The Like and Unlike - a deep dive.
I am apparently about to write an essay about someone liking and then unliking Instagram posts.
Social media is communication. It's just a very strange, indirect often ambiguous form of it. We're not writing letters or having conversations in the traditional sense, but we're still constantly sending signals to each other. A like, a follow, a view, a comment, even the decision to ignore something entirely â they're all tiny pieces of information being exchanged. Context is what gives them meaning. A single like tells us very little. A repeated pattern does.
So let's imagine a hypothetical couple (for reasons).
Person A is famous and fiercely protective of their private life. They have never publicly acknowledged the relationship. They've consistently drawn that boundary and, whether people agree with it or not, everyone broadly understands that's how they operate.
Person B knows this. She also knows that every interaction she has with anything relating to Person A is watched and pulled apart.
She likes a photo. Fine. I don't actually find that strange. The bit that fascinates me is what happens next. Half an hour later... The like disappears. Now THAT is interesting.
Because by then, it's already happened. The screenshots have been taken. The gossip accounts have done their thing. The comments have started. People are already discussing it. People are making the comment sections of your friends work accounts a bin fire and people are calling you all sorts of names.
Half an hour later, the like disappears. And now the bin fire is a bonfire.
It doesnt erase the conversation online. All it does is create a second event for people to talk about. And unlike the original like, which could theoretically be impulsive, an unlike is never accidental. Nobody accidentally goes back, finds the same post again, removes their like and carries on with their day. Unliking something is a conscious action. It requires you to realise people have noticed, recognise that it's become an issue and actively decide to reverse your earlier decision. I think the unlike tells us far more than the original like ever could, because it demonstrates awareness. She knows people have seen it. She knows people are talking. Otherwise, why go back at all?
That's why I struggle with the explanation that the original like was simply an accident. If this happened once, I'd probably buy it. Twice? Still plausible. Humans are impulsive and social media is designed to encourage exactly that. But if exactly the same sequence of events repeats over months, I think it becomes reasonable to ask whether something else is going on. People generally learn from consequences. If every single like produces exactly the same outcome, and every single unlike follows the same pattern, then by definition she already knows what pressing that button is likely to create drama. She knows people will notice. She knows screenshots will appear. She knows speculation will begin. Most importantly, she knows she'll probably end up removing it later anyway. That doesn't tell us why she keeps doing it, but I do think it changes the question from "Was it an accident?" to "Why is this pattern repeating?"
Supporting someone you care about doesn't require Instagram. If this is her partner, she can text him. Ring him. Completely wild idea but you can tell him in person. If it's her friend who posted the image, exactly the same applies. Instagram isn't where relationships actually happen; it's where other people watch them. The only thing Instagram adds is an audience. So if somebody consistently chooses the one form of communication that they know thousands of strangers are paying attention to, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask why the public element matters. There are dozens of private ways of showing support. Choosing the public one, when you already understand the reaction it creates, is interesting.
One explanation is attention. Social media is literally built around rewarding it. Some people enjoy praise. Some enjoy feeling influential. Some enjoy knowing they've become part of a conversation. Some people even seem oddly comfortable being criticised because, psychologically speaking, being talked about can still feel better than being ignored. That's an entirely separate discussion, but it's a real phenomenon. If someone knowingly repeats a behaviour that they already know will generate discussion, then attentionâwhether consciously sought or unconsciously reinforcedâhas to be one possible explanation.
The other possibility is to realise that if she just liked posts and left them up there then the mystery disappears. People shrug and think, "Well yes... they're obviously together," and everyone moves on. Ironically, it's the unlike that keeps the conversation alive. The like is almost boring after a while because it confirms the status quo. The unlike is what makes people start asking questions. Why remove it? Did someone ask her to? Did they argue? Has something changed? Is there a publicist involved? Is the relationship still okay? Is the relationship still happening at all? The unlike creates ambiguity, and ambiguity is like crack for the internet. We are pattern-recognition machines and the moment something appears and then disappears our brains rush in to explain the gap. I'm literally sitting here writing an essay about it. That's how effective the unlike is at keeping people talking. People continue to talk about YOU.
Another possibility is boundary testing. Let's assume that the relationship is still going. Relationships are full of negotiated boundaries. Sometimes both people are perfectly happy with them. Sometimes one person completely understands why a boundary exists while simultaneously finding it emotionally uncomfortable. Those two things aren't contradictory. You can respect a boundary and still quietly fucking resent it. In that situation, a tiny public gesture like an Instagram like could become a way of leaning against the edge of that boundary without actually breaking it. It's visible enough to make a point but small enough to deny. If anyone questions it, "It's just a like." If a partner questions it, exactly the same defence exists. And if you are someone who is possibly known for liking attention and not being able to be acknowledged by your famous boyfriend? Ouch.
Then there's another possibility altogether, and it only works if we completely change the starting assumption. What if the relationship has actually ended? Suddenly, the behaviour itself hasn't changed at allâwe still see the same like followed by the same unlikeâbut the psychology behind it could be completely different. I actually think this is one of the more human explanations, even if it's not necessarily a flattering one.
Ending any significant relationship is difficult. Ending one that also, however unfairly, gave you a degree of public attention has to come with another layer of loss that most of us will never experience. If, for months or years, your name has been linked to somebody else's, people are talking about you, searching for you, discussing you and wondering what you're doing, that becomes part of your identity whether you intended it to or not. Losing the relationship may also mean losing the audience that came with it. It wouldn't surprise me if that was incredibly difficult to let go of.
Perhaps there's comfort in people still assuming you're together. Comfort in seeing your names continue to appear in the same sentence. Comfort in knowing that, for another few days at least, people are still talking about you. Not because you're trying to convince anyone of anything, necessarily, but because ambiguity has a remarkable way of keeping a story alive. Certainty is boring. Certainty ends conversations. Ambiguity keeps people refreshing comment sections.
And then there's the less charitable interpretation.
If you already know that every tiny public interaction is going to send people running to the comments, fan pages and social media looking for clues, then you're also aware that the fallout rarely lands on you alone. It lands on them as well. They become part of the discourse whether they wanted to be or not. People start questioning their behaviour, criticising them, inventing narratives about what they've done wrong or what they must be thinking. In that scenario, even if it's never the intention, repeatedly creating ambiguity can have the effect of casting your ex in an increasingly unfavourable light while allowing you to remain one step removed from the conversation itself. You never have to say a word. Everyone else writes the story for you.
Of course, there are plenty of other explanations. Maybe Instagram glitched. Maybe she gets a text saying, "FFS can you take that down?" Maybe she acts first and thinks later. Maybe she simply refuses to let strangers dictate how she uses her own account. Maybe she's pushing against a boundary. Maybe she's seeking attention. Maybe she hates the attention. Maybe the relationship is thriving. Maybe it's been over for months. We simply don't know, and anyone claiming they do is full of shit.
At the end of the day we're all trying to reconstruct somebody's psychology from a handful of taps on a phone screen. That's a ridiculously small snapshot of a person's life. We don't know what conversations are happening behind closed doors, what agreements have been made, or what anyone is thinking. That's why I've deliberately framed this as psychology rather than gossip. I'm interested in the behaviour, not pretending I know the answer.
The only thing I'll admit I have a stronger opinion on is the public comments back in 2024. Personally, I've never believed that was accidental. Women in their thirties know how social media works. We know what happens when you publicly interact with someone you're romantically linked to, especially when that person has a large, highly invested fanbase. Beyond that, though? Your guess is as good as mine.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to stop analysing Instagram likes.
