Carson Campbell didn’t feel any remorse for his vote, and was even relishing in the chaos it might cause one of Love Island USA’s most contentious cast members of the season. “I love mess and I love reality TV,” the 24-year-old student and content creator says. “I love something with an end goal, when people are working toward a purpose.”
As a Love Island USA superfan who live-tweets and recaps every episode on TikTok, Campbell feels personally invested in how the reality dating show unfolds. Most reality programs are pre-recorded, but Love Island USA, an American spinoff of a British dating show by the same name that follows contestants at a luxury villa with the goal of finding love, is filmed in real time and airs six nights weeks (on Peacock) over a six-week period in the summer. Its format relies on votes from viewers, via the Love Island app, to help determine how the show progresses (you vote on favorite cast members, who pairs off on dates, and more).
That interactive component gave viewers the power to split up two contestants—Huda Mustafa and Jeremiah Brown—who coupled together in the first episode but had become too toxic for their own good by episode 13. Mustafa was controlling and territorial; in one episode she eavesdropped on Brown during a private conversation with other male contestants, calling him a “bitch” and a “pussy.” Brown was portrayed as a textbook love bomber; during a group challenge he confessed to telling 10 women he loved them.
When the time came to decide on their relationship, “we all agreed,” Campbell tells me from his home in Queens, New York. He often consults with his friends when a vote takes place. “America came together as a democracy and said we need them apart no matter who we have to throw in there as collateral. In the grand scheme of things, it’s not fair. But it was the right thing to do. Watching at home, we can see when something is going to crash and burn.”
The split sent Mustafa into a rage and her “crash out” went viral across social media. “Peak cinema,” Campbell calls it. While a lot of fans appeared to be fed up with Mustafa, prior to the shake-up, some worried about her well-being— “I thought Huda crashout would be funny, y’all I was wrong,” @daesbloodline posted on X. Fans have even tracked down Noah Sheline, her ex-boyfriend and father of her four-year-daughter, to express their disapproval for Mustafa. “You got one hell of an easy full custody battle ahead of you brother,” one person commented on his TikTok feed. Sheline released a statement on TikTok calling the fan obsession “unhealthy.”
“Her going on that show to find love, or whatever you think it was she’s doing, remember she’s still human, she has a daughter, and a life,” he wrote. “ I don’t like that I’m seeing so much negative shit on my page or even clips of it about her.”