The Rise of #ihatemybf: Why Do We Date Those We Don’t Like?
Image Credit: pikisuperstar Via Freepik
Sometime around late 2024, my For You Page was filled with clips and pictures of Barbie, Henry Hart, and Talking Angela, paired with captions about lying to your boyfriend about loving him or cheating on him, amongst other things. The posts kick-started the #ihatemybf wave on social media. While these were nothing more than a series of exaggerated memes the internet eventually got bored with, they also revealed how we’re approaching dating.
We’ve long been fed stories about the ‘perfect’ romance with a happy ending, but very rarely do we hear stories about meeting someone… Only to realise you don’t even like them as a person. While this isn’t your typical Hollywood plotline, it is a real relationship arc humans encounter. But it begs the question: why would you stay in a relationship you would rather not be in?
My first experience with this matter took place when my friend started dating a girl. The first few weeks? Picture perfect. He’d be raving about their date all week, their Instagram’s filled with one another, backdropped by Girl in Red, ‘We fell in love in October’. Soon, these ballads were swiftly replaced with his ravings - everything that annoyed him about her. Quickly, I snapped - why not break up if he was getting sick of her, to which he replied, “God no, I’d be single then.”
For many people, fears of singledom lead them to stay with a partner they don’t like. Psychologist, Dr Stephanie Spelmann, commented: “Those with stronger fears about being single are willing to settle for less in their relationships. Sometimes they stay in relationships they aren’t happy in.” The fear of loneliness may be a driving factor in people's decision to remain in unfulfilling relationships.
Choosing to stay in an unhealthy relationship is sometimes motivated by the time they feel they’ve already invested in it, abandoning it would render all their efforts meaningless, emblematic of time wasted. Economists call this the “sunk cost fallacy”, and in the context of relationships, this means believing previous effort, energy and time invested into a relationship is enough reason to keep ‘investing’ into the relationship.
In a way, leaving the relationship means admitting poor judgment from your side - something people may be unwilling to admit. I’ve noticed that when I keep investing in a relationship to justify my past efforts, the basis of the relationship shifts from attraction and enjoyment to justification, often merely leading to frustration and resentment. Sexologist, Carolina Pataky, warns against the sunk cost fallacy, saying, “A relationship can have been meaningful, formative, and deeply real, and also short-lived.”
While the #ihatemybf trend was expressed through short-form memes, designed to give a quick dopamine hit before you continued scrolling, it offers us an important reminder on dating. A fulfilling relationship cannot be built on attraction or whiplash alone: first, you need to actually like your partner as a human being. Only then can you find satisfaction within your relationship.