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marieprem08's review
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.0
Very informative but some repetitive parts
unladylike's review
2.0
Wow, this book was infuriating to read so much of the time, but at the same time, I'm glad I stuck with it despite wanting to figuratively throw it in the trash halfway through. Is that my testosterone talking? For context, I am a transgender woman with a currently testosterone-dominant system. I have taken T blockers and I have taken estradiol for lengths of time, but ultimately had too many negative health effects combined with the social problem that no matter how much I might medically transition, my body and gender put me in danger and most of the world will still perceive me as male or as some Subversion Other. I'll have to come back to my own personal experience more later, either in this review or in an independent essay, but lez get back to the book itself.
I listened to this book because I was looking for [b:Testosterone: An Unauthorized Biography|44326298|Testosterone An Unauthorized Biography|Rebecca M. Jordan-Young|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1570715358l/44326298._SY75_.jpg|68879597] but that title isn't currently available as an audiobook. Although that "Unauthorized Biography" was published less than three years ago, Carole Hooven's polemic tome comes fresh on its heels and sets itself out to disprove some of the main ideas of that book, naming and quoting it several times.
It's possible my initial distaste for this book was exacerbated by the author's tone of voice, especially in the first half: she sounds utterly condescending and resentful, and fails to address the Trans Question until late in the book. This is ironic because it starts and finishes with an anecdote about the difficulty she's had in critiquing a particular lecture based purely on its argument rather than her overwhelming impression that the lecturer is an "asshole." For me, Carole Hooven is an asshole no matter how much of her scientific data is valid.
Essentially, Hooven is an essentialist when it comes to gender. For her, a body registering more testosterone than estrogen is a man, and vice versa. Obviously I take issue with this, but it's a problem that might have been alleviated with a prominent disclaimer about language and definitions at the preface. I understand that it's clunky to replace every instance of "men" with either "cis men" or "bodies with testosterone-dominant systems" or "people I perceive to be male" depending on the intent. But seriously, even if I had read this book - published in 2021 - back in 2010, it would have seemed crudely dated.
Okay, I'm going to take a breath, attempt to regulate the spike of T I'm likely experiencing due to the ways this book agitates me, and instead copypasta the notes I wrote from it while listening:
I am feeling so on-guard, suspicious, and cautious while listening to this book. Is it going to be polemical? She’s rejecting recent scientific books that discredit biological gender essentialism, but I fear she’s creating a straw man, because I don’t know a single trans person who would claim that our hormones *only* affect our genital development.
She keeps including “pugnacious” as a quality of organisms with testosterone-dominant systems. I wondered what the precise definition is. “eager or quick to argue, quarrel, or fight.” Yyyyyuup! Would that character trait that I’m not so fond of diminish if I had continued with HRT?
“Androgens determine our gender identity.” She says “feminist” and “accused of sexism” with condescension and disgust.
Men dominate in all categories of violent crimes. However, within intimate partnerships, in heterosexual relationships in the West, the rate of physical violence inflicted by females and males is actually about equal. But the severity of that harm is significantly higher when committed by males.
While discussing rates of murder, physical partner abuse, and rape, one major thing that occurs to me that she hasn’t mentioned is that men would experience a different sense of internal and cultural shame and likely are much less likely to report or admit to friends or officials when they have been physically or sexually abused. No woman has been arrested or convicted of rape, she says. I don’t believe this is due simply to estrogen vs testosterone, but by the way our culture defines rape and only believes it happens from someone with a penis to someone with a vagina (or from a man to a younger boy).
Difference between proactive aggression and indirect aggression. (maybe around 55% in the book?)
When taking T samples from Brazilian and Italian male fans during the World Cup between those teams, what if they had also measured the T of the women who were also aggressively interested in the match? I hypothesize that spectator sports are one of the great arenas in which women are nearly as aggressive and excited as men (though there’s likely still a major gap).
“If you shot up a bunch of Buddhist monks with T, it would lead not to violence, but to random acts of kindness.” - T causes effects based on what the situation, individual, and environment call for to bring success, basically. It doesn’t turn the meek into warriors.
Scientists still don’t know *how* our brains and testes are able to generate such rapid amounts of T within minutes in response to different situations.
Males (those with T) have increase in dopamine even after ejaculation when presented with a *different* potential female sex partner (in both mice and men). M are more likely to desire more partners than F. But both are equally interested in forming a long-term partnership.
