Joe Rogan Experience #1665 - Carole Hooven

Joe Rogan 0:00 (drumbeats) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

Carole Hooven 0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music) Hello.

Carole Hooven 0:15 Hi, Joe.

Joe Rogan 0:15 Welcome. Thanks for doing this.

Carole Hooven 0:17 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 0:17 Appreciate it.

Carole Hooven 0:17 Thank you so much for having me.

Joe Rogan 0:18 My pleasure. I'm excited to talk about this. What, what made you want to write about testosterone? What was the motivation behind this?

Carole Hooven 0:25 So, I'll give you the short story f- first-

Joe Rogan 0:28 Okay.

Carole Hooven 0:28 ... and then, uh, later, I can give you the longer story.

Joe Rogan 0:31 You can give me the longer story.

Carole Hooven 0:31 The longer story involves chimpanzees.

Joe Rogan 0:33 Oh.

Carole Hooven 0:33 So that's kind of fun.

Joe Rogan 0:34 One, one of my favorite subjects.

Carole Hooven 0:35 Um, but the short story is (sighs) that t- I teach at Harvard about hormones. I teach a course, m- um, behavioral ... Well, it's on behavioral endocrinology. It's called Hormones and Behavior. And I've taught that, uh, for a long time now. And I got, I got my PhD at Harvard, studying testosterone and behavior, studying sex differences and the way we think and process information. And I love ... I've just love the topic. I love how much understanding testosterone helps me understand the world, understand men. I'm not a man. I don't really understand men, uh, or how they work. But understanding this hormone really has helped me a lot. And then, in teaching about endocrinology, and specifically testosterone, I get so much feedback from students about how it changes their lives, changes how they understand themselves personally, how they understand their relationships, how they understand the world. And it's empowering for them, and it's been empowering for me. And (sighs) so, I've just always had this natural, intellectual enthusiasm for this topic, a- and, um, but I'd say, in the last five years, I felt like the science was coming under attack. And there's been kind of (sighs) a program to dismantle the science of testosterone and how it shapes behavior, particularly the evolutionary basis of behavior, um, has kind of come under attack, the idea that there, that sex differences are grounded in biology, and I know that testosterone is a really important part of that. And, uh, there's a movement to kind of discredit that science or downplay the importance of biology, and specifically testosterone, in our lives, and especially in sex differences. And I'm fascinated by sex differences, and I'm fascinated by how evolution shapes sex differences across different species and how it works. And, uh ... So that's ultimately why I wrote the book, 'cause I kinda wanna get all the science out there and kinda push back against what I see as an attack on really good science. There's nothing wrong with understanding who we are from a biological point of view. Uh, and I think we should all be open to that and learn as much as we can about who we are and how we work.

Joe Rogan 2:53 Yeah. I, I agree with you, and I ... but I also think it's fascinating, when I watch (clears throat) the attack on the science of biology, the science of how ... If you w- like, I, I think that if we were an objective observer, like something other than human, and we're watching human beings, we would be really interested in the, the sex differences between the male and the females, and what's ... Why are there th- th- there's, like, this real clear pattern of behavior on both sides. Obviously, there's a spectrum in that pattern, but d- depending upon the levels of hormones and the genetic variance, there's a lot of, like, consistency. And what is causing this, and what is ... You know, what is it about male behavior that leads to this and female behavior that livs- leads to that? But then, you get into this weird thing where ideology has somehow or another overtaken science with a lot of human beings today. So they're willing to abandon science if it's inconvenient for their ideology. And it's very strange, 'cause you see really intelligent people doing this.

Carole Hooven 3:59 Yes. Yes.

Joe Rogan 3:59 Which is where it's really spooky, because they're scared of being chastised and attacked on Twitter. They're scared of being canceled. So they're scared of going against the mainstream, which is ideologically based instead of scientifically based.

Carole Hooven 4:14 (clicks tongue) That's right. And (sighs) I think the fear is that the science is getting in the way of the ideology. So we ... I agree with most of the goals of the people who are ideologically motivated. We wanna reduce human suffering. We want to, um, have ... make sure that we have, uh, equal human rights for people who have all kinds of differences. And so I agree with all that. But I don't think that, if science tells us that some of these differences are grounded in biology, that means that, A, these traits that may be, uh, like extreme male aggression. That doesn't mean that that's immutable. I mean, we have tons of evidence that it's not immutable. Humans have control over their behavior. It depends heavily on the culture. So, denying the importance of, say, testosterone in male aggression isn't gonna change the way that sort of differences in our natures or the impetus for males to feel, um, more than females, that they, uh, want to be physically aggressive or to respond aggressively in certain situations. Um, and I like that you said that there's ... you implied that there's lots of overlap in behavior between males and females and the degree to which that-

Joe Rogan 5:33 For sure.

Carole Hooven 5:33 ... is grounded in biology. So the point isn't - and I just wanna make it really clear - at the beginning, it's not that females are like this and males are like that in human- in humans or in other species. And especially, you know, culture plays such a huge role in how we develop and how we express ourselves. But even apart from culture, there are differences on average. So there are some females who are highly physically aggressive, and there are many males who are really emotional and sensitive and totally peaceful. Can I say what ... that you just said? You tear up sometimes?

Joe Rogan 6:05 I cry all the time.

Carole Hooven 6:06 Okay. So you're-

Joe Rogan 6:06 I cry mostly for happy things.

Carole Hooven 6:08 Okay. So yeah, no, and I, I just cry when I'm moved or passionate. I cry a lot, and I actually talk about that in the book because there's a relationship with testosterone there that we can talk about later, which is really interesting. But the point is that, you know, my book ...... T is not about, uh, not trying to explain why m- males are one way and females are another way. But why we're different on average, why we have somewhat different natures.

Joe Rogan 6:33 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 6:34 And testosterone is, to me, the most powerful way to understand those differences in our natures, you know, from an evolutionary point of view and looking at how we as animals, as mammals, um, try to maximize our reproductive success, right? And that's, so that's what testosterone does, is it helps males maximize basically the number of offspring they have through increasing mating opportunities.

Joe Rogan 6:59 Mm.

Carole Hooven 6:59 It doesn't mean that males are only interested in having tons of sex and tons of sex partners. But they're definitely more interested in that than females in humans and in many other species where increasing the number of mates, you know, yields reproductive benefits for males but not females. And that's what sex hormones do. Estrogen, you know, and progesterone do similar things in women. But it doesn't motivate us to fight aggressively for mates.

Joe Rogan 7:24 Right. Clearly, if we were looking at this again as an objective observer, we would see all this. There would be, without ... There wouldn't be any debate. It'd be like, "This is fascinating. Well, this is why. They've only been around for a couple hundred thousand years, and for a long time they were eaten by jaguars."

Carole Hooven 7:38 Right.

Joe Rogan 7:38 "And so they had to make as many babies as possible in order to ensure survival of the species. All this makes sense." You know? There's, uh, wh- did you talk to any people that has, have switched genders? Like-

Carole Hooven 7:49 Yes.

Joe Rogan 7:50 What was that like? Like-

Carole Hooven 7:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:51 ... one of the things that I found fascinating was listening to Chaz Bono-

Carole Hooven 7:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:55 ... talk about, uh, his transition.

Carole Hooven 7:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:57 And, um, how, you know, he just, like, kinda got it-

Carole Hooven 8:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 8:03 ... once he started taking testosterone. Like-

Carole Hooven 8:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 8:05 ... "Oh, this is what the fuck's been going on with the world."

Carole Hooven 8:08 Yes. Yes. So, I try to understand how testosterone works in humans by first thinking about it from an evolutionary point of view. What is the purpose, uh, of sex differences and sex hormones? Why do male animals have high testosterone and females have high, say, estrogen? And, and what do those do to our bodies and to our psychology to help us maximize our reproductive success? Meaning have ultimately sort of as many ... get our genes into the next generation, um, as efficiently as possible. So, one way is to, to look from an evolutionary point of view. Another way is to look at, uh, different kinds of experi- experiments in non-human animals. And then another thing we can do is look at what happens in humans who change their hormone levels. And this is absolutely fascinating and ... because we have some examples of that, you know, happening right now. So I talked to people for the book and I used their words because they're the ones who are living through these experiences and I wanted them to tell what it was like. So I interviewed, um, a male to female transgender person, a female to male transgender person, a non-binary person who was taking puberty blockers, and then somebody who is female who transitioned to male and then transitioned back to female. So I got-

Joe Rogan 9:30 Mm.

Carole Hooven 9:30 ... this really wide range of experiences, and I thought that what they had to say was incredibly powerful. And I can describe some of what they said, which helped me to understand myself better, helped me to understand my husband better, and really just had a big impact on me personally. I felt, I found this evidence really, really sort of moving and powerful. But one thing I wanna say before we talk about that is that one of the biggest, um, influences on human and non-human sex differences

Carole Hooven 10:01 is differences in the womb and what happens to us when we're inside our moms as fetuses developing. So, uh, males, uh, have testes that produce male levels of testosterone in utero, and that testosterone, that, uh, that's called a, a, um, perinatal effect or an organizational effect. So that's early on in life. We start out right from the get-go with these very different levels of testosterone, and that shapes the brain and body. So it helps to develop the genitalia, internal and external genitalia. So it, um, changes male genitalia to say form the penis and internal structures. But at the same time, it shapes the brain. So the cool thing about sex hormones, which are steroids, is that they can just get right into the brain and alter, uh, neural development. And that's what happens early on is we have these big differences that shape childhood behavior. So, everybody pretty much can accept that little boys behave differently on average, again, from little girls. Boys are definitely, all over the world, much more interested in rough and tumble play. Um, so, you know, I'm somebody who used to love to climb trees. I played baseball. I was pretty aggressive, I would say, um, which is a little bit more on the masculine side, so I'm just illustrating that. You know, again, this is kind of a, this is a spectrum, but we have these differences where boys, including my son who does not like baseball (laughs) and is not as kind of, um, probably boyish in some ways as I was, but he tackles his friends. Like, one of his favorite things to do is to, like, roll around on the floor and try to pin each other down. Boys do this a lot, and girls typically don't. They do other stuff on average. That seems to be, uh, consistent with what we see in non-human animals and a result of early exposure to testosterone. Because the levels ... so in boys, levels are high at certain periods in utero and then go up again, uh, for a short period of time after birth. That seems to have these effects on the brain that shape that rough and tumble play. And it's not an accident that there have, that boys have higher sort of aggressive physical play because that's what in a different environment, in our sort of ancestral environment, tho- they're practicing those skills that they would have needed for physical male-male status competition. So in our modern environment, males have different ways of competing that don't necessarily require physical competition, but it requires other kinds of behaviors that testosterone also seems to promote.Um, I think I'm... Uh, this is a long-winded answer to your question-

Joe Rogan 12:42 No, no, no. It's great.

