In The Latest Reality TV Feud, Abbie Chatfield & Ryan Gallagher Are Beefing On Instagram
While you were (hopefully) sleeping, two of the biggest stars to come out of two of Australia’s biggest reality shows started feuding on Instagram.
The Bachelor’s Abbie Chatfield and Married at First Sight’s Ryan Gallagher are at war over a now-deleted meme that comedian Nikki Osborne posted on the social media platform. The meme in question made a rape joke about vaccine mandates that featured an image of Lindsay Lohan and disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, a man convicted of rape and currently serving a 23 year prison sentence. The caption read: “‘The original no jab, no job.”
We’re choosing not to include the meme in this story, as it could be triggering to some readers, but Chatfield shared it on her IG Story if you do want to judge it for yourself.
Along with posting the offensive material, Chatfield told her followers “Imagine as a female in the industry, thinking it’s funny to make fun of sexual assault and rape victims?” she began. “For you to sit there and liken the vaccine to rape, it’s one of the most disgusting things I’ve seen in my entire life.”
Matt Agnew also called out Osborne’s “joke” on Instagram, writing “Male sexual violence towards women is normalised and legitimised through humour,” he posted. “The trivialisation and belittling of one of the most horrendous acts you can inflict upon another human is not only grotesquely distasteful, but astonishingly disrespectful and traumatising to the victims.”
Read Matt Agnew’s full post below:
View this post on Instagram
Soon after Abbie’s Instagram callout, Osborn’s post was flooded by people saying that it was an offensive thing to share. At first, Nikki changed the caption to read that it was ‘just a joke’ before eventually deleting the post altogether. But that wasn’t the end of the story, then Ryan Gallagher got involved, who starred alongside Nikki on the 2020 season of I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here!
He messaged Abbie privately in defence of Nikki, which she then reposted to her followers.
Check out the messages below (it’s a lot!):
Ryan wrote that because Nikki has previously joked about Weinstein on stage in her comedy set, this meant that her offensive meme was…errr, fine? I don’t get it.
Ryan accused Abbie of “bullying” several times, while Abbie took issue with Ryan misspelling her name which she considered to be “condescending” and misogynistic.
Alongside the message reposts, Abbie addressed Ryan: “I’d love to have that joke explained to me, I’d love to learn from Nikki and Ryan the pinnacle of Australian comedy,” she said. “Nikki’s upset? Okay! You know who else is upset? Rape victims.”
Ryan took to his Instagram Stories to respond to Abbie. “There’s someone online saying things, twisting words and saying that I believe in rape and stuff like that, like come on. Let’s not get our Instagram bloody army and bully people like you do to everyone,” Ryan began. “Like Sam Frost, she had to delete her Instagram. You say you’re a feminist and then you literally put every woman down on the planet.”
He continued, “She made a bad joke, people do it. I never once said that joke was funny.”
For what it’s worth, Osborn did address the controversy on her Instagram Story but did not apologise. Instead, she wrote the below post about her critics (which she labelled “Mob”) being “misinformed”.
Nikki also posted a definition of “virtue signalling” — which means to publicly express an opinion to demonstrate one’s moral correctness — a pointed comment assumedly directed at Chatfield, Agnew, or their followers.