“Men from low socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to get praise for [having relatively a lot of sexual partners].”
1 in 200 men alive today have Ghengis Khan as an ancestor because he spawned probably hundreds, and his sons were similarly promiscuous!
She thinks for humans, evolutionarily it has been in our best interest for survival for a mother and father to stay home monogamously (though the male impregnating others throughout his life also fits with the strategy).
Says only non-human species that has ever been seen to include exclusively homosexual variants is sheep.
Says research across diverse cultures supports the stereotype as true that gay and lesbian people tend to work in fields dominated by the other sex and to self-describe as less masculine or feminine, respectively. (E.g. lesbian mechanics and gay flight attendants)
Long-term studies she cites suggest early life “cross-gender tendencies” can be used predictively towards adults who are homo or bisexual.
CAH girls - who are exposed to a higher level of T in the womb, are much more likely to grow up and be attracted to women (“not strictly heterosexual”) - 30% vs. gen pop ~4%
CAIS girls (immune to androgens)
Her continued use of “MTF” and “FTM” in particular makes me feel like this would have been dated if I had read it 12 years ago when I had first come out.
Says testosterone is an important part of the equation in the general occurrence of sexual assault.
In CA, “rape” requires a *penis* penetrating a vagina, not just a finger!!! (only “sexual assault”). This author follows that guidance in how she describes Brock Turner.
At the end, she compares being gay or trans to having malaria - i.e. just because something might be natural doesn’t mean it’s good.
Never discusses differences in traditional cultures with matriarchs in power and/or records of almost zero instances of rape, such as the Haudenosaunee or Cherokee.
I listened to this book because I was looking for [b:Testosterone: An Unauthorized Biography|44326298|Testosterone An Unauthorized Biography|Rebecca M. Jordan-Young|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1570715358l/44326298._SY75_.jpg|68879597] but that title isn't currently available as an audiobook. Although that "Unauthorized Biography" was published less than three years ago, Carole Hooven's polemic tome comes fresh on its heels and sets itself out to disprove some of the main ideas of that book, naming and quoting it several times.
It's possible my initial distaste for this book was exacerbated by the author's tone of voice, especially in the first half: she sounds utterly condescending and resentful, and fails to address the Trans Question until late in the book. This is ironic because it starts and finishes with an anecdote about the difficulty she's had in critiquing a particular lecture based purely on its argument rather than her overwhelming impression that the lecturer is an "asshole." For me, Carole Hooven is an asshole no matter how much of her scientific data is valid.
Essentially, Hooven is an essentialist when it comes to gender. For her, a body registering more testosterone than estrogen is a man, and vice versa. Obviously I take issue with this, but it's a problem that might have been alleviated with a prominent disclaimer about language and definitions at the preface. I understand that it's clunky to replace every instance of "men" with either "cis men" or "bodies with testosterone-dominant systems" or "people I perceive to be male" depending on the intent. But seriously, even if I had read this book - published in 2021 - back in 2010, it would have seemed crudely dated.
Okay, I'm going to take a breath, attempt to regulate the spike of T I'm likely experiencing due to the ways this book agitates me, and instead copypasta the notes I wrote from it while listening:
I am feeling so on-guard, suspicious, and cautious while listening to this book. Is it going to be polemical? She’s rejecting recent scientific books that discredit biological gender essentialism, but I fear she’s creating a straw man, because I don’t know a single trans person who would claim that our hormones *only* affect our genital development.
She keeps including “pugnacious” as a quality of organisms with testosterone-dominant systems. I wondered what the precise definition is. “eager or quick to argue, quarrel, or fight.” Yyyyyuup! Would that character trait that I’m not so fond of diminish if I had continued with HRT?
“Androgens determine our gender identity.” She says “feminist” and “accused of sexism” with condescension and disgust.
Men dominate in all categories of violent crimes. However, within intimate partnerships, in heterosexual relationships in the West, the rate of physical violence inflicted by females and males is actually about equal. But the severity of that harm is significantly higher when committed by males.
While discussing rates of murder, physical partner abuse, and rape, one major thing that occurs to me that she hasn’t mentioned is that men would experience a different sense of internal and cultural shame and likely are much less likely to report or admit to friends or officials when they have been physically or sexually abused. No woman has been arrested or convicted of rape, she says. I don’t believe this is due simply to estrogen vs testosterone, but by the way our culture defines rape and only believes it happens from someone with a penis to someone with a vagina (or from a man to a younger boy).
