On Digital Voyeurism, Relationship Breakups and the Lost Art of Goodbye

Words: Valaniece

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So you and your partner (or situationship) just broke up, and now you’re listening to Fade Into You by Mazzy Star while you stalk their Instagram because you’re a masochist. You’ve sworn to your friends that it’s over this time but when they ask “Why haven’t you blocked them?” the cognitive dissonance dulls all better judgment and you reply with “We’re just fRiEnDs”… The truth is, you’re just too afraid to say goodbye. 

There’s a clip from the film Joe Black (1998) in circulation on Instagram and TikTok where the main characters walk away from one another on a busy city sidewalk. Each of them looks back once more, then never again. The clip's caption reads something like, Taking one good last look because I know I’m never going back again. This is what’s missing from our world and it’s something we secretly yearn for.

The poetics of goodbye. Tennyson said it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, but in the digital age, where everyone and anyone is one Google search away, is love ever truly lost? And is that for the best? We as a culture have forgotten the ability to go our separate ways, insisting upon staying “connected” even to our detriment. Morbid curiosity spurred on by unprecedented internet access has become a recipe for digital voyeurism, collective limerence, and has watered down the poetics of love’s aftermath. 
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Instead of songs like Girl From The North Country where Bob Dylan longingly reminisces of love lost, we have new-wave infidelity coined “micro-cheating” via the internet because the dude you’re dating refuses to unfollow his ex who he is “just friends” with. Bob Dylan sings, “If you’re traveling in the north country fair… remember me to the one who lives there. For she was once a true love of mine.” Bittersweet symphonies we turn to in times of heartbreak articulate complex emotions of nostalgia surrounding past love. These songs narrate a story we know too well; from strangers to lovers then back to strangers again. An achingly beautiful trope. It’s poetic and romantic, and it’s the reality of life that we refuse to accept because of social media. 

With collective limerence, we’re always longing for someone or something more yet never living for what we have now. A false sense of hope arises, causing one to irrationally cling to the past and read deeply into vapid digital interactions as innocuous as a simple like. Digital voyeurism has manifested a disconnect with reality in a world of connectivity (or lack thereof). Quick digital dopamine hits have created illusions of reciprocated longing. Though parasocial relationships describe one-sided relationships between celebrities and fans, the same conclusion can be drawn among peers. Parasocial relationships are defined by the extension of emotional energy from one person towards another who is completely unaware of their existence or not nearly as emotionally invested. Constantly thinking about someone more than the time you’ve physically spent with them is akin to that of a parasocial relationship, except it’s with the idea of an ex-lover. This becomes one-sided when convincing ourselves that cheap validation via story views and thirst trap likes equates to mutual interest. 

“Constantly thinking about someone more than the time you’ve physically spent with them is akin to that of a parasocial relationship, except it’s with the idea of an ex-lover.”

Though someone is gone from our lives physically, we fear the pain of loss so much that we settle with the idea of them. It’s difficult to let go, but we were never meant to internet stalk old lovers indefinitely. Our inability to let go results in emotional purgatory. People aren’t focused on the life they’re living and the people they’re physically with and we fill the void online, cheating ourselves out of the profound experience of saying goodbye.

The art of bittersweet goodbyes means finding beauty in the idea of two people from separate parts of the world serendipitously crossing paths to share a fleeting romance before parting ways forever. Today, it is a concept you only read in books or see in movies yet rarely experience in real life. The lack of mystery spoils the inherent artistry of life portrayed in cinema. If we can appreciate the melancholic beauty of lost connection on screen, why are we unable to in real life? Honoring emotions, as painful as they are, is imperative to self-growth and finding happiness. That’s what life’s supposed to be about. Not ignoring pain, but rather growing stronger despite pain. Digital voyeurism cannot replace physical reality. The internet is an illusion bordering delusion. Once we accept reality, we reach a place of acceptance and indifference free from pain. In that place, treasured moments no longer hurt to recollect. In that place, we wonder why we didn’t let go sooner. If it was meant to be, then it will be regardless of how many thirst traps you post. This only deludes the magic. 

Let them remember you the way they last saw you. Let the past stay in the past. Let intimate memories remain frozen like photos taken on disposable cameras so the last image they have of you is left untouched by the inevitable passage of time. There will always be a place where the love you shared exists forever in montages of a life truly lived, but that place is no longer your heart.