By Noemi Martinez, Staff Writer
Looksmaxxing has become an increasingly popular trend recently, but what is the effect of this unrealistic desire for perfection?
An unfortunate aspect of being on social media, especially as a younger viewer, is the constant reminder of personal imperfections. Being surrounded by dieting culture, new trends that idealize a ‘perfect’ body, and the creation of new insecurities all push audiences to criticize and hate their bodies. Some platforms, such as TikTok, promote these insecurities through trends like ‘LooksMaxxing’, ‘Legging Legs’, and ‘Mewing’. These trends prey on viewers that are especially self conscious and susceptible to self-hate and body image issues, particularly young women and men.
LooksMaxxing, a trend that initially gained traction as a joke, transformed into a challenge to maximize attractiveness and remove undesirable features. It began to target teenagers with adolescent features, an age group only beginning to grow into their bodies, and prompt them to attempt drastic weight loss or style changes. Teenage boys were encouraged to begin going to the gym and altering their eyes and jaw to achieve a desirable build. Teenage girls were encouraged to drastically lose weight and wear more makeup. Videos with captions such as “let me try looksmaxxing, I could really use it” (@mel4ficient on TikTok) have been promoted to young female audiences and gaining almost 3 million views, with the comment section praising her change in appearance.
It is undeniable that these trends have built up an unhealthy desire in a growing generation to alter their appearance in order to fit a made-up standard that preys on insecurity. While encouraging adolescents to take care of themselves and prioritize healthy habits that establish confidence could be seen as a positive influence, this method is ineffective. Health isn’t a priority, vanity is. Teaching the youth that the most important thing they can be is attractive is incredibly harmful.
Additionally, eating disorders are being promoted at extreme levels, particularly to young women. ‘Legging Legs’ is a body standard that encourages girls to lose weight so they can have a desirable look to their legs when wearing leggings. Madelyn, a content creator on TikTok and college student, asks “what are legging legs and where do I buy them” (@madelynearnest). Young, healthy women are being convinced that their bodies are imperfect and need to be changed to fit a new standard.
Diet pills, ozempic, extreme dieting, and intense workout routines are all ways social media has promoted dramatic weight loss to fulfill shallow beauty standards.
Finally, a very humorous example of this harmful trend, mewing. Mewing is the practice of moving tongue position to emphasize the sharpness of one’s jawline. This largely gained traction as a meme, but once again, rang home with the looksmaxxing community. The subject of many people’s jokes became a genuine practice to maximize attractiveness. While it’s difficult to reinforce a healthy mindset in an age group that tends to stumble into self-esteem issues, there is a semblance of hope that a large portion can turn these harmful practices into a joke.
Social media can be a predatory place for young and impressionable age groups. This group is in a place in their lives where their understanding and confidence in themselves is just beginning. Harmful trends and standards that impact even adults can have disastrous effects on developing minds, planting seeds of insecurity that only continue to grow as they get older. Dismantling beauty industries that capitalize on doubt is a step towards protecting the youth, and healing the many generations that have been conditioned to criticize and hate themselves.