How Social Media Taught Gen Z to See Their Closets as Problems.

‍Overprotected offline, underprotected online

Jonathan Haidt's best-selling book The Anxious Generation argues that Gen Z, born between roughly 1995 and 2012, grew up overprotected in the physical world and underprotected in the digital one.

Offline, parents and nannies feared predators and criminals at playgrounds and in public spaces. That fear kept many children from building social relationships early and left them wary of the world around them.

Online, the opposite happened. The digital world was an unknown universe, rules varied from household to household, and few adults grasped the danger of kids and preteens starting conversations with strangers on social media.

The turning point was the iPhone. Before its 2007 launch, children were expected to play with kids they knew. Nintendo games and other electronics were part of childhood, but the iPhone and the app boom that followed (about 3,000 apps in 2008, more than one million by 2013) moved entertainment onto the screen. Children began to consume information, build relationships and seek validation from strangers on the other side of it.

From feeds to closets

The digital age has changed how we consume fashion in ways we are still working out, because today's young people face consequences earlier generations never did.

It is not only that we can buy clothes in seconds, with a small device linking our living room to a warehouse across the country. Our relationship with our clothes is now shaped by the messages and dynamics of the digital world. We no longer dress only for the people we will meet. We dress for the feed. We dress in response to it. We dress looking for a response or a validation from it. 

That shift has many pillars, and they keep changing as algorithms adapt to what consumers respond to. One stands out: the way social media sells youth, and anxiety about losing it, to every age group. It has shaped how Gen Z grew up and came to understand themselves, and it will keep shaping the generations that follow.

The obsession with youth

The fashion industry has always sold extreme standards of beauty. In the 1800s, corsets were laced so tightly that they reportedly fractured young women's bones. The message about what it takes to fit in looked attractive on the outside, while the harm went overlooked.

Today the same pressure arrives as TikTok Shop content, aimed at people of every age through their interests, demographics, budgets and insecurities. "If you hate your nasolabial folds because people automatically assign you 10+ years, you are not wrong," announces Elder Jack, a Featured Shop Creator. There are Korean beauty products for older millennials, affordable clothing for teenagers, and workout gear for aspiring young fitness creators.

Many of these products carry high average ratings and positive reviews, yet they have reportedly been advertised in misleading ways. Product pages and paid posts use video editing and, often, AI to make items seem more special than they are and to trigger fear of aging. On the other side of the screen, the viewer is led to believe something is wrong with their body, and that a product is the missing piece. “Hey guys, I bought the viral Medicube collagen jelly Cream. Second day using it and it gives skin an okay hydration but nothing stunning like TikTok videos show. They all say the glass skin looks but of course will look like that when the skin is full of products.” r/Skincare_Addiction, Reddit review from a product TikTok creators like Elder Jack advertise. 

The corset squeezed the body. The social media feed squeezes self-image, at every age and every budget.

Anxiety by design

The algorithm is a chain designed to be addictive and capitalistic. Platforms are built for engagement, engagement rewards insecurity and outrage, insecurity sells products, and young people pay the cost.

The research points the same way. Studies from the National Institute of Mental Health have associated social media use with increased depression. Research from the Child Mind Institute ties rising depression to a loss of self-esteem. The exposure to curated, perfect images is overwhelming. Beauty standards no longer live only on the covers of printed magazines and in the next Hollywood movie. They are on our phones 24/7.

Courts are starting to take the design seriously. In March, the Los Angeles Superior court brought the K.G.M. v. Meta et al. case and the jury found Meta and Google liable for designs intentionally engineered to exploit developing brains, fueling severe anxiety, depression and body dysmorphia in a 20-year-old woman. 

Influencers add to the pressure by selling the notion of a perfect life: booked trips, designer unboxings and #GetReadyWithMe videos shot against always-clean, carefully curated backgrounds. Anger pays as well. When a post provokes outrage, creators use it to push ragebait, engagement and more profit to their channels. Monetizing viewers' anger shows that creators understand what their work makes people feel, and choose to double down for the sake of ambition and a bigger following.

