Australian Survivor: Blood v Water 2022 runner-up Shay Lajoie has claimed that the final Tribal Council was so brutal that it was scaled back by producers before going to air.
The 31-year-old entered the famed survival game alongside her long-term partner, Ben Watson. And, after 47 days in the Aussie bush, Shay did what most contenders can’t — outwit, outplay, outlast.
While she ultimately lost out on becoming Sole Survivor, fans were curious as to why she wasn’t asked many questions by the jury before the final vote.
Taking to Instagram on Tuesday night to clear the air, Shay said “there probably wasn’t much for producers to keep in the edit, as it was rather brutal”.
“When I would answer their questions, the males in the jury would interrupt with, ‘but what BIG moves did you make?’,” she recalled.
Shay added that she wasn’t “highlighting the men on purpose”, but at the time, “every female acted with grace and kindness”.
She continued: “On top of that, there were comments sprinkled throughout the night on how Chrissy and I weren’t deserving of those two seats next to Mark [Wales]. Chrissy responded great herself, ‘Well, we did something right because you’re there and we’re here’.”
She also added that she and co-runner-up Chrissy Zaremba “were called goats in a really negative light”, blatantly referencing Jesse Hansen as the culprit behind the comment.
Shay Recalls Being “Brutally Embarrassed” Filming Final Tribal Council
Backing up her experience in an interview with POPSUGAR Australia, Shay remembered the jury being “really nasty”.
“Chrissy and I, it took us three or four questions to realise ‘we are getting hanged. We are getting crucified here in front of everyone’,” she said.
“They were really nasty, to be completely honest,” she said of the jury. “A lot of it was coming from Jordie [Hansen] and Jesse and you could feel that they were fuelled by a bit of spite or anger that they weren’t sitting in those seats.”
The biomedical student added that it was “such a slap in the face” for the jury to “go from not wanting [her] eliminated to saying like, ‘you don’t even deserve to be here’.
“I kind of blacked out a little bit,” Shay concluded. “I just remember being brutally embarrassed.”
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