On dating apps, some of the dull or unoriginal things people share on their profiles are being dubbed ‘beige flags’. — AFP Relaxnews
After red flags and green flags, TikTok users have coined the term ‘beige flag’. This describes annoying, unoriginal or cringeworthy things that people share on their dating site profiles.
On the social network, users have taken to spotting and mentioning beige flags – including those of their own partners.
When scrolling through dating app profiles, you’ve probably come across all kinds of dull or banal facts or anecdotes, like “I love sports” or “If my dog loves you, I’ll love you too”. According to the TikTok community, these are beige flags, an increasingly popular term now with 96 million views on the Chinese social network.
Straddling the acceptable and the unacceptable, the beige flag designates the type of trivia that everyone could live without. According to the Urban Dictionary definition of beige flag, it is “something that's neither good nor bad but makes you pause for a minute when you notice it, and then you just continue on. Something odd.”
The term was first made popular by an American TikToker named Caitlyn MacPhil, who made a series of videos entitled “R U Beige” in which she gives examples of some of these signs that could suggest that someone is probably very boring.
In one of her videos she gives examples, including: “Having an opinion on whether pineapple belongs on pizza” or “Any reference to extremely mainstream sitcoms”. According to her, these kinds of anecdotes are boring because they’re seen over and over again.
In the comments, people in turn shared other examples of beige flags. These include lines such as “fluent in sarcasm”, or behaviour like “guys who include professional wedding photos of them dancing” or people who put coffee as one of their interests. “Everyone drinks coffee, it’s not a personality trait,” comments one Internet user.
Today, the idea of the beige flag seems to have taken on a whole new meaning. More recently, Internet users have been using the term to share more quirky anecdotes about themselves or their partner's personality or behaviour.
In one video, viewed two million times, a web user talks about his girlfriend’s beige flag: “My girlfriend’s beige flag is that she announces everything. Her stomach just growled? I have to know. Dinner is ready? She’s telling me. She has to pee? It’s the most important thing in the world. She’s cold? She’s calling me to let me know.”
Other Internet users don’t hesitate to use the beige flag concept to describe the unusual or hard-to-break habits of their other half. One, for example, says that her boyfriend has a habit of pinning his socks together in pairs so as not to lose them. In a nutshell, we could all be walking beige flags without even realising it – we all have boring or quirky traits to our personalities!
But the rise of the beige flag could also be a symptom of dating fatigue, an expression used to describe the weariness felt by people using dating apps.
In an interview with Metro UK, relationship expert, Jessica Anderson, explains: “People are fed up with going on dates with just anyone. We’re all busy and we don’t want to waste an evening sitting opposite someone we aren’t compatible with in any way. This has meant that people’s standards for dating app profiles have gone up.” – AFP Relaxnews
