i guess relationships are anti-feminist now?

fine: on embarrassing boyfriends

Two weeks ago, That Vogue Article on embarrassing boyfriends™ ran through my group chats faster than a chlamydia outbreak at the NYU campus circa fall 2015. Then a few days ago, someone asked me what I thought about the piece. I have no idea what I said because I was running on two hours of sleep and my brain cells were having trouble synapsing. Something about fear of vulnerability, probably, which isn’t untrue, but it’s also not what most irked me about that article, if I may be forgiven for saying so.

Yesterday, yet another friend brought up the subject in a complimentary fashion.¹ The discourse is still discoursing, unfortunately, and I have thoughts I’d like to excise from my mind. So. Here we are.

(Before we get started, because I know this is at times a confusing concept to folks: a perpetual reminder that I’m allowed to be vexed by my fellow woman and keep my feminist card current. Even if I’m somewhat annoyed to find myself in this position. I’d rather be writing about books or figuring out how best to ruin the workplace. You know—girl things.)

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I don’t really feel like rehashing the article’s many messages, some of which I agree with because it’s like, how can I disagree with someone saying water is wet, you know? What do I gain? Like, yes, people (a category that includes women) probably should not center their lives around their significant others. People (id.) should not make their relationships the crux of their social media identities (?). When a relationship does not work out for xyz reason(s), people (id.) may feel sheepish that they expressed their erstwhile optimism publicly.

Sure. The Pope, last I heard, remains Catholic.

Speaking of the Pope: a patch of warm afternoon light that briefly made me believe in God last week.

I’d posit that most of these points have more to do with the fact that for a couple of decades, social media has driven us to share every single one of our thoughts and ideas and opinions and moments and relationships and hopes and conversations. Slowly turned us into the perfect advertising targets. Now we’re taking stock of our digital footprints and thinking whoops okay maybe that was a bit much. We’re thinking maybe we keep some things to ourselves now. Not in a “I don’t want to be embarrassed if this fails” sort of way, but more like “let me actually curate an air of mystery.” I’m a firm believer that we should all know less about each other.

As much as it should have, though, a call for heightened privacy and discretion did not become the article’s rallying cry. More’s the pity. For the sake of argument, then, let’s say that the embarrassing boyfriends thesis is purely about romantic relationships between men and women. Bit boring, but sure, let’s go there.

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It is understandable, first off, for women to want to create some distance from men when for centuries we were largely beholden to the institution of marriage and to the men who controlled them by way of fathers or husbands. To rid ourselves of a system that takes advantage of us, and that in heterosexual relationships still, to this day, benefits men more than women, seems like a rational step in the journey toward equality, etc. To deny this would be silly and futile.

Tl;dr: I get it. We don’t want to run the public relations department for the male species. That’s fine. I do think it’s a slight extrapolation to think that “here is a photo of my boyfriend” means “men are the center of my universe and feminism has gone too far.” Like … what are we doing, exactly, when we start wondering if human relationships, which are frankly the whole reason why we’re Here To Begin With, are cringe? I need us to get a grip.

If you’ll let me be insane for one quick sec. I finished my rewatch of The Americans a couple of weeks ago and I still haven’t recovered. All to say that without each other, Philip and Elizabeth Jennings would have died. How’s that for embarrassing?

At this point we’re training ourselves to become the anti-Candides, expecting the worst of all possible worlds to save face in a future that does not and might never exist. How bleak. One of the few remaining good things about life—the sharing of it with those we love—and we’re turning it into a weakness and source of shame.²