GLP-1s and Looksmaxxing: Students’ Concerns With Physical Appearance

By Bree Mallory

Students across America may have noticed how prominent slang related to physical appearance has become over the past year or so.

Hearing a girl reassure her friend in the bathroom between classes that her outfit makes her waist look “snatched,” or thinner.

Hearing someone refuse to get another chocolate chip cookie in the dining hall because they don’t want to be “big backed,” or fat.

Seeing a student in a coffee shop show their friend the Instagram page of someone in their class and hearing them call the classmate “chopped,” or ugly.

Phrases like this highlight how the culture we live in facilitates the rise of unrestricted GLP-1 usage and the looksmaxxing trend to appeal to a lot of younger generations across genders.

While this generation is obviously not the first generation to care so deeply about their outward appearance, it is one of the first where anyone with these insecurities or unhealthy coping mechanisms can be broadcast to a wider range of people through social media. This allows more people to take note of what others are saying about themselves and apply it to their own lives.

“What’s different about social media is that it’s a constant,”said Leslie Couden DiLeo, Assistant Professor of Psychology here at Flagler. “You’re not having to go out and buy a magazine. Now, you can scroll for hours, you’re getting fed tons of other people… who want to present like they’re you and me saying that if you look a certain way, your life will be easier.”

Since the average social media user is in their 20s, it makes sense that college students would be very affected by this. 

“[College students are] kind of entering that age where they’re figuring out who they are. They’re trying to understand how they fit into the world,” said Natalie Jennings, assistant director of fitness and wellbeing at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut.

Because of this, it makes sense that students have been mimicking the behaviors and mindsets of those they see on social media.

According to market research, GLP-1 (drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy) usage has been on the rise among younger women since around 2023. While the drug can be useful for diabetes management, obesity and cardiovascular issues, many have started using it without a doctor’s prescription as a quick and easy way to lose weight, when they don’t really need to.

“One person I know isn’t prescribed it and started taking it to help her lose weight; she just couldn’t get off with just exercise,” Flagler sophomore Ricky Dominguez said.

Similarly, another trend having been popularized among teens and young adults is what’s known as looksmaxxing.

Predominantly a male community, those who participate in looksmaxxing focus on “self-improvement” by changing the way they look in order to be treated better by peers and employers.

“Looks matter more than people admit,” reads a quote on the movement’s official website. “Not just to strangers, and not just in dating.”

Brenna Callanan, Flagler senior, said that she knows someone who is a part of this community.

“They [work] out daily, sometimes more than once a day, take peptides and only eat healthy food,” she said.

While nothing is wrong with this on a basic level, it is when people take it a step further and begin involving surgery, drugs like GLP-1s, and more into their “ascension.”

Braden Peters, better known as Clavicular to his online fanbase, is a very popular looksmaxxing internet celebrity. In the past, Peters has advocated for “bone smashing,” or the act of repeatedly hitting oneself in the face with a blunt object to fracture the bones there and create more prominent cheekbones upon their healing.

Despite their popularity among students, several Flagler students shared their concern over the rise of these trends.

“It’s just excessive, especially when a lot of that rhetoric starts encouraging people to change their natural features to fit a standard or heightening insecurity…,” freshman Julia Kickham said. 

Junior India Motley said that she understands people taking GLP-1s if they need them for medical purposes. 

“I do, however, think it is very harmful to be as accessible as it is,” Motley said. “Many people who don’t need it are taking it and feeling the detrimental effects.”

Freshman Atlas Cuellar also had concerns about the accessibility of GLP-1s.

“When I first heard of Ozempic, I immediately heard of people using it for medical purposes saying they can’t afford it anymore, so it’s awful how it became popular,” Cuellar said.

Freshman Syd Eichhorn thinks that people should not be influenced by online trends and should instead try to be comfortable in the body they have.

“It is upsetting to see people go so extreme to change how they look instead of accepting who they are and loving themselves,” Eichhorn said.