Carole Hooven 12:43 ... which I no longer remember.

Joe Rogan 12:43 Don't worry about that.

Carole Hooven 12:44 Um, so... Oh, you a- okay, so about the trans thing. So, the reason I'm going into what happens prenatally is because the evidence that we get about testosterone from looking at transgender people is really interesting. However, if you are a, uh, female-to-male transgender person, and what happens when you... if you decide to alter your hormones... Uh, not all transgender people will want to alter their hormones. Some people just, um, will ch- um, will- will change sex socially. They'll change their pronouns. They might adopt the clothes, uh, say, or behaviors of the opposite sex. Um, but some people will... many people will want to alter their hormones to be consistent with those of the opposite sex. So, if you're, um, male-to-female, that would mean, um, blocking testosterone and increasing estrogen. And if you're going the other way, female-to-male, it'd mean blocking estrogen and jacking up your testosterone. So, we can look at that evidence. But we have to remember that once people transition, say, if a male, um, transitions to female, that person, so we'll call that a natal male, um, had high testosterone in utero. So, even though, as an adult, they might not have testosterone, and we can look at what their behavior looks like as an adult when they block testosterone and start living, um, as a woman, they still ha- ha- there's something different about their brain. So that their brain has been masculinized in utero. And female brains, we- you can say, have been feminized or not masculinized. Female brains are not exposed-

Joe Rogan 14:24 Can I stop you for a second?

Carole Hooven 14:25 ... to hormones. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:26 When you say, "Their brains have changed," or, "Their brains have developed this way," what are we basing this on? Is this fMRI? Like, what i- what- what- what method are we using-

Carole Hooven 14:35 (sighs)

Joe Rogan 14:36 ... to examine-

Carole Hooven 14:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:36 ... the way the brains are different?

Carole Hooven 14:38 Yeah. So, that's a really good question. So, most of the evidence that we have is from non-human animals that we have clear differences in- in the brain that, um ... One, uh, area of the brain is called the sexually dimorphic nucleus of the preoptic area of the hypothalamus. And the hypothalamus is, um, an area that basically controls the action of the pituitary, which is kind of the master gland for controlling all of our many, many, uh, hormones in our body. And the sexually dimorphic nucleus... So, sexually dimorphic means basically different sizes or shapes in each sex. So, testosterone increases the size of this. We know that it increases the size of this part of the, um, hypothalamus, and then that predicts male sexual behavior, mounting behavior, say, in rats. So, we know that sex differences in testosterone in many non-human animals do change, uh, do help to explain differences in the size of different areas of the brain. But there are also really small differences in just parts of the brain, um, and how neurons, say, branch or make connections. So, they tend not to be, in humans, as far as we know, big, obvious differences like the, um, SDNPOA. But there are some, uh, suspected differences in human brains, um, that are due to testosterone differences, but we don't have that kind of evidence. I guess, I'm not an expert on the brain, um, differences. But it's, uh, subtle differences in, say, branching or neuronal connections or the birth and death of neurons in utero. So, differences in testosterone can, um, cause differences in the, um, population of neurons or the number of cell bodies in different areas or the way that they make connections.

Joe Rogan 16:34 But the question is like, as they transition. So, if someone transitions-

Carole Hooven 16:37 Yes.

Joe Rogan 16:37 ... from male to female, d- what are we m- how are we measuring the fact that their brains have differences than people that were genetically-

Carole Hooven 16:46 Oh, right. Yeah, we don't. We don't.

Joe Rogan 16:48 We don't.

Carole Hooven 16:48 It's an assumption-

Joe Rogan 16:49 Oh.

Carole Hooven 16:50 ... that, um, because they were exposed to... So, a- a male is ex-... Because he has testes, he's exposed to male levels-

Joe Rogan 16:57 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 16:58 ... of testosterone in utero, so the assumption is that their brain has been masculinized. But it's a good question because there's a lot of controversy around brain differences-

Joe Rogan 17:07 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 17:07 ... and whether there really are any. But my understanding of that literature is that, um, brains can be sexed by experts in humans with 85% accuracy. But I don't think there is one really loud signal there that can be attributed to testosterone exposure in utero. But the point I was trying to make is just that there are probably differences in the brain, um, that were shaped during that organizational period, um, in transgender people, so that we shouldn't necessarily assume that if they change their hormones in adulthood, that they will be sort of just like the other sex psychologically, 'cause there may be other differences in their brain due to having high exposure to testosterone.

Joe Rogan 17:57 Okay. S-

Carole Hooven 17:58 But I can tell you some of the differences that we then see-

Joe Rogan 18:00 Sure.

Carole Hooven 18:00 ... once they transition. Um, d- did you have a question, s-

Joe Rogan 18:06 No, no. Y- you c- go ahead.

Carole Hooven 18:07 Okay. So, one of the biggest... What do you think the biggest, one of the biggest sex differences is in, uh, human behavior or human psychology? What would you...

Joe Rogan 18:20 (sighs) Um, I don't know. W- would it be aggression?

Carole Hooven 18:24 There's aggression, yep. That's big.

Joe Rogan 18:26 W- you tell me-

Carole Hooven 18:27 There's one other thing.

Joe Rogan 18:27 Another thing?

Carole Hooven 18:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:29 What?

Carole Hooven 18:29 Sex.

Joe Rogan 18:29 Sex?

Carole Hooven 18:30 Sex.

Joe Rogan 18:30 The males want more sex?

Carole Hooven 18:31 They do.

Joe Rogan 18:32 But what about females that want a lot of sex?

Carole Hooven 18:34 Yeah, there are lots of females who want a lot of sex. But on average, everywhere, uh, males want more sex, and they want more sexual partners.

Joe Rogan 18:42 I read something once, I don't know if you're aware of this, but a study out of, uh...... I think it was University of Rome-

Carole Hooven 18:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:49 ... where they were, uh, examining, um, a link between promiscuous women and their offspring being male, uh, having a disproportionate amount of gay men in their offspring. And they were thinking that it was some sort of a variant in the X chromosome, that there was something about the X chromosome that was leading them to be, um, much more attracted to men than normal, and that this is what led these women to be promiscuous and it led their sons to be gay. Which sounds like madness, right?

Carole Hooven 19:24 I did not hear that.

Joe Rogan 19:25 Let's see if I can find that.

Carole Hooven 19:26 I would want to see-

Joe Rogan 19:27 Yeah. I'm sure you would.

Carole Hooven 19:28 ... replication.

Joe Rogan 19:29 You're, you work at Harvard. (laughs)

Carole Hooven 19:30 That's interesting. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 19:31 When you're a moron like me and you read something like that, and you go, "Oh, okay."

Carole Hooven 19:34 No, no. That, I mean, I haven't heard anything like that. When I see one study that has that kind of, sort of explosive-

Joe Rogan 19:42 You want it to be finding.

Carole Hooven 19:44 ... finding, I wanna see more-

Joe Rogan 19:47 More data.

Carole Hooven 19:48 Um ...

Joe Rogan 19:48 Here it is. Researches, uh, by Andrea Camperio Giani from the University of Padova in Italy.

Carole Hooven 19:55 Oh, wait. I think I have seen this.

Joe Rogan 19:55 That's right.

Carole Hooven 19:56 Um.

Joe Rogan 19:56 It said, "The findings and link between homosexuality and female fertility strongly support the balancing selection hypothesis, which suggests that a gene which causes homosexuality also leads to high fecundity or reproduction among their female relatives."

Carole Hooven 20:12 Okay.

Joe Rogan 20:12 The team noted that-

Carole Hooven 20:13 But fecundity is different from-

Joe Rogan 20:14 Yes.

Carole Hooven 20:14 ... number of sexual partners.

Joe Rogan 20:16 But, but they had it connected to, uh, promiscuous women.

Carole Hooven 20:20 Okay.

Joe Rogan 20:20 Maybe this is in more-

Carole Hooven 20:21 'Cause you don't have more babies-

Joe Rogan 20:22 Right. I understand.

Carole Hooven 20:23 ... necessarily by having more partners, so.

Joe Rogan 20:25 Right. Uh, the team note, but you have a more o- more of a chance of having more babies if you have a lot of partners.

Carole Hooven 20:30 Mm, uh, I don't think you do.

Joe Rogan 20:32 But you probably have more sex. Like, naturally.

Carole Hooven 20:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 20:35 If you're with one partner, as time goes on, we all know you have less sex. But if you have new partners all the time, you have sex constantly. So if it's a woman is having sex every day with different people-

Carole Hooven 20:46 Okay.

Joe Rogan 20:46 ... what did I get?

Carole Hooven 20:46 Well, that's highly, highly promiscuous. Is that what we're talking about here?

Joe Rogan 20:49 Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

Carole Hooven 20:49 Okay.

Joe Rogan 20:49 Super hoes.

Carole Hooven 20:50 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 20:51 "The researchers analyzed the personality and fecundity of 61 females who were either mothers or maternal aunts of homosexual men to 100 females who were mothers or aunts of heterosexual men. Originally, the team thought the reason why the women who inherited the gay man gene might have more babies is simply because they increased androphilia." What is that? Or attraction to men.

Carole Hooven 21:11 Attraction to men.

Joe Rogan 21:11 That's it. There it is. "Thus making the male inheritance homosexual and the female inheritors more promiscuous."

Carole Hooven 21:17 Okay.

Joe Rogan 21:18 That's it.

Carole Hooven 21:18 Uh, okay. Yeah. I'm just-

Joe Rogan 21:20 But hold on. Keep that up.

Carole Hooven 21:20 ... super skeptical about-

Joe Rogan 21:21 Keep that up, Jamie.

Carole Hooven 21:21 ... everything.

Joe Rogan 21:22 Scroll down, because there's a stupid ad in the way over here.

Carole Hooven 21:24 So the idea is that-

Joe Rogan 21:25 However, here's the however.

Carole Hooven 21:25 ... since they're really attracted to men, their sons are gonna be really attracted to men?

Joe Rogan 21:29 The idea it's a variant of the X chromosome.

Carole Hooven 21:30 Okay.

Joe Rogan 21:30 There's something about the X chromosome that in-

Carole Hooven 21:32 What does that mean, variant of the X chromosome?

Joe Rogan 21:33 I don't know. I'm an idiot.

Carole Hooven 21:34 Oh.

Joe Rogan 21:35 I'm just, what I read.

Carole Hooven 21:35 No, no, no. You're not. Um ...

Joe Rogan 21:36 "However, after analyzing the personal characteristics of 160..." See, here's the however, that probably puts it in line. Uh, "Of 161 female maternal relatives of homosexual and heterosexual men, researchers changed their hypothesis and suggested that rather than making the women more attracted to men and therefore more promiscuous, the gay man gene appears to makes, make female inheritors more attractive to men."