Difference between proactive aggression and indirect aggression. (maybe around 55% in the book?)
When taking T samples from Brazilian and Italian male fans during the World Cup between those teams, what if they had also measured the T of the women who were also aggressively interested in the match? I hypothesize that spectator sports are one of the great arenas in which women are nearly as aggressive and excited as men (though there’s likely still a major gap).
“If you shot up a bunch of Buddhist monks with T, it would lead not to violence, but to random acts of kindness.” - T causes effects based on what the situation, individual, and environment call for to bring success, basically. It doesn’t turn the meek into warriors.
Scientists still don’t know *how* our brains and testes are able to generate such rapid amounts of T within minutes in response to different situations.
Males (those with T) have increase in dopamine even after ejaculation when presented with a *different* potential female sex partner (in both mice and men). M are more likely to desire more partners than F. But both are equally interested in forming a long-term partnership.
“Men from low socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to get praise for [having relatively a lot of sexual partners].”
1 in 200 men alive today have Ghengis Khan as an ancestor because he spawned probably hundreds, and his sons were similarly promiscuous!
She thinks for humans, evolutionarily it has been in our best interest for survival for a mother and father to stay home monogamously (though the male impregnating others throughout his life also fits with the strategy).
Says only non-human species that has ever been seen to include exclusively homosexual variants is sheep.
Says research across diverse cultures supports the stereotype as true that gay and lesbian people tend to work in fields dominated by the other sex and to self-describe as less masculine or feminine, respectively. (E.g. lesbian mechanics and gay flight attendants)
Long-term studies she cites suggest early life “cross-gender tendencies” can be used predictively towards adults who are homo or bisexual.
CAH girls - who are exposed to a higher level of T in the womb, are much more likely to grow up and be attracted to women (“not strictly heterosexual”) - 30% vs. gen pop ~4%
CAIS girls (immune to androgens)
Her continued use of “MTF” and “FTM” in particular makes me feel like this would have been dated if I had read it 12 years ago when I had first come out.
Says testosterone is an important part of the equation in the general occurrence of sexual assault.
In CA, “rape” requires a *penis* penetrating a vagina, not just a finger!!! (only “sexual assault”). This author follows that guidance in how she describes Brock Turner.
At the end, she compares being gay or trans to having malaria - i.e. just because something might be natural doesn’t mean it’s good.
Never discusses differences in traditional cultures with matriarchs in power and/or records of almost zero instances of rape, such as the Haudenosaunee or Cherokee.
micahhortonhallett's review
4.0
It's not often that a book can shift your core beliefs, but this one did (a bit) through a mixture of the personal and the scientific, without being dogmatic, oppositional, or arrogant. (Although there was some unnecessary eye-rolling at social scientists in the field of gender and sexuality).
aorth's review against another edition
4.0
I'd have to read this a few times to remember the all the specifics about differences of sexual development, but there is no doubt that testosterone is a hell of a drug! I found it interesting that there are so many (26?) hormones, and that testosterone is required to make estrogen.
bootman's review
5.0
If you didn’t read this book, based on some of the backlash as well as discussions in the media about the book, you’d think the entire thing was about the trans debate. While Carole Hooven does touch on these topics in a few different chapters, the book is so much more than that. I’m more of a psychology person than a biology person, and biological topics usually go way over my head, but Hooven is clearly an incredible teacher. She was able to explain everything from fetal development to puberty and so many other biological factors by making great analogies and talking in a way that the average person can understand. As a parent, I’ve been curious about topics of how gender norms shape children versus biological factors as well as how testosterone plays a part in aggression.
This is an incredible book, and thank goodness for people like Carole Hooven. I can’t imagine trying to be a scientist simply studying what you’re interested in and getting dogpiled just for discussing your findings. It’s clear throughout this book that Hooven is an open-minded, caring, and compassionate person. When touching on sensitive subjects, I saw her go above and beyond to be careful of her language and to clarify as much as possible. This book is great, and I hope people gain a lot more from it than the conversations around transitioning.
This is an incredible book, and thank goodness for people like Carole Hooven. I can’t imagine trying to be a scientist simply studying what you’re interested in and getting dogpiled just for discussing your findings. It’s clear throughout this book that Hooven is an open-minded, caring, and compassionate person. When touching on sensitive subjects, I saw her go above and beyond to be careful of her language and to clarify as much as possible. This book is great, and I hope people gain a lot more from it than the conversations around transitioning.