Clavicular, looksmaxxing, and how extremists hijack the algorithm

Summary

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Podcast Summary: "Clavicular, looksmaxxing, and how extremists hijack the algorithm"

Podcast: There Are No Girls on the Internet
Host: Bridget Todd
Episode Date: April 28, 2026
Guest: Mike (Co-host or regular contributor)
Description: Part two examining the rise of looksmaxxing influencer Braden Peters (aka Clavicular) and the complicity of mainstream media and algorithms in amplifying extremist, harmful figures and ideologies online.

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into how mainstream media coverage and algorithmic amplification turn extremist figures, like looksmaxxing influencer Braden Peters (Clavicular), from niche online actors into widely recognized celebrities. Bridget Todd and co-host Mike critically discuss the choices media outlets make in reporting on such figures—including the ethical fine line between scrutiny and unintentional influencer PR. They parallel this male-dominated online self-harm community with historic treatment of female-dominated “pro-ana” spaces, and explore gendered double standards in the portrayal of self-destructive behaviors. The conversation ends with a call for more responsible, well-contextualized media coverage—and reflections on shared responsibility in the digital attention economy.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Media’s Role: Turning Extremists into Celebrities

• Media Coverage Choices: Bridget warns against both ignoring extremists and writing about them in ways that glamorize or normalize their behavior.
  • “There has got to be a line between writing critically about these figures and essentially doing the work of building up their platforms on their behalf.” (Bridget Todd, 03:40)
• Historical Examples:
  • The 2016 Mother Jones piece on Richard Spencer used language (“dapper Nazis”) and aesthetic choices that glamorized hate figures, even when the article text was critical.
  • Similarly, recent coverage about Braden Peters by mainstream outlets like the New York Times described him as a “handsomeness influencer”—glossing over extremist content and real-world harms.

The Dangers of Apolitical Journalism

• Mike critiques the “apolitical” approach:
  • “It almost seems like they’re flirting with it as harmless or okay or worth it or somehow acceptable... some of them are almost actively trying to whitewash it and make it more acceptable.” (Mike, 07:01)

Amplification as Ideological Validation

• The timeline of Peters/Clavicular:
  • Not widely known outside the looksmaxxing subculture until a series of controversies and subsequent national media profiles (Atlantic, Guardian, Rolling Stone, New York Times) attracted broader attention (12:00–15:00).
  • “I would argue that he became recognizable because these publications said that he was recognizable, said that he was somebody that you needed to know about.” (Bridget Todd, 12:55)
• Quote from Salon (Sophia Tesfeh, 13:59):
  • “... if Charlottesville taught journalists to be wary of amplifying ideology, the current moment demands an understanding that in an attention economy, amplification itself is the ideology.” (Read aloud by Bridget, 14:45)
• Comparison to 2017 New York Times profile of a Neo-Nazi:
  • Both pieces focused on ‘relatable’ aspects, normalizing extremist figures.

Gendered Lens: Male vs. Female Self-Harm Online

• Media Double Standards:
  • “If you took a woman, an influencer, whose claim to fame was disordered eating and promoting disordered eating for others, I don’t think we would see these outlets covering it the same way... They are talked about in ways that make clear that they are promoting self harm and self harm tactics.” (Bridget Todd, 16:23)
• Pro-ana/Post-Tumblr Era:
  • “Platforms were pressured into getting rid of the content, research was published into it. Journalists covered it as a kind of harm, not an interesting cultural spectacle.” (Bridget Todd, 24:30)
• Algorithmic Magnification:
  • Both male (looksmaxxing) and female (“skinny talk,” pro-ana) subcultures exploit platform algorithms, but media response is vastly different.

The Psychology and Dangers of Looksmaxxing

• Clinical perspectives:
  • Dr. Justin Nepa: Looksmaxxing often progresses from self-improvement to “a severe cycle of body dysmorphic disorder, depression, substance abuse and self harm.” (21:25)
  • Body dysmorphic disorder is twice as common in heavy social media users (4.2% vs. 2% in the general population); affects 40% men.
  • Cosmetic procedures generally worsen BDD symptoms—not improve them. (22:34)
• Bridget:
  • “If you look at all of those behaviors together, the meth, the testosterone at 14, the hammer, I think it’s pretty clear that we’re talking about self harm behavior.” (Bridget Todd, 23:40)
• Comparisons table:
  • Bridget draws a line-by-line comparison between pro-ana and looksmaxxing communities (24:00–25:37), establishing algorithmic, commercial, ideological, and harm similarities—distilled as “Check.”

Gender, Media, and Social Response

• Societal frameworks:
  • “I think that because it is associated with men and masculinity, it automatically is given a different lens or a different framing.” (Bridget Todd, 26:48)
  • Boys’ eating disorder hospitalization rates up 400% since 2002 (Bridget citing UCSF study, 29:31), but frameworks for identifying and addressing boys’ self harm lag behind recognition of harm to girls.

