![\"Chat](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/SEI_255769684-433e.jpg\")
\n\t\tWomen are asking ChatGPT to objectively analyse their appearance \u2013 so, naturally, I also gave it a go (Picture: Owenr Supplied)<\/p>\n
\t\t
\n\t\tWomen are asking ChatGPT to objectively analyse their appearance \u2013 so, naturally, I also gave it a go (Picture: Owenr Supplied)<\/p>\n
If you, like me, are an unemployed millennial woman who likes makeup and spends upwards of four hours a day on TikTok<\/a>, you also might have recently reached the \u2018ChatGPT<\/a> helped me glow up\u2019 side of the app. <\/p>\n And if you, like me, took years of emotional excavation and experimental haircuts to glow up on your own, you might also feel a little upset by this.<\/p>\n This latest phenomenon involves a bunch of young women on ChatGPT uploading photos of themselves to the AI assistant<\/a> and telling it to make them hot(ter). They\u2019re asking it to act as \u2018an elite personal stylist\u2019, for example, and \u2018objectively\u2019 analyse their face shape, read their seasonal colours, determine their best hair length, and suggest where they might want to try some filler for \u201coptimal facial balance\u201d\u2014optional.<\/p>\n And the women are happily obliging. They\u2019re cutting their hair, buying brand new makeup, and booking expensive microneedling <\/a>appointments. I even saw one girl start a supplement <\/a>regime based solely on the computer\u2019s recommendations. (IMO, not to be advised without consulting your doctor.)<\/p>\n There was a lot I was immediately bothered by about this\u2014 such as the willing handover of our faces to tech overlords who may eventually make AI porn<\/a> out of us. But I was most bothered by the part of the glow-ups we can\u2019t see: what\u2019s lost when we outsource our self-construction.<\/p>\n Of course, like any dutiful writer, I wanted to see if the TikTok girls had a point, so tried an AI glow-up for myself.\u00a0<\/p>\n To get a proper ChatGPT glow-up, it\u2019s recommended to upload a bare-faced photo of yourself in natural light, to get a real sense of what\u2019s wrong with you. But I have a Capricorn mother for that \u2013 and if my face is going to end up in, say, some cyptocurrency commercial<\/a> I don\u2019t get paid for, I at least want to be wearing mascara.\u00a0<\/p>\n So I took a selfie in front of my desk after I\u2019d already gotten ready for the day and asked for the standard workup: \u2018What makeup and skincare would you recommend for me?\u2019<\/p>\n \t\t Whoever trained ChatGPT taught it well, as it knew to start with a compliment. \u2018You already have beautiful skin\u2013clear, glowy, and balanced,\u2019 it simpered. \u2018So this is about enhancing radiance and maintaining elasticity.\u2019 Then it went on to suggest several basic skincare products I already have in my medicine cabinet: cleanser, vitamin C, moisturizer, retinol and sunscreen.\u00a0<\/p>\n The makeup and hair results were equally as meh, suggesting traditional styles and popular products that would, if nothing else, ensure I look like everyone else\u2013soft layers with long bangs, a serum foundation, a peachy rose blush and a champagne highlighter.\u00a0<\/p>\n I was a little disappointed. I either wanted to be told I was drop-dead gorgeous or ripped to shreds, so I tried to get it to do the latter.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018What else might make me look better?\u2019 I wrote. \u2018Include treatments such as Botox and filler, etc.\u2019<\/p>\n That\u2019s when AI took the gloves off.<\/p>\n \u2018Suggested enhancements\u2026\u2019 it wrote next to the sparkle emoji, before listing off corrections for each of my features: under-eye filler (\u2018to brighten\u2019), a slight brow lift, subtle eyelash enhancement, light plumpness to my upper lip \u2018for balance\u2019, contour definition at the jaw (filler), light cheek volume to lift the midface, and slight Botox on the forehead.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018Overall,\u2019 it added, it was trying to \u2018provide a slight symmetry correction, but nothing too uncanny valley (aka CGI-like).\u2019<\/p>\n I asked if it could apply the tweakments it suggested to my photo, and here\u2019s what I got:<\/p>\n \t\t Subtle, indeed.