What is "Looksmaxxing"?

Looksmaxxing is the practice especially among young men online, to enhance their physical appearance. These practices range in intensity, from everyday skincare to cosmetic surgery. In recent years, there has been a huge surge online in self-care and wellness. This could be largely due to the pandemic in 2020 and the huge shift to better taking care of yourself and being quarantined for over a year and people deciding to work out more. Trends on Tik Tok, such as ‘clean girl aesthetic’ being a huge trend to emerge that focused on dressing in more leisure wear such as Lululemon jackets, drinking water or green tea, not partying out late, reading & focusing more, working out and eating healthier foods. This was more targeted to women and as a result ‘looksmaxxing’ emerged and targeted a more male audience.

 Looksmaxxing has roots based from the film, “American Psycho”, the scene from the film that goes over Patrick Bateman’s skincare routine. Bateman’s routine is very rigorous, doing a peel off face mask, applying an ice pack to his face and doing over a thousand crutches. The trend to looksmaxx and taking inspiration from the film, “American Psycho” is extremely ironic, as the film and novel are a satirical take on the upper class New York lifestyle according to the author, Bret Easton Ellis.

 As of lately though, looksmaxxing has started to leave its massive online presence and begun to seep into the mainstream world; this is due to the growing popularity of the creator ‘Clavicular’. Clavicular (also known as Braden Peters), is a 20 year old influencer who is currently the face of the looksmaxxing community. Clavicular, who is a live streamer that promotes toxic behavior and beliefs. In a GQ interview, Clavicular claims that he “smashed his face with a hammer to make bones regrow sharper, smoked meth to curb his appetite. At age 14, began injecting testosterone he’d ordered from the internet, with no parental or medical oversight.” Making statements and displaying this type of behavior while having a young and impressionable audience is among the many reasons that looksmaxxing is such a demeaning and toxic subculture to emerge from the internet and to be entering the mainstream. Although looksmaxxing isn’t the first concept to be a toxic and dangerous culture that revolves around appearance and gender; it can be easily compared to the diet culture of the early 2000s.

  All in all, looksmaxxing while it may seem satirical and funny to look at from the outside; its community and the people who are a part of it are broadcasting a set of beliefs and behavior to a very young audience which needs to be looked into.

Image Courtesy: Pexel