Althouse: "In some ways young men have been catching up with young women over the last few years, they are more sensitive and vigilant about how they should look..."

July 29, 2017

"In some ways young men have been catching up with young women over the last few years, they are more sensitive and vigilant about how they should look..."

"...and this is becoming more acute... I think it is to do with appearance and masculinity, and the messages we absorb through social media."

From "Steroids see four-fold increase, data shows, fuelled by rise in muscle-conscious young men" (UK Telegraph).

54 comments:

Ralph L said...: 2.3% cocaine users in the 16-59 age group--that's frighteningly high, considering the low and high ends of the range are probably much lower.

The problem with steroids is that you still have to lift the weights.

How many young males watch reality TV? And look at the half naked men?; 7/29/17, 7:51 AM
traditionalguy said...: At least they still want to impress girls...I hope it is girls.

Weight lifting should made be mandatory. Just leave off the supplements and do it God's way.; 7/29/17, 7:56 AM
Ralph L said...: The Crime Survey for England and Wales is a household survey, so does not include figures for drug use among those who are homeless, in prison, or living in student halls of residence.
So its numbers are useless if you want to see the whole picture.; 7/29/17, 8:01 AM
David said...: Big with young men on the "Arab Street" too. (I'm reading a book about the lives of young men in Cairo, Egypt.); 7/29/17, 8:03 AM
Fernandinande said...: Who is using them?
Categorised as a Class C drug by the UK government, this has not stopped documented users arising from the police force in the UK (BBC, 2013), 4% of British Army soldiers (Casey et al., 2014) and 62% of all current sanctions by UK Anti-Doping for using anabolic agents.

Back in 2008, Needle exchange programmes in Merseyside and Cheshire reported a 2000% increase in the number of steroid users using the programme (Evans-Brown and McVeigh, 2008).

This is in stark contrast to the Home Office’s Drug Misuse findings (2016) which estimate that steroid use is on a downwards trend however this does rely on self-reporting and users that are prosecuted thus the validity could be questioned as steroids are not a key target on the UK Police’s strategy and would not be actively pursuing steroid users/sellers compared to drugs that have a higher class categorisation.; 7/29/17, 8:59 AM
Known Unknown said...: Wait. I thought Dad Bods were in. What's going on??!???!??; 7/29/17, 9:13 AM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: Minnesota “Car Banging” Explained

This steroid abuse explains the rash of “car banging” behaviors among Minnesota WASP (WASP, WASP) teenagers, lusting for those really long for Sam Shepard “Far North” my-horny winters - to end.

Fathers, warn your daughters: it’s the Lutefisk-Steroid homeopathic combinations that turn “car banging” into violence. Father to father warning: maybe you shouldn’t tell your daughters after all. It might be just what they want.

This is why Minnesota Muslims avoid dark alleys near the Mall of America late at night. It’s that offensive Lutefisk smell, really.

“If he asks you more than 3 questions, you better get used to the fact that you are the murderer.”; 7/29/17, 9:14 AM
William said...: I suppose it's not the worst of all hobbies, but it does seem that the rewards of body building are not commensurate with the time and effort necessary to achieve results. I understand that there are health risks associated with steroids. You can kill yourself trying to look healthy. Ironic, huh.; 7/29/17, 9:22 AM
Henry said...: Maybe it has to do with a generation of smart people telling young men they're worthless.; 7/29/17, 9:26 AM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: ... there was that experiment ... injected women with testosterone ... made them dumb as men ... loss of all that pre-frontal question-asking activity ... this is why I warn my daughters against steroid abuse when they practice winter biathlon ski-‘n-shoot sexual fantasies, targeting Justin Bieber range dummies, but their Mom, an RN, has them covered for all that, so I just shut up ...

“If he asks you more than 3 questions, you better get used to the fact that you are the murderer.”; 7/29/17, 9:29 AM
Carol said...: You'd think they'd worry about losing their hair, with all that T circulating.; 7/29/17, 9:45 AM
clint said...: In the past, women competed for men by making themselves pretty while men competed for women by making themselves rich and successful.

Now, many women are also making themselves rich and successful. (Sisters are doing it for themselves, in the immortal words of Annie Lenox.)

Should we be surprised that this would change the optimal male mating strategies?

(I self-report and apologize for all of the cis-het assumptions in the foregoing statements.