Perverse Incentives for Media and Subject

• Mutual benefit:
  • “The outlets and the institutions clearly get some sort of benefit from the association with him. Not necessarily like critical association, but... that traffics in the sort of cultural cachet...” (Bridget Todd, 31:15)
  • Mike: “National politicians would be thrilled to have that kind of attention.” (33:24)

Oxygen of Amplification

• Phrase by media scholar Whitney Phillips:
  • “Coverage of extremist figures, even sometimes critical coverage, provides them the attention that sustains them.” (Bridget Todd, 36:41)
  • “Despite the best intentions of journalists, news media has unwittingly played into the hands of the contemporary far right.” (36:50)
• Critical omission:
  • Journalism often omits the harms these figures cause, their ideological extremism, and frames shock-jock behaviors as brand strategy instead of symptoms of mental illness or hate. (Bridget summarizes media criticisms, 37:31–39:00)
• Key quote:
  • “If you want to be played, are you still played?” (Bridget Todd, 37:15)

What Should Responsible Coverage Look Like?

• Bridget’s recommendations:
  • Reporters must actually enumerate the subject’s behavior—especially their harm to others, bigotry, and incitements—not just his charisma or notoriety. (Bridget Todd, 39:59)
  • Ask: Why is this person newsworthy? Who benefits from their visibility?
  • “It’s about whether or not this attention is becoming a form of platform building. And then you have these same systems later going on to critique these figures when it’s like, wait a minute, you helped them become this big influential figure in the first place.” (Bridget Todd, 44:59)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Media Responsibility:
  • “Writing about them like this is a choice, Writing about them in this way that builds their brands for them is a choice.”
    —Bridget Todd (05:50)
• On Gendered Media Treatment:
  • “If you took a woman, an influencer, whose claim to fame was disordered eating and promoting disordered eating for others, I don’t think we would see these outlets covering it the same way...”
    —Bridget Todd (16:23)
• On Boys and Body Image:
  • “UC San Francisco study by Dr. Jason Nagata found a 400% increase in eating disorder hospitalizations among boys since 2002. So boys are not immune to body image pathology and issues. But I think perhaps they are less seen in the frameworks that we have built around addressing it.”
    —Bridget Todd (29:31)
• On Amplification:
  • “In an attention economy, amplification itself is the ideology.”
    —Sophia Tesfeh (quoted by Bridget, 14:45)
  • “Whitney Phillips...’the oxygen of amplification.’”
    —Bridget Todd (36:41)
• Media Motivation Questioned:
  • “If you want to be played, are you still played?”
    —Bridget Todd (37:15)
• On What Should Change:
  • “It would behoove us if media and journalists could figure out a way to cover this person in a way that is a little more responsible and a little more ethical... Because I tell you, it ain’t just like some, some interesting cultural online phenomenon. At the heart of it is clearly an unwell person. And I don’t think that media should be obscuring that just to get engagement.”
    —Bridget Todd (41:46)
• On Structural Responsibility:
  • “Shouldn’t the institutions that decide what becomes visible, what gets amplified and what gets turned into a story rather than a warning sign? Like they also share some of the responsibility here.”
    —Bridget Todd (44:00)

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Important Timestamps

• 02:09: Content warning—self harm & disordered eating
• 03:40: Bridget discusses media complicity in building extremist brands
• 05:50: Example of Mother Jones & NYT coverage—mainstreaming hate figures
• 06:49: Mike critiques “apolitical” journalism
• 12:00–16:00: Timeline of Clavicular’s rise through media events
• 14:45: Sophia Tesfeh’s quote on amplification
• 16:23: Bridget on gendered lens—pro-ana vs. looksmaxxing
• 21:25: Dr. Justin Nepa’s clinical warning on looksmaxxing
• 24:00–25:37: Bridget’s comprehensive comparison of pro-ana and looksmaxxing patterns
• 29:31: Bridget cites study of boys’ eating disorder hospitalizations
• 31:15: The mutual incentive for media and online figures
• 36:41: Whitney Phillips’ “oxygen of amplification”
• 39:59: Bridget’s advice to journalists
• 44:00–45:00: Final thoughts on platforming, amplification, and shared institutional responsibility

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Conclusion

This episode contends that digital and media ecosystems often unwittingly participate in the elevation and normalization of harmful figures and ideologies—through a blend of algorithmic amplification, inadvertent glamorization, and the newsworthiness of controversy. The hosts urge more responsible, critical, and contextually rich journalism, especially as cycles of online extremism and self-destructive behavior accelerate. They encourage listeners to reflect on their own media consumption, and invite contributions on how digital communities and media can better disrupt, rather than enable, new forms of online harm.

