It’s official: Chris Harrison has handed out his final rose. Just hours after the premiere of Katie Thurston’s season of The Bachelorette, it was announced that Chris Harrison is stepping away from hosting duties for good after 19 years with the franchise.For those of you who need a crash course on how we got here, keep reading. This drama is a lot to process, even for Bachelor standards. To ease any confusion or headaches, use this timeline as a guide. Buckle in, because this is a long one.

January 26th -February 4th, 2021: Racist photos of front-runner Rachael Kirkconnell surface

A TikToker named feministmama managed to find photos and other pieces of evidence of front-runner from Matt James’s season (and eventual winner) Rachael Kirkconnell displaying a history of racism. Either ABC couldn’t seem to find this on a background check, or they just didn’t really care to. Long story short, among other things, Rachael was seen culturally appropriating Indigenous culture at costume parties; reportedly bullied a girl in highschool for liking a Black male; and most notably attended an “Old South”/ plantation themed party in 2018. Unfortunately for my parents, I ditched the plan of going to law school, but I don’t think you need to have a J.D. behind your name to know that this points to being a very bad and pretty racist (not to mention, straight up not cute) look.

February 10, 2021: Chris Harrison goes on the defence in an interview with Rachel Lindsay

Chris Harrison then went on the TV show Extra, to share his 2 cents (more like 15 minutes) on Rachael with Rachel Lindsay, the franchise’s first Black lead. During this interview, which literally no one at ABC should have let Chris do, his words were pretty-on brand for Bachelor production. By “on-brand”, he made excuses for racist behaviour, defended Rachael Kirkconnell to the extreme and then put blame on those who were calling Rachael out.

During the chat, Chris Harrison claimed that in 2018 (for those of you who are bad at math like me, that was three years ago), when Rachael attended this party, she couldn’t have understood the implications, that she deserved “grace, understanding, and compassion”, and that we should wait for her to speak and give her time to reflect. Chris pretty much sounded like he had some skeletons in his suit-filled closet and that if photos of him surfaced like this, he didn’t want to get hate for it.

February 13, 2021: Chris announces he is stepping aside temporarily

Bachelor Nation was more infuriated with Chris than Clare was when Juan-Pablo dumped her. A petition was created calling for him to be fired, and it gained thousands of signatures. Bachelor alumni were also very angry and called out Chris on social media. Approximately 24 hours and a million Twitter mentions later, Chris was told to announced he would be temporarily stepping aside for a period of time as the host of the franchise.

March 13, 2021: Tayshia and Kaitlyn are announced as the new hosts for ‘The Bachelorette’ 

A month after Chris’s interview with Rachel, it was announced that Chris wouldn’t be returning for hosting this season of The Bachelorette, but instead, former Bachelorettes Kaitlyn Bristowe and Tayshia Adams would be supporting Katie Thurston in her journey to find love.

June 5th, 2021: It’s announced Chris won’t be hosting Bachelor in Paradise

It was officially announced that Chris wouldn’t be returning for the upcoming season of Bachelor in Paradise either, and that different celebrity hosts would be filling in, like David Spade (literally, WTF) and Wells Adams and Sarah Hyland.

June 8th, 2021: Chris exists the show…permanently 

The end of Chris’s journey is finally here, because this morning – just HOURS after the premiere of Katie Thurston’s season of The Bachelorette, it was announced that Chris was exiting the show permanently. ABC Entertainment confirmed the news in a statement to US Weekly: “Chris Harrison is stepping aside as host of The Bachelor franchise. We are thankful for his many contributions over the past 20 years, and wish him all the best on his new journey”.

This is a pretty big moment for the franchise, one where a majority of its fanbase took a stand against racism and anyone trying to defend or excuse it. Here’s to hoping that this is the start of production making a positive change. There’s been no word yet as to who will be filling in for Chris, but if anyone is curious, Nick Viall has my vote, so ABC if you’re reading this, go call your favourite runner-up.

June 8th, 2021: Chris exists the show…permanently 

The end of Chris’s journey is finally here, because this morning,  it was announced that Chris was exiting the show permanently. ABC Entertainment confirmed the news in a statement to US Weekly: “Chris Harrison is stepping aside as host of The Bachelor franchise. We are thankful for his many contributions over the past 20 years, and wish him all the best on his new journey”.

This is a pretty big moment for the franchise, one where a majority of its fanbase took a stand against racism and anyone trying to defend or excuse it. Here’s to hoping that this is the start of production making a positive change. There’s been no word yet as to who will be filling in for Chris, but if anyone is curious, Nick Viall has my vote, so ABC if you’re reading this, go call your favourite runner-up.

Images: Daily Mail; TeaAndRoses21 on Twitter; ExtraTV on Youtube; Giphy