Also, it appears as though, in the universe of the initial letter, such caretaking goes hand-in-hand with ownership. There’s "Thank you for giving me the opportunity…to really keep him" and "I will do anything to keep him and make him stay" and "I will never let him go." Well, jeez. Is he trying that hard to get away? Because, lady, I don’t know, but perhaps there are other issues beyond potentially toxic ex-girlfriends which have prevented him from really feeling truly loved.

I don’t mean to judge the intricacies of one woman’s relationship, but that’s exactly what this open letter format does to every ex-girlfriend out there. If the "girls" of the intro were singular, then perhaps this could have been an elaborate act of passive aggression gone awry. It may have been specifically targeting a specific ex-girlfriend — one who didn’t answer the guy's calls and rudely told him his dreams of being an architect were far-fetched on account of the fact that he couldn’t draw. Who can say?

It’s not "girl," though; it’s "girls," and it’s also being shared and reposted in the way of a recipe for calorie-free cookie cake. Clearly, something much bigger than an out-of-control subtweet is happening here. This seems to be relatable to the many women who are celebrating their love by collectively trashing any other woman who has been non-platonically involved in their partners' lives. The fact that it went viral signals that this kind of retrograde "hold onto your man!" "other women are the enemy!" thinking still resonates with people on some level.

Theoretically speaking, the ideal relationship is an egalitarian one. In a practical sense, the best relationships are a balance of the preferences of the people within them. That could be something not quite egalitarian. Frankly, it’s nobody’s business. This letter insists otherwise. It makes a judgement call about the details of previous relationships while condemning every participant in them aside from the current partner.

And let’s make one thing very clear: Heterosexual couples do not always split up because The Woman was unable to make The Man happy. That sets an expectation in which the entire goal of any straight relationship is satisfying him, as if dating, for women, were a job opportunity involving blow jobs and exceptional lasagna-making skills. Working to make each other happy ought to be the goal of any romantic partnership, and if that effort were only ever intended to be one-sided, well, then the "girls who let him go" sure as hell made the right decision.