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Transcript

[Bridget Todd]

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[Bridget Todd]

Just a quick heads up that today's episode mentions self harm and disordered eating. There Are no Girls on the Internet. It's a production of iHeartRadio and unbossed creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this is There are no Girls on the Internet. This is part two of a two part episode about Braden Peters, AKA Clavicular, the looks maxing influencer who recently experienced an overdose on a livestream. If you have not listened to part one. You should. In that part one, we walk through who Peters is and how he rose to prominence online. And in this second part, I want to talk about the role that I think the mainstream media played in that rise. And it didn't even really start with coverage of Peters. Let's take it back to how mainstream outlets were writing about the rise of the so called alt right a few years ago. So let's talk about the role that media plays in turning niche extremists like Braden Peters, also known as Clavicular Online, into celebrity figures. I need to own that it's a little bit complicated because I also do feel that we spent far too much time doing that thing where media says, oh, we're going to ignore these extremist figures and just allow them to amass more and more power and influence without any kind of mainstream scrutiny. And then by the time this figure is big and they're everywhere, all over the Internet, then mainstream media is talking about them. But by then it's way too late. They're. They're very powerful. I saw that a lot and I think it was a big mistake. But it's also not like the only two choices are either media ignores figures like Peters as they get bigger and bigger, or they have to cover them, but they have no choice but to do so in ways that essentially celebrate them or almost kind of sound like they're advocating for them, or that they think that the audience should be sort of flattered or interested in them, where they're essentially doing positive PR for these folks and helping them build their brands. Like, I think there has got to be a line between writing critically about these figures and essentially doing the work of building up their platforms on their behalf. And this is a conversation that really predates the rise of Peters. This is probably not the first example of this or the only example of this, but the one that sticks with me very personally is back in 2016 when Mother Jones wrote about Richard Spencer and the rise of the so called alt right. Now, to be clear, having read the whole piece, it is like critical of the alt right and critical of figures like Spencer. But the headline for the piece was like, check out these dapper new Nazis strolling into town. It was actually a little bit hard to find the actual article because they did change the title on the piece that ran online eventually, but they didn't remove it from the Instagram. And we dug and we dug and we were able to find it. And again, I would say the piece is critical of the alt right. But the first few sentences are like describing Richard Spencer in this beautiful hotel room eating fancy sushi with chopsticks. And he almost sounds like a lifestyle influencer or a menswear influencer and not a hate monger. And so again, the piece itself was critical, but the headline in the image of Spencer in this, like, dapper suit, also with a subhead that again calls him handsome and dapper and says that they're trying to make fascism cool. Again, that's what people share on social media. It's the. The headline in the image. And so even if the piece goes on to be critical, which in this case it did, the conversation that's building up around the piece kind of sounds like, look at these cool, handsome Nazis, which, yuck. And to me, that kind of came to represent the pinnacle of the bad job media has done when it comes to how we talk about these folks critically. In the same way that I think it was very irresponsible for the New York Times to call Peters a handsomeness influencer in that big profile of him that really helped build his platform. I also did not think it was appropriate to frame the alt right as, as almost like a dapper menswear club. I'm not saying that these folks should not be written about. I think they absolutely should be written about because they deserve mainstream scrutiny and we should know who they are. But writing about them like this is a choice, Writing about them in this way that builds their brands for them is a choice.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Right. And in some of these cases, it almost seems like the media outlets themselves, like in that New York Times example, want to be apolitical. Right? Like just reporting on this guy doing this thing. No deeper thought about it. And that's, in my opinion, a really disappointing approach to journalism. Right. Like with Mother Jones writing about Richard Spencer. I think they got it wrong, because I don't. My understanding is that Mother Jones is like, pretty solidly anti Nazi. Right? Like it is a publication that is solidly anti Nazi. And so they got that wrong. These more recent pieces about Peters, I don't have that same confidence that they view this stuff as harmful. It almost seems like they're flirting with it as harmless or okay or worth it or somehow acceptable. Like they like it. It feels like some of them are almost actively trying to whitewash it and make it more acceptable.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. Because this is somebody who objectively pushes white supremacist ideology. This is somebody who is publicly engaged in self harm and the harm of others choosing in the title or the subhead of your piece to describe him as just somebody who promotes handsomeness. Come on. You know, and I think this gets back to my opinion. I guess my take is that I think a lot of legacy media organizations, they're doing that because they understand that framing it that way gets more engagement. If you were to frame it as a critical piece about somebody who is unwell and engages in self harm and the harm of others, I don't think that's as edgy as describing it as, oh, this handsome guy who has kind of an unusual worldview and an unusual pastime and practice around self improvement. I mean, it almost kind of feels like a certain type of access journalism, but the access that they're trying to get is access to somebody who was clearly unwell.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

