Over the past few weeks, I have found myself unexpectedly overwhelmed by a new vocabulary circulating on screens, words as amusing as ‘mogging’ and offensive as ‘foids’ (Prażmo, 2020). It is not the spectacle of ‘bone smashing’ that concerns me, but the quieter, more enduring messages that have been circulating for years. Blackpilling terms that sound absurd at first hearing, but carry with them entire worldviews about worth, hierarchy and the future.
The blackpilled internet has blown up in the mainstream and pulled back a curtain, I’m honestly unsure about how much my students have been exposed to. I have a sense that there are levels: first, some are aware and see this as silly and harmless, it clearly isn’t, but they dismiss it as internet noise as opposed to subversive and dehumanising. Second, some students have internalised the insecurity, misogyny and concept of optimisation, they may not act on all the disturbing advice, but the unhealthy thinking and constant self-review is activated. Third, I think there are young people who accurately see this subculture as a toxic environment full of grift. Looksmaxxers are a swindle, promoting views they may not truly believe in, solely to gain money or influence. They are astute in noticing that platforms reward dangerous and hurtful behaviour. At all levels there is nihilism, nothing is inherently moral or immoral, ethical standards are social constructs, all knowledge is possibly false. The first step in blackpilling is accepting that this is the world as it is, unchangeable and hopeless.
Emotional and Ideological Internalisation
If we look at behaviour in a school rather than the algorithm in a phone, the landscape would appear less sensational and more quietly unsettled. Across classrooms, there is a persistent undercurrent in conversations about the future, particularly among boys in the middle and upper years of secondary school, a sense that the world they are preparing to enter is economically unforgiving and socially transactional. In careers lessons, students speak less about vocation and more about pivoting. In tutor conversations, phrases such as “what is the point” or “it is rigged anyway” are voiced with a tone that is neither dramatic nor rebellious, but resigned.
Research on economic precarity and youth radicalisation suggests that this ambient insecurity matters (Gidron and Hall, 2017; Baele, Brace and Coan, 2019). Studies examining pathways into online extremism consistently identify feelings of status loss, economic anxiety and perceived unfairness as fertile ground for ideological recruitment (Kimmel, 2017). When opportunity feels limited, optimisation appears rational. Within this context, ‘looksmaxxing’ does not always begin as narcissism, it starts as risk management and a posture of self-defence. If the future is competitive and success feels uncertain, then improving one’s body, status and earning potential can seem like a responsible strategy. Students articulate this in the language available to them, a language increasingly shaped by metrics.
In corridors between lessons, boys ‘frame mog’ each other, exaggerating shoulder width, posture and stance in playful rivalry. Someone jokes that his clavicles are not wide enough. Another mutters that he is working out to looksmaxx before summer. The humour is layered, ironic, self-aware, and delivered in tones that signal performance. They insist that they do not mean it. They are, as one Year 10 boy told me, “just memeing.”
There is a temptation to say we are ‘revisionmaxxing’ to ‘grade mog’ in order to be in on the joke. I get it, but this is not 67. The vocabulary itself carries weight.
Self-improvement is given the language of ROI, return on investment, and market value, borrowing directly from economic discourse, mapping capitalist ideas onto adolescent bodies and relationships. Interactions are often coated in layers of ‘jesterism’ that function as protection. Slurs are reclaimed as jokes and extreme statements are cushioned with “I’m not serious” or “it’s just free speech.” In this performance, contrarianism becomes currency, the use of quips, scorecards and hate language embeds stereotypes. When a person’s looks have a market value and social interaction becomes transaction, human complexity is flattened. Humour may soften the edges, but constant exposure and repetition normalise this culture.
Reclaiming Human Worth in a Quantified World
Generation Z and the emerging Generation Alpha have grown up with algorithmic social media diets, where recommendation systems curate identity and ideology. There are different internets for different people. Millennial educators like myself, who encountered the internet as a comparatively static information space, may underestimate how personalised and isolating these feeds can be. As journalist Taylor Lorenz observes, “Platforms reward the most extreme, the most provocative, the most emotionally charged content because that is what keeps people engaged” (Lorenz, 2023). The internet is no longer a shared public square but a series of micro-publics, each shaped by engagement metrics. Reporting in The Guardian, drawing on case studies of young men drawn into misogynistic and far right digital communities, shows how financial instability and uncertainty about the future can make these worldviews feel not extreme, but rational (The Guardian, 2023).
Many of these creators are strikingly young, I feel both protectiveness towards them and dismay, as the content is saturated with hate, cruelty and self-loathing in equal measures. Some looksmaxxers began documenting their journeys in early adolescence, presenting themselves as analytical and self-improving, framing their transformation as a rational response to a competitive and unforgiving social hierarchy. A number have spoken openly about being neurodivergent, socially isolated, or feeling excluded in earlier stages of their lives, positioning optimisation as both personal discipline and a means of reclaiming control. Much of the fatalistic discourse surrounding looksmaxxing draws on race science and pick up artist misogyny, reframed in the language of self-improvement. Within these communities, practices such as extreme dieting referred to as leanmaxxing, jawline modification trends described as bone smashing, and obsessive biometric analysis circulate as rational strategies for increasing status. Video after video of young men scoring faces and rating bodies to determine PSL and who is a ‘low-tier normie’ makes me cringe. It is alarming to see young people can explain the PSL judgement metrics, which stands for PickUpArtistsHate, SlutHate, and Lookism, three broadly misogynistic incel communities where looksmaxxing took shape. Tiers are rigidly reinforced, placement is nitpicked and policed.
