it originated way earlier as a way to help people who have naturally small nasal passages. i guess both mewing and chewing help widen passages. The book breath goes into details but from the perspective of health and not looks. This has been known for like 100 years but mostly dentists payed attention to it.
The fact is mewing and chewing do make a measurable difference…over time. Tiktok promotes extremes as they get more views and the more extreme the more views in a cycle of escalation. This gave birth to sad boys who see the Toyota chivalre’s and think they need the same jawline. Similar sad nonsense has been going on for women too but that has unfortunately become all but normalized.
It's amazing how they normalized fillers to the point of being hideous and convinced themselves that that's a beautiful aesthetic. The consensus seeking hive mind at work.
Thats also partially because they were told fillers dissolve and to keep getting them, when actually fillers migrate and continue to absorb water and grow, leading to puffy "pillow face".
Outcome of chronic social media exposure.