Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing?

When I came across the Vogue piece by Chanté Joseph asking if having a boyfriend is now embarrassing, I laughed mostly because it’s a question I’ve quietly asked myself, too.

There’s a growing irony online around being visibly in love, especially if you’re a woman in a heterosexual relationship. On social media, “boyfriend” jokes have become their own genre. People talk about boyfriend culture like it’s a cringe aesthetic a soft-launch Instagram Story, a tagged photo you immediately regret, a public declaration of affection that suddenly feels uncool.

Joseph’s article points out that for many women, being partnered no longer feels like an achievement. Once upon a time, having a boyfriend meant you’d “made it” someone had chosen you. Now, being single can feel like the more empowered, independent, even aspirational option.

And I get it. There’s something freeing about belonging only to yourself. There’s also a quiet fear that being in a relationship means slipping back into old scripts being defined by someone else, or losing a bit of your autonomy.

But still, I don’t think having a boyfriend is embarrassing. What’s embarrassing (if anything) is performing the relationship doing it for an audience. It’s the idea that you need to prove something by having one, or hide it to seem above it all.

Love itself isn’t cringe. Sincerity just feels risky right now. We’ve learned to protect ourselves with irony and detachment; it’s easier to laugh at romance than to admit we want it.

So maybe the real rebellion especially for women is not rejecting relationships, but being honest about wanting them. About enjoying them. About saying: yes, I have a boyfriend, and no, it doesn’t make me less independent or less interesting.

There’s no shame in love. The embarrassment only starts when we care too much about how it looks, instead of how it feels.

AD🫶🏾