History is set to be made in the new season of The Bachelorette, and it’s all down to 2021’s leading woman: Brooke Blurton.
The 26-year-old was revealed earlier this year as the infamous franchise’s seventh Australian female to take the lead (well, eighth if you count the joint Bachelorette season with Elly and Becky Miles in 2020).
Lucky for us, fans were blissfully well acquainted with Brooke already, having seen her try her luck on both The Bachelor in 2018 and Bachelor In Paradise in 2019. As we already know, her quest for love fell short on both seasons.
But it looks like the upcoming season of The Bachelorette might just prove that third time is indeed the luckiest.
Of course, it’s not only Brooke’s effortless charm and positive attitude that we’re looking forward to watching this season. It’s also going to mark an historic first for the franchise, which has previously been notorious for it’s lack of diversity and representation.
Brooke is bisexual (making her the first LGBTQI+ lead in the Australian series’ history), which means the cast of contestants will include both men and women.
Furthermore, the reality star is also of Indigenous heritage, an incredible step forward for the dating show.
What is Brooke Blurton’s nationality and heritage?
Brooke was born to an Aboriginal-Malaysian mother and an English father. She is a proud Noongar-Yamatji woman and is outspoken in advocating for more representation of First Nations People in Australia.
In a statement about being the first queer Indigenous woman to be Australia’s Bachelorette, she said: “Obviously I have a cultural background and I’m really proud of that [but] I do know that I don’t represent every single person, as every person’s experience is so different.
“But I do represent a minority group that I’m really really proud of and I’m so excited at the fact that we’ll see that representation.”
Brooke has also spoken of her upbringing in Western Australia, where she explained how she felt different to other kids because of her mother and father’s differing heritage.
“I was fairer than some of the Aboriginal kids and they would call me a ‘half-caste’…meaning I simply wasn’t Aboriginal enough for them,” she said in a TEDx talk in 2019.
“I was bullied and I was teased quite a bit, but the thing was they made me feel different. I remember being very confused at the time, thinking if I wasn’t Aboriginal enough and I wasn’t white enough where did I fit in this world? Where did I belong?”
In the years since, Brooke has become a voice for minorities, using her platform to advocate for more Indigenous representation and respect.
On Australia Day this year, she shared a stirring message on Instagram for her thousands-strong following, writing: “Please consider our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who have come before us more than 45, 000+ years.
“26th January does not unite us. It does not allow us to celebrate. It merely dances on the graves of the hundreds and thousands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who died on this land.”
She later shared another post advocating to change the date.
There is no doubt Brooke is a inspiration in her own right for utilising her following to champion Indigenous rights. So watching her tackle The Bachelorette, a franchise that was absolutely tired and dated in its format, will be a breath of fresh air.
