Editing 355: Couple

It's hard to know when you are in a relationship in modern times. In olden days you might fancy a girl, and then ask her father if you might court her, and if he granted his permission you would be a couple. Today, that kind of structure and formality is considered antiquated in most western cultures; as a result we don't have any of the straightforward cues.

This comic suggests that "making it {{w|Facebook}} official", which means asserting the existence of a romantic relationship on Facebook by setting one's status to "In a relationship", has by 2007 become a way to define when you are a couple. [[Cueball]] would like to do it, probably after having sex for the first time with his love interest, to get confidence in his relationship and/or show it off to his friends. Because his love interest isn't so sure about that relationship, or doesn't like to formalize it and prefers to enjoy without thinking too much about it, he suggests a compromise: using the "It's complicated" status instead. And he does so with a phrasing very reminiscent of a formal way to propose to marry someone ("Will you be my wife?").