What matters for education is the interpretive frameworks students internalise from this. In classrooms, this can surface subtly, in the ranking of peers, in the comments about worth, the quiet assumption that some bodies or identities are inherently higher value than others. If students are absorbing hierarchies dressed as self-improvement, then schools are not merely sites of academic instruction but contested spaces. What power structures are being reinforced in schools? For all of our talk of schools being a place of belonging, this digital barrage is the reality we are competing with.
Wellbeing, Loneliness and the Mask of Irony
Beneath the bravado lies loneliness. Many boys articulate a sense of isolation that is difficult to admit without irony. The language of optimisation provides cover. To say “I need to increase my value” is less vulnerable than saying “I feel alone.” To mock oneself as ‘mid’ is safer than admitting insecurity.
Wellbeing education that ignores this vocabulary risks missing the emotional content it carries. When a student jokes about being low ROI in relationships, there is often a question underneath about worth and belonging. When another declares himself blackpilled, even in jest, he is rehearsing a worldview in which hope is naïve. For students, the line between self-improvement content and grievance-based ideology can blur gradually. A podcast about discipline leads into commentary about “high-value men,” which slides into broader claims about societal decline. There is no explicit announcement that one has crossed into misogyny or self-harm apparatus. The pipeline is subtle, and its entry points are ordinary.
Research into radicalisation pathways consistently highlights how communities built around grievance offer belonging (Baele, Brace and Coan, 2019; Kimmel, 2017). The Guardian has reported on young men drawn into online spaces that begin with self- improvement and gradually introduce misogynistic narratives, providing both explanation for personal disappointment and a ready-made community of validation (2023). Major platforms amplify intensity because intensity retains attention (Tufekci, 2018). Content that is extreme, controversial or emotionally charged travels further than nuance. The reward structure incentivises escalation. Influencers who adopt increasingly provocative positions gain followers, sponsorship and status. Students are not always unaware of the performative nature of this ecosystem. They joke about engagement farming and know that outrage generates views. However, recognising that a system is exploitative does not automatically produce resistance. In fact, this is where awareness can tip into nihilism. If every voice is monetised, if every hot take is crafted for clickbait, then sincerity itself appears suspect.
Education as Counter Narrative
The first challenge is to help students see the harm and untruths. The second challenge is to empower them, because they are inheriting a world where they have to repair those harms. How do we help them see the incentives behind extreme misogyny and care enough to correct them? Schools are sites of resistance, where students learn to question the narratives placed before them, to construct identities rooted in dignity, and to recognise their own worth in ways that restore hope.
Media literacy cannot be confined to identifying misinformation. It must include analysing economic incentives, understanding algorithmic amplification and interrogating the troupes. In classroom practice, this might involve slowing down a viral clip and asking not only whether it is accurate but what emotional response it seeks to provoke, who benefits from that response and what assumptions about human value it encodes.
However, critique alone is insufficient. If we expose the manipulation but fail to offer alternative forms of belonging, students may retreat further into detachment. Solidarity must be lived, not merely described. Collaborative projects, mentoring and structured dialogues are useful tools. When students work together towards a common outcome, whether producing a performance, solving a complex problem or building something collectively, their worth becomes defined by participation, persistence and mutual reliance. Authentic classroom discussion allows students to encounter not only new ideas, but themselves, developing identity, agency and intellectual confidence through being heard and taken seriously. Dialogic classrooms position students as active participants in knowledge construction, where understanding emerges through questioning, listening, and collective meaning-making.
Mobile phone policies can create space for presence during the school day, yet they cannot substitute for deeper work. The question is not only how to limit exposure but how to build resilience to these messages, interrogate media, and create supportive friendships.
To move students beyond nihilism requires demonstrating that care is not weakness and that worth is not a commodity. It requires adults who are willing to learn the language of this other internet without endorsing its flattening logic. Education has always been about expanding frames of reference. In an era where young people are encouraged to quantify themselves, our task is to reintroduce forms of value that cannot be ranked or monetised. To fight nihilism, the best things we can give our students is agency and hope.
References
Baele, S.J., Brace, L. and Coan, T.G., 2019. From incel to extremist: analysing the radicalisation pathways of online misogynistic communities. Terrorism and Political Violence, 31(6), pp.1–20.
Gidron, N. and Hall, P.A., 2017. The politics of social status: economic and cultural roots of the populist right. British Journal of Sociology, 68(S1), pp.S57–S84.
Kimmel, M., 2017. Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era. Revised edition. New York: Nation Books.
Lorenz, T., 2023. Extremely Online: The Untold Story of Fame, Influence, and Power on the Internet. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Lorenz, T., 2025. Why Clavicular Is Suddenly Everywhere [online video]. YouTube, 31 Dec. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2X6jmxpbDI
Prażmo, E.M., 2020. Foids are worse than animals: A cognitive linguistics analysis of dehumanizing metaphors in online discourse. Topics in Linguistics, 21(1), pp. 1–17. https://doi.org/10.2478/topling-2020-0007
The Guardian, 2023. Online radicalisation and young men: case studies in digital grievance culture. The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com
Tufekci, Z., 2018. YouTube, the great radicalizer. The New York Times, 10 March.
Surreal photography manipulation by Fran Carneros: https://www.designer-daily.com/surreal-photography-manipulation-by-fran-carneros-52552