Opinion: Looksmaxxing & Eugenics: To Be Perfect

Where were you when Clavicular was brutally framemogged by the ASU frat leader? I remember exactly where I was. My mom was talking about something unimportant, when I opened my phone to TikTok and I watched a video where I saw the streamer Clavicular get framemogged and I cried. But who is Clavicular, and why has he so frequently stayed relevant for the past year? Clavicular is just the start of a long line of lonely males, preying on likewise or uninformed teens. The method he uses is looksmaxxing. 

Looksmaxxing is, in theory, when you develop habits with the intention of “‘improving how you look.”’ This is often characterized by strong jawlines, prominent cheekbones, and slanted colored eyes. These habits can range from something as simple as sleeping on your back, to something as harsh as starving yourself over long periods of time. While the term looksmaxxing was popularized largely by TikTok, the word originates from various Internet forums like 4chan or Reddit which host incel communities. In many ways, looksmaxxing is a self empowering mask of incel subculture. It’s the idea that you need to look “perfect” in every way to make a woman fall in love with you. That thought process is clearly absurd, but the common denominator of the two ideas is such a drastic misunderstanding of the opposite sex, and an asphyxiation of female thought. 

Looksmaxxing isn’t an entirely new concept. It's a reflection of eugenics, which suggests that the human race could improve if people with undesirable traits reproduced less, and those with desirable traits reproduced more. Sounds like a parallel to looksmaxxing, right? The heel of both eugenics and looksmaxxing is human subjectivity, as the result of both practices produce uniformity. When you reduce human beauty to a measurable scale, introducing the aspect of perfection, you create a linear, rigid standard of beauty. This standard leaves a world of fractured copycats, mad at themselves for not looking more like someone else. 

How do you prevent this? Appearance would be an afterthought in an ideal world, but it’s fruitless to idealize. As simple as the name, basic human intuition requires you to construct ideas based on exterior. In our view, the first step to breaking judgment is to stop judging yourself. The less you critique, name your own flaws, and discourage yourself, the less you will judge others.