Do you remember 2019? Most of us don’t really anymore, due to a little mass trauma that happened immediately afterwards known as 2020. If you can still remember anything from the Before Time, however, you may vaguely recall that in October of that year, rumors first surfaced that Ben Affleck was using dating apps. The rumor, popularized by a Page Six article claiming the actor was “looking for love” on ultra-exclusive dating app Raya, sparked an ongoing saga that somehow survived the pandemic and continues to this day.
In February 2020, Affleck denied the dating-app rumors during an appearance on Good Morning America, in which he insisted he is not on any dating apps, including, “Tinder, Grinder, Grindr, Brinder, Grinder, Bumble, Humble,” many of which are not actually the names of real dating apps at all. Affleck also addressed the rumor that his Raya profile featured Bob Marley’s “Guava Jelly,” telling Good Morning America, “I am not on any websites, I have no songs.” This discrepancy between the detailed Page Six report and Affleck’s insistence he is not on any dating apps, including several that do not actually exist, prompted some speculation that perhaps there was a Ben Affleck catfish on the loose — though, as Vice noted at the time, if you’re going to impersonate a celebrity on a dating app, why would you choose Ben Affleck?
At least one Raya user, however, did believe she had stumbled upon an Affleck catfish, which brings us to Part Three of the saga. Earlier this week, Affleck’s rumored dating app presence made headlines once again after a TikTok user named Nivine Jay shared a now-viral video Affleck allegedly sent her after she matched and later unmatched the actor on Raya.
“Thinking of the time I matched with Ben Affleck on raya and thought it was fake so I unmatched him and he sent me a video on Instagram,” she captioned the clip, in which Affleck, holding his phone much too close to his face, says, “Nivine, why did you unmatch me? It’s me.”
These words will likely go down in internet history as some of the most cringeworthy ones ever uttered, and Affleck’s brief monologue — probably more memorable than any other performance the actor has delivered in his career — has already been thoroughly mocked and memed.
While humiliating, the video is also an example of one of the original dating app faux pas. Reaching out to someone who unmatched or ignored you on a dating app via another platform is a classic red flag, the kind of misbehavior that immediately makes you “that guy,” the creepy one on a dating app no one wants to be. Why? Because it feels very stalkerish. Remember, if someone unmatches you on a dating app (or never matches with you to begin with), it’s because they don’t want to interact with you. Tracking down their Instagram and sliding into their DMs is almost definitely not going to change that.
May Ben Affleck’s latest humiliation be a reminder, and a warning, to us all: Don’t be that guy.
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