It is definitely a tricky fine line to walk of like how journalists should be covering people like this. But to your point, I think it seems clear that the coverage that Peters has gotten over the past week is not the way. Right. Like it seems like this is not the way and we all need to learn how to cover it better.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes, and I'm glad that you put it that way because I'm not pretending like I have all the answers. I certainly don't. Even the Louis Theroux manosphere documentary that we mentioned got. I, I heard, I read and heard a lot of criticism saying that documentary was a failure because it just ended up giving these guys exactly what they wanted, which is a bigger platform and another stage. Right. I personally did not happen to agree with that take, but I understand that take and I wanted to say that because it is complicated, it is a fine line to walk. It does become difficult to know when you have crossed over into giving somebody a platform or amplifying them versus engaging in like important criticism or like critique or scrutiny with them. I absolutely own that. That is a tough line to walk, but I know it's not calling them a handsomeness influencer. I know it's not obscuring the fact that this is somebody who is engaging in act of self harm and harming others on camera. Right. Like, I know that it is complicated, but it's work that needs to be done and it's worth figuring out because we're going to just see more and more and more of these figures rising to prominence. And I know that this is not the right way to do it.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Yeah. And I agree that it's going to become a even bigger problem because the. There's just so much reward to be had. Right. If you're like a mid tier influencer. And you look at this enormous run of success that Peters has had over the past week where he has shot to national attention and celebrity emulating, that probably looks like a pretty good idea, right? And I think people in traditional media really need to think carefully about making sure that they aren't setting themselves up to be gamed by smart, savvy young influencer types who are taking notes and behaving in ways specifically to get this kind of attention because it is so rewarding.

[Bridget Todd]

Exactly. So, so let's, let's break that down because I want to be clear. It's not like Peter's is, was a complete nobody. He has over a million followers across platforms. He is and was genuinely influential within the looks maxing community. But that context that you just met brought up really matters a lot. So if we compare him to other major manosphere influencers. Andrew Tate has tens of millions of followers and clearly has mainstream political access. Jordan Peterson, he has a book empire. Major interviewers and even folks that I would categorize as sort of mid tier figures like fresh and fit, they have much larger, more established fan bases than Peters ever had before. December 2025, about the time when Peters was on my radar, he was very known within his subculture, but basically not really that known outside of it. Unless you were somebody who was following online niche subcultures and that like, unless you were someone like me who is like, like in the trenches, you probably didn't know who this guy was and what happened to change that? I would argue press coverage, because let's look at this timeline. November 2025, Peters injects his underage girlfriend with peptides on stream. Mostly that that controversy stays internal. December 24, 2025, Peters is live streaming himself. Driving a cybertruck in Miami. He seemingly hit someone on the live stream goes viral late December through January of this year. The Atlantic, the Guardian, Rolling Stone and the New York Times simultaneously all begin working on major profiles of him by January 2026. Thomas Chatterton Williams of the Atlantic, who I fucking hate, calls Peters the newest star and most recognizable member of the looksmaxing movement. But recognizable to whom I would argue that he became recognizable because these publications said that he was recognizable, said that he was somebody that you needed to know about. February 2026, the New York Times publishes its major profile by Joseph Bernstein. Peters is now earning $100,000 a month. Also in February, Peters walks New York Fashion Week for designer Elena Velez. This is just days after his arrest in Arizona. By late March of 2026. The New York Times devotes a full episode of the Daily to Peters and looks maxing. And then that leads us to Just last week, April 14, 2026, Peters is hospitalized for a suspected drug overdose while live streaming. So to me, that paints a very clear timeline of the fact that, you know, this guy's increasingly extreme behavior plus mainstream media attention is what led to his celebrity really growing. Sophia Tespe wrote a really sharp piece of media criticism for salon on April 6, 2026, where she compared the coverage of Peters to this infamous 2017 New York Times profile of Tony Hovater, who is a neo Nazi welder in Ohio. The profile talked about how much this guy loved Seinfeld and how much he liked the store Target. And. And the Times got into trouble for basically normalizing white nationalism at Salon. Tesveh writes, quote, if Charlottesville taught journalists to be wary of amplifying ideology, the current moment demands an understanding that in an attention economy, amplification itself is the ideology. And I completely agree with that. Again, I am not saying that these people should not be scrutinized, should not be written about, but it is a choice to write about them in a kind of way that just amplifies and does the work of what they're trying to do for them, that helps them launder their ideologies for audiences and make those ideologies seem cool or handsome or sexy or whatever.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

That's such a good comparison to that 2017 profile. I remember that, you know, this was shortly after Trump had been elected to his first term, and there was, like, this national movement seemingly to, like, normalize extremists and make people with neo Nazi beliefs seem as if they were mainstream. And that was about 10 years ago. And so it's interesting to think about that example and compare it with Peter's what's happening today, because there are so many similarities to the underlying ideology as you've described. But, like, the face of it has evolved, possibly because it's been struck by a hammer, possibly for other reasons, most likely because people have gotten wise and that sort of stuff just doesn't play so well anymore. Maybe. Hopefully.

