Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing? A Response to Vogue.

By Anonymous

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The recently published British Vogue piece titled “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” by Chanté Joseph has triggered an avalanche of debate across mainstream media. The article taps into an emerging Gen Z tension: the sense that a woman admitting she’s in a committed, heterosexual relationship has somehow become uncool. While this newfound self-consciousness is often framed as a liberating shift for straight single women who refuse to be defined by their relationship status or feel imposed upon by anyone else’s, it originated, however, in discussions among influencers and content creators on social media, warranting further examination of how “liberating” or countercultural this phenomenon really is.

To start with, this “debate” is obviously and intentionally heterocentric, privileged, offensive, and reductive. Like most social media conversations that garner the attention of mainstream news, it features predominantly young, white women putting forward a “hot take” just extreme enough to prompt a “backlash,” which is really just the reassertion of common knowledge. And while each of us individually may be able to quickly grasp why labeling an entire romantic practice “embarrassing” is silly at best (and problematic at worst), plugging this backlash back into the algorithm and waiting for it to disperse into popular sentiment takes another two to three business years, trapping us in circular, shallow conversations which undermine our power of collective dialogue. You may be wondering, then why write about it at all? Because, though most of us may be conscious of how one-dimensional this idea is, rhetoric has impact.

For some, relationship-shaming has made its way off social media, into our lives, and worse, into our minds. Without social media, though, “embarrassment” takes on new meaning. Embarrassment, unlike shame or guilt, is externally imposed—the product of breaking social rules rather than moral ones. Navigating between emotions in the public and private spheres has always been a challenge for women in a society that does not view them as people, and newly imposed restrictions on expressing romantic love provide yet another obstacle, forcing an insincere and impractical concealment of our personal lives to protect us from embarrassment, even in front of our closest friends. We are not necessarily embarrassed in front of ourselves as much as we are in front of others. Therefore, to be embarrassed of a boyfriend means to feel scrutinized by outsiders for demonstrating care or vulnerability. Conversely, to insist that others feel ashamed of their own relationships to pay their dues to the latest baseless internet feminism trend provides another standard to weaponize against the women closest to us. 

How did this judgment and insecurity about being perceived become so insidious? These immature conversations set a new standard that allows us to play into our lowest instincts. Though cliché-sounding, shaming others (especially friends) for how they present their relationships to the world only creates further insecurity and turmoil around intimacy. As fun as it may be to pretend that intimacy can be out of fashion and that our harshest judgments are in service of some greater pseudofeminist activism, the unfortunate truth remains that real change will never be the result of reactionary, borderline moronic conversations about what to do with the “young, single white woman.” Annoyingly, real change begins by opening our own minds, especially toward those around us, even if it means laying down the judgments we use to protect ourselves.

This article was originally published in CHICK Magazine Issue #1 on December 10, 2025