Welcome to Debunker, a weekly breakdown of misleading (and sometimes flat-out wrong!) news from the worlds of science, health, and more—for Beast Inside members only.
For more than a month now, YouTube creator Tina Liu has been going through life with her tongue firmly planted against the roof of her mouth. She follows an elaborate regimen for how to chew her food, and she’s making sure to breathe through her nose, all in an attempt to transform the shape of her jaw.
Liu, a Toronto resident who goes by the YouTube handle “Tina Tomato,” has become the latest YouTube user to embrace “mewing,” a controversial practice that purports to be able to transform the look of a person’s face. By keeping their tongue touching the top of their mouth and chewing plenty of gum, “mewers” believe they can develop more attractive appearances.
After weeks of doing the tongue exercises, Liu says keeping her tongue at the roof of her mouth has become a habit. She concedes that it doesn’t appear to have done much so far to change the shape of her face, but she understands why it’s taking off on YouTube.
“It’s about looks, and people are generally motivated if there is an inexpensive way—it’s basically free—to improve the way they look,” Liu said. “Why not, right?”
Mewing has been popular for years with groups of men on the fringes of the internet who are unhappy about their appearances, including men who identify as involuntarily celibate “incels.” Over the past few months, though, it’s exploded on YouTube communities devoted to self-improvement and beauty, with videos about the practice regularly racking up hundreds of thousands of views.
Liu’s one-month review of mewing has nearly half a million; the video that attracted her to the technique has more than 3 million views.
Experts say mewing is unlikely to make any difference for the devotees who have followed the tongue exercises. In fact, it might even damage their jaws.
“It’s not a position that the jaw wants to be in,” Tung Nguyen, an associate professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill’s School of Dentistry, told The Daily Beast. “But more importantly, there isn’t a shred of peer-reviewed evidence or publication that really supports that this technique has any impact on facial balance.”
“THE DEREK ZOOLANDER LOOK”
Many of the most popular videos about mewing also fail to mention that the practice’s eponymous creators have regularly faced discipline from orthodontic organizations for their outlandish ideas.
“Mewing” is named after Drs. John and Mike Mew, a father-and-son duo from Britain who have promoted mewing, which they call “orthotropics,” for decades. They claim that the “orthotropic” techniques used in mewing can be used to inexpensively, successfully mold a jaw, while traditional orthodontic methods like braces or drastic jaw surgery are more expensive. Mike Mew has become a social media star on YouTube—his channel counts more than 100,000 subscribers.
The Mews didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Mike Mew advises his YouTube acolytes to follow a number of unusual practices, many of which are meant to remind them to keep their jaws in the desired form. For example, Mike Mew says in one video that he eats with one hand stuck behind his back in his belt as a reminder to chew correctly.
“I often just take my non-dominant hand and slip it down in my belt behind my trousers,” Mew says in the video, advising viewers to “chew your food until it’s absolute mush.”
Mew’s unusual advice has made him a hero to men self-conscious about their jaw lines and other features who gather in internet forums devoted to “looksmaxing,” a subculture of people obsessed with using unusual techniques to become as attractive as possible, to share notes on mewing.
Andrew Marsh, a health and fitness YouTuber who has been practicing mewing since December, says he’s heard from many young people who think mewing will radically alter their looks.
“They express their insecurity, and it’s kind of sad,” Marsh said. “This isn’t going to transform your life completely. They have this picture in their head that they’re going to end up looking like a Brad Pitt.”
Nguyen said that people following Mike Mew’s advice are only in for disappointment.
“His tools are just variations for posturing the jaw,” Nguyen said. “Kind of like the Derek Zoolander look, if you will.”
In the most extreme cases, Nguyen warns, the most committed mewers could permanently damage their jaws if they hold the positions for too long. The good news, according to Nguyen, is that holding the mewing positions for hours at a time, day after day, is physically impossible for most people.
The Mews have frequently clashed with orthodontic authorities in the United Kingdom. John Mew had his dental license erased from the British General Dental Council in 2017 for violating patient confidentiality rules. In another ruling, the group criticized Mew’s use of orthotropics on his patients and suspended his dental license “for the protection of the public.” Mew’s license to practice has not been restored, according to the General Dental Council’s website.
Mike Mew has also faced disciplinary action. According to a document that was later deleted from the Mews’ website, the British Orthodontic Society investigated the younger Mew on a host of issues. The group’s investigator noted “grave concerns about Dr Mew’s fitness to practise,” adding that Mew’s YouTube channel promoted ideas that have “no scientific basis.”
The Orthdontic Society’s complaints about Mike Mew included criticism of his call for babies to be fed “large lumps of hard food,” rather than soft food, based on Mike Mew’s theory that it’s “very difficult” for babies to choke. The investigation noted that Mew’s claim “has the potential to cause harm or death to a baby.”
Mew was also criticized for his YouTube reviews of the bodies of celebrities like Taylor Swift and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. In one video, Mew declared Zuckerberg had sleep apnea and predicted he could die “a decade early,” a claim the orthodontics group called “inappropriate” and “irresponsible.”
The group also criticized Mew for comments praising the abdomens of a group of chained African men in a picture even though they appeared to be slaves.
“A shameful history without question,” Mew said, according to the report. “But these guys have got great abs.”
The Orthodontic Society report called Mew’s remarks “unprofessional” and “offensive.”
In late 2018, Mike Mew claimed in a video that he had been expelled from the Orthodontic Society after the investigation. The group declined to comment on whether Mew is still a member.
Despite the Mews’ history of disciplinary complaints and the practice’s lack of scientific grounding, mewing has become a YouTube phenomenon. Like Liu, Marsh told The Daily Beast that he found out about mewing through another YouTube video.
Peter Huntley, a British orthodontic specialist who has been critical of mewing, told The Daily Beast that he’s “very disheartened but not altogether surprised” that mewing is taking off on YouTube.
“Snake oil salesmen have always achieved their sales by persuasion,” Huntley wrote in an email.
Nguyen said mewing has often spread through eye-catching before-and-after pictures of people who claim they have practiced mewing—pictures he says don’t represent the average results from mewing.
“I want people to be more buyer-beware,” Nguyen said. “Don’t get caught in the hype.”