When brands lean into the outrage

The normalization of anger has left consumers wondering where brands' values stand when viral campaigns lean into division and outrage. American Eagle's campaign with Sydney Sweeney is one example. Some critics read the ad as promoting eugenics, pointing to the actress's line: “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color. My jeans are blue” 

Amid the controversy, and the online conversation about the harm eugenics has caused throughout history, particularly in Nazi Germany, the American clothing brand sidestepped the criticism. Its statement fueled more ragebait and discussion:

“‘Sydney Sweeney has great jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story. We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”

Investors did not seem to mind. American Eagle's shares rose 24% on August 4, 2025, a jump Axios attributed to President Trump's public praise of the ad.

In September 2026, Converse pulled an ad featuring K-pop singer Karina of aespa after critics said the imagery resembled Ku Klux Klan robes and a lynching. Nike-owned Converse said: “We’re sorry. We understand why this image is deeply upsetting and recognize that we got this wrong. We removed it from our channels and are working to remove it everywhere it appeared. This should not have happened, and we will do better.”

Converse declined to comment on how the ad was approved or what it will do to keep this from happening again. The company also paused paid social media advertising. Its silence left many followers unsure whether the ad was an oversight or a calculated strategy to profit from triggers, fear and rage.

Growing up in front of a global audience

The same open door that feeds insecurity also exposes young people to harm. An estimated 300 million children worldwide are victims of online sexual abuse, exploitation and solicitation every year. Without sufficient regulation to protect them from predators, young users remain open to unwanted comments and solicitations.

Fashion content raises the stakes. Outfit-of-the-day and #GetReadyWithMe formats put teenagers' bodies and appearance on public display, often to an audience they cannot see or vet.

Teenagers used to grow into adults in the privacy of their rooms, surrounded by family and their immediate circle. Now they grow up in front of a global audience, where the way they look shapes the way they feel at the very moment their identity, beliefs and personality take shape.

The strongest objection

Defenders of the platforms make two fair points. Parents, they say, are responsible for what their children do online. And social media has democratized fashion, opening doors that gatekeepers once kept shut.

The second point is true. Digital spaces are not inherently harmful, and the safe ones prove it. TrevorSpace, run by the Trevor Project, is a moderated community where LGBTQ+ young people from 13 to 24 can connect from anywhere in the world. Discord lets organizers build moderated spaces that people can join only by invitation. Young LGBTQ+ people who are misinformed or isolated can find information about their identity and the importance of self-expression that they would never find in a school or public library. Aspiring fashion professionals can find communities that show there is more than one path into the industry, even when family and teachers resist a creative career.

But that is the point. These spaces are good because someone designed them to be: moderated, age-bounded, built around belonging instead of engagement. That answers the first objection too. No parent can out-supervise systems engineered to capture a child's attention. Household rules matter, but they cannot replace design choices that only the platforms can make.

The platforms hold the rails

Much of the responsibility undeniably sits with the companies that run social media. They have the option to make these spaces safe, and so far too many have chosen not to.

In March, a New Mexico jury found Meta liable for violating the state's Unfair Practices Act. The state, led by Attorney General Raúl Torrez, demanded that Meta remove child predators, implement strict age verification and fix algorithmic designs that connect minors with bad actors. In August, First Judicial District Judge Bryan Biedscheid ordered Meta to pay $567 million into a youth mental health fund, on top of the $375 million penalty the jury set (Courthouse News). Together, that is a fraction of the $201 billion in revenue Meta reported for 2025. Meta chose not to comply and appealed the decision in court.

The question for fashion is what the industry does with this power. Brands advertise on these platforms, pay creators to work on them and profit from the anxieties they produce. They are not bystanders.

What we can do with our own attention

Users shape these spaces too. The comments we leave on accounts run by celebrities, news outlets, influencers and fashion brands matter. A feed full of encouraging, welcoming words invites more people to connect and to share their stories, work and talent.

Three habits would start to break the chain:

1. Scroll past what makes you angry. Hate-comments and quote-posts feed the ragebait trap, where brands care about engagement and dollar signs, not whether a comment is kind or cruel. Tap "not interested" and tell the algorithm the content does not deserve an audience.
2. Say something kind, or nothing. Encouragement on a creator's outfit post or a small brand's launch is a vote for the internet we want. This is particularly meaningful for small businesses and emerging creators who are swimming against the tide of established accounts and solid engagement.
3. Spend on purpose. Follow and buy from creators and brands that sell confidence instead of insecurity, and question any ad that tells you something is wrong with your face, your body or your age.

The fashion industry has spent centuries telling people what to fix. The next chapter should be about what to celebrate.