The Ending Of Public Relationships
The public response to the end of YouTube couple relationships
In the past few weeks we have seen the end of the romantic relationships of Thimna Shooto & Libho Geza, Mo Mdluli & Thato Rampedi and Sibu Mpanza & Buhle Lupindo. The significance of these breakups is because these couples are hyper-visible people who’s relationships had an emotional investment from many people who only have a para-social relationship with the people mentioned.
The announcements that these couples have split up has brought much public conversation about why it was necessary for these couples to announce their breakups, subscribers/followers who have expressed heartbreak because of these breakups and the complexities of detangling from someone you have built a business with.
One thing I would like to first point out is that the breakups mentioned earlier (which will be the main focus of this article) have been amicable. And by that I mean there has not been a public spectacle involving infidelity or any other such ‘scandal’. What we have seen, at least from the communication that has been sent out by these couples, is the very normal process of couples deciding to path ways when there are irreconcilable differences. This is a very normal reason for the end of many romantic relationships.
What I have seen from the social media discourse over these breakups is people who are convinced that there is a ‘scoop’ or ‘something more’, or ‘another reason’ behind these breakups as opposed to what I mentioned above which is; two people breaking up because of irreconcilable differences. There is a feeling that there is a section of the internet that does not believe that couples who are hyper-visible can breakup without there being an underlying scandal that these couples are trying to conceal.
I wanted to title this piece ‘We have decided to break up’ because I think we should take these couples at their word when they tell us that they have made an adult decision to no longer be involved in a romantic relationship instead of violently insisting that there is a hidden scandal.
The other observation I made particularly on social media, which is where these conversations happen, is that there is no need for these announcements as these people are ‘nobodies’.
I should not have to spend any time addressing this particular point but I will indulge. One of the best parts of modern day internet culture is that the internet is big enough for there to be pockets and subcultures of people on the internet which other people will never be exposed to. Alex Cooper’s Call Her Daddy podcast is one of the biggest podcasts in the world. So big that Spotify acquired it for an estimated $60 Million. Many of the people reading this article have never heard of Cooper and have not listened to a single episode of the podcast. This does not mean Cooper is not a hyper-visible person and has a massive following.
Geza and Shooto met and coupled on a national tv show and accumulated a large social media following post the end of Love Island South Africa. Mdluli and Rampedi do not have a joint couples channel but have a segment on Rampedi’s channel and have created numerous videos together in the time that they have been together. Rampedi’s channel has over 100 000 subscribers. This means there are 100 000 people out there who have potentially consumed the content that has been made by the couple.
Mpanza and Lupindo also do not technically have a joint channel but from many people’s perspectives, the More Mpanza channel functioned very much as a couples channel even though Mpanza tried his best to reiterate that it was not one. That channel has 54 000 subscribers which I will repeat is 54 000 people who are potentially invested in this relationship.
For people to then get on the internet and lambast these couples for announcing their breakups evidences no capacity to think on the side of these people. I strongly believe that the people who hold the view that ‘internet couples’ should not announce their breakups are people who think those who are hyper-visible on the internet are not ‘real celebrities’ and that no one should care about their lives.
When you think about the fact that there is a large pool of people who have watched Mpanza and Lupindo’s relationship for the past 4 years, it is not unusual that; there are people who care about the end of their relationship and that the couple in question has some sort of responsibility to announce said break up.
There is then the very complex matter of these couples having to detangle their business relationships.
One thing that I have noticed since the split of Geza and Shooto is that both of them have continued making content for well know fast fashion brand FashionNova. The collaboration between the two and the brand began when they were still together. This is on top of countless campaigns that the two have made together (as a couple) since the end of season 1 of Love Island SA. It is obvious to me that many of these campaigns were gotten by the couple precisely because they are a couple even though they have individual capacities to be influencers.
It will be interesting to see if the two will be able to secure individual campaigns post the break up.
Turing to Mdluli and Rampedi, in his Instagram stories after the announcements went up, Rampedi made mention that Mdluli and himself were still in some sort of business or working relationship with each other. What you have here are two people who have been in a very public romantic relationship, had built a following around their relationship and were probably the best of friends have to now navigate a business relationship with this very heavy cloud of a romantic history having over their heads.
Mpanza will be the first to admit that Lupindo has been a central piece to the growth of the More Mpanza channel. What then will become of the growth of the channel with the couple’s split? Besides the More Mpanza channel (which I repeat is not a couple channel) the two have separate channels which they have tried their utmost best to keep independent of the other person. Although the content overlap has largely been kept at a minimum, there has been some sort of dependence on the pre- and post- production side of things. By that I mean the equipment used to shoot, who helps you come up with content, who you workshop content with, editing, first reviews, etc. Both Mpanza and Lupindo have lost the person that they have done this with over the last 4 years.
Another observation I have made and perhaps the last point I want to ventilate in this piece are the people who say all YouTube couple relationships are bound to fail. This argument is as infantile as the ‘why do we care about their breakup’ stance. There is nothing about hyper-visibility or internet fame that renders romantic relationships between two people who are internet famous bound to fail. There have been many a relationship between people who are much more famous than the couples mentioned in this article that have stood the test of time. What then is it particularly about couples who are famous on the internet that make it impossible for their relationships to last?
I want to close out by saying there is no shame in us (the people who had some sort of investment in these relationships) also being heartbroken by these breakups. These people have shared some very intimate and extremely personal parts of themselves with us and we have every right to mourn what feels like a loss even to us.
