The Traitors Ireland: What makes this intoxicating show so utterly gripping?
The Traitors Ireland has it all: drama, lies, truth, murder, banishment, and a shattering denouement. This heady package is wrapped up in an aura of intrigue, with Siobhán McSweeney as an all-seeing deity. The programme is hypnotic rather than addictive, more like an epic poem or mythic saga than a reality TV show. But why are we so utterly gripped by it, every single time? Why is everyone talking about it? In psychological terms, the attraction is fairly straightforward: The Traitors Ireland provides a deft combination of knotty psychological situation-making and raw emotional exposure. Both ingredients are intoxicating. Both meet our fundamental needs for figuring things out, feeling as much emotion as we can bear, and sharing our hot takes at work the next day. We hunger for psychological complexity, strong emotions and human connection, but day-to-day reality routinely disappoints us. In The Traitors Ireland, we experience intricate psychological behaviour and extreme emotional manipulation at a safe remove. We enjoy the roller coaster without stepping on to it ourselves. We connect with our families and friends as we watch, gasp, and gossip. The Traitors Ireland plays shamelessly into our deepest fantasy about human nature: that we can work out what other people really think if we analyse their behaviour closely enough. We implicitly believe that there is logic to human actions and that we can figure it out if we put the effort in. This belief has essentially no basis, but it is a powerful, motivating myth. For the most part, we are not rational creatures. Believing that we are is, perhaps, our most irrational belief of all. The Traitors Ireland – with its impossible tangle of individual deceit and group dynamics – seduces us with complexity and rewards us with surprise, betrayal, and relief. As ever, the best deceivers are those who are truthful 99 per cent of the time and lie just once. Skilled participants substitute emotional truth – crying, for example – for literal truth, masking their deceit about one thing with genuine tears about another. Emotional truth suspends all reason. The gut rules the mind. The Traitors Ireland finale: Final betrayal barely registers as second season fizzles out Group dynamics loom large. Confirmation bias happens when a much-liked person makes a suggestion to the group, and other people start to agree. The gathering consensus is based on emotion rather than reason and is all the more powerful for that. Social forces come into play. Our logical individual brains cannot hold a candle to group dynamics. We would rather be wrong together than right alone. We think and move in packs. Once the group reaches full agreement, it takes just one person dissenting for other doubts to emerge. In a finger snap, perfect harmony descends into perfect chaos. Then, the process starts again, with a new focus of agreement. Traitors winner to use €22,925 prize to fund IVF treatment With this in mind, the perfect traitor is not the best liar, but the best social psychologist. Emotional awareness, which can be conscious or unconscious, is the difference between winning or losing on The Traitors Ireland, surviving or being murdered. Emotional awareness can be taught to an extent, but some people are naturals. Liars are superb. On top of this, The Traitors Ireland has two more trump cards that virtually guarantee its success: the relatability of its participants and the general absence of romance. I struggle to identify with participants on Love Island, but The Traitors Ireland is full of relatable humanity. Flaws and foibles abound. Inconsistency lurks at every corner. The Traitors Ireland simply feels real – just as Love Island does not. Perhaps the most remarkable feature of The Traitors Ireland is the absence of romantic storylines. The bizarre brand of showmance that is central to Love Island is simply not a feature of The Traitors Ireland. There is accelerated intimacy among the group, but there is little room for flirtation, amorous advances, or full-blown relationships. This is about lies, not love. Traitors Ireland host Siobhán McSweeney: ‘I’m not getting paid enough for it. That’s RTÉ’s fault’ The irony is that the key features of The Traitors Ireland – deception, manipulation, and judgment – also shape many relationships. The TV show allows us to vicariously experience these behaviours without the risks they would incur in our own lives. We get all of the devilish pleasure and none of the heinous pain. But McSweeney makes The Traitors Ireland what it is. We like to explore what Carl Jung called the shadow side of humanity, the disowned dimensions of our psyche, but we need someone to hold us safely as we gaze into the dark. McSweeney does the job with relish and aplomb. She leads us to the edge of the abyss and asks if we enjoy the view. We do. We really, really do. Brendan Kelly is professor of psychiatry at Trinity College Dublin