In a world where the act of dating has been made possible by a smartphone application, it was only a matter of time before someone thought up a technological advancement for ending a relationship. In other words, if you simply cannot find a way to break it off with your significant other, no worries, there’s an app for that.
Enter: Binder, the new app that defies all Beyoncé logic, encouraging you to swipe to the right to send a goodbye text and voice mail, just in case they didn’t get it the first time around — to that burning flame about to blow out. Ouch.
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Let’s be honest, no one wants to be the heartbreaker, and thanks to 28-year-old Jordan Lair and 26-year-old Ian Greenhill, you don’t have to be.
We tried it
For the record, I am in a happy, loving relationship, with no desire whatsoever to break it off. However, this was an app too hilariously ridiculous it had to be tested out. Don’t worry, I gave him fair warning.
First, you fill out a few details regarding the person you are about to bin, including their name, phone number and a photograph. You are brought to a final decision page where you must swipe right to bin. You are then given a list of excuses to choose from. I opted for “our relationship is as patchy as your beard,” because, laugh-out-loud, who says that? Once you’ve chosen your excuse, the deed is done, and whoever will receive a text and a phone call.
Warning: If you do so choose to Bin to score a few giggles, I highly advise you take precaution.
For an application that is supposed to be a joke, the messages are actually really mean. I asked my boyfriend to forward me the text he received, curious as to what it said. It was definitely 10 times harsher than “;our relationship is as patchy as your beard,” which he totally would have laughed at. However, the text read, “Hey, it’s Binder, the app for dumping people. Your (now) ex says they want you to go and enjoy your future, they’d like you to still be friends and maybe you could come to dinner with them and their new, hotter, lover? Sorry, you’re binned.” Basically, if whoever you binned is completely unaware that this application is just joshing them, you could potentially just have actually broken up with them — or started an intense argument.
According to The New Yorker, “To test Binder, Greenhill swiped away his girlfriend — they met working in a clothing store, with four walls; she was his boss — and she recognized that the voice in the cruel recorded message was his. He didn’t mean it. “She was actually quite angry,” he said. No surprise there.
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But the founders do state that the app itself is meant to be funny. Its creation was inspired by a Scottish beer campaign, after all. However, after its release, more than 6,000 people downloaded Binder and sent out breakup messages with a simple flick of their wrist.
“I hope nobody’s doing it seriously,” Greenhill told The New Yorker. Unfortunately I am sure a handful of people are.
It has become so much easier to say — or rather type — what we are really feeling over the phone or computer, because through technology the pressure of facing someone directly no longer exists. Our words are no longer sound waves but ink. Whether this makes them easier or harder to forget, I really don’t know. This app takes things a step further, because now not only can we hide behind our phones, we can now hide behind someone else’s voice.
“I suppose ten years ago, the idea of being dumped by tech would seem awful,” Laird said. “But these days it’s sort of like, oh, well, maybe it is the next step.” I’m not quite sure it was the next step, but thanks to Lair and Greenhill, Binder has definitely started the conversation.
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