<\/p>\n The whole thing made me pretty sad. It made me think about how I would feel if I had this technology when I was a teenager or in my early 20s, back before I learned how to fill in my eyebrows or that how you look can\u2019t solve all your problems.<\/p>\n Not to be Grandpa Simpson shaking my cane at the clouds, but back in the late 90s, your ugly, awkward years were usually\u2026 ugly and awkward. There was little hope for the clunky and inept among us. High Street makeup was chalky, and we straightened our hair with an iron. And it wasn\u2019t until my 20s that I encountered body glitter for the first time in the wild.<\/p>\n And before that, pre-Internet, it was even harder to look like the person you wanted to be. As young teens, we searched high and low for speciality items that spoke to us. We had to put in real miles\u2014at the mall, thumbing through magazines and catalogues, all to find the specific accoutrement that would represent who we were.<\/p>\n \t\t For me, one of those was a pair of shoes.<\/p>\n I\u2019d never seen anything like them. They were wild. Big, loud and silver. I was convinced they were the lynchpin missing from my life, the key that would unlock sudden popularity and universal adoration.<\/p>\n They were gorgeous and unique, so of course my mom didn\u2019t get them. My dad didn\u2019t either. They both routinely referred to them as \u2018hideous\u2019 and \u2018clodhoppers.\u2019 It didn\u2019t matter, though. I loved them.<\/p>\n While writing this piece, thinking back on them fondly, I wondered if I could find them. I did, on eBay. And\u2026<\/p>\n \t\t These shoes dared to ask: what if Bozo did Ketamine?<\/p>\n My mom\u2019s never been more right. They\u2019re giving IT does acid with the crew from Medieval Times. They\u2019re giving \u2018I am a bridge troll, small and clever, answer my riddle or enter never.\u2019<\/p>\n But they meant so much to me. Not only did no one else in my school have them \u2013 for good reason, I can see now \u2013 but I sourced them myself. I found them in the back of a teen catalogue, bought them with my own money, and had to fill out an IRL order form to get them, which makes cringing at them that much sweeter.<\/p>\n Don\u2019t get me wrong, it\u2019s not that I think young women should have to suffer because I did \u2014 I\u2019m not a boomer. It\u2019s more that, as women, I want us to keep as many unnecessary shoulds out of our lives as possible.<\/p>\n Womanhood is a tornado of shoulds that only get louder and harder to solve as you get older.<\/p>\n Should you take that job? Meet up with that guy? Start wearing bronzer? Move across the country, get a red light mask, go to therapy? Stop therapy, lose 15 pounds, fix your screen time? Should you have a kid, stop the medicine, go high protein?<\/p>\n We don\u2019t need any more shoulds, especially if they come from robots in fake lab coats. Besides, the AI isn\u2019t even telling us what\u2019s beautiful; it\u2019s regurgitating everything it\u2019s ever seen online. It\u2019s pulling a statistical average. There\u2019s a chance your upper lip is fine the way it is.<\/p>\n Self-expression is the project of a lifetime. It\u2019s hard and tiresome. It takes trial and error, risk and failure, and really ugly shoes. But it\u2019s also deeply rewarding, continuously having to find yourself somewhere amongst the experiments.<\/p>\n It seems like it\u2019s one of the only parts that\u2019s up to us, so maybe it\u2019s time to try to hold on to the parts we get to choose.<\/p>\n Arrow Arrow![\"Nicole](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/unnamed-e232.jpg\")
\n\t\tI wasn\u2019t going to do this without mascara (Picture: Owner supplied)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/unnamed-d1bc.png\")
\n\t\tChatGPT\u2019s interpretation of my face with tweakments (Picture: Owner supplied)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/nicole-james-chatgpt-glow-up.png\")
\n\t\tBefore and after my glow up (Picture; Owner Supplied)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/unnamed-1-aa11.jpg\")
\n\t\tI was sure these shoes would unlock universal adoration for me (PIcture: Owner Suplied)<\/p>\n
\nMORE: ITV legend speaks out after influx of messages and urges fans to \u2018please listen\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n
\nMORE: Here\u2019s why Keir Starmer thinks technology will actually make us \u2018more human\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n