Australian journalist Adam Hegarty has officially gone viral. The 60 Minutes Australia reporter’s interviewee walked out of their interview, but that’s not why everyone is talking about Adam.
On Sunday, 12 April 2026, 60 Minutes aired an episode which featured Adam Hegarty interviewing “Looksmaxxing” influencer Clavicular, aka Braden Peters.
“Looksmaxxing” is one of the latest internet buzzwords. It’s a slang term for trying to maximise your physical appearance, i.e. your looks. It originated in male-focused online spaces like forums and migrated to Reddit and TikTok. It can range from fairly harmless self-improvement practices (like eating healthily, building your fitness and wearing make-up), to more extreme behaviours such as “bone-smashing”, which involves deliberately hitting or applying force to your facial bones (like the jaw, cheekbones, or nose) in an attempt to reshape them.
Who is Adam Hegarty?
Adam Hegarty joined 60 Minutes Australia in 2023. Prior to that, he worked for The Advertiser in Adelaide, then Network 10, before emigrating to the UK and reporting for Sky News, TRT and The Times as an overseas correspondent.
He returned to Australia in 2018 and joined 9News first as a producer, then as a reporter.
Does Adam Hegarty have a romantic partner?
In an interview with TV WEEK, Adam spoke about his then partner, and fellow 9News journalist, Amber Johnston.
“It helps having a supportive partner who is in the trenches as well,” he says. “We appreciate it’s a very specific job.
However, the couple are rumoured to have since split as they haven’t appeared in each other’s Instagram feeds since February 2025. But maybe they are still keeping their private lives off the grid.
What happened in the interview with Clavicular?
Braden Peters, aka Clavicular, walked out of the interview after what he called “the worst sequence of questions” from Adam Hegarty. First, Adam asked him if he identified with the incel community. Incel, being another slang term for “involuntary celibate”, refers to someone (usually a man) who feels they are unable to find a romantic or sexual partner despite wanting one. It has evolved to refer to someone who blames others (usually women) for their lack of relationships and holds negative views about dating and women.
“Looksmaxxing was obviously a term created by the incel community. How do you feel about being linked to that group?” Adam asked Braden in the interview.
“I’m not linked to that group in any way,” Peters replied. “Looksmaxxing is self-improvement, right? So it’s about potentially even ascending out of that category. That would be kind of one of the goals is to disassociate from being an incel and overcome that. So that doesn’t make sense.”
Adam then asked Braden why he chooses to spend time with people like the highly controversial “manosphere” influencer, Andrew Tate. Braden accused Adam of trying to make the interview “political” and walked out.
But not before telling Adam that he didn’t have the time to look into “who your wife cheated with.” When Adam responded that he wasn’t married, Braden said it was “too bad” that he couldn’t teach him about looksmaxxing so he could “switch up” his marital status.
Why is everyone talking about Adam Hegarty?
Well, simply put, the internet thinks he’s an attractive man! Plus, some find the irony in him interviewing men who are all about “looksmaxxing” when his looks are already maxxed.
Many commenters online said that Adam “outmogged” Braden, meaning Adam was more attractive than Braden. One user even said he was “completely auramogged.”
“Who’s the sexy looksmaxxed Australian doing the interview? His facial expressions are great,” wrote one user on X.com (formerly Twitter).
