'Love Island USA' is finally a hit after 7 seasons. Now it must decide what to do with contestants accused of racism.
Spotlight, a publication run by the entertainment data company Luminate, reported that the season, which started on June 3, had been streamed over a billion times in its second week of release, and was close to rivaling Netflix's hit dating show, "Love Is Blind."
But the success of "Love Island USA" is being tested after two contestants, Yulissa and Cierra, were removed from the show after being accused of sharing racists posts on social media.
Fans are calling on the show to carry out better background checks on future cast members.
How its makers respond comes at a time when some viewers expect businesses to uphold progressive values, while others complain that popular culture is too "woke."
Here's what to know about the controversy surrounding "Love Island USA."
Yulissa and Cierra were removed from 'Love Island USA' over racist social media posts
When the lineup for season seven of "Love Island USA" was released, fans found and reshared two clips of the cast member Yulissa Escobar saying the n-word. In episode two, she was removed from the show off-camera without explanation from the show or its distributor, Peacock.
The show's narrator, Iain Stirling, said during the episode, "Yulissa has left the villa," referring to where the cast live.
Last week, Yulissa shared her side of the story on TikTok, and said the producers told her on the second day of filming that they were cutting her because of a video that had resurfaced.
Yulissa said they didn't specify which video. Contestants on set are cut off from the world, and Yulissa said she had to wait two days to get her phone back and find that viewers were calling her racist.
A representative for "Love Island USA" did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
Yulissa apologized for saying the word in the video and other posts, and said she didn't know its meaning.
Last week, fans called for Cierra to be removed after screenshots emerged of her using a slur against East Asian people in two separate Instagram posts. One of the posts was reshared in a slideshow Cierra posted on TikTok in 2020.
Cierra was removed from the show on Sunday, the week before the season finale, after fans complained for days and signed a petition calling for her removal. On Monday, it had over 17,000 signatures.
Stirling said: "Cierra has left the villa due to a personal situation," again without further explanation.
Cierra's parents posted a statement on her Instagram on Sunday, telling fans to stop sending cruel messages to her and her friends and family.
"We know our daughter. We know her heart. And when she returns, we believe she'll face this with honesty, growth, and grace," they wrote.
How to manage reality TV contestants' pasts is a headache for producers
In the years since George Floyd's death sparked widespread protests and a national reckoning, resistance to political correctness has grown. In response, many institutions — from universities to major retailers like Walmart and Target — have scaled back their commitments to DEI, or diversity, equity, and inclusion, in turn prompting backlash from liberals.
The situation on "Love Island USA" has echoes of how the cast member Danny Bibby — who dated Kaz Kamwi, a Black woman, on the 2021 season of "Love Island" — was criticized after posts resurfaced of him using the n-word. Fans criticized ITV, the production company and distributor of "Love Island," for not removing him from the show.
At the time, a representative of "Love Island" told MailOnline that Danny apologized for his "inappropriate remark."
" Love Island USA," broadcast on Peacock and owned by Comcast, is a business, too, and just as susceptible to public backlash. Perhaps that's why producers acted swiftly to remove contestants accused of racism.
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