Dear Boys, Looksmaxxing Is a Fool’s Errand

Boys these days are under the impression that they need an extreme makeover to get the girl. They couldn’t be more wrong.

By Joel Stein
April 5, 2026 12:00 pm ET


A Vitruvian Man figure surrounded by various items related to fitness, diet, and grooming.
Nick Little for WSJ

When I was a teenager, I was woefully ignorant of my facial width-to-height ratio. Today many boys measure the space between their eyes and the angle from their chin to their neck, rating themselves from Chad to midtier normie. They are running a spreadsheet of stats on their own looks, following the theory that romance works the exact same way as fantasy-league football.

This part of the manosphere, called looksmaxxing, has even spread to my 16-year-old son’s liberal, private Los Angeles high school. Their hero is Clavicular, the 20-year-old looksmaxxing live streamer with nearly one million Instagram followers, who pushes extreme beauty products—methamphetamines, steroids, and a hammer to break your jaw bone so it regrows stronger—and who was recently arrested in Florida on a battery charge.

{paywall}

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