Nene or totoy are the closest Tagalog translations for a rapidly disappearing phenomenon.

The ugly and awkward phases of youth (nicknamed the “tweens”) are dying out. Up until recently, people went through a middling phase between childhood and maturity, looking frumpy and inelegant.

You can still see some traces of this in current 2016 vs. 2026 comparisons; but you’ll also see a growing number of throwback photos showing fashionable outfits and polished looks where gangly totoy or nene photos would usually be.

“Tweens” were usually sunburnt, sporting scraped knees, rough skin, awkward-fitting clothing, and messy hair. In the late 2020s, that species seems to be endangered.

Before diving into the death of the tween phase, it’s important to note that there’s nothing wrong with taking an interest in fashion or beauty. It can drive a sense of community, creative expression and self-esteem. But it’s also worth thinking about the implications of a generation of kids that rarely, if ever, experience being blissfully unaware of their appearance.

A tween extinction isn’t just indicative of a shift in beauty trends: it also reveals changes in the values driving our culture.

Despite their laughable looks and questionable outfit choices, nene and totoy (slang terms which find their roots in the words for “young girl” and “young boy”) kids were often photographed experimenting with new friends, new hobbies and new environments. They used their transition years to explore their interests and passions freely, without fear of looking unattractive or undesirable.

Don’t blame the kids

Many children today didn’t have the same privileges afforded to them. Lockdowns limited the number of hobbies and activities children could partake in, on top of shrinking the physical environments they had access to. The pandemic years also birthed online, camera-based environments like Zoom, TikTok and other forms of media, bringing with it a habit of peering at oneself on the screen, since there was little else to do.

A video-based community also changes the visual environments that the youth grow up in. Pre-pandemic, it was rare to see celebrities, K-Pop idols or runway models up close. Today, it’s almost impossible to be online without seeing them. It is also exceedingly difficult to avoid exposure to media showing viewers how to style themselves and keep up on a slew of trends that are moving faster than ever: clean girl, siren, Pilates princess, ABG, and many more.

Rather than growing up comparing themselves to schoolmates, the youth are growing up comparing themselves to models and beauty content creators. This isn’t to say beauty standards and being looks-conscious never existed before TikTok and Reels. Hundreds of films from the 1990s and 2000s are historical proof that attractiveness has always been an issue of concern for adolescents.

But while there’s always been pressure to be beautiful, the universality of the “tween phase” in previous generations meant that this pressure could still be defied en masse — that it was still possible for most of the population to make their way through the world as ugly ducklings and still find happiness (as many of ‘90s and 2000s movies will also show).

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be beautiful, but it’s dangerous to stake too much of our time and personality on it. The ugliness and awkwardness of being totoy or nene marked a formative and crucial rite of passage. It didn’t just encourage playfulness or childlike abandon: it also built moral character.

The glow-up problem

Let’s start with a fact everyone’s been aware of for decades: Attractive people are treated better, in school, in the workplace and even in criminal trials. Pretty privilege isn’t a new phenomenon, and the increased set of advantages that come with being beautiful is a large motivator for many people to work on their appearance.

The new media environment we find ourselves in encourages and reinforces the importance of being beautiful. Pretty privilege exists, so if you want to be treated well, suck it up and glow up, argue with the beauty corporations and the influencers on their payroll. It’s easy to see what a slippery slope this becomes.

Very impressionable children (and adults) will get caught up in microtrends and spend more time and money on styling and makeup tutorials, focusing more and more of their personality on looks in hopes of receiving basic human decency from their peers. As a result, it creates the unspoken belief that people who don’t focus on their appearance are lazy and sloppy, and therefore not worth treating kindly.

Everyone becomes shallower as a result. Why is there a floor for how attractive someone needs to be before we can treat them with decency?

Does there really need to be a makeover, or a glow-up diary or a get-ready-with-me montage, before someone can be worth our time?

At the moment, the unspoken answer is yes, which poses yet another dangerous problem.

Bringing back ugly ducklings

If everyone is spending all their time on their looks, what happens to all the other interests we could be pursuing, all the discoveries we could be making, the growth we could be experiencing?

Beauty and self-expression by themselves are not bad. Fashion and aesthetics by themselves are not problematic. It’s a matter of dosage, a question of how much we should think about our appearance, before our looks consume too much of our attention and existence. The answer isn’t going to be the same for everyone, but it’s doubtful that someone’s entire life should revolve around being conventionally attractive, a look which is so temporary and ephemeral. Even chasing a natural youthfulness and beauty is impossible, for it’s designed to fade away with age.

Totoy and nene kids, the tweens and ugly ducklings, understood that there’s more to life than trends and outfits. There were sports to try, dirt roads and playgrounds to explore, books to read, meals waiting to be devoured. The death of the “ugly phase” may also mean reduced experimentation and adventurousness, which are traded for an increased focus on the benefits that come with being considered beautiful.

Much of life’s pleasures require the willingness to get dirty and scraped up. Many worthwhile pursuits require large amounts of attention and effort, leaving no room for strict beauty and wellness regiments, or time to be ever-watchful of trends and brands. There are many discoveries that won’t be made, passions that won’t be pursued, paths that would remain untrodden if we are all collectively consumed by our desire to look beautiful.

There’s more to strive for besides being attractive. How much of life will we miss out on if we’re too busy preening ourselves and admiring our reflections? To be an ugly duckling is to explore, spread our wings and find new connections and joys. As the cliché goes, to be cringe, to be totoy and nene, is to be free. (ABS-CBN News)