[Bridget Todd]

I think you're right. And I guess that's why I keep bringing it back to this gender lens, because I really do think that if you took a woman, an influencer, whose claim to fame was disordered eating and promoting disordered eating for others, I don't think we would see these outlets covering it the same way we have women influencers, people like Liv Schmidt, who we've talked about on the podcast before who their whole thing is being super thin and promoting disordered eating to others. And you don't see the New York Times calling them, you know, beauty influencers or influencers who promote beauty. They would, they are, they're talked about in ways that I think make clear that they are promoting self harm and self harm tactics. And so just as somebody who came of Internet age in the Tumblr days, I remember so clearly these they used to call pro Anna accounts, Tumblr accounts that glorified and promoted disordered eating. It was a real cesspool. It's kind of coming back in the form of skinny talk. But we did not also have a mainstream media that was amplifying this and laundering this as a cool or sexy or reasonable thing to do like we do now. And so I think if you looked at Peter's documented behavior from that lens and not from an entertainment lens, it becomes so clear how irresponsible it is to divorce what Peters actually promotes and stands for from all of the harmful behaviors that it actually is. So you know, self administering steroid injections starting at age 14 using methamphetamines to suppress appetites for appearance goals. Bone smashing. Hitting himself in the face with a hammer to change his bone structure. Obviously doctors have said don't do that because it causes fractures that in heal properly can cause permanent nerve damage and disfigurement. And on top of that there is no scientific basis for it even working to make you look a certain way. Injecting unregulated substances into his own body and the body of others, including minors without medical training and looking at the circumstances regarding his recent overdose. When that happened, Peters posted to X with blood on his face writing quote the worst part of tonight was my face descending from the life support mask. Let's take a quick break. Craving bold authentic taste without kitchen chaos. True nature meets Hawaiian Kahlua pork delivers slow roasted tenderness with smoky tropical notes. Pre cooked perfection. 30 years supplying the finest restaurant. Chances are you've already had their pork heat in 2 minutes. Shred for plates or bowls. Complaints turn to second helpings and laughter. Real meat, real flavor. Go to TrueNatureMeats.com code free meat for 20% off plus free New York strip Texas smoked brisket and Mediterranean chicken with code free [e-mail] Every business has an ambition.

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[Bridget Todd]

And we're back. Dr. Justin Nepa, who is a board certified psychiatrist in Florida, wrote a clinical analysis of looks maxing in March. And he said what often begins as an innocent foray into better grooming or fitness can quickly spiral into a severe cycle of body dysmorphic disorder, depression, substance abuse and self harm. He also said that he has seen young men spend three to four hours daily analyzing their facial features, measuring jawlines with calipers and comparing themselves to digitally altered images. This creates masculine demoralization. And again, if you were a young woman who came of age when I did, at a time when magazine covers were all making it very clear that the most important thing that you could be was like super skinny to be hot. This behavior, it doesn't seem that foreign to me. But then you have mainstream platforms trying to make it seem like this is reasonable or even safe or healthy behavior that it's just, you know, regular grooming or regular self improvement when it isn't. Body dysmorphic disorder affects about 2% of the general population. In heavy social media users, that figure more than doubles to 4.2%. 40% of BDD sufferers are men Stuck. Studies consistently show that individuals with untreated BDD who undergo cosmetic procedures experience no improvement or worsening of symptoms. Peters has had multiple of these procedures. So again, it's not like something where you can get the procedure, get the jawline, get the thing that you've been holding out for and then a switch clips and you're fine. In fact, the data seems to be pretty clear that that's actually not what happens. It's a consistent hamster wheel where the point is trying to achieve this status of perfection. But perfection does not really exist. So it's going to continue to be increasing, increasing things with a never ending cycle. A 2025 peer reviewed paper called Looks Maxing Colon straddling the inflection between self enhancement and self harm, directly associates this content with body dissatisfaction, body dysmorphia and suicidal ideation in young men. So when you look at all of those behaviors together, the meth, the testosterone at 14, the hammer, I think it's pretty clear that we're talking about self harm behavior.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Yeah, those are harmful behaviors. Right? That one is doing himself by definition, self harm.