Carole Hooven 22:01 Okay.

Joe Rogan 22:01 Huh. So it, well, how do they know that, though?

Carole Hooven 22:05 Okay. But, uh, females who are highly attractive, who have what we would call high mate value-

Joe Rogan 22:11 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 22:11 ... tend not to be super promiscuous because they can get a high status, high investing male.

Joe Rogan 22:17 Right. That's why I'm unders-

Carole Hooven 22:17 And you screw up that relationship if you're promiscuous.

Joe Rogan 22:20 Right.

Carole Hooven 22:20 Then, then you're no longer high mate value-

Joe Rogan 22:23 Right.

Carole Hooven 22:23 ... because your partner's gonna question whether the offspring are his.

Joe Rogan 22:27 That's why I'm confused about how the, they, how they switched-

Carole Hooven 22:30 Okay.

Joe Rogan 22:30 ... because it seems like they're 180 degrees from each other. "If sexually antagonistic genetic factors that introduce homosexuality in males exist, the factors might be maintained in the population by contributing to increase the fecundity, greater reproductive health, extroversion, and a generally relaxed attitude towards family and social values in female of the maternal line of homosexual men." Huh.

Carole Hooven 22:52 That's interesting.

Joe Rogan 22:52 Lot of questions.

Carole Hooven 22:52 What year was that?

Joe Rogan 22:53 Uh, it was a long time ago, if I remember correctly.

Carole Hooven 22:55 Because, okay, 2012.

Joe Rogan 22:57 2012.

Carole Hooven 22:57 So you would think that if it's 2012, if there's something to it, it might have been replicated.

Joe Rogan 23:02 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 23:03 And if it's just one study from 2012, you have to look at where it was published-

Joe Rogan 23:07 Right.

Carole Hooven 23:07 ... where it was cited. Was it replicated?

Joe Rogan 23:08 I don't trust Italians.

Carole Hooven 23:09 Really?

Joe Rogan 23:10 Yeah, I'm one of them.

Carole Hooven 23:10 Are you Italian?

Joe Rogan 23:11 Yeah. I don't trust my people.

Carole Hooven 23:12 What part of Italy are you from?

Joe Rogan 23:14 Uh, well, both part, well, part of my family's from Palermo.

Carole Hooven 23:18 Okay.

Joe Rogan 23:18 And part of my family's from, uh, Naples.

Carole Hooven 23:21 Okay.

Joe Rogan 23:21 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 23:22 All right.

Joe Rogan 23:22 And then a little bit are from Ireland. I'm joking around about not trusting them.

Carole Hooven 23:24 I'm, no, I'm n- I'm not Irish.

Joe Rogan 23:25 But I always joke around about how I'd never trust, I would never buy an Italian car, because they don't pay attention. They're not, like, really-

Carole Hooven 23:30 What kind of a car would you buy?

Joe Rogan 23:31 ... tightening the bolts down. Um, you know, I like German cars.

Carole Hooven 23:35 Okay.

Joe Rogan 23:35 They're more engineered.

Carole Hooven 23:36 Okay.

Joe Rogan 23:36 They're more, like, rigid.

Carole Hooven 23:39 (laughs) Rigid.

Joe Rogan 23:39 More disciplined.

Carole Hooven 23:40 Okay.

Joe Rogan 23:41 You know what I mean?

Carole Hooven 23:41 Yes.

Joe Rogan 23:41 Like, they're more structured.

Carole Hooven 23:42 Yes.

Joe Rogan 23:42 Japanese cars are excellent.

Carole Hooven 23:44 No, I, I know Japanese a little bit. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:44 I love Japanese cars. Very structured.

Carole Hooven 23:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:46 Reliable. Italians aren't reliable.

Carole Hooven 23:49 But they're so different from the Germans in personality and-

Joe Rogan 23:53 Yeah, yeah, yeah. In art and food and ...

Carole Hooven 23:55 Um, yeah. Sex.

Joe Rogan 23:55 And they're fun to hang out with.

Carole Hooven 23:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:57 Yeah. They're great.

Carole Hooven 23:57 Um, so speaking of sex, the biggest effect of changing your hormones is changing yourself sexually, what you want sexually. So, and I learned this, uh, this is one of the most salient points from interviewing the transgender people I interviewed, was how their sexuality changed. And, uh, it's also completely backed up by all the literature on transgender transitions. And it sort of confirms the stereotypes about testosterone. So, if you, um, are a female and you jack up your testosterone to male levels, that's a huge difference. So the female body is very, very sensitive to testosterone increases, because we have so little compared to men. We have a minuscule amount. And so any little change will have huge effects. And so you have very dramatic effects on natal women who take a lot of testosterone. So first of all, their bodies change. They get jacked, even if they're not lifting weights. They get a lot of muscle mass. Um, they get facial hair. Their voice can deepen. And they, especially when they're first-... taking the testosterone. They're going through something like a male puberty. I don't know what your male puberty was like, but I bet you were totally horny. I'm just guessing.

Joe Rogan 25:20 For sure.

Carole Hooven 25:21 Like, really kind of ... And this is something I, I'd love for more people to talk about. I'm interested in what that is like because, yeah, I, I ... I mean, I, I shouldn't talk about my own puberty, but yeah, that was a time when I was interested in sex and, um, felt very different because my hormones were changing. You know, estrogen helped to make me a sexual being, but testosterone has a different effect. It seems to be more intense. And what was so interesting to me is the way that some of the people I interviewed for the book talked about how their sexuality changed, and natal females who took on a male identity started viewing other females, according to them, as objects, sexual objects.

Joe Rogan 26:05 Objects?

Carole Hooven 26:06 That they had so much lust. And this is not a- how all men are or how all trans people are, but this was the effect in the few months after increasing testosterone, sort of like a male puberty, which can feel overwhelming, where thoughts of sex are overwhelming, and that there's a intense need to kind of get some release. And there's a way that these, um, trans men started viewing women, which was kind of alien to them because they hadn't looked at other people as sexual objects in the s- that same way, but sort of a really intense need to get a release and seeing other, um, women as vehicles (laughs) for that, and also orgasms changed.

Joe Rogan 26:58 So, but when you mean by o- objects, you mean that-

Carole Hooven 27:01 (sighs)

Joe Rogan 27:01 ... you stop thinking-

Carole Hooven 27:01 Yeah, I don't wanna overstate it.

Joe Rogan 27:02 ... of them as person- as people? Like-

Carole Hooven 27:04 I, I don't ... I really don't wanna overstate it and, and give the idea that trans ... I wanna be careful about this, and I, I hope that I'm not giving the idea that trans men suddenly are objectifying women. It's more that there's a ... that women nat- um, natal women like me don't really understand male sexuality in that we think that men should kinda be more like us and respect everybody, and, and why can't they just treat me like a to- like a human being instead of looking at me as a sex object, right? So women get frustrated because men look at them as sex objects.

Joe Rogan 27:43 Right. But conversely, women dress very provocatively and still think that.

Carole Hooven 27:49 Yes.

Joe Rogan 27:49 That they don't like that men look at them-

Carole Hooven 27:51 Yes.

Joe Rogan 27:51 ... like sex objects when their, their cleavage is showing, and they're wearing skirts, and their legs are ... they basically have a vagina curtain on, and their legs-

Carole Hooven 27:58 Yeah, okay.

Joe Rogan 27:59 ... are hanging out. And-

Carole Hooven 27:59 So that's so-

Joe Rogan 28:00 It's very odd because they're obviously ... right? They're accentuating this sexuality.

Carole Hooven 28:05 Yes, but I think that women don't understand-

Joe Rogan 28:08 The impact.

Carole Hooven 28:09 ... the effect that that has on men.

Joe Rogan 28:12 Well, why?

Carole Hooven 28:13 Or, or trans men because they don't feel that same urgency, right?

Joe Rogan 28:18 Right.

Carole Hooven 28:18 And what ... And what I learned ... I just was really interested in understanding what that's like. Instead of shaming men for feeling that way, I wanna understand what that feeling is. Like, I really wanna get it.

Joe Rogan 28:30 Right.

Carole Hooven 28:30 And so talking ... And I again ... So talking to people who transitioned who are natal females who were then like, "Holy shit, this is what it's like to live as a man and have this sexual desire," that was foreign to them.

Joe Rogan 28:44 Right.

Carole Hooven 28:45 Um, so there was that piece of it. That's a major piece. It does soften with time. So that's really just sort of the male puberty part of it, and that's an intensity that females, I think, don't get. Um, but then there's this orgasm thing, which I thought was really interesting. So the male orgasm apparently feels very different from the (laughs) female orgasm, and people who transitioned talked about how their experience of orgasm changed. Um, so do you wanna hear about that?

Joe Rogan 29:20 Yes.

Carole Hooven 29:20 Okay. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 29:20 I do. I have just so many questions.

Carole Hooven 29:23 So I can say, so I've had an orgasm.

Joe Rogan 29:28 Whoa.

Carole Hooven 29:28 So I can, I can ... I have.

Joe Rogan 29:29 Crazy.

Carole Hooven 29:30 And so for ... Men might not understand that for women, it is a full body experience that takes a while to build up. It plateaus, but it takes a while to kinda terminate. And sometimes after sex, men are like, "Oh, done, ba- ba- bah. You know, I'm falling asleep. I'm gonna go do this or do that." And women are, like, sort of luxuriating in the afterglow, right? And it can be ... feel insulting or hurtful for women when the guy is like, "I'm, I'm outta here, or I'm onto something else now." So it seems (laughs) that, that ex- ... so that full body feeling and the whole body being a, a sexual organ is a function of testosterone differences because when, um ... for trans men, the experience changes from the full body experience to a sharper, more intense, more acute, more time limited experience. So it's more intense at the peak, and, uh, but it seems-

Joe Rogan 30:29 But yet they're still getting an orgasm in the same method that a woman would get an orgasm.

Carole Hooven 30:34 What do you mean method?

Joe Rogan 30:35 'Cause they still have the same equipment.

Carole Hooven 30:38 No, no, no. Oh.

Joe Rogan 30:39 A trans m-

Carole Hooven 30:40 Yes, yes.

Joe Rogan 30:40 A trans man.

Carole Hooven 30:42 Yes, yes.

Joe Rogan 30:42 So you change ... They change the orgasm-

Carole Hooven 30:45 Yes.

Joe Rogan 30:45 ... but you still have female equipment-

Carole Hooven 30:47 Yes.

Joe Rogan 30:47 ... essentially.

Carole Hooven 30:47 Yes. So that-

Joe Rogan 30:50 Interesting.

Carole Hooven 30:50 But the experience changes, and the body ... So ... And if you go the opposite direction, you, you soften that intensity.

Joe Rogan 30:58 Mm.

