26 People From 2007 Who Regretted Going to Hot Topic

The 2000s were a rough decade for fashion trends and moody teenagers. Emo and pop punk were in their heyday, and that mix provided some of the most horrendous looks in history. Real punk was cool, but when you add pop to it, you end up with guys highlighting their hair and gauging their ears.

Pretty much everyone who engaged in these trends seems to regret them. The guy from Smosh stopped straightening his hair, Fall Out Boy hasn’t charted in years, and there are now forty-year-old dudes walking around with huge holes in their ears and lobes that flap around in the wind like a basset hound.

Here are some of those future regretful folks back in their prime, when Hot Topic was the coolest spot at the mall.