Gen Z and millennials are obsessed with a TikTok filter that shows how you’ll look when you’re old. They’re divided about the results

The quest to set back the clock, and look youthful is an aptly old tale. But as much as we fight the course of time, either through lotions, potions, or by fruitlessly swapping blood with your 17-year-old son, wrinkles tend to come one way or another. Aging is usually a slow or incremental process, but TikTok’s aged filter is giving us an eerie preview.

The now viral filter adds wrinkles and even jowls to create an older version of the user’s face.  Some dermatologists, who to be sure have some skin in the game (literally and figuratively), claim the filter to be a largely realistic representation of how our face changes over time. 

The filter has taken off, with almost 11 million videos under it currently—even Kylie Jenner has joined in on the fun. As with most TikTok fads, viewers are divided by their reactions, as people share their shock or delight at the A.I. transformation. And unlike some trends  (like bottles exploding after being thrown down the stairs), there’s potentially a deeper meaning behind our responses to this filter.

The reactions to the aged filter can be partitioned off into a three categories. One group is simply shocked or jokingly horrified at how “bad” they look, another takes the more whimsical approach smiling with the filter, regarding their wrinkles, usually with a Hallmarkey comment like “aging is a gift” while a gentle guitar strums in the background. Finally, a portion of people take the more proactive or resistent approach, claiming that they won’t let this aging occur either through wearing more sunscreen or getting botox. Naturally, each group thinks the other is wrong.

“Images like these are powerful,” Joanna Grover, a licensed clinical social worker and author of The Choice Point, tells Fortune, these images “move us emotionally and are more likely to lead to a shift in our behavior or our desire for something.” 

The image exposes our inner anxieties. Growing old is a common fear (despite being natural part of the life cycle), a Pfizer survey from 2014 found that 87% of Americans report at least one fear regarding aging, with the most worried about the loss of physical ability. But as we get older, we start to feel less upset by the promise of getting older, as a separate survey conducted by Forbes Health found that 53% of respondents weren’t afraid of aging and became less fearful as they got older. It’s worth noting that most of the people reacting to TikTok viral videos present as younger, and the app skews to a younger audience.

Alongside a fear of aging is pervasive ageism, or bias against older people. America is an aging population with an increasingly older workforce, but that doesn’t mean stereotypes don’t abound about older people and getting older. A report from WHO from 2021 found that one in two people globally hold moderately or highly ageist attitudes. 

Societies that fear death more are more likely to fear aging and therefore exhibit ageist behaviors, explain researchers in an article for the Conversation, pointing to a study that linked the two. “In western cultures, death is often associated with aging, and vice versa. And a fear of death contributes to a fear of aging,” they added. And internalized ageism creates an ironic predicament, as negative outlooks on aging can shorten your lifespan according to a study published by the Association of Psychological Science.  

Therefore shock is likely a part of the fear of aging and just the sheer bluntness of the image itself. On the other hand, the reaction of acceptance is likely a concerted effort to fight against this fear and embrace the change (or maybe people in the filter just look better).

Either way, our minds go a little wild when we see our aged selves. “The images we focus upon result in elaborating on ‘what if,’” explains Grover, adding that one could look at the image and wonder “what if” they continue to sit in the sun without sunscreen. 

It leads to this reaction where one uses the image to see “what I can do today to make it better,” she notes, recalling a time her dermatologist showed her what would happen to her skin if she didn’t stay out of the sun. 

“This was 22 years ago, I still see that image and, yes, it has changed my behavior,” she notes. Maybe this TikTok filter will have the same effect, or it could finally lead to us chipping away at a societal obsessiveness over anti-aging. It could also just be a fad.