Channel 4 viewers hit out at Sky's 'painful' Miriam Rivera dating show and claim it was an 'attempt to elicit cheap sensationalism and mockery'

Viewers have slammed an early noughties dating show which tricked six men into competing for the affections of a young model without knowing she was transgender as a Channel 4 documentary revisits the uncomfortable reality TV programme.

Miriam: Death of a Reality Star explores the life of Miriam Rivera, a Mexican model who appeared on a cruel Sky1 dating show There's Something About Miriam in 2003.

The show saw six men compete to win her affections and £10,000 but they did not find out about Miriam's gender identity until the finale - which led one contestant to smash up the luxury Ibiza villa in which the contestants were staying and even threaten to 'kill' the 21-year-old model.

The documentary explores how Miriam, rather than the show's producers, were demonised after the deception was uncovered - and how the young and hopeful model who wanted to find love and become famous later disappeared into the world of sex work and drugs, before her untimely death in 2019. 

As modern-day viewers look back on the dating show in the Channel 4 documentary, they have been left horrified by the premise of the programme and have accused the original production companies, and Sky, of 'throwing her under the bus'. 

Viewers of Channel 4 documentary Miriam: Death of a Reality Star have criticised 2003 dating show There's Something About Miriam (pictured) which aired on Sky1, for 'exploiting' the transgender model

One person wrote on X: 'I remember the TV show was vile, pure exploitation of her.'

Another said: 'The production company was fully aware of what would happen, considering shows at the time mocked anyone trans, they went ahead to compete with Channel 4 and Big Brother, so chucked Miriam and the lads under the bus for the views.'

One viewer said watching the documentary and revisiting the dating show had made her 'angry'.

She wrote: 'Of course, the producers now claim they were merely naive about trans folk back then, but I do remember how they knowingly used Miriam Rivera's trans status in an attempt to elicit cheap sensationalism and mockery.'

Another viewer, who had not watched the show the first time around, said it 'should never have been made in the first place' after watching the first episode of the Channel 4 documentary.

Miriam Rivera, pictured, was tragically found dead in her mother's home in Mexico in 2019 in an apparent suicide, but some close to her do not believe the model took her own life

After watching the documentary which explored the cruel dating show, viewers took to X to criticise its premise

The viewers' horror at what Miriam experienced at the hands of the production company has been echoed by her brother, Ariel Mendoza.

'My sister was exploited, then abandoned,' Miriam's youngest brother told the Guardian.

'She was alone in a foreign country. Miriam was a tough girl but it broke her. I really think they used her. The boys got more help than Miriam.'

The documentary explores how the men, furious and humiliated after having been duped, launched legal action against the show's producers to try and take out an injunction and stop it from airing.

The men alleged conspiracy to commit sexual assault, defamation, breach of contract, and personal injury in the form of psychological and emotional damage.

They eventually settled for an undisclosed amount, and the show aired the following year. The massive scandal reportedly cost Sky TV three quarters of a million pounds, according to claims in the documentary.

Unlike the boys, who had a psychiatrist brought in for them, Miriam was given no support despite coming out to the world and receiving a torrent of abuse.

Her words after the finale was filmed reveal just how vulnerable she was feeling at the time.

She said: 'I went back to the hotel and I was shaking from the experience. I didn't know if they were going to punch me or attack me.

'I wasn't out to hurt anyone's feelings. No one in the crew would talk to me. They were all my friends during filming and now they don't want to know me. I feel really upset and alone.'

Dr Smith, who was brought in to offer support to the boys, reflected: 'I had been brought in ostensibly to look after the boys.

'No one had given a thought to how Miriam might feel. The reveal was her coming out to the world and as far as I was aware, Miriam hadn't been psych tested.

'How would she deal with rejection? Not just from who she picked, but everyone who thought trans people were freaks.

'They sold her a dream without anybody telling her what could go wrong. I thought, she's vulnerable, she's had a really really hard life, like a bird with a broken wing.'

The dating show brought Miriam, who was often known as the 'world's first transgender reality star', much notoriety - later appearing on Big Brother Australia in 2004 - but her fame came at a terrible price in the form of transphobic abuse. 

This included an incident in 2007 when she was pushed out of the fourth-story window of her New York apartment, leaving her with traumatic injuries. According to her friends, the treatment she received after the show caused a steep decline in her mental health.

Miriam was found dead in her mother's apartment in Mexico in 2019. 

Though authorities claimed it was a suicide, her close friends and family - including her husband Daniel Cuervo, believe she was murdered.

All of her friends were shocked to hear of Miriam's death in 2019 - and they were even more bewildered to learn that she had taken her own life in Mexico.