Because FOX is not known for great sensitivity and a high level of taste in its reality programming, it’s understandable that the ads for tonight’s premiere of “More To Love,” the network’s new plus-sized dating competition, would be worrisome. Would “The Bachelor” creator Mike Fleiss’ saga of a large bachelor seeking love among equally full-figured women would be played for laughs? Or be exploitative? Or just  jaw-droppingly wrong?

You’re not the only one who had concerns. So did the bachelor.

“I was concerned off the bat that the main premise was to poke fun,” said Luke Conley, the 26-year-old sub-contractor and real estate investor who works his way through 20 women looking for love in a Bel Air mansion “But as I got to know the producers, and had them explain to me that this is a legitimate show, I (believed) that the desire of the show is for two people to make a sincere connection. It just happens that it’s not size-2 models. As I got to know them I felt better about it…I definitely wanted to find someone special. I came with my heart open.”

Even with that caveat, there’s no guarantee that “More To Love” is going to be any good, or do anything more than prove that heavier people are just as capable of romantic idiocy, over-investment and a fondness for hot tub make-out sessions with virtual strangers as skinny people.

(It’s probably not a mistake that it begins the night after the finale of “The Bachelorette,” where Jillian, like the other Bachelorettes and Bachelors before her, pondered marrying one of two people she could probably live happily ever after with, and with whom she’d recently made out, just to make sure.)

Luke, a former college football player, says that the ladies involved said that they’d had similar concerns about the show and “had to be talked into it at first for that same reason.” 

He acknowledges that there haven’t been a whole lot of reality shows – or shows, period – where heavy-set people play the romantic lead. That’s not exactly true – there just aren’t many  where the woman is heavy-set, because we’re all supposed to watch “According To Jim” and “The King of Queens” and not bat an eye. Luke says he hopes he’s part of a trend, but says the lack of representation of large-sized lovers”hasn’t been a source of frustration for me.”

Still, he admits that the same is probably not true for the female contestants, seen crying on the commercials and admitting that their weight has been a hurdle in their dating lives. Indeed, at least one had never been on a date.

“I hope that it builds up their self-esteen, and gets them out of their shells more,” he says. “In high school, (my weight0 caused me to be somewhat bashful. I would always find out later about girls who had crushes on me after the school year was over. I never knew what to do with that.”

But after high school, Luke said he no longer let his weight “hold me back – I was a bigger guy, playing football. I bulked up and never let it stop me.”

Again, that wasn’t true of the ladies – “It was shocking to me that girls of that age had not had dates before,” he said. “That did make a big difference in their ability to open up and let their guard down. They had some obstacles to overcome.”

Of course, the skinny minnies on most dating shows have their own obstacles -insecurities that make them loud, drunk and combative, vanity that makes them loud, drunk and combative, and a need to push their modeling careers. But these ladies, who, from the commercials, are very attractive, are different because they might not be used to being considered so. 

But the larger ladies have a fan in Luke, who “grew up in a family of plus-sized women. To me, it’s more about personality than a dress size, but I have connected better and enjoyed girls more that are plus-sized…I don’t want no skinny minnies.”

Tellingly, even his celebrity crushes, Beyonce and Kim Kardashian, are known for having larger, more shapely backsides than the usual starlet (“You noticed that, huh?”)

And on behalf of those of us non skinny-minnies: YAY! Of course, appreciating a big butt doesn’t make a guy a saint. It just means he likes big butts.

A reporter during the phone press conference I took part in asked Luke if there was any way to be prepared for having 20 women after him at the same time. His answer made absolute sense to me, because he called it like it was – “(I was) dating 20 women simultaneously. When I was on a group date, I tried to make it like a party atmosphere. My goal was to make sure no one was left out.”

Luke is not able, of course, to say if he finds love on the show. He did say that there was a bit of hot-tub action, and he doesn’t apologize for it.

“I was really looking at it like I was dating each girl individually. A date can lead to a kiss or a make-out sessions,” he says. “If I was with a girl, I wasn’t thinking about the other (ones). They understood my intentions to get to know them. Kissing is part of dating.”

So is trust, confidence and private conversation, something I don’t know how you cultivate dating on a TV show. Oh, well. Maybe, if there isn’t true love, at least there’s some confidence building. 

Who am I kidding? It’s probably going to be a train wreck, just like every other dating show. Oh, equality.