The false romance of “princess treatment”

Imagine walking in on your neighbor repeatedly spraying their spouse in the face with a water hose. In real life, this would warrant some concern. On TikTok, though, it’s a part of the latest relationship test. Women online are listing a series of errands and romantic gestures and having their male partners guess which category of behavior they fall into: “princess treatment” or the bare minimum. If they get it wrong, they’re immediately hosed in the face.

The trend, by and large, is all in good fun. Some couples seem to be in agreement on what are reasonable expectations in a relationship — and what demands are diva-level. According to some women, however, any favor a man can provide — no matter how arbitrary or unnecessary — should be considered the “bare minimum.” In one TikTok, influencer Emma Moriarty expects her husband to give her the first bite of his food at a restaurant, pay for her parking tickets, and fill up her gas tank. “It’s from the same bank account!” her partner rebuts to the last scenario after getting splashed.

These royal-inspired standards have been a hot topic over the past month thanks to influencer Courtney Palmer (@courtney_joelle). The self-proclaimed “housewife princess” shared a video explaining the “princess treatment” she receives from her husband when they go to restaurants. “If I am at a restaurant with my husband, I don’t speak to the hostess,” she says matter-of-factly. “I do not open any doors, and I do not order my own food.” The video sparked immediate concern from users (“me when I’m a prisoner,” replied a commenter) and several parodies. Still, “princess treatment” has proven to be somewhat of an irresistible concept online, as evidenced by the viral water hose game. The clips seem to be partly in jest, while still suggesting “princess treatment” should be the norm.

After all, Palmer isn’t the only person promoting “princess treatment” across the app. From strict rules around confirming dates to traditional dating gurus, women are being encouraged to take an increasingly high-maintenance approach to dating and relationships.

But are high-maintenance demands as rewarding as they seem at first glance? And are they just making women passive in relationships?

It’s not an uncommon observation that TikTok isn’t the best place to learn about dating and relationships — despite the fact that a sizable portion of Gen Z and millennials are receiving counsel from the app. It’s not that users can’t find solid guidance from credentialed relationship experts. It’s just that the people and opinions that most routinely go viral are controversial or completely absurd. And much of this content — even when it’s cloaked in the language of empowerment — has an overarching conservative or regressive bent.

For women, in particular, online dating advice can be pretty bleak. On one end of the spectrum, you have content that fits squarely into the overtly religious, “trad wife”mode of thinking. Christian influencers like Sprinkle of Jesus founder Dana Chanel and podcasts like Dear Future Wifey extol the values of submitting to your husband or weathering their mistreatment.

A more subtly insidious version of this content frames traditional gender norms as radical, affirming, and indicative of a woman’s worth, a la “princess treatment.” SheraSeven (aka Leticia Padua, aka “sprinkle sprinkle” lady) has become one of TikTok’s foremost dating gurus for unabashedly promoting a “gold digger” mentality. She maintains throughout her videos that a man’s only purpose in a relationship is to provide, and that it’s a woman’s role is to receive. A similar self-styled expert, Russell Hartley, has become popular for his punchy digs at broke or stingy men who don’t want to provide financially for their women.

It’s not hard to see why Padua and Hartley’s content might sound amusing and maybe even refreshing. They prioritize women’s comfort in relationships, while reducing men to charitable givers — something many women have probably experienced the exact opposite of. Meanwhile, an alarming amount of young men online are being told that the ideal woman is subservient.

“The whole manosphere is about what it means to be a ‘high-value man’ who gets a ‘high-value woman,’” says Rachel Vanderbilt, relationship scientist and host of The Relationship Doctor Podcast. “They have these expectations that women are going to have a low body count” — that is, a limited number of previous sexual partners — “and are going to behave like mothers and be nurturing.”

In the current hellscape that is heterosexuality, an excessively doting partner who’s willing to take care of everything might sound appealing to some women. Solomon suggests these expectations might be an extreme response to bad treatment that they’ve witnessed, if not experienced, from men throughout their lives.

“I think a lot of cis-hetero women are looking at patterns in their families where they’ve either seen women be actively mistreated by male partners or where women have been rendered invisible by domestic and caregiving responsibilities,” she says. “When we can identify something we don’t want, our next move tends to be, so what instead? And our go-to is a 180.”

These desires by certain women suggest a tension between the traditional values that are constantly being romanticized and the fact that women don’t have to be as reliant on men as they once were. In 2023, a study by the Pew Research Center reported a growing number of married women, 29 percent, earning the same amount of money as their husbands, while 16 percent were the breadwinners of their households.

Still, much dating advice suggests that women belong in a passive, dependent role. It’s the same paradox behind “princess treatment.” The power is all in theory, not in practice.

Author and clinical psychologist Alexandra Solomon suggests that the “princess treatment” trend is an “attempt to hold onto something that feels gender-traditional in the face of an economic reality that just is anything but.”

“What ‘princess treatment’ is saying is, ‘no matter how much money he earns, what he’s providing is a tremendous amount of comfort for me,’” she says. “There’s no economic cost to him pulling out my chair, but these are all the ways in which I feel cherished and chosen and protected and provided for.”

On TikTok, being treated like a princess involves a never-ending list of rules and expectations that are high-maintenance, if not totally random. Last month, the newsletter Cartoon Hate Her observed what they dubbed the “Princess Signaling Game,” an informal trend where women announce their strict but often virtueless standards for potential suitors on social media. This included a suggestion by a TikTok user that if a man doesn’t confirm a date by 2 pm, he’s immediately disposable.

Having standards is necessary. But having these kinds of inflexible rules contributes to an extremely self-focused vision of dating that already thrives on TikTok. From “ick” lists to red flags to beige flags, the process of finding a partner looks less like connecting with a person and more like a process of elimination based solely around our petty dislikes. These trends lack any interrogation of whether our wants are even valid or meaningful in a relationship. Like the 2 pm rule, they seem to promote antisocial behavior.

“Dating is a process of mutual curiosity and a desire to get to know each other, not a series of tests that someone needs to pass in order to move forward,” says Vanderbilt. “‘Princess treatment’ and all of these related videos are usually designed in secret with an expectation that most people are going to fail.”

Overall, these sorts of assessments aren’t exactly helpful in discerning a partner who’s kind or caring, just someone who can check random boxes and jump through hoops. All of it speaks to a culture where men and women increasingly fail to relate to one another.

“Men are being told how to treat women and all of these ways to play hard to get,” says Vanderbilt. “Then women are like, ‘Men need to do all of these things and prove their value to me.’ And so we’re both speaking past each other instead of coming to dating as a human experience.”