And further note that gay men have been using these "new" mating strategies for a very long time.); 7/29/17, 9:52 AM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: "Should we be surprised that this would change the optimal male mating strategies?"

Volume.; 7/29/17, 10:01 AM
loudogblog said...: I wonder if this is some sort of rebellion against the current criticisms against men for being too masculine? The more it seems that some keep pushing for a gender-neutral society, the more it seems that young people are finding ways to enhance their gender identities.; 7/29/17, 10:28 AM
rhhardin said...: Physics and math are what impresses women, guys.; 7/29/17, 10:35 AM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: rhhardin - Physics and math are what impresses women, guys.

That’s how I impress mine.

Doc Johnson's Savanna G-Spot Tickler (now on Amazon!) Vibrator Stimulator Sex Toy for Women Clitoral and G-Spot Vibrations.

Superstring her right along!

“If he asks you more than 3 questions, you better get used to the fact that you are the murderer.”; 7/29/17, 10:42 AM
mockturtle said...: There have been many eras in history when males preened for females' attention. And, of course, in the animal kingdom it is the rule rather than the exception. But the indiscriminate use of steroids is a dangerous trend and these young men will find their well-toned bodies falling apart much too soon.; 7/29/17, 10:50 AM
mockturtle said...: And, for me, nothing is a bigger turn-off than a man obsessed with his appearance.; 7/29/17, 10:52 AM
Mountain Maven said...: U.K. is not the U.S. at least not yet.; 7/29/17, 10:52 AM
rhhardin said...: James Tate The Blue Booby.

...Also, the males do not
make fools of themselves
chasing after the young
ladies. Rather,
they gather the blue
objects of the world
and construct from them

a nest—an occasional
Gaulois package,
a string of beads,
a piece of cloth from
a sailor’s suit. This
replaces the need for
dazzling plumage;
in fact, in the past
fifty million years
the male has grown
considerably duller,
nor can he sing well.
The female, though,

asks little of him—
the blue satisfies her
completely, has
a magical effect
on her...; 7/29/17, 11:03 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: I think that this is going to be interesting to see how it turns out. Guys use steroids to get hot bodies for the gals, but then the steroids cause them to act in stereotypeical male ways, esp as to anger and dominance. My partner ran into this about two decades ago, shortly before we got together. She ran into a guy on a plane flight with a very buff, cut, body. Her father and brothers lifted, and got really big, so she is attracted to this sort of thing. Turns out, he was very controlling, and had a short temper. And spent 4 hours a day in the gym working off the steroids. Both of which she doesn't do well with. For example, he ordered her soup that she couldn't eat, then got upset when she wouldn't eat what he had ordered. Learned later, there is a name for the anger issues: "roid rage". She now has gotten pretty good at detecting the subtle signs in their faces that indicate long term steroid use. Point of this though is that women are often attracted to this sort of thing, which may be fine, if they are comfortable in a subordinate position. It works less well when the woman is professionally in the superior position, and is, essentially, buying a trophy husband. Male steroid use tends to accentuate male dominance, not submission - and it also can make guys horny, which often pushes against sexual exclusivity.

Of course, the other way to get nice pecs, abs, etc, is with implants. Apparently, according to her, there is more and more of this on TV. She can detect it by the way that the muscles move - or really don't move, when the guy moves. But in their defense, women fake it too - last night she asked whether the tits of one of the main characters on McGuyver were fake. Duh. She was lying on her back, and they were still sticking straight up. She taught her daughters this when they were at the age when they were starting to worry about this with other females, and likely would have done the same with sons and implants (or roid face), if they had been as insecure with their bodies, as young adolescent girls are with theirs.; 7/29/17, 11:04 AM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: The Blue Booby.

Beautiful.

It's also why males prefer dull black ops. Protects gene pools.

Beautiful, poem. Keeper.; 7/29/17, 11:07 AM
YoungHegelian said...: I see mostly (young) men in DC who are just suspiciously too buff. But what's weird is that they're not "skinny" buff, meaning all muscle & no fat. Combine that with any hint of "chipmunk cheeks" & you've got a "roid" user. But, it's not just steroids. It's Human Growth Hormone, testosterone, androgen, waaaay too much protein to be good for your kidneys, & I'm sure other stuff I don't know about.

