Siena Yates: Everyone on MAFS is awful, why are we watching?

Forget about a lack of diversity on Married At First Sight NZ, how about the genuinely stunning lack of humanity?

The more I watch this show and see (and write) all the coverage around it, the more I realise just how awful these people are.

And I get it, they're filmed under tough circumstances; surrounded by cameras, purposefully put in stressful situations and plied with alcohol, but guess what? That's what they signed up for. This is like me coming to work every day and complaining about having to use a computer, sit with my co-workers and write the news.

Especially when what they really signed up for was to get famous.

That's not to say they weren't also genuinely looking for love, but you can do that anywhere. They could've joined the rest of us wallowing around in the cesspit that is Tinder, gone speed dating or gone to a singles' night - literally anything else.

But what they chose to do was put themselves in the hands of producers and televise what was only ever going to be a tonne of drama.

It's a very specific kind of person who signs up for reality TV and you can't even claim a naive kind of ignorance anymore; it's 2017 and we've had three seasons of The Bachelor and our own Real Housewives despite our lack of actual celebrity housewives.

And being the kind of person who signs up for fame isn't a bad thing at all - you put yourselves out there, New Zealand. Back yourselves.

What does make you an awful person is consistently attacking someone else, starting fights and walking out on the show for being the exact same kind of person you are.

Haydn and Luke have both been accused of signing on just for fame and were attacked by the others for not having the right intentions.

Lacey whinges to Dom about Luke being on MAFS for the wrong reasons, before applying to be a host on Bravo.

But let's gather the receipts, shall we? Because sure, Luke's been doing random promos, cooking videos and public appearances, popping up on my timeline more often than I'd like, but what about his wife Lacey, who made a big show of leaving the experiment because her husband's intentions weren't as pure as hers?

Lacey, who helped form both a "Pretty Committee" and a "MAFS NZ Girls" Instagram page, who's been doing all the same things Luke has and who far more tellingly, left the show and immediately applied for another one, submitting her application to be the first local host of Bravo NZ.

What about Bel, who continuously claimed she was giving it her all and genuinely putting her heart on the line, yet is also in on both of the aforementioned Instagram pages and this is her second reality TV appearance in one year?

Bel in her second reality TV role in the space of one year.

Dom sent awful text messages about his wife to his wife, Claire led Dom on even though she was never into him, Bel seemed to only bark orders at Haydn, and Vicky constantly trashed her husband, messaged Haydn saying they should've been matched instead, lied and said it was the other way around and literally made her husband get a haircut she found more attractive.

And we've gotten this far without even mentioning Ben's awful behaviour, treating his husband Aaron like trash, acting selfish, childish and superficial, starting drama and fighting at an already awkward enough dinner party.

Ben and Vicky bring the drama at the dinner party. And pretty much everywhere else.

Ben also has quotes about him being "Regina George meets Satan" and a "real piece of work" on his Instagram bio which he told The Project were "badges of honour".

And of course, there's Andrew, who's made headlines this week for attacking a woman on Tinder two years ago when she didn't want to "satisfy his Asian fetish". He then attacked her again when she made the exchange public, calling her an "awful person" and accusing her of defamation and blackmail, and he also attacked a Herald journalist for writing about him, calling her "vile" and "scum".

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The only exceptions to the rule - for now, at least - are Aaron, Brett and Angel.
The closest to scandal Aaron got was when he left at the end of one episode to spend the night with his ex. But it was later revealed that he actually just went to do an ambulance shift with him because apparently, he's a saint.

Meanwhile, Brett and Angel have only made headlines for being so cute the rest of us are sickened with jealousy, and for shining a spotlight on diabetes, which Brett suffers from.
So here's my question: Why the hell are we still watching?

Are we also bad people? Do we just want to sit around drawing comfort from the knowledge that other people are worse than us? Do we like to watch the drama so our own seems inconsequential in comparison?

Surely New Zealand is better than this?