We’re Finally Being Normal About Acne

If you were assembling a quintessential Party City–style 2020s costume, you’d have no choice but to include a sheet of neon-colored, star-shaped stickers for maximum historical accuracy. There, alongside the baggy jeans and tiny sunglasses, would be pimple patches. Bold and unapologetic, the stickers transcended their skincare category to become a full-fledged cultural touchstone, even a status marker. More broadly, they heralded the arrival of an acne-positive era, one that encouraged consumers not just to treat their acne, but to also openly embrace and celebrate it. 

As we enter the back half of the decade, however, the pimple patch is beginning to feel less like a badge of honor and more like a relic of a very specific cultural moment. In place of acne positivity, a new ethos is emerging: acne neutrality. Neither performatively celebratory nor a well of shame, the acne-neutrality mentality simply accepts breakouts for what they are: an annoying but ordinary aspect of our corporal form. And in the end, this might be the most liberating approach of all. 

The acne-positivity to acne-neutrality pipeline follows the same trajectory as the body-positivity movement, albeit condensed and sped up. Movement toward radical body acceptance first took root in the 1960s before blossoming into a mainstream perspective in the 2010s, and that’s when big brands started incorporating all shapes, sizes, and abilities into advertisements, too. Toward the end of the decade, critics argued that body positivity, while better than outright self-hate, still placed too much emphasis on our physical forms. A sense of respectful remove, they reasoned, was a more realistic mentality. 

Acne positivity exploded in the late 2010s and early 2020s, as waves of beauty ads centered and celebrated breakouts, while a number of celebrities embraced their own imperfect skin in public. They rocked texture on the red carpet, dared to skip filters on social media posts, and spoke candidly on personal complexion struggles. It’s an undeniably progressive approach, but for everyday people who struggle with more severe acne, a star’s bare-faced selfie featuring a couple of pink pimples hardly feels revolutionary, and in some cases, it can feel like yet another societal obstacle, like there’s a “right way” to have acne. Did any of those advertisements feature a truly severe case, with hormonal pustules and cracked, angry sores? The types of breakouts that are so extreme and widespread that they creep between your eyebrows and down your neck? Having acne can feel devastatingly isolating. A cheerful cheek sticker is great if you have a few errant zits, but at the height of my own battles with breakouts, I could have used every star in the pack and still needed more. What if I don’t want to celebrate the cysts so deep and angry that they make my lymph nodes swell? 

It turns out that the celebrities themselves might feel the same way. Keke Palmer has opened up about her years-long struggle with hormonal acne and her search for a permanent solution. “It hurt emotionally in a way that you can’t describe,” she told Gayle King in an interview earlier this year. “I had it all my life, and it was a burden I learned to wear, but I didn’t want it.” She hones in on a central and deeply relatable point: No one wants acne, point blank. Pretending that it’s just an inherent feature we’re fine to carry all our lives is, frankly, not the truth. Even attempts at so-called visibility gnaw at the nerve of the problem. Rachel Sennott recently revealed that an HBO executive told her, “We can keep all of this,” gesturing to her facial breakouts. Well-meaning, sure, but her acne being pointed out in such an overt way was the impetus for her to start Accutane. 

Byrdie cover girl Alix Earle’s own acne journey was a critical component in her meteoric rise to It-girl status, too, and is perhaps one of the best mainstream examples of acne neutrality in the social media age. She wasn’t shy about showing off her extreme breakouts—which seemed to stand in bracing contrast to her glamorous aesthetic and high-flying lifestyle—but she didn’t try to conceal her own feelings of insecurity or her eventual decision to start Accutane, too. Even with the release of her own skincare line, Earle was candid about using her products in conjunction with medical-grade treatments—often the only solution to yearslong complexion struggles. She doesn’t couch her self-consciousness in platitudes or try to qualify her feelings with any “but we’re all so beautiful; don’t worry about it” prattle. Does anyone want acne? No, obviously not. But should we imprison ourselves indoors until we’re completely spot-free? Of course not. 

Critically, this acne-positive era didn’t kill the acne business. A model with a breakout in a foundation advertisement didn’t inspire millions to ditch the salicylic acid and just let it ride. If anything, it transformed acne from a private insecurity into a public identity marker—one with its own products, aesthetics, influencers, and market. In fact, the acne industry is scaling by nearly 6% a year. 

From a psychological standpoint, acne is a unique ailment. “Acne often has a much deeper psychological impact than people think because it sits right at the intersection of visibility and identity,” explains Rachel Goldman, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and author of When Life Happens. “Compared to other appearance concerns, acne often creates a stronger sense of unpredictability and loss of control, which tends to increase anxiety. It can also feel more socially ‘exposed’ because it’s on the face, which is central to identity and interpersonal connection.” Neutrality might not necessarily be the solution for sufferers, however. Dr. Goldman, who incorporates CBT-based treatment, shares that she prefers to build more emotional flexibility around the issue rather than eliminate any negative feelings altogether. “So it’s less about ‘neutral versus positive’ being right or wrong and more about what helps someone move out of that rigid ‘all or nothing’ thinking—that self-judgment—and toward a more balanced internal narrative.” 

Acclaimed esthetician and brand founder Sofie Pavitt is so skilled at understanding and treating breakouts that she’s been dubbed “The Acne Queen.” For the clients who come to her New York studio in search of solutions, it’s clear that acne’s effect is inside and out—despite the uptick in positive messaging surrounding it. Pavitt says she even once saw a brand post caption that described acne as a gift. “I, for one, have never found a client to be ‘ok’ with having acne,” she says. “It’s miserable, and getting it clear for them is always my main goal.” Pavitt takes a measured approach to the whole concept: Acne is normal, but it’s also normal to not want it (and to want to clear it up). With patience, consistency, and possibly professional help, she says, that is indeed possible. 

Regardless of whether acne neutrality is ultimately more beneficial than outright positivity, one thing is certain: It definitely asks less of us. In a culture that increasingly asks individuals to build identities around every visible aspect of ourselves, something is refreshing about that restraint. Maybe I don’t want to be an acne warrior or feel like I’m making a statement every time I leave a cyst unconcealed. Perhaps we can just let a pimple be a pimple.