Big Brother 6: Why Ivette Lost

And so it’s over – Ivette lost, Maggie won. I had predicted it would go down this way as soon as Ivette chose to bring Maggie to the final two instead of Janelle. Some agreed, some doubted me, but I was so certain of the outcome that I wrote the bulk of this article before the finale even aired. I could do that because it was not what happened at the end that caused Ivette to lose; it was what happened along the way. So what did Ivette do right to get to the Final 2? What did she do wrong to only place second? Why did Ivette lose?

Ivette, like all players, made certain choices as the game went on. Who should she vote for? Who should she side against? How should she behave? Let’s look back at all of this through the lens of What Big Brother 6 Houseguests Should Have Learned in order to determine the wrongs, the rights, and why the final outcome was as it was.

The first rule is one that it seems many players glossed over this season – scheming and plotting. Sure, there were alliances, but how much true scheming was there? Very little. Most of the contestants understood the first part of this rule – creating an early alliance to keep you around. But most of them also ignored the latter – figuring out a full strategy and reworking alliances to your advantage.

The final paragraph in this rule starts by saying, “Note that I have been talking about making alliances, not making friends.” Of course, we saw that this season has been dominated by emotion, to the point that the dominant alliance even called themselves the “Friendship.” While it worked for the alliance overall, and it worked to Maggie’s advantage (which is, I’m sure, one reason she kept pushing it), this most definitely did not work for Ivette. We’ll get into that more when discussing Rule 4, but one thing to note is that Ivette chose her Friendship over the possibility of making a better alliance several times in the game.

Ivette was one of few Friendship players to seriously contemplate alternate plans. Her relationship with James could have allowed her to form a secondary alliance. She could have jumped ship and put herself into a better position earlier in the game. But she didn’t – she chose friendship and the Friendship. Similarly, at the very end she could have taken Janelle instead of Maggie to the Final 2. But she didn’t – she chose friendship and the Friendship.

So certainly Ivette didn’t scheme and plot too much, in violation of the second rule. But just as certainly, she didn’t keep her scheming secret. Everybody in the house knew she was a member of the Friendship alliance. This didn’t end up hurting her. But what did hurt her was that the entire house also knew she was James’ pal, and members of her alliance worried about her loyalty. She sided with the Friendship when the time came to decide, but I don’t think that question about her loyalty ever truly left their minds – especially for April and Jennifer, both of whom voted for Maggie to win. Any question made it that much easier for them to vote the opposite way at the end.

The third rule says to pretend to be nice. Ivette had some serious problems in this area and pretty much guaranteed that she lost at least one jury vote because of it. Much of Ivette’s whining and insulting was kept to the diary room, where none of the other players could see it. But there was quite a bit that was out in the open as she bashed Janelle, Rachel, Ashlea, and even April. Some of that certainly made its way back to the people in question or their partners/friends.

But one action in particular stood out among all the others. Ivette took exception to the way Rachel handled being nominated and evicted – which was ridiculously hypocritical considering the way Ivette handled just about anything negative. But the real problem was that she just couldn’t keep it to herself. In her goodbye video to Rachel, Ivette made a point of insulting her. This simply was not smart. Goodbye videos should be used to make nice, not to leave a final nasty impression on a potential voter! If Rachel had any thoughts about voting for Ivette in the end, that video certainly erased them. We saw how much it affected her when the jurors were discussing how each finalist played. And because Rachel’s partner was also in the jury, that one unthinking action likely helped swing Howie against Ivette as well.

Why did Ivette do something like that in her goodbye to Rachel? Because throughout the game, Ivette has been controlled by her emotions – in drastic violation of the fourth rule. When Ivette was upset, everybody knew it. When Ivette was happy, everybody knew it (and it even caused April to be upset once, when Ivette won the final Veto).

But more to the point, we’ve already discussed how emotion overruled strategy in this season. Ivette exemplified this problem, right down to her final decision to evict Janelle and keep Maggie, thus ensuring herself only second place (not to mention a Reality TV Hall of Shame Moment, which will be posted soon).

Some people have said that Ivette would have lost to Janelle too, even if she had made a different choice for the Final 2. I disagree. Janelle would have obviously received votes from Rachel and Howie. Ivette would have obviously received a vote from Beau. What about the others? Those saying Ivette was right in her decision have suggested that Maggie could have turned against Ivette if she took Janelle, and that April would have carried through on her promise to vote – and lobby – for Janelle. Indeed, a couple jurors even mentioned at the end that any Friendship member who took a non-Friendship member to the end would lose their votes. That’s easy to say, but I think it’s nonsense.