August 18, 2014 cover of TIME magazine

By now, everyone has probably seen this week’s TIME cover story. The magazine’s August 18th cover photo showed a topless, seemingly frumpy, middle-aged man worried about his loss of testosterone and (therefore) manhood under the title, “Manopause?! Aging, Insecurity and the $2 Billion Testosterone Industry”. The cover story details the booming testosterone (“Low-T”) industry in the U.S., describing the reasons why middle-aged men might go to the growing number of Low-T clinics for treatment. While the article draws some interesting parallels to the hormone therapy industries that have targeted women and highlights some of the important risks and unknowns about Low-T treatments, there are some interesting gaps and missteps in the article that are worth detailing.

First, if we are going to talk about a male menopause, can we please pick one term? This author of this article refers to male menopause, andropause, and then titles his article “manopause.” So, which is it? Having all of these terms floating around is just confusing. As we know from research on women’s menopause, having more than one term or having vague terms for a health condition just leads to confusion. This article adds to the confusion over terminology.

Second, the article is titled “Manopause” but really has little to do with this supposed testosterone “deficiency” condition. The article is mostly about the growing Low-T industry and men’s search to remain youthful. It is more about potential treatments for testosterone deficiency than anything else. Anyone looking for information on what “manopause” is would be misled by the title and would not find any answers in this article. At most, readers learn that men who are worried about aging might have low testosterone. Readers will not gather comprehensive information about manopause, andropause, male menopause, or male aging.

Third, this article only addresses research on testosterone “deficiency” in a cursory manner. Readers looking for actual evidence of decreasing testosterone in midlife or the need for Low-T treatment should make sure to consult scientific studies of such things. Since this is TIME magazine, this is not a source of any real information on these subjects. As another commenter reports, the author’s reference to “foggy science” is also misplaced; while we do not have complete answers, there are real studies to be found on this subject.

Fourth, there are comparisons made to women’s menopause, hormone therapy for women, and how women handle their midlife transitions in this article. While it makes sense to compare endocrinological changes in women’s and men’s bodies and burgeoning hormone replacement industries for midlife women and men, comparisons about how women and men “handle” their midlife transitions are a bit misplaced and subjective here. The author states that “women handle their [bodily] betrayal more matter-of-factly – a nip, a tuck, a tint, maybe, but not a Vegas condo”. The author argues that, “judging by the demographic profile of sports-car buyers,” men don’t deal well with testosterone deficiency and bodily change. As someone who has studied women’s bodies and women’s menopause for almost 20 years, I think this comparison masks the variation in how women or men might experience these transitions and reifies gender dichotomies that help no one in the long run. Women DO have trouble with bodily change at times. And the majority of men still forgo Low-T treatments. The author would have done better if he had steered away from these gendered generalizations about how individuals “handle” midlife.

A commenter at HealthNewsReview.Org asks, Does Manopause Really Warrant one of TIME’s 52 Covers This Year? This is a great question. The power of pharmaceutical industries in this country means that topics like this get more press than is probably warranted (especially in light of all of the topics that could have had this front page, such as Ebola, Ferguson, Parkinson’s or ALS disease, foreign conflicts, etc.). Some scholars argue that we are experiencing the “pharmaceuticalization” of society, which puts industries like the Low-T industry front and center and makes us think in terms of “deficiency”, “disease”, and “replacement”. Pharmaceuticalization reinforces ideas about the importance of youthfulness and unchanging bodies and makes the onset of midlife problematic in general. We are actively urged to fight bodily change (here termed bodily “betrayal”) despite how normal it is.

Lately I’ve also seen a lot of press on men and masculinity. NPR has been running an “All Things Considered” series on boys and men this summer, detailing the hardships and unique experiences that boys and men have. I also read that a group of middle aged men recently got together to create a play called “Four Play” to combat the hype around Menopause: The Musical – to make sure that men have their stage too. In Detroit this summer we’ve also been tangoing with groups of Men’s Rights Activists who feel that feminists are taking over the world. To me, the “Manopause” cover of TIME magazine falls right in line with other recent attention to “men’s issues”. To me, this is all a backlash against attention given to women’s issues. In some cases I don’t even think it’s a conscious or calculated backlash but it still presents as one.

Overall, I’m indifferent about this TIME story. I don’t think it warrants the cover photo or the cover story but it is interesting to find out about a growing testosterone industry. Nonetheless the hype around the story concerns me because I keep thinking about what’s lurking behind the hype. For instance, we have to think about the gendered dynamics behind these stories and media portrayals, for gender forms an important backdrop here and can hinder the pursuit of real knowledge about these midlife transitions. Gender ideologies are what make testosterone (and estrogen) important in the first place. In addition, I do think we need to settle on one term for male menopause/andropause/manopause and why it might be important for us to think about. Finally, we really need to think about what pharmaceuticalization means for all of us.