Serial dating and push presents: love in the age of the algorithm is complex

The Guardian

3 days ago

Sitting in a hospital bed, pregnant Campbell Puckett, known as 'Pookie', is handed a Craie Kelly Epsom 25 Hermès bag (retailing around £20,000) by her husband, Jett. 'It's time for her push present,' he says behind the camera. The husband and wife are arguably the internet's favourite heterosexual couple at the moment, and if they are anything to go by, the standards for modern romance are high.
Jett recently gave Pookie a single instruction on one of their European getaways: 'Do not leave Paris without a Birkin.' Luxury unboxings are a staple on their page.These #relationshipgoals have increasingly influenced viewers' standards and expectations in their own relationships. The spectacle of lavish gifts and experiences can shift expectations and expressions of love towards the more demonstrable aspects of romance. 'If my husband doesn't get me a Hermès Kelly as my push present, he will be fired,' reads one TikTok comment.
Sometimes, the deepest connections you feel toward a partner come not from the giving of gifts, but the smaller moments of kindness: preparing a favourite snack or a foot rub on the sofa. Growth and connection can come after the reconciling of a fight. Sometimes, love is just spending time together in silence.
To their credit, Pookie and Jett also share more candid moments of love. 'In case any of you are wondering what Pookie's favourite thing to do is, it's cuddle,' says Jett, with a sleeping Campbell lying on his bare chest. Although one of their shared moments of breakfast in bed, sipping pink champagne and dancing together in PJs, was professionally filmed to launch their new merchandise line.
These exceptionally high relationship goals are also found on the other side of the spectrum in the content of serial daters. 'Dating influencers' are predominantly young women who reveal all about their love lives to eager followers. Take TikToker estéeisonline, outlining her ideal man, she claims to just be looking for a '6ish foot, dark haired, good haired, moustached or bearded man … maybe with tattoos, who's funny (my kind of funny), creative, thoughtful, emotionally available, ambitious, makes money, wants kids, likes cats … and is my biggest fan'. In a later viral TikTok, she tearfully relays her disappointment at her date's request to split the bill. 'I just want a gentleman,' she says through tears. In this world of dating, if idealised standards aren't met, it doesn't matter that the date was 'good'.
There is a personal cost to this style of dating. Hannah Zaslawski began a TikTok series where she tried to go on 50 first dates in pursuit of love. After experiencing major fatigue and burnout, she would suddenly call it quits at date number 38, and in doing so ended her virality. Influencers are almost obliged to keep drearily dating because the TikTok algorithm demands it.
More uncomfortably, there is the question of our relationship to their relationships. Many of their viewers appear to live vicariously through them; something that becomes especially apparent when the relationship ends. Recently, when popular influencer The Wizard Liz called off her engagement to fellow YouTuber Landon Nickerson over his messaging of another woman, swathes of her fans had their own lives altered. 'If [Liz] had to go through this, us mortals, us little peasants … how are we going to survive?' declared another of her fans.
In all of this content, it's apparent that influencer couples and daters make a deal – in exchange for sharing their lives with an audience, they are able to make an income through advertising and commerce. A couple becomes in effect a throuple – creator, partner/love interest and audience. Their audience buy what they sell because, in buying into their brand, they're buying into the ideal of romance being sold.
Pookie wanted to be an influencer since 2017 and hit what the Cut called 'algorithm gold' when she introduced her husband into her content, after years of consistently posting with modest success. Items from their clothing line, Quintessential Love, are often sold out. Jett gives TED talks on how to 'authentically love out loud' like he does.
Although, the business of likes has, at times, come between couples. Former Instagram it couple Jay Alvarrez and Alexis Ren's wanderlust relationship ended abruptly in 2016, when in spectacular public fashion ( destroying the facade entirely), Alexis told a fan that 'the relationship wasn't good for [Jay's] business any more'.
Love in the age of the algorithm is complex – but creators and audiences would do well to remember that so is love in the real world.
Zandile Powell is a video essayist and writer