This week on Survivor 2022, it was Chanelle Howell who faced Jeff Probst and had her torch snuffed. And once again, during the elimination interviews, we got a pretty good tell-all.
We love to hear what the TV chooses not to show us, and Chanelle really let us in on some Survivor secrets. Chanelle spoke with Entertainment Weekly about her time on Survivor 42, and she pointed out something that happens a lot on reality TV, and that’s the double standard we see when it comes to how women and men play the game.
I underestimated how emotional Hai was and how emotional Mike was — and they were very emotional. Because I’m a super logical person, and when I look at the game and I look at the greats of the game, the greats of the game can come back from Tribal after being blindsided to be like, “Good game move, let’s move forward. I might work with you in a vote or two.” That’s how I see the greats operating, but I underestimated how Hai and Mike were playing very emotionally.
Here’s what she told EW about all that went down with her and Mike, and how he felt so betrayed by her:
I don’t think I could recover from that. And I do wanna kind of tap into the Mike vote because I know a lot of people were so confused. “Why did you do that?” I think in this game of Survivor that a lot of people only get the chance to play once, if they’re lucky. You could sit there and cross your fingers and hope for the best possible outcome, and hope that this person who is clearly on the bottom, which is Daniel, doesn’t use the advantage that he has in his pocket to save him. I could cross my fingers and hope that it doesn’t happen, or I could play for the worst possible outcome, right?
And so if I would’ve gone home and didn’t play for the world’s possible outcome, I think I would be like, “Darn it! I didn’t do this and I could have done this.” And the fans would be like, “Why didn’t you do that? You had that strategic move in your back pocket!” And so that was me playing for the worst possible outcome instead of crossing my fingers that the best possible outcome comes true.
And the thing that I underestimated again was how emotional Mike was, because honestly, Mike and I made the exact same move for the exact same reason, more than once! Mike and I both lost our vote. He didn’t tell me that he lost his vote. I didn’t tell him I lost my vote. Mike voted for me in case of Daniel’s shot in the dark. I voted for him in case of Daniel’s shot in the dark. We made the exact same moves.
And, for some reason — and I think this is a bigger theme — I am vilified for it. And I say that this is a bigger theme because, at the same time, you see Omar: He risks his vote at the ship wheel. And I risk my vote at the ship wheel for the exact same reasons. Yet when we get to merge, we heard Hai, say, “Chanelle screwed Omar, so he doesn’t have a vote.” And I’m like, “We made the exact same move!” Why is it that women in this game can make the exact same moves as men, but don’t get the same grace they do, or don’t get the same leeway they do, or are vilified in a different way?
For the full interview with Chanelle, go to EW.com.