Carole Hooven 30:59 And there's more of a the whole body is, is responsive-

Joe Rogan 31:04 But this is-

Carole Hooven 31:04 ... in a way.

Joe Rogan 31:05 You're confusing the shit outta me.

Carole Hooven 31:06 Okay, sorry, I'm probably con- confused.

Joe Rogan 31:07 So this is if you go the other way-

Carole Hooven 31:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:08 ... you're talking about male to female.

Carole Hooven 31:10 Yes.

Joe Rogan 31:11 And then male to female have orgasm, but are they keeping the equipment? See, this is where it get-

Carole Hooven 31:16 You can keep ... So that, that is-

Joe Rogan 31:16 Yeah, but if you can't ... How are you getting an orgasm without that?

Carole Hooven 31:21 You mean, if you have a penis?

Joe Rogan 31:23 If you don't anymore.

Carole Hooven 31:25 Well, most trans people now are keeping their genitalia. They're not surgically-

Joe Rogan 31:30 Is that really ... Can we say that?

Carole Hooven 31:32 Um, I can say it. I ... 'cause I just did.

Joe Rogan 31:35 (laughs)

Carole Hooven 31:36 But ... And I believe that that's the case, and I think the trend is changing. Um, yeah, but-

Joe Rogan 31:45 But-

Carole Hooven 31:45 ... I should have some evidence behind that.

Joe Rogan 31:46 But that ... It's um ... But this is where I'm confused.

Carole Hooven 31:48 Yeah, so-

Joe Rogan 31:49 Is that essentially the only way to achieve orgasm?

Carole Hooven 31:52 You can still have an orgasm.

Joe Rogan 31:53 Even if you remove your genitalia?

Carole Hooven 31:56 No. So, (sighs) that's a whole other area. The ... Y- y- you're not just removing the genitalia. You're creating, um, female, something like female genitalia. And yes, you can definitely have orgasms, but I don't know as much about exactly how that works.

Joe Rogan 32:16 But definitely?

Carole Hooven 32:19 Y- well, I had a trans woman come talk to my class who had had the surgery and, uh, discussed in graphic detail what her orgasms were like.

Joe Rogan 32:31 Hmm.

Carole Hooven 32:31 Um, so yes.

Joe Rogan 32:33 Okay. That's why I'm confused.

Carole Hooven 32:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:36 But, so-

Carole Hooven 32:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:37 ... female to male-

Carole Hooven 32:39 But let's assume that they're keeping-

Joe Rogan 32:41 ... they sharpen and change-

Carole Hooven 32:41 ... their genitalia.

Joe Rogan 32:41 Yeah. Let's-

Carole Hooven 32:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:42 Well, for female to male, they definitely are, right?

Carole Hooven 32:44 But this is consistent with the literature about, um, sex differences in orgasms and sexual experience-

Joe Rogan 32:53 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 32:53 ... where it's more shar- it's more sort of acute and less concentrated on the whole body for men than it is for women.

Joe Rogan 33:00 So essentially, the testosterone is leading the body to a very specific kind of experience during orgasm.

Carole Hooven 33:06 It seems that way. It seems that way.

Joe Rogan 33:08 Hmm.

Carole Hooven 33:08 And that's something that I thought was fascinating.

Joe Rogan 33:11 It is.

Carole Hooven 33:11 So the orgasm, but just in addition to what it's like sexually to be in the world-

Joe Rogan 33:19 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 33:19 ... and how you view the sex that you're attracted to and, and-

Joe Rogan 33:22 Right.

Carole Hooven 33:22 ... what the urgency is like. And I still ... You know, as a woman, I don't really understand. Obviously, I don't understand what it's like to be a man or have high testosterone or what it's like to be a man sexually in the world. And that's part of why I'm interested in the hormone. Um, and aggression, interestingly, does not seem to ... There's not good evidence that men, that trans men, uh, become much more aggressive or that trans women become much less aggressive. There are some anecdotal, um, changes in anger and emotions. So, the emotional piece seems to be that, uh ... So I, I talked a lot ... I asked questions about emotional expression, partly 'cause I cry. I, I was telling you earlier, I tear up a lot when I am moved, and I seem to be moved all the time and I can't control it. I cry when I'm teaching, which is really embarrassing. But I teach about what I think are really important issues.

Joe Rogan 34:22 Yeah, you're a human. You care.

Carole Hooven 34:24 I care a lot, but I c- I care so much that I c- just cannot control my reactions.

Joe Rogan 34:31 I think that's great.

Carole Hooven 34:32 I- i- i-

Joe Rogan 34:32 I think people are scared of that for some strange reason that thinks-

Carole Hooven 34:35 Yeah. No, I-

Joe Rogan 34:35 ... they're supposed to be stoic all the time or-

Carole Hooven 34:37 It's masculine.

Joe Rogan 34:38 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 34:38 So being stoic is masculine, and having a lot of emotions and expressing them is more feminine. Of course, again, this is a spectrum and there's lots of overlap, but that also seems to be a function of testosterone. So the people I interviewed described taking testosterone and then feeling that their emotions were blunted. They couldn't access their emotions. They stopped crying, and that anger was the only accessible intense emotion.

Joe Rogan 35:05 Oh, that seems silly.

Carole Hooven 35:05 And it, that's just-

Joe Rogan 35:07 That's ... As a person who's male, that's silly.

Carole Hooven 35:08 Yes. So, that was one person I talked to. That is not a universal experience. And there aren't big sex differences in anger in the first place. There are h- large sex differences in physical aggression. Like, really fucking somebody up is more of a, you know, much higher rates of that in men. Killing people, you know, that's basically-

Joe Rogan 35:28 Oh, yeah.

Carole Hooven 35:28 ... all men. Like, serious physical violence where you put yourself at risk, there's a large sex difference there. But when you sort of move to the middle and you're talking about anger and you're talking about throwing stuff and pushing and hitting, there's not a huge, um, sex difference there in term, at, at least in terms of, um-

Joe Rogan 35:46 Lashing out with anger.

Carole Hooven 35:46 ... interpersonal, um, romantic relationships too.

Joe Rogan 35:50 Okay.

Carole Hooven 35:50 But that's a- another area. But so the things that change in transgender people, uh, the biggest thing is sex and sexuality and sex drive. And then there's some evidence, a little bit of evidence about aggression, but that doesn't seem to be very pronounced.

Joe Rogan 36:07 What's always interesting to me, that there's a lot of people that they sort of dismiss traditional, uh, gender stereotypes in terms of makeup and clothing and, and then ... And some of these people are actually not just dismissive of these stereotypes, but, um, they, they, they seem to think there's something wrong with them. They, they, they're insulting of these things. They think that these things are in somehow or another holding back women or holding back men. And what's odd to me is that it's celebrated in transgender people. So whenever a trans woman is, like, wearing a ton of makeup and short skirts and a lot of, like, nail polish and big hoop earrings, everybody's like, "You go, girl."

Carole Hooven 36:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:59 No one is ever looking at that trans woman, saying like, "You are accepting these harmful gender stereotypes and embracing them." Right?

Carole Hooven 37:09 Yeah. I-

Joe Rogan 37:10 But it's part of what ... You know what I'm saying? Like-

Carole Hooven 37:12 Yeah, I do, and I think that's so complicated because if you have gender dysphoria, if you're com- if you're really uncomfortable with your body and how it's sexed and you desperately, you know, you really ...... go into puberty and you're horrified at how your body is changing because it doesn't represent how you feel, then I can understand how you want to adopt maybe an ex- more extreme version of what you perceive the opposite sex to be like. So I get it, and I have sympathy for people who are suffering in that way. But it do- you're right that there is a sort of-

Joe Rogan 37:49 Double standard.

Carole Hooven 37:50 ... stereotyping-

Joe Rogan 37:51 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 37:51 ... of the gender role. Um, and that's, uh, it's just super complicated.

Joe Rogan 38:01 It is super complicated.

Carole Hooven 38:02 Um-

Joe Rogan 38:02 And I, I also, I, uh, I understand it and I, I sympathize with them and I, I support them. Go do that.

Carole Hooven 38:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:11 Wear all the makeup, wear all the fake eyelashes, go crazy. But why do you give a shit when women do it? When biological women do it?

Carole Hooven 38:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:18 Like, why does anybody care? Like, that's what they like. Like, there's clearly something different.

Carole Hooven 38:23 Right. Right. Right. I see what you're saying.

Joe Rogan 38:23 Like, look at you.

Carole Hooven 38:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:24 Okay, you're very conservatively dressed, but why do I see your whole arms? Like, what's that about? But imagine-

Carole Hooven 38:30 'Cause I'm psyched 'cause I work out. I'm like, "What can I get some on?"

Joe Rogan 38:31 'Cause you got the guns. But if I was dressed like you, it'd be odd, right? If you were wearing a dress.

Carole Hooven 38:36 Oh, I sup- Well, men wear tank tops and show off, but-

Joe Rogan 38:38 Very rarely. Not for formal things like this-

Carole Hooven 38:41 Oh. Right. Right. Right.

Joe Rogan 38:41 ... or a podcast or-

Carole Hooven 38:43 Right.

Joe Rogan 38:43 It would be odd if someone just showed up here with a wife beater on, it would be odd.

Carole Hooven 38:46 So I wish that weren't odd. I, in the book, that is something that I write about at the end, what I want for my son. Here's where I start getting emotional. It's really important to me that he feel free to express himself in whatever way he wants, and I wish... This is what I get upset about when I teach, that there are these restrictive norms and people who feel different feel they just have to break out of that norm instead of feeling comfortable just being who they are with their bodies. And, um, you know, I wish, like, that he could wear whatever clothes he wants and-

Joe Rogan 39:25 Well, he can.

Carole Hooven 39:25 ... and be accepted and, um, but there are these norms that we still have, and there is this confusion where women are stigmatized for being ultra fe- some women are stigmatized-

Joe Rogan 39:38 Yes.

Carole Hooven 39:38 ... for being ultra feminine.

Joe Rogan 39:40 That was my point.

Carole Hooven 39:40 But women have a lot of leeway. Women can be super masculine. We can be ultra feminine. It's basically fine. Men have much more narrow, um, constraints that they have to operate in because it's, you know, women are seen as the weaker sex. So if you're a man and you are more feminized, uh, even as little kids, you know, little boys who grow up to be gay are more likely to want to play with girls and play with dolls and wear dresses, and they are bullied for that, and they are tortured. And a lot of those boys, um, I mean, some of those boys now are becoming transgender, so maybe it's, in some ways, it's, um, they're becoming very uncomfortable with their sex because it's an extremely unpleasant experience and then they end up feeling like they are the opposite sex because you can't, there isn't the leeway for them to just express themselves and be who, who they are. Um-

Joe Rogan 40:32 Right. What I was getting at is that females in our culture-

Carole Hooven 40:37 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:37 ... are allowed to wear very little clothing at formal events. Like, if you go to a restaurant and the man is wearing a suit and a tie-

Carole Hooven 40:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:46 ... and a jacket, the woman will als- often be wearing this vagina curtain-

Carole Hooven 40:50 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:50 ... long legs all exposed.