What's really ironic? A man's testicles & their hormonal output is a finely balanced thing. When you start messing with steroids or male hormones, that balance is disrupted. The testicles reduce their hormonal output, & it doesn't come back to normal when the guy stops using. In the long term, a steroid or hormone using man will ending up more "feminized" than a man who never used the drugs.; 7/29/17, 11:07 AM
JAORE said...: Steroids for appearance sake?

What could go wrong?

Of course the bulk of these guys begin in the age range where young men feel they are:
1. Invulnerable; and/or
2. Don't think they will, or even understand why one would want to, grow old.; 7/29/17, 11:07 AM
My name goes here. said...: 90% of what men do, including vanity and their appearance, is in an effort to woo, keep, or protect women.

There *might* be some sort of "lets make our fashion different than (choose one: current trends, our elders, good taste)" rebellion but it has several magnitudes less influence than that 90%.; 7/29/17, 11:15 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: This latter reminds me of another of her stories. She ran into one of the local TV personalities one night at a club (I think it was the night that I met him, but may have been on another occasion when they ran into each other). He asked her out. And her response was that she didn't go out with guys who wore more makeup than she does (which isn't much, even when going out to clubs). He wore it professionally, so pretty much had to do it in real life, esp when out at night. But she has noticed more and more guys accentuating this and that with makeup. Or, even surgery - cheeks, jaws, and even dimples (she notices them because her son has such, naturally).; 7/29/17, 11:18 AM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: mockturtle said...
And, for me, nothing is a bigger turn-off than a man obsessed with his appearance.

7/29/17, 10:52 AM

Yep. Slobs are unappealing - but so are peacocks.

A friend who broke up with a very handsome and very vain man told me "I was tired of being locked in deadly competition with him for use of the bathroom mirror."; 7/29/17, 11:25 AM
Mark said...: And, for me, nothing is a bigger turn-off than a man obsessed with his appearance

There is nothing new here. It is just another variety of the metrosexual. And part of that culture which has an obsession with the body, from hair to muscles to genitalia. A culture that is invariably on the left, which believes that they can reinvent humanity. If many of these guys were women, they'd probably be wearing pink hats that are meant to look like vaginas on their heads.

And, no, it is not women that they are in to.; 7/29/17, 11:30 AM
Fernandinande said...: Feste said...
injected women with testosterone ... made them dumb as men ...

Testosterone improved some aspects of spatial abilities in women.; 7/29/17, 11:41 AM
Fernandinande said...: "The relationship between women’s objective physical attractiveness and their dieting motivations and behaviors may depend upon their social environment—specifically, their romantic partners’ attractiveness—such that less attractive women with more attractive partners may be particularly motivated to diet."; 7/29/17, 11:43 AM
Bruce Hayden said...: Yep. Slobs are unappealing - but so are peacocks.

A friend who broke up with a very handsome and very vain man told me "I was tired of being locked in deadly competition with him for use of the bathroom mirror."

My partner is the same way. She grew up in a city with a lot of beautiful men around. Many were famous entertainers, but others were just pretty boys. A lot of gigalos And refused to date any one of them who was more vain than she about their looks (but might have made an exception for Elvis, if he had asked - but he didn't. Sexiest man she ever met, right after a concert, when he gave her a scarf as a memento). She has always demanded that the men she was with had an ego about who they were, but it could never be about their looks. And, esp if it involved primping. Dressing nice was one thing, but obsessing in the mirror was something else entirely.

As noted above, we were watching McGuyver last night, and she commented that her sister would love pretty boy McGuyver, but she wouldn't give a guy like that the time of day. Rarely a hair out of place, even after his many harrowing, often violent, escapades. Her choice is his sidekick.in real life, guys don't have hair like that without obsessing over it, combing it like girls do, using "product", etc.

One reason that I think that she, and many other women, dislike vain guys who obsess over their looks, is that they are concentrating on the appearance of male dominance, instead of the reality of it, which has typically come from success in male pursuits, such as business, the military, etc. it is superficial, and often identifies guys who lack real world successes on which to build their male egos.; 7/29/17, 11:57 AM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: "Testosterone improved some aspects of spatial abilities in women."

Plus: Better parallel parking skills. (I admit I am lousy at it unless the space is pretty big,)

Minus: A mustache.

The minus outweighs the plus.; 7/29/17, 12:13 PM
Titus said...: I do a cycle of steroids every summer. It's required in my world.; 7/29/17, 12:15 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: Fernandinande said...