[Bridget Todd]

Exactly. And I just, again, I just really think that we would be responding differently to Peters if he were a woman. Going Back to those early 2010s Tumblr pro Anna Pro Anorexia communities. Those communities were mostly teenage girls and young women. They were thinspo photos, diet tips, tips for evading parents and doctors. Mantras like skip dinner end up thinner again. If you listen to our skinny talk episode, you know that it's still very much a thing. It's very similar to, I think what Peters is pushing. A tight knit online community with its own vocabulary hierarchies and in group culture. Check. An ideology that frames dangerous self harm behaviors as an aspirational lifestyle choice. Check. Pseudoscience justifications for those behaviors? Check. Practical tips on how to harm yourself more effectively? Check. Tips on evading medical scrutiny and parental scrutiny? Check. Monetization through memberships and affiliate products? Check. Algorithmic amplification pushing vulnerable young people deeper and deeper in. Check. In February 2012, after pressure from the National Eating Disorder Association, Tumblr announced that it would ban blogs that actively promote or glorified self harm, including eating disorders. And those Communities were not celebrated as like a fascinating cultural provocateur. Right. For the most part they were treated as a public health crisis. Like platforms were pressured into getting rid of the content, research was published into it. Journalists covered it as a kind of harm, not an interesting cultural spectacle. Like what I think that we're seeing with Peters.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Those comparisons are so strong when you lay them out like that that you know, after running through that long list, it's like how. Well how, how could anyone not take a gender lens to see the, the different way that Peters and looks maxing is being treated than it would if he were a woman or not Even hypothetically how the pro anorexia movement was treated several years ago. And I know you and I talked about this a little bit before the show. I just think it's so interesting to think about why that different treatment exists for looks maxing which seems geared at young men versus the pro anorexia movement which was primarily aimed at young women. And we came up with a couple of hypotheses, but no like really clear answer. You know, I would be interested to hear from listeners if they have any thoughts about why this difference exists. I don't know if you want to opine a little bit on it right now.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, I mean this is just my opinion. This is for people who are much smarter than me to figure out. I don't have any kind of inside knowledge into this. I just want to own. This is just my opinion. I think that because it is associated with men and masculinity, it automatically is given a different lens or a different framing. I think that when men do something it is seen as like a serious thing that has serious societal consequences or impact or that we need to be looking at it and treating it in a much more serious lens. And I think it's easier to see young women and girls doing a similar, not entirely identical but a similar thing and saying oh those that's unwell behavior, that self harm behavior. I think that when I'm. When, when it's coming from young men and boys, when it's coming from and targeted at young men and boys, I think it's easier for some people to apply a different lens to it. I guess I don't really know why. And I think you can really see it in how Peters was dealt with or not dealt with, depending on how you look at it. After he filmed himself injecting peptides into his body, into his then underage girlfriend's face, he was temporarily banned from KICK and then came back. He Got that New York Times profile and then he walked in Fashion Week. And so I just think that if there had been a woman who had done something analogous, I don't think that she would get all of the, all of this, like, positive stuff out of it. And I also wonder if part of it is that we just are aware of the pressure around this kind of thing when it comes to girls, but we're less aware of it when it comes to young men and boys. That we have a framework in our mind for what it looks like when a young woman or a girl is coming into contact with this kind of content and this kind of behavior. That I almost wonder if we don't. If we, if we have not really identified a similar kind of language around what it looks like and how it should be treated when it's happening to a young man or a boy.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

I agree. I think that's a big piece of this that we just have like a background cultural familiarity with the fact that these things are threats to young women. The ideas of body dysmorphia, body image issues, disordered eating. A lot of people are very familiar with those problems in the context of young women. And it does feel more new to be applying those same concerns to young men. And there's surely a whole bunch of cultural reasons for that. But it does seem like perhaps we all need to update our mental models and realize that young men are being really affected and targeted by these harmful things.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah. A UC San Francisco study by Dr. Jason Nagata found a 400% increase in eating disorder hospitalizations among boys since 2002. So boys are not immune to body image pathology and issues. But I think perhaps they are less seen in the frameworks that we have built around addressing it. Like, I just don't. I don't think that we are like, we have not updated our information about what and who gets impacted by eating disorders and body dysmorphia and self harm around it. And just another thing that I wanted to. To say while we're making these comparisons to the pro Anna pro eating disorder, mostly content for and by women and girls, largely those communities were girls harming themselves. Again, we do have figures like Liv Schmidt, who ran an online group where you could pay to get access to her tips and tricks for disordered eating. So it's not entirely, but mostly it is like self harm. But Peters has demonstrably harmed other people. You know that girlfriend that he injected with the peptides, the women that he provoked a fight with to post online to get engagement. The person he hit with that cyber truck. He doxed a reporter who was trying to interview him. He openly advocates for teenage boys to inject themselves with unregulated hormones. And he earns a hundred K a month in doing it. So that financial incentive to continue this behavior and for other people to continue behavior like this is obviously enormous. And that takes me back to my question about the role in media amplifying him.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Right, the incentives for him, but also the incentives for media who might want to cover him.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. So that's a piece of this I want to really dig into because I do think it is incentivized to write about him. You know, in the six weeks following him reportedly hitting a guy with a cybertruck while live streaming, Peters went from this well known subcultural figure to essentially a mainstream Internet celebrity. And here's a rundown of all the places in the aftermath of that that wrote pieces on him. There was a piece In Wired in September 2025, it was his first major outlet profile that called him one of Looks Maxing's most popular influencers. That Atlantic piece, which called him the newest star of the movement, that January 2026 Rolling Stone piece that called him a premier figure in Looks maxing, that piece did also note that Peters fixation on optimization is inseparable from aggressive sexism. There was a piece in the Guardian in January calling him one of the most prominent influencers in the looksmaxing community. A full profile at GQ in February, that New York Times piece in February, which was a major, major profile, and then later devoted an entire episode of the Daily to him in March. And then walking in a Looks Maxing themed Runway for designer Elena Velez just days after he was arrested. And so I think the outlets and the institutions clearly get some sort of benefit from the association with him. Not necessarily like critical association, but association that traffics in the sort of cultural cachet or perceived cultural relevance of what he is doing. And I think each one of those is a signal that made the next one that followed more and more justified. Right. Each one raised his income, raised his platform, built out this cultural cachet and legitimacy, which we know is exactly what these guys are after. And so I do think it's like they're kind of working in tandem here, where, you know, the outlet that writes about him in this particular kind of way gets a raised profile and so does he. So it's like, you know, one hand washes the other kind of thing. I think, again, I know this is a tough line to walk, but that's just my, that's just like my take on what's happening here.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

