All posts tagged: important issues

Let Trans People and Looksmaxxers Change Their Bodies

Let Trans People and Looksmaxxers Change Their Bodies

Published by Jenni Sidey

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the head of Health and Human Services, regularly espouses a menagerie of health conspiracy theories, including the idea that fluoride turns kids trans. By pushing his unfounded ideas about health and wellness, he can Trojan Horse in a variety of ideas about perfecting the human body. Such ideas have a dangerous precedent. The people who take it upon themselves to define what is innate and what is adornment are often the same ones deciding who is worthy of human rights and healthcare. In The New York Times, Andrew Sullivan recently wondered whether or not gay and trans rights have “gone too far.” This rhetoric is eerily similar to the way many mainstream outlets talk about Clavicular and his followers. Both argue that what these people are doing is too extreme. It is assumed that looksmaxxers are miserable pursuing dissociative perfection, while trans people are miserable because of the many roadblocks to their desire. Of course, it’s also true that trans medicine is often done under the care and supervision of medical …

It’s About to Be Hot Peptide Summer

It’s About to Be Hot Peptide Summer

Published by Jenni Sidey

Brace yourself for hot peptide summer. In late February, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. joined Joe Rogan on his podcast, revealing that that he’s directing the FDA to loosen regulations on over a dozen previously banned peptides. The move, which seems likely to be announced in the coming weeks, would largely reverse the FDA’s previous decision to place 19 peptides on the agency’s category 2 list, which effectively bans pharmacies from formulating them for human use—and, by extension, restricts doctors from prescribing them. (Not that the initial decision to ban these peptides prevented surging demand from fueling a booming black market online). According to the Human Health and Services Secretary, who expects that about 14 of these peptides will soon be moved back to the right side of the law, the compounds should have never been banned in the first place. He cites overreach by the Biden administration, but the fact remains that virtually all of these peptides still lack meaningful—and in some cases, any—human trials. That reality has many experts worried. For instance, …

What is Bonesmashing? Inside the Extreme Looksmaxxer Technique

What is Bonesmashing? Inside the Extreme Looksmaxxer Technique

Published by Jenni Sidey

When you’re a teenager, your parents like taking stuff away from you: videogames, sleepover privileges, the car keys. When Braden Peters, who you know as Clavicular, was a teenager, his mom took away his hammer. She wanted young Clav to stop bonesmashing—that is, tapping his face repeatedly with a hammer to change his face shape. Now 20, Clavicular, the most famous looksmaxxer in the world, continues to bonesmash. And as looksmaxxing goes from edgelord forum fodder to dinner table conversation, its most notorious face-shaping technique has found the spotlight too. Bonesmashing was invented by looksmaxxers, a mostly-male Internet subculture of extreme aesthetic self-improvement. Looksmaxxing was developed in the early 2010s on openly misogynistic forums like PUAHate, SlutHate, and Lookism. As an ideology, it places appearances above all, believing that how you look determines who you date, how much money you make, and everything else in life. In the 2020s, looksmaxxing exploded in popularity on TikTok, buoyed by personalities like Clavicular who introduced many of its extreme procedures to the masses. Looksmaxxing techniques generally fall into …

The Longevity Bros Are Fighting

The Longevity Bros Are Fighting

Published by Jenni Sidey

Influencer tantrums. Back-stabbing biohackers. Epstein files. The meticulously monitored shit hit the fan over the last week as social media’s loudest longevity nerds threw their quantified selves into a battle royale that has ruptured the bro optimization internet and likely caused a collective cortisol spike that is surely not optimal. Bryan Johnson vs. AG1 It all started last week, when longevity influencer Bryan Johnson got his hands on a 2024 study involving AG1—the nutritional supplement that sponsors popular podcasts that Johnson has not yet been on as a guest—and railed on the product’s ineffectiveness. “I’d cancel your AG1 subscription,” he began. “They just completed a clinical trial and the results show no clinical benefit.” Obviously, AG1 had not just done anything. The study is over a year old. But it is worth noting, just for the record, that the study in question was not a wholesale discreditation of AG1’s value, as Johnson’s tweet implies. The clinical trial was focused primarily on gut health and safety, and set out to observe how well the body tolerated …

What’s Best for Longevity: Working Out or Not Drinking?

