What ‘Looksmaxxing’ Says about Modern Masculinity
As young men struggle, many have embraced extreme attempts to alter their experience.
Jillian Sunderland and
Jordan FosterTodayThe Conversation
Jillian Sunderland is a PhD candidate in sociology at the University of Toronto. Jordan Foster is an assistant professor of sociology at MacEwan University. This article was
originally published by the Conversation.
Our journalism is supported by readers like you. Click here to support The Tyee. 1 Comment / 1 New
‘As traditional pathways to masculine status such as stable work, home ownership and long-term partnerships are delayed or feel out of reach, the body becomes a locus of control.’ Photo via Instagram.
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Young men and teenage boys are learning to see their faces and bodies as projects to measure and optimize.
On social media platforms like Reddit, Instagram and TikTok, jawlines are dissected, cheekbones compared and perceived “flaws” catalogued. Widely viewed
videos and reels help users to rank their faces and identify areas for improvement. They also advise on just how best to bulk up, trim down, make over and become more desirable — and
more masculine.
This growing practice of ritualized self-scrutiny, and the litany of “solutions” in service of it, is known as “
looksmaxxing.”
These “solutions” range from bizarre but mundane ones like “
mewing” — the practice of continuously flattening the tongue against the roof of the mouth to define the jawline — to far more dangerous ones like “
bone-smashing,” which involves repeatedly tapping facial bones with solid objects like a bottle or even a hammer in order to force them to sharpen for a defined look.
For scholars who study masculinity and social media like we do, this phenomenon suggests that something about masculinity might require serious critical analysis. Our work examines the rise of male beauty culture, its concomitant demands, the increasing aesthetic labour men invest in their appearance and the cultural pressures shaping young men today.
And what we found is that there is a common pattern. As traditional pathways to masculine status such as stable work, home ownership and long-term partnerships are delayed or feel out of reach, the body
becomes a locus of control — a site on which to reclaim power and
sculpt a new vision of modern manhood.
Appearance becomes one of the few domains where control still feels possible.
Inside the looksmaxxing culture
While some of these practices that young men and boys have become preoccupied with are innocuous enough, the popularity of looksmaxxing does raise concerns.
Self-described looksmaxxers organize their efforts through intensive ranking systems and pseudo-scientific hierarchies. For instance, online guides encourage users to
measure facial symmetry, jaw width and “canthal tilt” — the angle of one’s eyes relative to one’s cheekbones — as if masculine desirability could be quantified through technical metrics.
Others insist that “nothing can upgrade the face faster than
reducing body fat” and provide instructions on how to achieve a “lethal face card” — slang for someone who is exceptionally good-looking.
These difficult standards and ranking systems often reproduce deeply rooted hierarchies of race and class by centring the “
Chad body” or the archetypal “
alpha male” — a white, muscular, aggressively dominant and affluent male.
In recent years, looksmaxxing — initially confined to fringe incel spaces and the broader online “
manosphere,” where communities of men debate status through often misogynistic beliefs about women — has been sanitized for public consumption. As the concept entered
mainstream digital culture, these pressures increasingly encroach on the lives of young men and boys.
Its organizing logic is simple. In order to reassert power and to reclaim their place as “manly” citizens, meeting specific aesthetic standards through a series of grooming tactics is a necessary strategy.
As many young men push back
against gender equality and reframe it as producing male disadvantage, looksmaxxing offers a seductive explanation for exclusion: you are simply aesthetically deficient, and that can be fixed.
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Masculinity in an era of uncertainty
To understand why looksmaxxing has gained traction, we need to look beyond social media and toward the broader conditions shaping young men’s lives.
For much of the 20th century,
masculine status was closely tied to the breadwinner model, through which men’s authority and status flowed from stable employment and the ability to provide for their families. That model has steadily eroded.
In much of the industrial world, stable career ladders have given way to a
contract- or gig-based economy and less secure employment opportunities. The rise of artificial intelligence has intensified employment anxieties further as young men confront a labour market where entire sectors of white-collar work
are unstable.Other status markers of adulthood have eroded as well. Young people today are
less likely to own a home,
face higher levels of economic precarity and are entering romantic relationships later, with a growing share of young men reporting
little to no dating experience.
As the economic and social foundations of traditional masculinity weaken, the cultural scripts linking men to guaranteed partnership, power and authority have become less certain. These shifts are also unfolding alongside changing attitudes toward gender.
According to Ipsos, nearly one-third of gen-Z men globally agree that
a wife should obey her husband, suggesting a resurgence of hierarchical views of gender relations among some young men.
In this climate, looksmaxxing reframes structural barriers as individual shortcomings. Young men are told that recognition and status can be reclaimed through straightforward investments in their appearance. Things like sharpening their jaw, building muscle and cultivating the coveted “
hunter eyes” — eyes that are deep-set and almond-shaped with minimal upper eyelid exposure and no white visible below the iris, often associated with intensity and confidence.
The business of self-optimization
The Stealthy Far-Right Campaign to Recruit Young Men
read more Social media platforms and relevant industries — including male skin-care companies — profit from young men’s preoccupation with perfection often with
little or no mention of the physical, social, emotional or economic consequences that accompany such appearance practices, let alone the
structural issues that underscore them.
Male anxiety is being
monetized in the form of supplements, fitness coaching and cosmetic interventions, including
multi-step skin-care regimens and intensive injections.
In this appearance-oriented environment filled with brand messaging, masculinity becomes a competitive asset to be purchased. Boys and young men have gradually become a highly profitable demographic, with corporations and businesses doubling down on advertisements and product offerings targeted specifically at them.
According to a leading provider of global business intelligence, market research and consumer insights, the men’s beauty products and skin-care industry globally will be worth more than
US$5 billion in 2027.
The question now is no longer whether young men will pay attention to looksmaxxers and invest, but how far they’ll go in pursuit of occupational, social, sexual and economic prestige.
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