It seems fair. It seems warranted. I mean, you go through that timeline and it that's so many major profiles from major publications within like a month of each other. You know, national politicians would be thrilled to have that kind of attention. Yes, there are tons of a list celebrities who did not receive that much attention in January and February of this year.

[Bridget Todd]

Exactly. And this is somebody who does not even really have that big of a footprint. He certainly didn't have that big of a footprint to warrant this much ink at the time. More after a quick break.

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[Bridget Todd]

Let's get right back into it. Media scholar Whitney Phillips has coined this phrase the oxygen of amplification. And that's the idea that the coverage of extremist figures, even sometimes critical coverage, provides them the attention that sustains them. A 2025 peer reviewed paper found that, quote, despite the best intentions of journalists, news media has unwittingly played into the hands of the contemporary far right. And so that's kind of what I think is going on here, that in some instances perhaps they're sort of being played. But with the New York Times, I don't know. I, I don't, I'm not comfortable saying that the New York Times is being played at a certain point. Like if you want to be played, are you still played?

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

You know, yeah, it's a great question. If you're just like happy to go along with being played, is it being played? Great question.

[Bridget Todd]

Tess Faye, in that Salon piece that I mentioned earlier, really put it well. She writes, journalists covering figures like Clavicular are being pulled into a system where their own professional criteria, novelty, conflict and visibility are being gamed by subjects who understand the attention economy better than most of the reporters covering them. She also noted that that New York Times profile, which I completely agree with, never quite grapples with the women that Peters has harmed. The teenage boys injecting steroids into themselves at his instruction or the reporter on whom he sicced an anti Semitic mob. And that ultimately the form of coverage these figures get really does matter. Ezra Marcus, writing at the Intelligentsia, described Peters as, quote, something of an edgelord folk hero whose profit strategy uses shock jock tactics with straightforward marketing that like shock jock folk hero profit strategy framing I think is exactly the heart of the problem here because it treats what I think is objectively self destructive behavior as a kind of brand strategy, not as symptoms of a mental illness of some or some larger issue. And I think it's worth kind of like saying plainly that this is not just a body image stories. Peters has also been described by the Forward as a right wing extremist to watch. In 2026, Charlie Wurzel of the Atlantic writes about how Peters revels in anti Semitism. He's well known for using racist slurs in his live stream. And as we already discussed, we know that looks maxing ideology and the broader white nationalist movement it represents are not adjacent. They are like the same. That Venn diagram is like essentially a circle. And so the choice to cover him as a just a cultural phenomenon, I think it is a choice that has wildly dangerous, harmful impacts. Not just for Peters, for all of

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

us, but as we talked about it, it is hard to know, like, what is the line? What is the right way to cover these kinds of figures? What do you think? Do you, you know, for journalists who might be listening and asking, like, well, what is the right way to cover somebody like Peters? What do you wish would have been different in some of this coverage he's gotten over the past month?