Carole Hooven 40:52 Oh. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:52 You see her toes.

Carole Hooven 40:53 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:54 You see all of her feet and these strappy little shoes. There's, uh, a long cut where her full arms are exposed. Her breasts are at least half exposed, right? There's cleavage. I'm not criticizing this. I'm just l- uh, again, let's... I'm looking at it-

Carole Hooven 41:09 Well, what is your opinion?

Joe Rogan 41:09 I'm looking at it like an obs- objective observer. I'm on the outside look-

Carole Hooven 41:13 Are you?

Joe Rogan 41:13 I'm trying to.

Carole Hooven 41:14 But are you objective?

Joe Rogan 41:15 This is what I'm saying.

Carole Hooven 41:16 Okay. Okay.

Joe Rogan 41:16 I'm looking at this like an objective observer.

Carole Hooven 41:18 Okay.

Joe Rogan 41:18 Like, it's fascinating that you're saying that as females transition to males, they start objectifying females. But females that are just, identify as female and are attracted to men often dress in a way that would make them much more sexually, if not available, much more looked at like a sexual object. This is not all of them. I'm not generalizing.

Carole Hooven 41:43 Yes.

Joe Rogan 41:43 I'm just saying-

Carole Hooven 41:44 Yes.

Joe Rogan 41:45 ... you do not see very many, many men out at dinner with short skirts on-

Carole Hooven 41:50 Yes.

Joe Rogan 41:50 ... where you see their feet and you see th- uh, all of their arms and deep into their armpits and you see a, a deep cut in their chest. It's odd, right?

Carole Hooven 41:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:57 Just as an objective observer, just looking at it, like, as looking at this species-

Carole Hooven 42:01 But sorry, why is it odd?

Joe Rogan 42:01 ... if I was an alien from another planet.

Carole Hooven 42:03 I don't see why it's odd.

Joe Rogan 42:04 Because it's very different than males. It's hugely different.

Carole Hooven 42:07 Because... But that has to do-

Joe Rogan 42:10 Because why?

Carole Hooven 42:10 ... with sex differences in what promotes reproductive success, right? So for, if women... (sighs)

Joe Rogan 42:20 That doesn't make any sense.

Carole Hooven 42:21 No, I think if-

Joe Rogan 42:22 Here's why it doesn't make any sense.

Carole Hooven 42:23 Okay. I am saying that, okay.

Joe Rogan 42:23 Because if a guy showed up in short skirts, if a short shirt where you, or short skirts where you could see big muscular legs and he had a tank top on where you could see his arms and his low cut thing where you could see his chest, that would be a, a, a masculine man that would be more likely to provide you with healthy-

Carole Hooven 42:38 He'll show up in his Maserati.

Joe Rogan 42:40 he-

Carole Hooven 42:40 He'll show up in his Maserati and his expensive suit.

Joe Rogan 42:41 We're not talking about a vehicle. We're talking about clothing.

Carole Hooven 42:44 But-

Joe Rogan 42:44 We're talking about clothing. We're talking about a, a stark difference in the way males versus-

Carole Hooven 42:49 Yes.

Joe Rogan 42:49 ... females dress.

Carole Hooven 42:49 Yes.

Joe Rogan 42:50 Where females, although you're saying they don't want to be sexually objectified or they don't re- realize they are, and males ma- f- female to male, when they start taking testosterone, are more likely to objectify females.

Carole Hooven 43:03 Yes.

Joe Rogan 43:03 It's, it's just, it's a weird thing. And again-

Carole Hooven 43:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:05 ... I'm just looking at this for what it is. Humans have these v- strange patterns with males and females. And females show way more of their bodies, even in formal settings.

Carole Hooven 43:16 But, so why do you think that they show more of their bo- why do you think that is?

Joe Rogan 43:20 I'm asking you.

Carole Hooven 43:23 I think that the patterns of attraction differ in humans because it's...... adaptive for males to seek out females who have high reproductive value. And our reproductive value has more to do with our physical health than if a, a female is seeking a mate, she wants somebody who's high-status, who can, who's healthy, but who can provide for her and her offspring, on average. But these are the, you know, we have different mating psychologies on average, and so for me, uh, it's more important that I, yes, I mean, both sexes want partners who are healthy and relatively attractive and smart and kind, right? So that's well-established. But there are these differences in, uh, which sex values physical attractiveness more, and that's males value it more because it has more to do with female reproduction. So females do better when they live a long, healthy life and they want to advertise cues of youth and health. And that's-

Joe Rogan 44:28 But that's such a stark contrast.

Carole Hooven 44:30 Yeah. But I think for males, it's much more important to be, for women, they're gonna, the emphasis is more likely to be on status and success and resources. Like, and in our society, that's money, um, and cues of high-status. So men are gonna advertise that more than women, just on average. But yeah, our culture has really amplified in some cultures, not everywhere, you know, the expression of those signals.

Joe Rogan 44:56 And then there's also the, a reaction to that-

Carole Hooven 44:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 44:58 ... in other countries, uh, other cultures, like Islamic cultures-

Carole Hooven 45:01 Yes. Yes.

Joe Rogan 45:01 ... where they cover the women up completely.

Carole Hooven 45:03 Yes.

Joe Rogan 45:03 And they take a, a completely opposite approach.

Carole Hooven 45:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:06 It's, uh, it's fascinating, right? If you look at the, the real, raw difference between male and female wardrobe, it's very, very different. I mean, that's, that might be one of the biggest differences amongst us, except for the fact that you guys carry the babies.

Carole Hooven 45:22 Yeah, and you have, I mean, culturally, it's really interesting-

Joe Rogan 45:25 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 45:25 ... to look at different cultures and how they vary in terms of those sex differences. Um, yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:34 It's very weird, right?

Carole Hooven 45:36 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:38 Now, when you set out to do this, what, obviously, you have a son, you're a woman, you're trying to understand these things. Like, did you approach this from a, a n- did you have a neutral position? Did you have a bias going in here? Did you, did you, uh, w- were your biases confirmed or were you surprised by anything?

Carole Hooven 45:58 So I, uh, try to have a neutral position. My position is firmly, uh, pro-science and the truth, and I'm extremely passionate about, uh, I, I get, I tear up talking about this. It's so important to me. But I think that it's respectful, it res- it's the, you're respecting another person's intelligence and ability to handle the truth, um, is so much more respectful than giving them information that might make them feel good. Um, so, and I don't even remember what your question was now, uh-

Joe Rogan 46:38 Whether or not you went in this with a neutral perspective or you-

Carole Hooven 46:40 Yeah. Okay, so my perspective is that science is the way to get at the truth, and I'm a, I love teaching this class because I get a lot of students who are not scientists, think they don't like science, but they wanna know about themselves and their bodies and, and we ta- we don't just talk about sex and testosterone. We talk about hunger and diabetes and energy, um, and parenting and how hormones shape all these different kinds of behaviors. So then they love learning that, and it's not stuffy. It's fun and, and it's accessible, and they, through science, they're learning about who they are and how they work, and they find that tremendously satisfying. So I'm gonna tell a little story about science and what it meant to me in learning about testosterone, and that is, I describe this in my book. Um, and when I was a grad student, I, so I went to, I changed my career late in life, and, uh, so I was in, gosh, I guess I was in my early, very early 30s, and I got accepted to Harvard, and I felt like an imposter, like a lot of people do. "You know, I don't belong here."

Joe Rogan 47:52 What were you doing before that?

Carole Hooven 47:53 "They made a mistake." So I'll just back up and say that I was not a stellar high school student. This is hard to admit to such a big, um, audience because I teach at Harvard, but it's also a lesson, um, like, I was at the bottom of my class in high school. I was somebody, I grew up in Weston, um, and, um-

Joe Rogan 48:15 Weston, Massachusetts?

Carole Hooven 48:15 Weston, sorry, Mass, yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:17 (laughs) You did the s-

Carole Hooven 48:17 Um, sorry, I'm just, Weston 'cause I know that you lived-

Joe Rogan 48:20 Newton.

Carole Hooven 48:20 ... in Newton or something.

Joe Rogan 48:21 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 48:21 And, um, I skipped classes and just had, like, very little parental oversight, and, um, was kind of a party animal, but kinda destructive. Like, I, I really, f- and so I ended up failing gym and English, which is ironic because I just wrote a book and I'm extremely athletic, but, um-

Joe Rogan 48:43 (laughs)

Carole Hooven 48:43 So I failed gym and English. I just didn't go. I just blew it off, and I didn't know, which is a lesson because I have students at Harvard who are just f- totally freaked out about getting a B+. And I just feel like, I always tell them, I'm like, "Look, l- you don't know where I came from and yet, what you can change, and, you know, and plus, you, uh, a B+ is, is great, and you're gonna be where you're supposed to be. Just, like, work hard and be disciplined, et cetera." Um, so that was my high school experience. So, um, and then I went to this great college, Antioch College, but then I didn't know what I wanted to be, but it was, um, I graduated from college in 1988, and I was, like, really excited about computers, (laughs) which is so funny because they, like, um, computers were sort of fairly, fairly new, and I wanted a job where I could work with computers. Um, so I just got this job in financial software, and, and that's, there was, like, 10 years of just doing this financial software stuff, but I was just doing that...... so I could get my life together. I had a l- I really had a lot of growing up to do. I just wanted to live on my own and be responsible and have a job and save money. But I traveled a lot and I read a lot, and then I figured out that I wanted to understand human behavior. So I quit my job and I applied to grad school. So that's kind of the long story about how I got there. But again, I just forgot what you-

Joe Rogan 50:02 So w- I asked you if you came into with, uh, oh-

Carole Hooven 50:05 Oh. (laughs) Right. But I think you asked something about the background, but, um, so... Oh, so when you want to know, I was gonna tell my story of what happened, my, why I felt like an imposter, is partly because I didn't have the same background that my Harvard students have. They were all, like, had their shit together from the get-go. And they were, you know, had these habits, they were, uh, that enabled them to be successful. They were getting As in high school, and president of this, and captain of that, and they're really mature, amazing students. And that just wasn't me. It took me a long time to kind of get to a place where I felt like I belonged, and, um, I'm probably still not there. But, so I was in this seminar, this grad student seminar. I think it was my first year at Harvard, and it was the evolution of human sexuality. And, um, we were, I, we were reading a paper on the evolution of rape. And there was this explanation about rape in the scorpion fly and this implication that, um, humans rape, men rape because they, it's an adaptation, uh, if they don't have the resources to acquire a mate, they'll just use rape. And I had to comment on the paper. It was my turn to talk. And I was getting really emotional, and I felt, I was pissed off and I just was like, "Why isn't anyone else outraged here?" You know? And so, I remember just my eyes were watery and I was kind of angry and I said, "This guy's an asshole."

