Our Obsession With Dating ‘Icks’ Is Holding Us Back

“New ick unlocked” read the text on a TikTok I’d just opened. The video showed the back of a man’s head, his earlobe flapping in the wind. I laughed as I typed “ick” into the search bar, curious to see more videos on what gives people “the ick,” and was met with a slew of other videos of small, seemingly harmless things that cringe out daters.

By now, the idea of the ick has become common parlance among Gen-Z and Millennial daters. A person gets the ick when they suddenly feel repulsed by the person they’re dating...