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, something that I think needs to happen is you have to give a full accounting of what it is this person has done to. And I'm not even talking about, you know, I'm talking about, like, his own words, things that he has said. I think that they're really making some editorial choices about what is and is not part of his story or an important sort of part of his story. I think a lot of the stuff that he does with, like, slurs and his antisemitism, I think somewhere along the line they've made an editorial choice that that stuff is like, just kidding or just joking and is not really important to the story of who he is. And I'd like to know why. You know, and if you're trying to be of service to your audience or your readers, why. Why have you made. How. How have you come to the conclusion that some of this stuff is not important to include for folks to understand who this person is? And if it's not important, then why are you telling me about him? Like, that's another question I would ask when he didn't have that many followers and was still a pretty niche person in this niche subculture, why was it important that I know about him? I'm not saying that it's not important, but I think that, like, you've gotta make a case for why it is that you're telling me about him. Why are the New York Times dedicating an entire episode of the Daily to him? And I think it's important to sort of end with where Peters is now, where we are in all of this. So, as I said, last week, April 14, Peters was streaming from a bar in Miami, and his friends noticed that something was Wrong. He became unresponsive. The stream cut out. The Miami Fire Department responded to the report of a 20 year old having a possible OD. That was Peters. He was hospitalized in stable condition. And then the next morning he posted that photo of himself with blood on his face and he wrote just got home. That was brutal. All of the substances are just a cope trying to feel neurotypical while being in public, but that obviously isn't a real solution. And again, he goes on to talk about how the worst part of the night was his face descending from the life support mask. And, and that's the thing that he, you know, chose to tell his followers about. That was like weighing on him after a hospitalization for an OD that happened on a livestream. He's worried about what it did to his face, what his face looks like. And it reads to me like a 20 year old who has been told by both like the community online that he came of age in by other influencers, by mainstream outlets like the New York Times who are calling him somebody who promotes handsomeness, that his worth is his appearance. And I just don't think that we would do that with someone who was struggling with a more quote, feminized version of body dysmorphia and self harm. And so since his od, he has indicated publicly that he might not be streaming that much anymore. Not because he's taking a mental health break, but because according to him, he can't stream sober. He said in a video, I ain't going to be doing any more substances for a little while, hopefully for forever. But that means I can't really irl stream anymore. So that's the thing, I can't really irl stream because as you guys know, I'm quite brutal without that. So I think I have to figure something else out. And I think that's really what it comes down to, that this is obviously somebody who is not well, who is using substances and self harm by his own words to cope. And I think that not just for him, I think that for all of us, it would behoove us if media and journalists could figure out a way to cover this person in a way that is a little more responsible and a little more ethical. And that really makes clear what it is that we're actually talking about. Because I tell you, it ain't just like some, some interesting cultural online phenomenon. At the heart of it is clearly an unwell person. And I don't think that media should be obscuring that just to get engagement. So I know that this episode has been quite a lot about Peters, but it's not even really about this one guy. It's really about what happens next. Because Peters is not going to be the last person to push harmful ideology or to try to package self destructive ideas as just self improvement. We already know that this pattern is so much bigger than any one individual. So the real question that I would ask is what role do major outlets want to play in that cycle? When institutions like the New York Times or others choose to frame these extremist figures, do they interrupt that pipeline or do they just smooth it out? Do they help contextualize harm and help their audience really understand what's at stake and who these people are? Or do they repackage it into something that feels safe or even aspirational or cool? Until it doesn't? To me, it's about whether or not this attention is becoming a form of platform building. And then you have these same systems later going on to critique these figures when it's like, wait a minute, you helped them become this big influential figure in the first place. And I want to be clear. Peters is responsible for his own actions and his own bad behavior. But shouldn't the institutions that decide what becomes visible, what gets amplified and what gets turned into a story rather than a warning sign? Like they also share some of the responsibility here. So it really isn't about this one guy. It is whether or not we've built media and digital systems that can recognize the difference between reporting on harm and is helping to repackage it and make it palatable for more and more people at scale. So I know that was a lot. I've clearly been holding in a lot of thoughts about this person and the phenomena around them. I this is again, this is one of those episodes where this is just my opinion. I really want to hear what folks think. Like, has this person come across your feed? What has your engagement with them looked like? And if you have any thoughts on how folks can do a better job, myself very much included, talking about people like this and extremist figures like this, we would love to hear it. If you're on Spotify, you can leave us a comment in our Spotify comments or shoot us an email. Maybe we'll do a follow up episode about how people feel. But yeah, that's all I got.

[Mike (Co-host or Guest)]

Well, thank you Bridget for the rundown and listeners can, yeah, leave us Spotify comments. Shoot us an email. Helloangodi Follow Bridget or the show on social. BRIDGET Marie in D.C. and just the name of the show There Are no Girls on the Internet. Thanks Bridget and I'll talk to you soon.

[Bridget Todd]

Thanks, Mike. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach [e-mail] youm can also find transcripts for today's [e-mail] There are no Girls on the Internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of iHeartRadio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our Executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and Sound Engineer Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. I'm U.S. transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. We all seem to be in a rush these days, from work to driving our kids around. But when you're behind the wheel, please do not speed. A few minutes saved by going faster is never worth the risk. So follow the speed limit, enjoy the drive, maybe bring some snacks for the kids, and know that along the way you're getting quality time with your family. Paid for by NHTSA

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[Bridget Todd]

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