Joe Rogan 51:38 (laughs)

Carole Hooven 51:38 Like, the guy who wrote the paper. And, um, that wasn't, you know, an appropriate scientific response. That was an emotional response. And I will just say, if you jump forward, that kind of response now is kind of, is, seems to be in many places okay, that you're supposed to have an emotional response. And if you do, then maybe we shouldn't have assigned that paper. But I have an experience with rape, and so it was upsetting to me. And, um, I didn't want rape to be a natural part of human behavior. I wanted it to be something pathological. And, um, so I was having a hard time analyzing the data, but the professor kept saying, "Look at the data, look at the data, look at the data." And this, to me, was one of the most formative experiences, because it helped me realize how important the truth is and that I can use science as a tool to get to the truth and understand myself and understand my life and understand even men or things that have been troublesome to me, even if it is painful. And that pain is okay, and I grew from that pain. And I learned that I can use science to understand. And ultimately, it made me feel better and more empowered and more in control. So my bias is like so firmly with the science and how important it is, and how I was respected as a young scientist and given the truth and sort of really encouraged to, to look at the data and analyze the science instead of like give in to my emotions and believe what I wanted to believe. I don't want to give anyone else like a line of bullshit about anything, bec- like that the sexes are on a spectrum, you know, that there's five sexes, because maybe that makes people feel good about being different. You can feel good about being different even with the truth that there are two sexes. That's okay, you know? We can talk about that.

Joe Rogan 53:36 But why do you think there's-

Carole Hooven 53:36 It's just confusing to be fed lies about science just because it makes people feel better.

Joe Rogan 53:43 But what is this shift? Where do you think this shift happened in academia where it became-

Carole Hooven 53:48 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 53:49 A b- does it drive you crazy?

Carole Hooven 53:51 Uh, it's so sad and discouraging to me. I mean, no, it makes me want to leave. Like, it, it's really... It's sad, like socially it's sad, because I can't talk about what I wanna talk about. I showed you some of the things my students said.

Joe Rogan 54:08 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 54:09 They want the truth, but they're afraid to speak up. Sorry, I don't, it's, I didn't-

Joe Rogan 54:13 No, okay. It's okay.

Carole Hooven 54:15 Um, it's just, it, science really changed my life. It is what helped me go from somebody who was confused and had no direction and lacked confidence, you know, to, to like finding something that works for me, finding something that's so powerful to explain the world. And, um, and I love helping other people do the same thing and have a l- you know, imbue in them a love for science and how powerful it is. And I just feel like it's getting shat on, um, because I don't, I don't have a great explanation. I think social media has a lot to do with it, but, um...

Joe Rogan 54:53 What aspect of social media do you think accentuates it?

Carole Hooven 54:55 Well, that (laughs) there's a lot of shaming on social media. There's a lot of shutting down conversation. If you have the wrong... You know, everybody's always advocated for certain points of views and had their agendas, right? And that's okay. And, but we should be able to have open conversations about people's points of view that should be informed by reality, right? Um, but now I think we have the ability to make people feel bad about what they believe. Like, I, uh, when, before I really understood how things work, I did teach a couple classes where I said that sex, I thought sex was on a spectrum, and I remember feeling good about that. I remember feeling like my students really liked that and I feel good saying that. And that was sort of back in the day, uh-

Joe Rogan 55:42 When, when did, how long ago was this?

Carole Hooven 55:45 That was probably seven years ago or something.

Joe Rogan 55:47 What made you want to teach that sex was on a spectrum?

Carole Hooven 55:50 Because I thought, I thought that the features associated with sex, because they can vary so much, so sex is really about what kind of gametes you make, or what your gamete plan is, whether you have, um-

Joe Rogan 56:04 Whether you can reproduce.

Carole Hooven 56:04 ... large, immobile gametes, or whether you're gonna be making, um-

Joe Rogan 56:08 Right.

Carole Hooven 56:08 ... small, mobile gametes. So, like, sperm and eggs.

Joe Rogan 56:11 Eggs. Yeah.

Carole Hooven 56:11 That's really how sex is defined across the animal kingdom. It's not chromosomes. It's not sex hormone levels. It's not body types. That's not how you define sex. Those are features that are associated with sex, right?

Joe Rogan 56:24 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 56:24 And those things do vary. Even genitals vary. You know, you can have all these different combinations, right? So, I thought, I sort of wanted to see things that way because I wanted to validate people who are different, because I really do care so much about, identify somehow, I don't know why, with, I think, people who are different. And I thought that that kind of validated people with differences. Um, and I have since learned that that's just not, it doesn't validate them. It's not, it's just not true. Um, so I sort of studied it more and got more into the, um, literature. And as I realized, no, it's really about gametes, and I'm, I'm muddying this up to make p- me and- and my students feel good. And that's just not how it works. And since I've been, I think I'm getting better at teaching what is now controversial information. My students are saying, uh, that they appreciate having someone who's willing to talk about sex and sex differences and admit that there are two sexes and to explore how that works. They're craving that. But I think that, um, social media somehow, and, um, you know, I hate to say it's a, it's a generational thing-

Joe Rogan 57:42 I think it's an academic spillover.

Carole Hooven 57:42 ... so I don't know if I'm just old.

Joe Rogan 57:44 I think that academia has spilled over into social media because people that were in school started using social media and then the people w- who are overwhelmingly progressive that run institutions.

Carole Hooven 57:56 Uh.

Joe Rogan 57:56 You know?

Carole Hooven 57:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:57 That-

Carole Hooven 57:57 Well, that people are just capitulating all over the place-

Joe Rogan 57:59 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 57:59 ... to a vocal minority.

Joe Rogan 58:01 Right.

Carole Hooven 58:01 So, the people who disagree, which is the majority, are being shamed.

Joe Rogan 58:05 They get scared, and they don't want to lose their jobs.

Carole Hooven 58:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:08 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 58:08 And that's a whole other ball of wax. But I am scared as a science educator because this is, science is such a beautiful, powerful tool.

Joe Rogan 58:20 It's reality.

Carole Hooven 58:21 It's reality. And, uh, that story I told about that seminar, it, it's just so clear to me how important science is and that you not twist the truth to try to make people feel better.

Joe Rogan 58:34 Right.

Carole Hooven 58:34 It's disrespectful to them.

Joe Rogan 58:37 Right.

Carole Hooven 58:37 And it doesn't solve problems in the world. You're not gonna solve problems and make social progress-

Joe Rogan 58:42 But you see the motivation of it.

Carole Hooven 58:44 ... by twisting science.

Joe Rogan 58:44 Right? You see these people are compassionate towards people that-

Carole Hooven 58:47 Yes.

Joe Rogan 58:47 ... want to be-

Carole Hooven 58:48 Yes.

Joe Rogan 58:48 ... something other than they are. They have body dysmorphia, or whatever you want to call it.

Carole Hooven 58:52 And people want to be their allies.

Joe Rogan 58:53 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 58:54 Um, and I understand that. And it's not, they're not, uh, I'm not smarter than they are. I'm not better than they are. I think I see things differently. But I think it's the wrong direction, and I'm scared, and I don't know h- h- what is gonna put an end to this, but it seems to be getting worse and worse. And I, you know, a- my students are congratulating me for teaching just basic science now.

Joe Rogan 59:17 Like it's risky.

Carole Hooven 59:18 Yes.

Joe Rogan 59:19 Yeah. Yeah, it's strange. I mean, we've, we, we change terms to make people feel better-

Carole Hooven 59:24 Yes.

Joe Rogan 59:24 ... as if somehow or another-

Carole Hooven 59:25 Chest feeder.

Joe Rogan 59:26 Yeah. Yeah.

Carole Hooven 59:26 Uterus haver.

Joe Rogan 59:28 Menstruator.

Carole Hooven 59:28 Yes.

Joe Rogan 59:29 Yeah. Yeah, it's very strange.

Carole Hooven 59:31 But smart people think that is the right thing-

Joe Rogan 59:33 Right.

Carole Hooven 59:34 ... to do, and that does make me wonder if I'm just completely wrong. What am I missing here? You know, these are smart people I respect, and I have questioned myself over and over again.

Joe Rogan 59:42 But are they cowards?

Carole Hooven 59:45 I think they think they're doing the right thing.

Joe Rogan 59:47 Do they? A lot of them I bet don't. A lot of them I think are, uh, as you said, they're capitulating. I think a lot of them are really worried that this is the trend-

Carole Hooven 59:56 I don't know.

Joe Rogan 59:56 ... and you can sort of get out the basic facts while sticking with the current ideology, which is to-

Carole Hooven 1:00:01 Well, they also get a lot of approval, a lot of social approval.

Joe Rogan 1:00:05 That's what I'm saying.

Carole Hooven 1:00:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:06 You get a lot of social approval and, more importantly, you avoid the criticism. You- you avoid the harsh hate.

Carole Hooven 1:00:12 I don't know. I don't know. I think when you get that much social approval from other smart people, you feel like this is the right thing.

Joe Rogan 1:00:19 Right. But if you step out of that, then you get hated on.

Carole Hooven 1:00:22 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:00:23 And that's worse. The social approval's great and s- for sure people do that. They virtual signal left and right online.

Carole Hooven 1:00:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:29 It's like one of the main activities on Twitter.

Carole Hooven 1:00:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:32 But the one thing that they d- happen to do while doing that is avoid the hate that you get from stepping on that third rail of, you know, you- you, when you step out of line and start saying things that maybe you actually believe but aren't a part of the orthodoxy.

Carole Hooven 1:00:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:49 Then you get hated on.

Carole Hooven 1:00:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:50 And piled on.

Carole Hooven 1:00:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:51 And that's terrifying for people.

Carole Hooven 1:00:52 Yeah. And that's why I wrote the book, because it's not just social media. It is, I have air quotes here, it is the "science" that is coming out now is m- uh, there, about testosterone, um, there are books coming out and there are even studies coming out that are completely designed to show that testosterone, uh...... differences are less than we thought, you know, that there aren't really large sex differences in testosterone, that there's an overlap in testosterone that's just not that powerful and important, which means we can celebrate everybody as really being, um, sexless, you know, that there's no such thing as male and female. Testosterone really doesn't do that much, or, or females have much higher testosterone than we thought and that, that just to blur the biological differences so that people... I guess the agenda is so that fe- people feel more com- more comfortable expressing themselves and their gender as they see fit, which I just think you should do anyway. Let's promote that.