Hah! Good one. It's all that interior space!; 7/29/17, 12:28 PM
traditionalguy said...: A sharp dressed man with good shoes is the opener for meeting attractive women. The women's curves and slinkyness is the opener for meeting strong men. All this other stuff is male competitiveness.; 7/29/17, 12:36 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: Wait, Fernandinande! Not so fast ...

We administered testosterone in a randomized, placebo-controlled design to 42 women.

We performed fMRI during wayfinding tasks in a recently learned virtual environment.

Testosterone improved some aspects of spatial abilities in women.

Testosterone increased medial temporal lobe activity during virtual navigation.

Fernandinande!

Just what ..

.... part

.. of ..

“Single Dose” am I failing to understand? And how were these injections made? And the placebo? And for just which feline endo felicities might testosterone serve as an, um, well, “update inhibitor”? And "virtual navigation" just what kind of VR game are they making? And when will it be out?

Fernandinande, a mere 42 women? What happened to the Latin-lover mojo? That sample enough for you? Why not be the man/the woman, and get full Six Sigma on this business, baby?; 7/29/17, 12:40 PM
bgates said...: A young man who needs to inject sex hormones in order to make his body match his self-conception is engaged in a pursuit so dangerous he should be put in prison, unless he also has his penis cut off, in which case he's a hero.; 7/29/17, 1:57 PM
wholelottasplainin said...: Feste said...
injected women with testosterone ... made them dumb as men ...

Testosterone improved some aspects of spatial abilities in women.
******************

I'd love to have some femme 'splain why throughout history almost all the major scientific and technological advances have been made by "dumb men".

Obviously it can't be that men oppress women, because that would not explain why the dumb men still made the advances.

Or is the "argument" that many more and better advances would have been made if women had been permitted to make them?; 7/29/17, 2:18 PM
jg said...: White men stole the scientific accomplishments of their wives and/or People of Color and passed them off as their own. Didn't you see 'Hidden Figures'?; 7/29/17, 3:35 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: lost my post? ... here, again next ...; 7/29/17, 3:58 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: Jay Elink said... “Testosterone improved some aspects of spatial abilities in women ... I'd love to have some femme 'splain why throughout history almost all the major scientific and technological advances have been made by "dumb men".

Fair swipe.

I recently re-read Cromer’s (sci-prof) “Uncommon Sense: The Heretical Nature of Science,” (Amazon available - easy read) which isn’t gender-argumentative. He shoots straight arrow at “dumb men” (religious) opposing “dumb men” scientists (Galileo, and such), for the better part of our existence. And aims at egocentric-magic thinking that has dominated much of our short existence.

The testosterone correlate to “dumb men” subsides with age. Discipline, like military discipline, or hard academic discipline, or learning how to rebuild your ‘57 Chevy with a Chilton’s Guide, relieves much of the duty to think, or to under-think, at younger ages, while providing safety checks for failed juvenile double-checking, via commanding officers or written manuals.

The femme element is plain absent as ‘authority’ for much of our history. Aristotle’s hysterical-women rants didn’t help, for scholastic history, still in place in much religious thought today.

Smart females know - and have known - as well, or better than males - how to play ‘the game.’ Biology teaches us so. Chinese women - watch out boy!

Cromer book. Pretty good. Amazon Kindle.

Peace; 7/29/17, 3:59 PM
Fernandinande said...: Jonathan Graehl said...White men stole the scientific accomplishments of their wives and/or People of Color and passed them off as their own.

I stole that link from an African-American female black lesbian urban Latinx woman astrophysicist of color.

Don't tell anybody.; 7/29/17, 5:09 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: "I stole that link from an African-American female black lesbian urban Latinx woman astrophysicist of color. Don't tell anybody."

Glad I didn’t see this.

Because Laslo's filming now. "African-American female black lesbian urban Latinx woman astrophysicist, Tinder Profile, ‘seeking lonely, Massive Gaulois Optical Package 98-footer. Smokin’.’”; 7/29/17, 5:22 PM
Fernandinande said...: As any sufficiently advanced technology is magic, I think our universe is held in place via gravitational containment, a la magnetic containment of plasma, inside a far bigger, far better universe where the better inhabitants of that better universe place bets on which life-form that happens to develop in our small, contained universe will be the first to discover how to communicate using radio waves. It'll take 7 billion years for Them to discover that us humans are the winners, and another 5 billion years to send us our share of the winnings.; 7/29/17, 5:27 PM
Jael (Gone Windwalking) said...: Dyson-magic, "Infinite in All Directions." We could be crashing into theirs. They, ours. If not, we'll always have the Tardis. Out.; 7/29/17, 5:41 PM
Paul Ciotti said...: "(increasingly) men are more vigilant and sensitive how they should look."

