It was a shocking season finale of The Bachelorette when DeAnna Pappas rejected Jason Mesnick's proposal.  Fans cried foul and female viewers from all across the country said that they would date Mesnick in a heartbeat.  It seemed that the single dad from Seattle would not stay single for much longer.  After all, his fellow competitors Jeremy Anderson and Graham Bunn quickly found love off camera when the show ended.  One month ago, Mesnick said in a press conference call, "I am in a place where I could start dating again, but to be honest, I don't even know how right now. My focus is on getting back to work and just being a dad."  It's pretty hard to focus on those two things when you're off shooting another reality show, though!

Here's the thing.  It's not that I don't think Mesnick shouldn't be the next Bachelor in the upcoming season.  I personally would probably run away with him, no questions asked, in a heartbeat.  He's not only good looking but he's attentive, thoughtful, funny, romantic, and oh yeah, the guy has no problem with kids - because he's a single dad.  It just doesn't seem though, that Mesnick needs to turn to reality tv again to find someone to spend his life with and I can't imagine he did it for anything other than the money.

This upcoming season of The Bachelor will teeter very close to crossing the line because Mesnick is not just looking for a wife, he's looking for someone to be the mother of his child.  If a woman starred in a reality show called, "Who Wants To Be My Baby's Daddy?", it would draw some seriously heavy criticism.  If a woman even went on The Bachelor, got rejected, and went on to The Bachelorette, taking somewhere from 4-6 months away from her toddler, people would cry out and attack her abilities as a mother.

You look at Brad Womack or Andy Baldwin and you say, "How can this person have a hard time finding a date or a woman to settle down with?"  Reality television is probably the last place to search for a soulmate and absolutely, positively the last place on God's green earth you'd look for a parent for your child.  As a single mother, sure, yes, I'd love to find someone to spend my life with.  Take half a year away from my son to find that person?  No thanks.  The right person will come along and given The Bachelor's track record, it's a little surprising that Mesnick would put not only his fate and future in the hands of reality television, but his son's, too.



- Gina Scarpa, BuddyTV Staff Writer
(Image courtesy of ABC)