Being lowkey in love might just be the new flex.
I read this article from British Vogue called “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” It talks about how people these days seem to be cryptic when posting about their boyfriends. No more anniversary dumps or couple selfies. Instead, it’s soft launches, blurred faces, and coded captions like “his POV.”
The writer, Chanté Joseph, says women used to live in what she calls “Boyfriend Land,” a time when “women’s online identities centered around the lives of their partners.” Back then, being ‘claimed’ was the pinnacle of it all, like being partnered is some sort of a dream come true for some (ugh). Now, Joseph writes, women are trying to exist outside that, to be in relationships without being defined by them.
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Meanwhile, in my circle, it’s the complete opposite
Everyone’s flexing their jowas like it’s a full-time content.
I have friends whose Save the Date videos look like movie trailers: drone shots, voice-overs, outfit changes. Others post every tiny moment like the coffee run, the “he picked me up 🥺” photo, the couple outfit selfies. Even when the boyfriend isn’t in the picture, he’s tagged. And of course, he reposts. Then there’s one friend who tracked her boyfriend’s location while he was on vacation and posted it on IG: “Just checking where my baby is 🩷.” Girl. That’s not cute. What are you, Interpol? (I sound so bitter but trust me I’m not, but do you get me when I say it’s yes, a bit off and cringey?)
But I get it. I do. Love makes you soft, sometimes delulu. But sometimes it feels like some people aren’t in relationships anymore, they’re in an ongoing marathon to keep proving they are loved.
After reading the piece, I asked myself: why do we do it?
Why do we feel the need to prove our love through posts? Why does every new relationship need to pass through the algorithm before it counts?
Maybe it’s because we grew up in a time when the internet became our diary. Posting your boyfriend isn’t just sharing, it’s proof. It’s like saying, “I’m loved, I’m chosen, I’m doing fine.” It has become a form of validation. Or maybe it’s because we’ve seen what happens when people stop posting. Everyone notices. The “happy couple” disappears, the photos get archived, and suddenly the breakup rumors start. We’ve turned relationships into a series and when it ends, people expect closure.
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But not everyone’s playing the same game
There’s a kind of girl that also caught my attention. She might be single (or not!) but she’s focusing on herself. The one who posts about her solo dinners, her skincare routines, her Fridays at home. The one who reads, works out, and glows differently you’d think they’re single.
They’ve made independence look romantic—a life of their own making. I honestly get it. Dating these days feels so off that I’ve muted people who constantly flex their relationships. Not because I’m bitter, but because it doesn’t look authentic to me at all.
What I enjoy more now are the women who turned self-love into an aesthetic. They’re not waiting around. They’re studying, traveling, saving, glowing up, hard-launching themselves. Women who realized that being loved isn’t the same as being fulfilled. Their partners might be in the frame, but never the focus. A coffee cup here, a shoulder there but the main character is always themselves.
I also know couples who are genuinely happy and you can tell, even without the “my baby” posts. They don’t flex, they don’t announce. You just see it. A hiking photo. A random shot of a toy store in Hong Kong. No tags, no matching captions, just small moments that feel shared. You can tell they were together, but it’s not the point of the post.
Some couples in my circle don’t even post together at all. Maybe just a meal they both ordered, the same plate showing up on two feeds. Or one of them posting about the trip while the other shares a sunset from the same place. No “date night” hashtags, no heart emojis. Just real life happening. It’s not romantic in the typical sense, but you feel the love anyway. Then again, nothing wrong with PDAs and cute selfies, you do you, but sometimes it feels so performative and pretentious.
Love is beautiful, we love love
But we don’t like it to be too performative. And that’s not hate. I love seeing people happy, in love, thriving. But I think most of us just want a quieter kind of love now. One that doesn’t need validation, one that doesn’t require social media proof.
Still, that Vogue article made me think that maybe it’s not that we’re all bitter. Maybe we’re just tired. Tired of performative love, tired of seeing relationships crumble in real time, tired of pretending everything has to look perfect and happy.
But at the end of the day, love’s still worth it. It’s just different now. We don’t need to flex it, hard-launch it, or explain it to the world.
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