Joe Rogan 1:01:56 You should do that. But the thing is, it's not true.

Carole Hooven 1:01:57 Let's just do that.

Joe Rogan 1:01:58 That's the problem with it. I, I remember watching this YouTube video where this woman was talking about the, the differences between males and females were all cultural, and there's no difference-

Carole Hooven 1:02:07 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:02:07 ... between males and females, even with strength and athletics. And I was like-

Carole Hooven 1:02:11 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:02:11 ... "This is one of the dumbest conversations I've ever heard anybody speak out loud."

Carole Hooven 1:02:16 But that-

Joe Rogan 1:02:16 It's just so stupid.

Carole Hooven 1:02:17 ... is... So, the athletics is a huge issue right now because there's... I wrote about this in the book also because there's questions about whether trans women should be able to participate on women's sports teams. So, the big issue is, well, does testosterone really confer an athletic advantage? And I write about these examples where people are arguing that it doesn't. It is insane. Of course it does. And it's not just common sense. There is tons and tons of evidence.

Joe Rogan 1:02:44 Find that quote... There was that tweet by Amy Alkon who, uh, tweeted, uh... I sent it to you before, about the differences in sprinting speeds. And she was talking about a woman's world record, I believe in a 400 meter.

Carole Hooven 1:02:58 That's 10%, right.

Joe Rogan 1:02:59 And that 300 high school kids that are boys every year break that.

Carole Hooven 1:03:05 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:03:06 They break the-

Carole Hooven 1:03:07 Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:07 ... the women's world record for sprinting.

Carole Hooven 1:03:09 Yeah. No, it's... And it's testosterone. I mean, it's very-

Joe Rogan 1:03:12 There it is.

Carole Hooven 1:03:12 ... clear that that's what it is.

Joe Rogan 1:03:13 The fastest female sprinter in the world is American runner Allyson Felix, a woman with more gold medals than Usain Bolt. Her lifetime best for the 400-meter run is 49.26 seconds. Based on 2018 data, nearly 300 high school boys in the US alone could beat it. That's fucking bananas.

Carole Hooven 1:03:32 Okay. But people are saying, um, that... Some people are saying that that advantage is cultural.

Joe Rogan 1:03:40 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 1:03:40 And, um, it's not, and I outline in the book pretty clearly what going through male puberty and having high testosterone in puberty, how that changes... I mean, you know, you're jacked and part of it's 'cause you take testosterone. And so you can speak from personal experience about the change in your athletic capacity and muscle volume. It's all super clear. There's no doubt that you, you have increased hemoglobin, you have increased muscle math, you have a l- muscle mass, you have a larger body size, you have increased bone strength, all directly a result of high testosterone. And they don't... It doesn't-

Joe Rogan 1:04:14 Right. But this is-

Carole Hooven 1:04:14 It doesn't go away when you reduce testosterone.

Joe Rogan 1:04:15 But in their defense, it doesn't all go away when you reduce testosterone, but some of it does go away.

Carole Hooven 1:04:20 Oh, certainly.

Joe Rogan 1:04:20 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 1:04:20 So, the hemoglobin plummets. I mean, it depends... If you, if you go... If you're, um, male to female, hemoglobin plummets. And hemoglobin is important because it carries oxygen and it has to do with lung capacity and, um, aerobic capacity and power. And so that's an important, uh, decline. But muscle mass does not... I mean, it's totally variable, but typically, it does not go down to, uh, typical female levels. There's definitely an advantage that's retained.

Joe Rogan 1:04:49 There's also an advantage-

Carole Hooven 1:04:49 I mean, bone strength and height-

Joe Rogan 1:04:50 Yeah.

Carole Hooven 1:04:50 ... and grip and all that stuff is re- is retained.

Joe Rogan 1:04:54 And just the, the shape of the bones, it's very different. It's, uh, it's a strange time when it comes to the, the reality of the differences between genders. It's a, a str- very strange time because it doesn't, it doesn't... Like, we've... No one's ever said, like, men are better than women or women are better than men. We're just different things. And transgender people are different as well. It's all... We're all just different. We should be accepting of each other and loving of each other and give each other equal rights and laws and, and respect. But when it comes to athletics, there's a reason why men don't compete against women. And I had this bizarre conversation with this guy once who, uh, has this TV show where he kind of debunks things, but when I got him alone to talk about these things, like, without a team of writers, when you, you leave someone to just their opinions, and he had these sort of very progressive talking points that he would kind of blurt out. But then when I started challenging him on these and-

Carole Hooven 1:05:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:05:49 ... going deep, you realize, like, he didn't really think about this. He just wanted to appear that he was progressive, which I am. I am a progressive person. I know I look like a meathead, but I'm very progressive.

Carole Hooven 1:06:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:01 I, I just look at reality though. I grew up with martial arts and with fighting, and I know there's a fucking radical difference between males and females. It's radical. It's not, it's not small. It's not subtle. It's radical. When you-

Carole Hooven 1:06:16 You mean in, in physical strength or do you also mean in psychological-

Joe Rogan 1:06:18 In physical strength, in violence-

Carole Hooven 1:06:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:20 ... in psychology-

Carole Hooven 1:06:21 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:06:21 ... in attitude, in, in competitiveness. It's radical. There's a radical difference. And also, there's a spectrum. And some people-

Carole Hooven 1:06:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:31 ... are far more feminine than they are masculine, and they happen-

Carole Hooven 1:06:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:35 ... to have penises.

Carole Hooven 1:06:36 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:06:36 And some women are far more masculine than they are feminine, and they have to have vaginas. But it doesn't change the norm. It doesn't change, and it certainly doesn't change in the... on the high ends of these spectrums.

Carole Hooven 1:06:46 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:06:47 When you look at the high ends of these spectrums, so ultra female versus ultra male, you're looking at two radically different things.

Carole Hooven 1:06:54 Yeah. Yeah. And I like... really like what you said about... I, I'm getting emotional again. Um, I like what you said about just accepting and understanding each other.

Joe Rogan 1:07:07 Yes.

Carole Hooven 1:07:08 That, to me... You don't have to accept bad behavior. You don't have to accept hurtful behavior, but it does help us to really work hard to understand it. So... And those are the extremes of behavior. Um, but you're right, we're different. And I think it's interesting and it's exciting the way that we're different, the ways that we're different. And testosterone really does help to explain so many of those differences. So, understanding that hormone helps us understand each other. And I want to... It helped me.Even though I have been teaching about this stuff for ages, writing a book, and especially reading about the transgender experiences, helped me to have sort of this epiphany. So you can see how emotional I am, right? I'm like ultra-emotional. My husband is a British philosopher, and he is not, uh, he doesn't get angry, he doesn't, uh, really express a lot, a, a huge range of emotion. He's a wonderful guy and I love him. But I've always kind of picked on him and thought there was something wrong with him for not being more emotional, not being able to have these long conversations about emotions and psychology and what, and what happened in his childhood to make him like that. And I have a temper. He doesn't have a temper. I c- cry during lecture and can't even... and cry at home, and, you know, can barely control that.

Joe Rogan 1:08:32 (laughs)

Carole Hooven 1:08:32 My epiphany was, I'm not better than he is because I'm so in touch with my emotions. I have issues. Like he (laughs) probably has issues too, but he doesn't have to come to be closer to me in my way of being in the world. I need to work on accepting who he is. He's an awesome guy, and I was always trying to get him to be more like me, and I think women really want men, if they're in heterosexual relationships, um, to be more like them emotionally. But I had this epiphany, like, no, it's working out and, and our marriage would be better if I just shut up about some of the getting him to be more emotional all the time. I need to take the gifts that he's giving me, and I have to look at myself and where my emotionality, which I'm, you know, getting emotional again. Um, but that was all through learning about, like learning more about this hormone-

Joe Rogan 1:09:25 Mm-hmm.

Carole Hooven 1:09:25 ... and what it does. It's just who he is as a man.

Joe Rogan 1:09:28 Well, this-

Carole Hooven 1:09:29 It's not that all men are that way.

Joe Rogan 1:09:30 Right.

Carole Hooven 1:09:31 But it did help me, just the understanding helps us to accept each other, and that's sort of one larger point in the book that I don't try to make so explicitly, but I hope that, um... And again, I don't mean we have to accept bad behavior. But we can try to understand these extremes of male behavior that are disturbing, and more disturbing than extremes of female behavior. You know, I can cry and have a fit, but I'm not raping anybody. Um-

Joe Rogan 1:09:57 (laughs)

Carole Hooven 1:09:57 Well, because that's an extreme of m-

Joe Rogan 1:09:59 Yes.

Carole Hooven 1:09:59 That's a bad extreme of male behavior that we need to understand. But let's understand like where that's coming from instead of shutting down the conversation or shaming men for just being men. Who, all men are being blamed for the extremes of male behavior? They, that's ridiculous, in my view.

Joe Rogan 1:10:13 I, uh, I agree as well.

Carole Hooven 1:10:15 Thank you.

Joe Rogan 1:10:15 I think, I look at the human race as a, a puzzle that is whole, but every piece is different. And you cannot get a person, maybe like your husband, to be shaped like your piece.

Carole Hooven 1:10:26 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:10:26 It's not going to work. But together, we fit together in some very strange synchronicity. It all works.

Carole Hooven 1:10:32 That's beautiful.

Joe Rogan 1:10:33 It works.

Carole Hooven 1:10:34 That is beautiful.

Joe Rogan 1:10:35 But you have to find the right people.

Carole Hooven 1:10:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:10:37 Like, if you found someone who didn't jive with you, it wouldn't work. And, and you can't change people. You ve- I mean, you can kinda influence them a little bit and...

Carole Hooven 1:10:45 No, that's right. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:10:46 But, um, I think that's important in regards to everything. It's re- im- im- important in regards to gender, to transgender people. And if there's anything that upsets me more than anything, it's when I get misrepresented as being either hostile towards transgender people or, uh, dismissive of transgender people. It's not the case. And all-

Carole Hooven 1:11:11 Is that because of the Fal- Fallon Fox thing?

Joe Rogan 1:11:13 It came to that Fallon Fox things. 100%, because I was furious at that, 'cause I know what that is. Here's what that is. That's someone who wants to win. That's someone who's sandbagging. You're pretending that you're not a male, and you're competing against females without letting them know. If you wanted to tell them that you were male for 30 years and became female for two years, and they still wanted to compete against you, we have no qualm. I'm all in.

Carole Hooven 1:11:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:34 But that's not what that is. When you say, "I don't have to tell them because it's a medical condition," well, that's horse shit, and we all know it's horse shit.

Carole Hooven 1:11:41 Was that what happened?

Joe Rogan 1:11:42 Exactly. That's why I was so furious. Because she fought two people without telling them that she was a male for 30 years.

