Pretty, Polished, and Patriarchal: The Rise of Conservative Aesthetics

I have noticed that society is turning a little conservative, from politics to fashion. The rise of conservatism in the U.S. didn’t happen overnight. It’s been slowly creeping in over the past four years, starting with Trump’s presidency to the clean girl makeup trend, podcast debates on gender roles, and the growing obsession with the “soft girl” lifestyle.

What might look like harmless beauty routines or vintage fashion inspiration is tied to something deeper, something that quietly pulls us back into traditional and conservative ideals. These aesthetics carry weight. They reflect a cultural shift, and they’re reshaping how young women see themselves.

From Bold Beauty to Bare-Faced Subtlety

Let’s go back before 2016: bold brows, dramatic eyeshadow, matte lips in vibrant shades, makeup was expressive, unapologetic, and loud. Everyone had their own personal style and were dressed in big, bold, and bright colors. Everyone was confident. Fast-forward to now, and the beauty standard has changed. The clean girl aesthetic, with its minimal makeup and barely-there gloss, is everywhere.

At first glance, it’s refreshing. But under the surface, this trend often reinforces Eurocentric beauty norms, clear, poreless skin, slicked-back hair, and delicate features. It tells us that to be beautiful, we must be quiet, tidy, and “not too much.” It shames the bold. It rewards conformity.

When Aesthetic Becomes a Political Statement

We’re living in a strange era where the line between lifestyle and politics has become increasingly blurred. You scroll through TikTok and see a dreamy video of a woman baking sourdough in a prairie dress. At first glance, it seems peaceful and wholesome. Suddenly, it’s no longer just an aesthetic, it’s a message about control.

During the pandemic, cottagecore exploded. People were exhausted. We longed for comfort and simplicity. The fantasy of living in a cozy cottage, baking bread, and escaping the world felt healing. But cottagecore, like many aesthetics, evolved. It began to intertwine with conservative and religious values. Some creators started using the soft life and cottage core aesthetics to reject feminism, career ambition, and even sexual liberation. For some, this is rooted in Christianity or Catholicism, where submission to men and traditional roles are framed as divinely feminine.

That’s when it gets dangerous. These messages are subtle, coated in softness and nostalgia. But they promote a future where women are financially dependent on men, expected to be silent, and discouraged from speaking up or pursuing their own goals and dreams. Tradwife influencers have turned homemaking into high-performance content. Clean Girl creators set impossible beauty standards while insisting their look is “apolitical.” But there’s nothing apolitical about trends that quietly encourage women to return to tradition, to be quiet, soft, and obedient.

Creators like Nara Smith (@naraazizasmith on TikTok) and Ballerina Farm (@ballerinafarm on TikTok) post content that romanticizes stereotypical gender roles like cooking, childcare, homemaking, wrapped in perfect lighting and curated calm.

Nara Smith is a 24-year-old South African–German model and trad wife TikTok creator based in the U.S. who went viral on TikTok for her soft-spoken ASMR-style cooking videos, where she prepares dishes (and even homemade toothpaste or mozzarella) from scratch while dressed in designer outfits.

With over 11 million followers on TikTok and 6+ million on Instagram, she beautifully embodies the “tradwife” aesthetic, celebrating domestic life while sparking online debates about gender roles. She is married to model Lucky Blue Smith and they have three children, Rumble Honey, Slim Easy, and Whimsy Lou, and are expecting a fourth.

Ballerina Farm is run by Hannah Neeleman, a former Juilliard-trained ballerina turned “farmfluencer” based in Kamas, Utah. She and her husband, Daniel Neeleman, raise eight children on their idyllic 328‑acre property, sharing videos of homemade bread, milking cows, and farm‑to‑table meals on TikTok (10 M followers) and Instagram (10 M+). Still, her presence has become a major part of the conversation around modern domesticity and online “tradwife” culture.

Then there’s SheraSeven, who teaches women how to “secure” a wealthy husband, even if he doesn’t love you. Her advice includes strict, outdated rules for how women should look, act, and behave in relationships. These ideals are often sold under the popular buzzword “soft life,” but in this context, it means glorifying the role of a stay-at-home wife or girlfriend as the ultimate feminine goal. Living a soft life isn’t inherently bad. Choosing to slow down, embrace domesticity, or center peace can be healing. But it becomes harmful when it’s overly romanticized and marketed as empowerment, especially when it’s rooted in rigid gender roles and patriarchal values.

