I will be the first one to say that the beauty industry is a deeply double-edged sword. On one hand, it literally got started by ads to encourage women to feel bad about themselves so that they could get a good husband.
In my last article, I discussed the terrifying world of male “looksmaxxing,” a term which is quickly becoming the new era of male “beauty” per the manosphere. I don’t think we as a society are ready to fully acknowledge what this “industry” is doing to men and women.
While both “beauty industries” tend to have similiarities, the differences are what make one so much scarier than the other. Let’s jump in.
In both “beauty” industries, much of the advertising starts out the same.
Did you ever notice how often, particularly in the past, makeup companies or hair companies would try to shame women into not fitting in a certain ideal? In certain years, you needed to be blonde — Y2K bleach blonde like me. Other years, it had to be a gloomy, edgy dark auburn or a chestnut brown.
If you couldn’t hack a particular style or a perfectly hard (yet soft-looking) body in the Y2K, you felt awful. Some of those magazine comments about celebrities were absolutely scorchingly cruel. I mean, think of how many eating disorders started to kick off back then.
In a lot of fucked up ways, the beauty industry did this to people. They got you wanting to hate yourself, then trotted out a solution to your problem that works perfectly. Imagine that!
In recent years, the body positivity movement and diversity movement started to bring a lot more options. Beauty became more inclusive, feminist, and real. And honestly? I’m happy for that.
Over the centuries, women started to combat the hateful messages the media gave them about body standards. They also started to emphasize other parts of what they offer, such as their personalities, their skills, and income.
The Manosphere did the opposite. At one point, the theme of man-centric beauty was about embracing your grizzly self and treating yourself. It got whittled into something deeply twisted, hate-inspired, and insanely unattainable.
A looksmaxxing account takes photos of people who look incredible, downright amazing…and say they’re not enough. Their jaws are not square. Their eyes don’t tilt well. They pick apart men, give them the most unrealistic goal possible, and say that’s the “bare minimum.”
Looksmaxxers insist that good looks will get men love and success — nothing more will do. But it’s not just a matter of good looks. No, they tell men that they are worthless unless they join in their programs.
Why does this matter? I once heard a cult member who had to bring in new members tell me, “You have to make sure they hate themselves enough to actually buy what you’re selling. You want them to be desperate for your end game.”
Self-loathing is a very powerful tool. However, women have learned how to cope with and understand the puppet strings pulling them around. Men, from what it seems, have not.
Then, there are the guardrails women’s beauty has that men’s don’t.
So, I’m going to talk about the biggest, most terrifying aspect of looksmaxxing versus standard women’s beauty care. Women’s beauty is almost entirely guarded by the FDA and medical licensing boards and spa boards. Let me explain this difference.
Women’s Beauty
Did you know that lipstick and eyeshadow both have to be cleared by the FDA? The same can be said about that nice, juicy-scented skin cream you wear as well as the perfume you’re wearing. All cosmetics are under FDA approval requirements.
The FDA is not perfect, but it does offer some modicum of safety. You do not hear about women getting physically addicted to lipstick. You don’t hear about FDA-approved items including uranium.
On a similar note, those high-end spa treatments often have a lot of checks and balances. It has to be clinically proven to be effective by independent boards, then given the green light by the FDA or a medical board. In other words, Botox, saunas, and laser therapies are actually science-backed and safe.
Looksmaxxing, Bodybuilding, and Male-Oriented Goods
You know what isn’t protected by the FDA?
Supplements.
Ask me how I know, or refer to my kratom rehab to find out. Most of the looksmaxxing gear is either outwardly illegal for use the way it’s being sold to use, made from shady stuff, or involves doing very risky things in the name of looking better.
We’ve all had gastation “supplements,” potentially. Maybe they were Stacker 2s for late-night study sessions or workouts. Or maybe you like me and needed some kratom. Or you might be the lochal lech who wants to get some dick work going on with those Horny Goat Weed Pills.
None of those were examined by the FDA and we have no idea whether they work. With me, my Feel Free bottles worked *too well* and turned into a near-lethal addiction I am only two weeks clean from. (It’s great to be sober, by the way!)
The results can vary. Sometimes, you’re flushing your money down the toilet. Other times, that gym supplement you’re taking could become a horrific, agonizingly addictive substance.
I get vitamins to help me focus on work and keep my looks pristine at the local store. Over there, I overheard one man talking about a pre-workout add-on called Phentermine that has become so addictive that he had a friend get institutionalized after he quit it.