What’s Best for Longevity: Working Out or Not Drinking?

Published by Jenni Sidey

We know that drinking alcohol is probably not the best thing you can do to extend your lifespan. And research has shown that activities like strength training and improving your V02 max can help add years to your life. But if you had to focus your energy on just one of these—in other words, saying goodbye to the bar or getting underneath one a few times a week—which would do the most to extend your longevity? That’s what a new study aimed to uncover—and the results may surprise you. In a good way! That is, if you’re not ready to give up drinking. No, alcohol is not suddenly healthy. And fitness is still the best investment you can make in your health. But the relationship between the two isn’t as simple as previously thought. And, depending on your current fitness level, hitting the gym might be a better new year’s resolution for improving your longevity than attempting to give up or cut down on your drinking. What the study found The Trøndelag Health Study, also …

I Was Addicted to Hair Transplant Consultations

I Was Addicted to Hair Transplant Consultations

Published by Jenni Sidey

I would never have confessed to another man what I was going through. But by sheer virtue of being in the same room together, we’d disclosed something to each other; silent brothers in the same lonely war. Among them, I felt normal and lucid. It was the closest thing I had to a support group. Sitting on a heinous mustard-yellow sofa beneath a framed Lichtenstein knockoff, tapping my foot in time with the middle-aged man with a horseshoe hairline reading a magazine, I felt held. The staff at hair transplant clinics is usually great too. Though almost always helmed by a man, these offices often employ beautiful women as receptionists and assistants. My first consultation in Dallas introduced me to a Russian woman in a white lab coat who sat me down in a chair, grabbed a fat marker, and drew a line that cleaved my forehead roughly in half. Such hairlines do naturally occur, though most typically in chimpanzees. She held up a mirror. “Is this what you want?” she asked. “No?” I guessed. …

The Food Pyramid Is Back and Beefier Than Ever. Is That a Good Thing?

The Food Pyramid Is Back and Beefier Than Ever. Is That a Good Thing?

Published by Jenni Sidey

What is beefy, V-shaped, and obsessed with protein? We’re talking about the new—and notably, inverted—food pyramid that the Trump administration just unveiled as part of its updated dietary guidelines for Americans. The fact that we have new guidelines is not a surprise. They’re updated every five years, so a change was due. What’s notable this time around is that the government-backed recommendations go far beyond the minor tweaks we’ve become accustomed to in recent updates. And while some shifts are welcome—like limiting added sugars and avoiding highly processed foods—others fly in the face of well-established and ongoing research, leaving some nutrition experts scratching their heads. What do these guidelines mean for you? It’s worth clarifying right off the bat that these updated guidelines probably won’t impact your life very much, if at all. Nobody is coming for your Crunchwrap Supreme. “The dietary guidelines exist to inform what a healthy eating pattern should look like for your average healthy American,” says Gabby Headrick, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Exercise and Nutrition Sciences at the …

A Cautionary Tale Against Quitting Zyn—or Anything—Cold Turkey

A Cautionary Tale Against Quitting Zyn—or Anything—Cold Turkey

Published by Jenni Sidey

This story is part of our ‘Habits to Embrace—and Ditch—in 2026’ series. Read the whole list here. A couple months ago, on a Saturday afternoon in Los Angeles, I sat cross-legged on a shit-stained sidewalk, staring at my hands, uncertain of where I was, or even if I was. According to my brain, I knew I was in Echo Park, the LA neighborhood that’s home to Dodgers Stadium. But whether it was the real Echo Park or a simulation, a convincing-enough mix of new highrises and grungy cottages in imitation of Echo Park, I wasn’t sure. For several hours, I’d been haunted by yellow-tinted hallucinations, sweeping in and out of my mind like searchlights, which told me I might’ve slipped between worlds. The street was quiet and empty. I knew I shouldn’t stand, let alone go anywhere, in case the situation got worse. Meanwhile, the idea of running into somebody, having a conversation, was terrifying. I touched the ground with my hands, unmoved by the dog shit, and wondered if maybe this square of concrete …