Soft launch? No thanks, it’s officially embarrassing to have a boyfriend
From Lily Allen’s breakup album to viral memes, Gen Z women are rebranding singlehood as self-preservation and the internet can’t stop talking about it.
If anyone ever sees a man on my story, it’s a paid post: this cheeky line under British writer Chanté Joseph’s Instagram post with 24.8k forwards sums up Gen Z’s overall mood. Over the past few weeks, jokes about women being ‘embarrassed to have a boyfriend’ have evolved into a full-blown cultural moment.
The trend allegedly began with singer-songwriter Lily Allen’s latest studio album, West End Girl. Detailing her split from actor David Harbour, the record’s unapologetic tone has inspired what fans are calling the “Lily Allen winter”: a season of self-focus, friendship, and freedom from performative coupledom.
Joseph’s post was flooded with comments from women saying they no longer post their partners online. Some wanted privacy; others joked that deleting breakup photos was “too much effort”. One user summed up the vibe: “Having a boyfriend seems like a subtle co-sign of men conceptually and politically, which definitely results in immediate aura loss.”
From boyfriend effect to soft launch
This isn’t out of nowhere. The ‘boyfriend effect’ trend — videos showing how life changes once you’re in a relationship — has morphed into a more ironic question: “Wait, is having a boyfriend itself the cringe move?”
While the meme originated in the West, Indian Gen Z is totally in on the joke. Insta tutorials on how to ‘soft launch’ a partner are racking up millions of views. Think blurry arm photos and mysterious dinner shots.
“Posting your partner is fine sometimes, but making it your entire personality? That’s cringe,” says 25-year-old influencer Himika Ghoshal, adding, “Single women in their mid to late twenties are happier now; they’ve realised there’s more to life than romantic relationships.”
Himika adds that the trend is Gen Z’s way of dealing with patriarchy and reclaiming agency: “This is going to lead to a generation of women who are unapologetic, not people pleasers, and just living for their own happiness and not what society wants them to be.”
The psychology of staying offline
For Gen Z, love isn’t an achievement to flaunt but an experience to protect. “They grew up watching others’ relationships being glamorised and then publicly falling apart,” explains psychiatrist Dr Darshan Yallappa Jotibannad.
He points out how social media itself has turned affection into a performance: “Displaying love publicly now comes with aesthetics, captions, and engagement metrics. Refusing to play along by soft-launching or calling it ‘embarrassing’ becomes a quiet rebellion against algorithm-driven intimacy.”