Other options such as grey-area steroids and the like? Yep. That will cause nightmare “returns” in the name of looksmaxxing. People have already started to look like walking zombies as a result of the extreme use.
Looksmaxxing, unlike women’s beauty, has no guardrails. Also, unlike women’s beauty, looksmaxxing views these risky choices as a badge of honor. In other words, it’s a luck of the draw on what you get and you might not like what the results are.
Even cautious people might end up using the wrong supplement or technique in looksmaxxing.
The final attitude is also just as disturbing.
Attitudes on beauty between the sexes also change a lot of the final result.
Women’s Makeup And Beauty
So here’s the thing: makeup might be a patriarchal tool in some senses, but it’s also a feminist tool. Beauty salons were one of the final bastions of women’s employment in Afghanistan before the Taliban removed it.
Beauty salons often acted as a safe place for battered women who wanted to get away from men for a while. In the past 50 years, makeup also became a very personal form of self-expression for myriads of people — myself included.
I’m very pro-plastic surgery, pro-makeup, pro-nails, and pro-falsies. My face is my canvas, my body my project car. My makeup empowers me. I love my makeup and self-improvement. It helps me make me happy and that’s something that’s super feminist, because it’s my choice and my body.
Makeup can bring joy. There is an upside to it and a little powder can go a long way. I remember watching The Swan, where women who hated their bodies got extreme plastic surgery and crying out of joy for them because they looked so happy. That’s like a fairy tale for me!
Looksmaxxing
Looksmaxxing is one of those things that starts with an external locus of control: the attention of women. When looksmaxxers don’t get the girls they want (because extreme bodybuilders are not really hot to most of us), they flip out.
They get depressed. They get angry. They start doubling and tripling down. They turn their bodies into a paddling post, a form of punishment for not being perfect enough to be worthy of love. Psychologists are already sounding the alarm over this.
Looksmaxxing is a movement that is started by awful, damaged people, designed to make you hate yourself, works to get you to injure yourself, then spits you out with a new slew of problems once you no longer “work as intended.”
If you ask me, there’s nothing “pretty” about that.
Women don’t understand how toxic the male beauty industry is…
That’s the truth. As a gender, women have had to deal with all the magazines picking other women’s bodies apart, tweaking looks, or whatever. We know it’s awful. On an objective level, every woman knows the insecurity marketing is BS, even if it still affects us.
Over the years, women have begun to adjust how they react to it and have learned to heal the hurt. We have support groups. We work on our personalities. We start seeing the value in people beyond their looks.
Men have yet to do that. And unlike what women dealt with, it wasn’t the same message. Women were also told that sewing, baking, cooking, and other “feminine” skills could help them show value.
Looksmaxxing STRIPS all of that: it’s look beautiful (THIS TYPE OF BEAUTY ONLY) or you’re worthless. And it’s promoted by the worst of the worst men, for men who genuinely should have been in therapy.
This is a movement that rapes men’s bodies, minds, and souls. It strips them of their humanity. And by the time they realize how badly they’ve been trapped, they may have ruined their look altogether.
My partner and I have spoken a lot about how looksmaxxing is more similar to an eating disorder and mental illness than it is actual health and wellness, and that seems to answer all of the questions about why there are no guardrails. Because it’s the men’s version of 2014 ED tumblr. They gatekeep among themselves, uplift their strategies internally, the difference is that Patriarchy is a system in decline, so it appropriated these very disordered approaches to lifestyle and body care almost immediately as a way to revive itself.
Honestly, I didn't know anything about this trend until you wrote about it. It got me wondering if it was related to Incels, Red Pillers, and the general Manosphere dogma. Turns out, it totally is (based on my cursory research).
At this point, the guys falling for this toxic garbage need some help. Looksmaxxing to get the girl is a waste of energy when what (broad brush here) is a better method is using humor, wit, listening, and above all, respect- guys, please, respect women...it's not hard to do. These fellows are not getting that sort of guidance. Then again, there's no money in it. As you've stated, when the looksmaxxing doesn't work- they're lost and left where they were or worse. How long before there are recovery group meeting for these guys?
Also, it's not in any way lost on me that women have been subjected to impossible standards for-fucking-ever and that there's a whole industry that sets the pace and then offers a cure to the psychosis they've instilled. It's insidious, abusive, and a crime against humanity. Other than that I have no opinion.