What do ‘likes’ have to do with love?

It’s hard enough to navigate a relationship as a young adult without being bombarded by happy couples, relationship therapists, unhappy people in relationships, unhappy singles, dating coaches, and happy singles online.   

I don’t especially enjoy a scroll through Instagram around Valentine’s Day because of the overload of couples content: dating experts, picture-perfect happy couples, and general fearmongering about being single. One respondent to a survey conducted by The Boar said, “Sometimes this content feels aspirational, but not necessarily realistic”, and I couldn’t agree more. We all know by now, this is the way social media works. 

In a poll survey conducted by The Boar, 62% of responders said no, having a boyfriend was not embarrassing now

I might be a bit of a sceptic, and I wouldn’t describe myself as the biggest fan of PDA – friends of mine might report me making fun of touchy couples on campus (I stand by it). But to clarify, I’m not a cynic, and I don’t hate love. I love my own boyfriend very much. But my Instagram followers will note that he doesn’t feature that much on my fairly quiet page.   

Is the answer yes, then, to Vogue’s inflammatory question: Is it embarrassing to have a boyfriend now?   

In a poll conducted by The Boar, 62% of respondents said no, that having a boyfriend was not embarrassing now. And even though the Vogue headline might suggest it, I don’t think writer Chante Joseph tried to say dating a man is inherently embarrassing. She argued that letting a romantic relationship overpower your identity, including your performed identity on social media, is embarrassing – “audiences are icked out by seeing too much boyfriend content.”  

Weirdly, I’m not sure if I’ve ever known a time in my life when being in a relationship had no connection to social media. Facebook relationship statuses used to be semi-important, and when I got Instagram in Year Eight, couples my age had each other’s usernames in their bios.  Now people like to ‘launch’ their new relationships. Posting a mirror selfie with your new boyfriend captioned ‘exclusive’ is what we call a hard launch. Posting the back of someone’s head or a meal out for two are examples of the soft launch: a chic, ‘if you know, you know’ situation. 

 In the era of the manosphere, it’s no wonder a lot of women long to break free from their heterosexual dating prospects

For years, tying your worth to your heterosexual relationship was the norm for women. A boyfriend wasn’t just a companion but a badge of honour as well, a symbol of status and security. And these times aren’t too far behind us, if at all. Recently, we’ve begun to see the glamourisation of traditional gender roles such as the ‘tradwife’, a stay-at-home wife and mother who looks after the household while her husband works. Her husband is the ‘high-value’ man: a protector, provider, and counterpart to his ‘high-value’ wife. 

In the era of the manosphere, it’s no wonder a lot of women long to break free from their heterosexual dating prospects. Videos of men stuffing wedding cake into their new wives’ faces and making sexually explicit references in their wedding vows go viral. Andrew Tate might be ‘dead‘ now, but in his wake lies an outspoken misogynistic sentiment, ideas about outdated gender roles and an often-violent tension between what women want and what men are offering. It’s this kind of behaviour that’s making straight women give up on their dating pool. Creator @cordially.kylie put it aptly, “I think I’m gonna propose”, describing an evening she had with her female friend and roommate. Some of the Instagram reactions comment on her sexuality, but we actually have a word for the feeling this creator describes: heteropessimism. The term was coined by the scholar Asa Seresin, who then amended it to heterofatalism: a complete lack of faith women have in men as romantic partners. 

Because being in love isn’t ‘embarrassing’, but centring a whole life around another person kind of is

Many heterosexual women seeking romance, sex, and companionship on an ‘exclusive’ level will struggle to cut dating men from their lives entirely. But what Vogue’s article outlined was that criticising and moving away from heteronormativity means removing boyfriends from their pedestals.  

Audiences might be put off by seeing women online overcome by their boyfriends, and perhaps this is why we’ve seen the rise of the ‘soft launch’. It’s still wanting the badge of honour that is a boyfriend and trying not to let it overpower personal identity. Because being in love isn’t ‘embarrassing’, but centring a whole life around another person kind of is.