The debate surrounding SBS’s upcoming dating reality show My Remaining Love isn’t really about dating. At its core is a more fundamental question: Who gets to decide how people living with terminal illnesses or life-altering diseases tell their own stories?
Set to premiere on August 3 at 10 PM KST, the series follows men and women in their 20s and 30s who have received terminal diagnoses or survived life-threatening illnesses as they search for love. Directed by Lee Eun Sol—the producer behind the unconventional Fortune Tellers’ Love—the show introduces a format in which contestants exchange “time” with one another each night as their relationships develop. The panel of hosts includes actress Lee Se Young, Jung Yong Hwa, SEVENTEEN’s DK, and Choi Ye Na, whose own experience overcoming childhood cancer brings another layer of perspective to the program.
According to the production team, the show began with a simple question: If you knew your time was limited, who would you choose to love?
Before a single episode has aired, however, that question has already been overshadowed by another.
Online reactions split almost immediately. Critics accused SBS of turning terminal illness into entertainment, with some describing the concept as “misery porn” or an attempt to commercialize suffering. Others defended the premise, arguing that the contestants are adults capable of making informed decisions about sharing their own experiences and deserve the same opportunity to pursue love as anyone else.
Those opposing reactions reveal two very different philosophies—not just about reality television, but about agency, dignity, and who has the right to shape stories about illness.
The Oldest Criticism of Reality Television
The controversy itself is hardly new.
Reality television has long occupied an uneasy space between documentary and entertainment. The more personal the subject matter becomes, the more audiences question whether they are witnessing genuine storytelling or emotional spectacle.
Over the years, reality television has centered on plastic surgery, obesity, addiction, hoarding, teenage pregnancy, infertility, and mental illness. Each time, viewers have asked essentially the same question: Should deeply personal experiences become entertainment?
Some of those programs disappeared under criticism. Others earned respect because of how responsibly they treated their participants.
That history suggests audiences rarely judge a program solely by its premise. They also judge how carefully—or carelessly—it handles the people at its center.
Illness Has Always Been Part of Storytelling
Cancer. Disability. Terminal illness. Death.
These have always been part of storytelling because they force audiences to confront questions about identity, family, mortality, and love. Films win awards because they explore these subjects with honesty. Novels become classics because they do the same.
Few people object when those stories are fictional.
What changes with My Remaining Love is that the people confronting those questions are not actors following a script. They are ordinary individuals whose diagnoses are part of their real lives, making every emotional moment ethically heavier.
That difference alone explains much of the discomfort surrounding the show.
Why Agency Matters
Perhaps the strongest question raised by the controversy is one of agency.
Many online comments assume exploitation simply because of the contestants’ medical histories. But exploitation is not determined by subject matter alone.
Consent matters.
If participants understand what they are joining, are capable of making informed decisions, receive appropriate support, and willingly choose to share their experiences, many ethicists would argue they are exercising their autonomy.
At the same time, consent does not automatically eliminate the possibility of exploitation. A person can willingly participate in a program that ultimately fails to protect their dignity or well-being.
The ethical challenge, then, is balancing protection with autonomy.
The conversation shifts from asking, “Should SBS make this show?” to something more complicated:
Should society prevent people from choosing to tell their own stories simply because those stories involve illness?
Why Society Is Uncomfortable With Sick People Dating
Some of the most thoughtful reactions came from cancer survivors themselves.
Several shared that they had stopped believing they deserved romantic relationships after their diagnoses. Others admitted they hesitated to date because of surgical scars, ongoing medication, physical changes, or fear of becoming a burden.
Those comments reveal something larger than one television program.
Serious illness often changes how people see themselves long before it changes how others see them. Society frequently associates illness with fragility, dependence, or the end of romance altogether.
Whether intentionally or not, My Remaining Love challenges that assumption by presenting people with serious medical histories as individuals still capable of seeking companionship, intimacy, and happiness.
That alone helps explain why some survivors welcomed the concept.
Why Some Viewers Call It “Misery Porn”
The criticism also deserves to be taken seriously.
Many opponents are not rejecting the contestants themselves. They are questioning the incentives behind reality television.
Critics worry that producers may amplify grief, uncertainty, and emotional vulnerability because those moments naturally generate stronger audience engagement. Reality television has long been criticized for selective editing, dramatic music, manufactured tension, and transforming personal trauma into compelling television.
If terminal illness becomes another tool for emotional engagement rather than a reality treated with care and respect, many argue the line has been crossed.
Whether My Remaining Love does that cannot be determined from its teaser alone.
It will depend entirely on its execution.
Why Supporters See Something Different
Supporters, however, often see something beyond romance.
They see community.
Someone who has undergone chemotherapy, organ failure, or a terminal diagnosis carries experiences that healthy people may struggle to understand. Dating after serious illness also involves conversations that many couples never have to face so early—about medication, recurrence, fertility, physical limitations, and uncertainty about the future.
Finding someone who already understands those realities can reduce isolation in ways that extend beyond romance itself.
Several commenters suggested that the show could offer participants something television rarely provides: a space where they do not have to explain why their experiences changed them.
The Difficult Question No One Can Answer
One comment asked a question that lingered throughout the discussion:
What happens if one of the contestants dies after the show?
It is an uncomfortable question because it forces viewers to confront something most dating programs never acknowledge.
Traditional dating shows promise the possibility of happily ever after. My Remaining Love openly recognizes that, for some participants, love may exist alongside the possibility of loss.
That reality does not make those relationships less meaningful.
People living with terminal illnesses continue to fall in love, marry, have children, and build lasting friendships. Knowing that life may be shorter does not mean those experiences become less valuable.
It simply changes how they are lived.
The Ethics Will Depend on What Happens After Filming
Ultimately, the show’s ethics may have less to do with its premise than with everything that happens once filming ends.
Does SBS provide psychological support?
Are participants given meaningful control over how their stories are edited?
Are families protected?
How will the network respond if contestants face harassment after the broadcast?
Will grief, illness, and loss be treated with dignity rather than spectacle?
Recent years have prompted greater scrutiny of reality television’s duty of care, as former contestants around the world have spoken openly about the emotional consequences of sudden public exposure.
Those questions will likely determine how My Remaining Love is remembered.
Korea’s Dating-Show Boom Keeps Pushing Boundaries
The controversy also reflects a broader evolution within Korean dating television.
Dating shows have expanded well beyond the familiar formula of attractive strangers living under one roof. Recent concepts have centered on divorced couples, former lovers reconnecting, fortune tellers, older adults, and people from highly specific professions or backgrounds.
Each new format attempts to answer the same challenge: How do you make dating feel emotionally distinct in an increasingly crowded genre?
My Remaining Love may be the boldest answer yet—not because it is about romance, but because it enters one of the few subjects television has traditionally approached with far greater caution.
Whether My Remaining Love ultimately becomes a thoughtful exploration of love, mortality, and resilience or another example of reality television pushing ethical boundaries cannot be determined before its premiere.
Its success—or failure—will depend less on its premise than on its execution: how it treats its contestants, protects their dignity, and respects their stories long after the cameras stop rolling.
Until then, the debate reveals something larger than one television program. It exposes how uncomfortable society remains with seeing illness not only as tragedy, but as a life that continues—with love, hope, and difficult choices still very much a part of it.
