One Thing We Can All Agree On: Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton Are Engaged

The tabloids have been trapped in a death spiral with Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton ever since the two first locked eyes, and lips I guess, on the set of The Voice in 2015. One week the pair are in love, the next they’re not, and she’s leaving him for this person, that person, or god forbid, her ex Gavin Rossdale. Sometimes he is going to pop the question in Oklahoma, or leave her for a good ol’ country woman. There have even been multiple occasions where the two eloped abroad, or quietly, at home. Now, in what is maybe the most ironic twist of all: America’s (worst!) couple is finally fucking engaged.

Shelton broke the news on Instagram earlier Tuesday:

Multiple sources then confirmed to People that the singing competition judges got engaged in Oklahoma, where they live. The news comes amid previous rumors they were breaking up, which are now untrue, I guess. In September, tipsters told Us Weekly that the two felt “suffocated and stressed” in quarantine, and that both were “stretched to the limit.” Good for them—tying the knot anyway!

Of course, everyone has lots of opinions about Stefani and Shelton. This is fine! Their deep cultural cache, perplexingly, sells quite a bit of magazines, evidenced by the landfills overflowing with In Touch issues detailing their fictional breakups. Peeling back the curtains just a bit, they also traffic incredibly well for gossip bloggers looking to drink the sweet, sweet nectar of SEO gold.

The key to the veritable cottage industry of tabloid gossip around them is duality. Stefani and Shelton are a couple that means entirely different things to entirely different people. Plenty of people hate their relationship, as a concept and as a literal thing that exists. Just glance over at all those rumors in the tabloids that their relationship is staged, or for the express purpose of bolstering ratings on The Voice. Others, mostly evangelicals and avid CMT viewers, revere them, as the epitome of American heterosexuality, or what two loving famous people should look and act like. He’s a country singer, she is a former SKA band frontwoman. He loves Jesus, she loves fashion. And where do Jesus and fashion meet more perfectly than at a wedding?