New wave: Why relationships are about more than red, green and other flags

Red flags for toxic partners. Green for good ones. But rose, white, black, pink? Colour coding is now a swirly mess

How many flags are we supposed to look out for in people now? There’s red: Signs and behaviours that indicate that a potential partner is bad news (or at least, not right for you). So, red is bad. A green flag is a mark of good qualities (or at least those that make them attractive to you. OK, green is good. So far, so good.

Ranveer Singh’s character Rocky Randhawa (left) from Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani is an internet-certified green flag.

Allie and Noah in The Notebook are red flags who should be grateful they found each other.

Each of the four main characters in Veere Di Wedding (2018) had beige flags.

In The Devil Wears Prada, Nate was a rosy flag who should have been more understanding.