Who is this person who thinks men "should look" a certain way?

It seems to me if a man takes a shower, brushes his teeth and cleans his nails, man, that's it. He's done for the day. Let people with nothing better to do spend an hour a day in front of a mirror.; 7/29/17, 7:10 PM
I Have Misplaced My Pants said...: And, for me, nothing is a bigger turn-off than a man obsessed with his appearance.

Agree. Be scrupulously clean, take care of your grooming and hygiene, wear clothes for adult men (no cargo shorts or superhero t-shirts) that are appropriate to the occasion (put on a nice shirt and slacks for church or meet the teacher night please; likewise have work clothes for outside that you use when you get all dirty and sexy doing man stuff) and let that be the end of it. Any less is slobby; any more is, well, kinda gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But it's not attractive to most women.; 7/29/17, 11:42 PM
walter said...: I Have Misplaced My Pants said...Be scrupulously clean, take care of your grooming and hygiene, wear clothes for adult men (no cargo shorts or superhero t-shirts) that are appropriate to the occasion (put on a nice shirt and slacks for church or meet the teacher night please; likewise have work clothes for outside that you use when you get all dirty and sexy doing man stuff)
--
Right..adhere to the dictates of women and do that "man stuff"; 7/30/17, 1:37 AM
urbane legend said...: walter said...

--
Right..adhere to the dictates of women and do that "man stuff"

I call it self-respect. And I add shaving to all that. I will not leave the house with beard stubble.; 7/30/17, 6:21 AM
Mark said...: I didn't shave yesterday. And I didn't put a tie/noose around by neck either. Most Saturdays I don't.

I guess I have no self-respect.; 7/30/17, 9:17 AM
Lucien said...: I lifted weights in my high school and college days with my buddies. We liked the way it made us stronger and built muscles. We got to where we loved going to the gym so much that we just felt at loose ends on the rest days. I read Arnold's books (the autobiography as well as the Modern Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding) and he was my idol.

We never did steroids though - even knuckleheads like us knew that the ladies liked a guy who was fit and had decent muscles, but were repulsed by the steroid freaks. To be fair there were some who liked that look, just like some men like bottle blondes with fake tans and big plastic tits. But most people are attracted to something that is more natural looking.

I'd guess that these steroid users today are either narcissists doing it for themselves, gay (most gay men seem to like the muscle freak thing), or are severely deluded about what women like.; 7/30/17, 9:46 AM
mockturtle said...: Lucien says: We never did steroids though - even knuckleheads like us knew that the ladies liked a guy who was fit and had decent muscles, but were repulsed by the steroid freaks. To be fair there were some who liked that look, just like some men like bottle blondes with fake tans and big plastic tits. But most people are attracted to something that is more natural looking.

I'd guess that these steroid users today are either narcissists doing it for themselves, gay (most gay men seem to like the muscle freak thing), or are severely deluded about what women like.

This.; 7/30/17, 10:56 AM
walter said...: urbane legend said...I call it self-respect. And I add shaving to all that. I will not leave the house with beard stubble.
--
Put down the cargo shorts! In fact, no shorts period..unless the ladies green light your leg tone..
Manly..; 7/30/17, 11:18 AM
Char Char Binks, Esq. said...: It may be about looks, but it's probably also about the other half of the mating game -- competition with other men. Yes, I mean direct, physical fighting or intimidation. It doesn't mean they actually have to engage in combat, but they want to be confident that they could do so if needed, or that they could make a potential opponent back off. Muscles are just the ticket for men who want to fight, and especially for men who want to avoid fighting without cringing, running away, or losing. Sure, most women probably don't like the Hulk look, or the tanned-and-shaved body-beautiful look, and some even prefer weak, scrawny men, but that doesn't help a man who is beaten down physically or psychically by stronger men. An American could just carry a gun, but that's not an option for the British.; 7/30/17, 2:50 PM