WHAT WILL? –
Oct. 20, 2025 – The author G.K. Chesterton once said that “meaningless does not come from being weary of pain; meaningless comes from being weary of pleasure.” This truism seems particularly apt in the age of the smartphone: we have seemingly endless entertainment, distractions and information in our pocket…According to a new report in the Wall Street Journal, “happy pills” have been recast as a trendy lifestyle choice for young people. While antidepressant use has soared over the last decade, happiness has not. Last year, around 9 million adults and 500,000 children were prescribed antidepressants, and many of these people are now sharing their stories online. User shares per video tagged #ssri nearly quadrupled from 2022 to 2025, whilst #antidepressants has surpassed 1.3 billion views on TikTok. Influencers, some paid by Big Pharma, try to destigmatise antidepressants by reframing them as accessories for enlightened and empowered young women — just another form of self-care.
This romanticisation of mental illness is nothing new: think of the beautiful-sad-girl iconography in Sofia Coppola’s 1999 The Virgin Suicides or Angelina Jolie’s Oscar-winning role in Girl, Interrupted that same year. What is new is the speed and scale at which young women can communicate — and inevitably compete — in the aestheticisation of their suffering, and how this jars with Generation Z’s otherwise clean-cut image.
