me that the Guy Smiley Bachelor, who is 32 years old, thinks a woman eight years his junior is ready to take on the responsibility of becoming a wife and a step-mother in one swift move. Or maybe, from his previous experience with television romance, Jason sees the spectacle for what it really is and just wants to have a fling with a hot young thing, knowing they'll never make it to "I do." He did, according to People.com, make a proposal, but we all know by now that just because a television Bachelor or Bachelorette is engaged, it doesn't necessarily mean forever.

With Jillian gone, the show lost its credibility (not that it ever had much). She was a classy gal with a cool wardrobe who thought joining the circus of reality television would offer her a new brand of adventure. She never meant to fall in love with the guy. But there she was standing hopeful among the final three, her pretty Canadian heart bursting for the muscle-bodied man before her, pleading for reciprocity.

And then she didn't get a rose. She said her good-byes gracefully, tearfully and I know deep down it's probably for the best that he didn't choose her only to publicly dump her three months down the road.

Anyway. I really don't want to spend more time watching next week's heinous "The Women Tell All" and then the finale and the "After the Final Rose" special in two weeks. And even though I can't stand the glare of Jason's plasticky, neon smile anymore, I think I'm too far gone to turn my back on the whole fiasco without witnessing the wreckage.

In other, unrelated Canadian pop culutre news: MTV Canada's quirky VJ Dan Levy has started his own lifestyle wesbite, DOOP, a fun and blatant spoof of the aforementioned GOOP.