Is having a boyfriend embarrassing now? (a response to vogue)
a response to vogue from a Gen Z Christian.
Reading that article felt like watching culture do backflips to avoid admitting the real issue. It’s not that having a boyfriend is embarrassing. It’s that we’ve built our entire worth on things that were never meant to hold the weight of our identity and now the cracks are showing. For years, social media trained women to perform their relationships for approval. You weren’t just dating someone, you were curating him, you were expected to turn your love life into a highlight reel and shocker that became exhausting, cringe and honestly dehumanising. So now the pendulum has swung to the other extreme..pretending men don’t exist, hiding boyfriends like FBI agents, cropping out them out of frames and acting like basic love is a political stance.
To all my fellow girlies in their 20s, I just want to grab your shoulders and say, the problem isn’t men the problem is misplaced worship. When you treat a relationship as a trophy, you’ll eventually resent it, when you treat singleness as a personality, you’ll eventually fear losing it, when you treat public approval as your god, anything you post becomes cringe but when Christ is the center? Relationships don’t embarrass you, idolatry does.
The Real Issue Isn’t Boyfriends, It’s That We Don’t Know What To Do With God’s Good Gifts Anymore
The article acts like women are “embarrassed” of having boyfriends because it’s too normative, it’s too boring, it ruins their online persona, it makes them look “republican” (girl… be serious), men might embarrass them eventually but none of this is actually about relationships, It’s about performing a lifestyle before an audience that changes its mind every five minutes. This generation doesn’t know how to enjoy God’s good gifts without turning them into brands like food is content, workouts are content, relationships are content, breakups are content and even silence is content. No wonder women are scared to post their boyfriends..not because relationships are embarrassing, but because the internet is ruthless and fickle but here’s the truth, God never asked you to live your relationship in front of millions. He asked you to live it faithfully in front of Him. The article romanticizes singleness like it’s some feminist trophy but Scripture refuses to idolize either state. Paul calls singleness a gift and marriage is also a gift both are meant to serve Christ, not your online aesthetic.
Your boyfriend is not your identity, your single era is not your redemption arc, your dating status is not your righteousness because Christ is. When your identity is in Christ, you don’t have to hide your relationship OR flaunt it. You just get to be normal, free and grounded.
The problem With “Boyfriends Are Out of Style” culture, this mindset is basically modern gnosticism dressed in TikTok slang..It teaches: Men are culturally embarrassing, heterosexuality is a little cringe, womanhood is more valid when unencumbered, relationships “tank your aura”, love makes you less interesting but biblically? Love isn’t cringe but It’s courageous, commitment isn’t boring, It’s countercultural and relationships aren’t embarrassing. It’s sanctifying. And men? They’re not props, they’re humans made in the image of God broken, yes but so are we. The world is allergic to weakness, sacrifice, humility and commitment. Christian women are not, we don’t run from love because it might hurt, we steward love because it reflects Christ.
If you want to post your boyfriend, do it without overthinking, if you don’t want to post him, great live quietly, if you’re single, enjoy it without turning it into a brand. If you’re dating, enjoy that without turning it into a flex. Stop letting TikTok comments disciple you more than Scripture. What’s actually embarrassing isn’t having a boyfriend. It’s letting culture bully you out of enjoying the very things God calls good. Love is not lame, commitment is not dated, heterosexuality is not political, relationships are not your brand. And you? you’re not defined by who you’re with or who you’re not with but you’re defined by who saved you.
Thank you for reading.