This isn’t just about women. Men are too often falling into this aestheticized conservatism through what feels like unrelated content. Many young men discover “red pill” rhetoric through YouTube, Twitch, or podcasts that appear harmless, like gaming, comedy, or commentary, only to encounter creators using dark humor, racist jokes, or sexist ideologies dressed up as “edgy.” Platforms like YouTube, Twitch, and Spotify often play a major role in this radicalization. Their algorithms prioritize engagement and frequently recommend conservative or red pill content to users, especially young men.

Creators like Andrew Tate, currently under investigation for rape and human trafficking, and controversial figures like Adin Ross or the hosts of Fresh & Fit exploit this system. Fresh & Fit, for example, openly glorifies toxic masculinity and even published a book titled Why Women Deserve Less. And despite their inflammatory content, they continue to reach millions of impressionable viewers. This kind of media doesn’t always feel political, which is why it’s so dangerous. When patriarchal and conservative ideas are embedded in entertainment and lifestyle content, they become easier to digest. They feel normal. Before long, viewers aren’t just watching, they’re believing. They’ve taken the red pill without even realizing it.

The irony of the tradwife and red pill movements is that they’re anything but traditional. Many of the so-called “traditional” wives are full-time content creators, not homemakers in the old-fashioned sense. They're online monetizing their lifestyle, brand-building on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram, often becoming the main breadwinners. Meanwhile, their husbands sit on podcasts, preaching head-of-household authority, despite not contributing financially or emotionally in the ways their grandfathers did. It's less about values and more about virality, clout-chasing wrapped in vintage wallpaper and submissive aesthetics.

Is It Really The Princess Treatment?

By now, you’ve probably heard about the “princess treatment.” For some of us, it’s the dream to be loved out loud, spoiled a little (or a lot), and cherished like royalty. It’s that soft life where your partner brings you flowers just because, surprises you with a homemade meal, or offers you their jacket without hesitation. On the surface, it feels harmless, even sweet. But recently, the conversation around this trend has taken a sharp turn.

Enter Courtney Palmer, better known on TikTok as @courtney_joelle, who’s sparked major controversy for her take on the princess treatment. Her videos, where she proudly shares that she doesn’t tie her own shoelaces or speak to waitstaff because her husband does it all, have gone viral. Her reasoning? To lean into her femininity and allow her husband to fully embrace his masculinity.

Now let’s be clear: there’s nothing wrong with wanting softness, romance, or choosing a traditional lifestyle if it’s truly your choice. But trends like this, especially when they’re rooted in rigid gender dynamics, deserve a closer look. Much like the girlboss era eventually revealed its flaws, the princess treatment and tradwife aesthetics can slide into something more harmful. They often romanticize submission and idealize a version of womanhood that erases autonomy and mutual respect.

When femininity is framed as passive and masculinity as control, we risk reinforcing old narratives that never served us. Love should be nurturing, yes, but not at the cost of agency. And femininity? It’s expansive, not a script written by the patriarchy.

It’s Not Just a Trend, It’s a Warning

We have to start recognizing that these aren't just aesthetic trends. They’re social cues. They’re political messages dressed in beige tones and blush pinks. They whisper that “good women” are quiet, submissive, and modest. And they shame those who are not. They promote misogynistic and racist ideology due to the red pill content that most men are currently seeing. 

Many of these ideals hurt women in the past, our grandmothers, our mothers. My own family members, who grew up in that era of “traditional values,” warned me: Never put a man above your dreams. Because they remember what it was like to be expected to serve before being seen. Millennials and Gen Z are among the first generations to grow up with more autonomy, more options, and the ability to create lives and careers on our own terms. We must protect that freedom.

The Future Is Loud

The world doesn’t need more girls who shrink themselves to fit into a soft mold. It needs girls who are bold, loud, complex, and fully themselves. Girls who wear glitter eyeliner one day and bare skin the next, not because it’s trendy, but because they want to.

Let this be your reminder: your worth isn’t in how soft you appear. It’s in how strong you are!

We don’t have to return to the past to find peace. We can build a future where softness and strength coexist, where freedom isn’t filtered, and your voice doesn’t need to be quiet to be heard.