Bennifer

WORDS BY Alice Wright @alicewrt

ART BY Marissa Hor @marissa.pdf

You definitely did not hear it here first: Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez (Bennifer) are back together. The ‘it’ couple of the early 2000s have found their way back into each other’s arms and it’s all pop culture fanatics, like myself, can talk about. We’ve been transported back to a time where skinny, low-waisted jeans ruled the world, the first iPod of the Apple epidemic was released, celebrities’ lives were more important than our own and in all honesty, I was just a small child. But even though I didn’t get to fully experience the highs and lows of Bennifer, I still feel the cultural significance of their past relationship and the reunion of the two. With all this hustle and bustle of pop cultural significance, I think it’s a good opportunity to draw this back to us common folk... to investigate how people feel about the concept of getting back with your ex.

In my not-quite-expert opinion, it doesn’t work. When things end, they end for a reason. Even with all the attempts to reignite a piece of your past, your demons will haunt you. To find out what others thought about what I once believed was a room-dividing topic, I took to creating a questionnaire. For a few seconds I felt like a true data analyst. I was collecting qualitative and quantitative data left, right and centre.

The majority of people said they would never get back with their ex if it was entirely up to them. That’s 85 per cent to be exact. A few reasons being… “I think you break up for a reason, and it’ll always be there if you get back together.” “...people don’t change that easily.” “In my personal experience it didn’t work, as it was a very manipulative situation and used my emotions against me.” “There’s often a reason y’all didn’t work out in the first place and sis, don’t convince yourself otherwise just because you’re lonely or you miss the attention.” “People can change, however, toxic is toxic. Know your worth.” I also want to highlight the statistics surrounding those who did get back with their ex and how it worked out. Roughly 30 per cent of participants said they have gotten back with an ex before. Following on from that I asked: did it last? For that question only one participant (three per cent) responded with yes. Does this prove to us that in 2021, we will stop trying to get back with our exes and learn from one another’s experiences? Here are a few reasons why individuals think that people attempt getting back with their exes…

It’s interesting that although the likelihood of exes getting back together and it lasting is so minimal, we tend to give it a go so often. More than 50 per cent of participants have attempted to get back with their ex, a third of them achieved getting back with them, and only one person said the relationship lasted. The data tells us that we don’t think logically when it comes to falling in love. I guess this is a sign that as humans, we are likely to follow our heart rather than our brain. I think there’s beauty in the fight we have to maintain connections and reignite flames. We are willing to take risks to fall in love and try again in order to have that happy ending we are all searching for. ‡

“Because it’s a familiar place, and it’s often easier than getting to know a new person.” “Time blurs all the bad memories of a relationship and makes you miss the good ones. It’s easier to go back to someone you know than to put yourself out there to meet someone new.” “For the wrong reasons: fear, attachment, codependency. For the right reasons: time apart, facilitated growth, changed circumstances that once served to drive a wedge.” “...[We] have a history and it’s really nice being with someone who knows you well instead of having to go back to dating and being with people who hardly know you.” “Comfort, love, manipulation maybe.”