Carole Hooven 1:11:49 But she said it was a medical...

Joe Rogan 1:11:51 Yeah, she said she didn't have to tell anybody because it was a medical issue.

Carole Hooven 1:11:53 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:11:54 Which is nuts. So, that's why I got angry. And when I get angry, I would normal-

Carole Hooven 1:11:59 What happened after that?

Joe Rogan 1:12:00 ... never get into that sort of subject. I wouldn't, I wouldn't have such a strong opinion, but-

Carole Hooven 1:12:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:05 ... it's in my wheelhouse. I'm a martial arts expert. I do cage fighting commentary. That's what I do. I've done it for more than 20 years. So like, when that kind of shit happens, and you try to tell me there's no difference between males and females, like, fuck you.

Carole Hooven 1:12:17 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:12:18 I watch males and females fight.

Carole Hooven 1:12:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:20 Uh, I've seen thousands of fights feet away from me.

Carole Hooven 1:12:24 But, so, can I ask a sensitive question?

Joe Rogan 1:12:27 Yes.

Carole Hooven 1:12:28 Do you understand why people got upset about the way that you talked about it?

Joe Rogan 1:12:32 Oh, for sure, yeah.

Carole Hooven 1:12:32 Why do you think they got upset?

Joe Rogan 1:12:33 Because I called her a man.

Carole Hooven 1:12:36 W- W- Would you call her a man now?

Joe Rogan 1:12:36 I said, "You're a fucking man." I, in the same situation, I would be just as furious.

Carole Hooven 1:12:43 Well, you could be furious, but would you use the same language knowing that people who are listening, they're not her, but they are people who feel like a woman-

Joe Rogan 1:12:52 Yeah, it's-

Carole Hooven 1:12:52 ... and wanna identify as a woman?

Joe Rogan 1:12:54 ... it was-

Carole Hooven 1:12:54 It's very painful to be-

Joe Rogan 1:12:54 Aggressively insulting, right?

Carole Hooven 1:12:57 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:12:57 And insensitive, and also inflammatory in a way that would incite people who are transphobic.

Carole Hooven 1:13:07 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:07 Which I'm not.

Carole Hooven 1:13:08 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:08 That's, that's part of the problem.

Carole Hooven 1:13:10 I see.

Joe Rogan 1:13:10 Is that even though I look like a meathead, and like I said, I'm, I'm a very progressive person. I'm very open-minded. If I meet transgender people, I'm extra kind. I try to treat them with the most amount of respect, because I don't want them to feel bad. That's how I feel.

Carole Hooven 1:13:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:24 But this is not one of those situations. This was a girl who got her face crushed.

Carole Hooven 1:13:28 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:28 And I'm like, "This, you're a fucking asshole."

Carole Hooven 1:13:30 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:30 Like, you're not supposed to do that.

Carole Hooven 1:13:31 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:13:31 Do you know what sandbagging is?Sandbagging is, like, say if we, uh, were in a martial arts tournament.

Carole Hooven 1:13:37 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:13:37 And, uh, you were, uh, like a ten-year Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt. But you entered into this tournament and lied and said you were a purple belt.

Carole Hooven 1:13:46 (laughs) . Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:13:46 And you started competing against people that had only been doing it a couple years.

Carole Hooven 1:13:49 Oh. Oh. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:49 And you fucked them up. That's what sandbagging is.

Carole Hooven 1:13:52 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:13:52 That was the general consensus for a lot of people, how they felt about people that transition and compete against females in a lot of sports.

Carole Hooven 1:14:00 Without te- without making it known?

Joe Rogan 1:14:02 Without telling them. But, but that's in martial arts. In martial arts, I feel like it should be... It's like riding bulls. Do you choose to ride a bull? You have a massive disadvantage against that bull. There's no way you're gonna hang on. The best chance you got is eight seconds. Right? You wanna do that? I'm all for it.

Carole Hooven 1:14:20 Have you rode a bull, ridden a bull?

Joe Rogan 1:14:21 Do you want... No, I have not.

Carole Hooven 1:14:22 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:14:23 Have you, you... I don't... I'm all for anything that people wanna do where they understand the risks, where they're getting into it.

Carole Hooven 1:14:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:29 I don't like deception. When someone tells you that they're a biological female and they're not, that made me furious because I knew the story and I knew this one girl got her, literally got her skull broken.

Carole Hooven 1:14:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:41 And I'm like, "This is a person who's probably gonna be injured for the rest of her life."

Carole Hooven 1:14:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:45 Like, and from deception. Like had she known that this was not a biological female that she was competing against, maybe she would not have taken on that bout. That's, that's what made me furious.

Carole Hooven 1:14:57 Right. Well, you want people to have the truth.

Joe Rogan 1:14:58 Exactly.

Carole Hooven 1:14:59 Yeah, no. 100%.

Joe Rogan 1:14:59 But now when it comes to sanctioned events like powerlifting, there's a, there's a giant issue right now with the Olympics.

Carole Hooven 1:15:05 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:15:06 Where they're allowing a transgender male-

Carole Hooven 1:15:08 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:15:08 ... who's breaking all kinds of world records compete in a-

Carole Hooven 1:15:12 Or trans female.

Joe Rogan 1:15:13 Trans... I'm sorry.

Carole Hooven 1:15:14 Trans woman.

Joe Rogan 1:15:14 You're right. You're right.

Carole Hooven 1:15:15 Trans woman.

Joe Rogan 1:15:16 Trans woman.

Carole Hooven 1:15:16 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:15:16 Uh, transgender male to female. Sorry. Who's competing against females and breaking... Well, this is also part of the problem, right? We don't see the opposite.

Carole Hooven 1:15:24 No (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 1:15:24 There's not a lot of trans males that are kicking ass.

Carole Hooven 1:15:26 No.

Joe Rogan 1:15:26 It's kind of crazy. Crazy.

Carole Hooven 1:15:27 So, so what do you think should happen?

Joe Rogan 1:15:30 Trans people should compete against trans people. If there's so many of them that we have to change all these rules, why not have a transgender league? Why not have a transgender division? We have two divisions, right? There's a reason why we have two divisions. Why? For fairness.

Carole Hooven 1:15:44 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:15:44 Men and women don't compete against each oth- each other for what Amy Alkon highlighted.

Carole Hooven 1:15:49 This issue is not gonna go away.

Joe Rogan 1:15:50 This doesn't... It's not gonna go away, but it just doesn't mean people aren't compassionate. There's a reason why males don't compete against females. And this is part of the thing that I had with this guy, with, you know, this TV show host, where I was telling him, "Okay, do you think that males should compete against females?" And he's like, "No." I go, "Well, what are you, what are we doing then?"

Carole Hooven 1:16:07 But the way people are trying-

Joe Rogan 1:16:08 Because he's transgender.

Carole Hooven 1:16:09 The way people are trying... So my feeling here is that the way to decide these issues is not wha- is not to pretend that males don't... that natal males do not have any kind of advantage or to, to suppress discussion of that or to suppress knowledge about testosterone. So I feel... So I, I feel like I know what the literature says, and there is an advantage. Natal males will have an advantage. But to me, that doesn't decide the issue. I think there is a really, you know, there is a case to be made that if you are legally female, you should be able to compete as a female. There's an ethical case there, but-

Joe Rogan 1:16:50 Legally female meaning what?

Carole Hooven 1:16:51 Well, if you have had your, uh, sex changed on your birth certificate say-

Joe Rogan 1:16:55 Right, but if there's physical advantages-

Carole Hooven 1:16:57 ... and you're Canadian... No, no. So all I'm saying, yeah, and I agree, there's physical advantages-

Joe Rogan 1:16:59 We're talking about competition.

Carole Hooven 1:17:01 No, no, no. I, I, I agree. I agree.

Joe Rogan 1:17:03 We're not talking about a person just identifying and living life in society.

Carole Hooven 1:17:06 Yeah. But I think that the conversation can't happen when it's, um... if we don't get the scientific facts out there, because people are so hung up on the science and arguing about the science, that they're not even open to hearing the ethical case. So let's establish the science, let's work with the facts, and then let's sensitively hear the ethical case and consider that ethical case. So even if there is an advantage, is there an ethical, philosophical case to be made that trans women should be able to compete against natal women? You might say no, because there's a physical advantage. But at least we should get the facts out and then just sort of put the facts on the table so that we can have that conversation. But that conversation isn't even happening so that people are closed off to what could be a decent ethical case because maybe it's not all about physical advantage. Maybe there's some human rights issues that people aren't even hearing or open to right now.

Joe Rogan 1:18:03 Right. But we're talking only about athletics.

Carole Hooven 1:18:05 But there are human rights-

Joe Rogan 1:18:07 If there's athletics-

Carole Hooven 1:18:07 ... in athletics too.

Joe Rogan 1:18:08 Yeah. But there's not if you're... if you have a massive physical advantage.

Carole Hooven 1:18:11 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:18:11 If a guy identifies as a woman and he doesn't wanna take hormones and he wants to compete in women's boxing-

Carole Hooven 1:18:16 Oh, okay. If you're not taking hormones.

Joe Rogan 1:18:17 But you know what I'm saying?

Carole Hooven 1:18:18 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:18:18 Do you understand what's happening in high school sports, right?

Carole Hooven 1:18:20 Of course. I do.

Joe Rogan 1:18:20 There's two men-

Carole Hooven 1:18:21 I know.

Joe Rogan 1:18:22 ... or two bio... Excuse me, two biological males in Connecticut-

Carole Hooven 1:18:25 Natal, let's say natal, let's say natal males.

Joe Rogan 1:18:27 Whatever it is.

Carole Hooven 1:18:27 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:18:28 That have-

Carole Hooven 1:18:29 Trans, trans girls.

Joe Rogan 1:18:30 They have 18 state records.

Carole Hooven 1:18:32 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:18:33 Which is crazy. So imagine if you were a biological female-

Carole Hooven 1:18:36 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:18:36 ... and you're the cream of the crop and you've busted your ass your whole life-

Carole Hooven 1:18:40 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:18:40 ... through dedication and discipline to get to that point and you want to get a scholarship somewhere and you're getting denied.

Carole Hooven 1:18:45 Yep.

Joe Rogan 1:18:46 This is, this is the reality-

Carole Hooven 1:18:48 But what if... Okay, but then what if-

Joe Rogan 1:18:48 ... of biological females.

Carole Hooven 1:18:49 But what if you're the... I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but what if you are one of those trans girls, you identify as a girl, you believe on some level that you're a girl, you really want to be accepted, you wanna do your sport, you don't wanna play in some third league like some sort of weirdo, you know, say you, you just wanna be a girl, you wanna play against the girls, there is an ethical issue there. And I agree, they have an advantage.

Joe Rogan 1:19:16 I don't think there is. Okay.

Carole Hooven 1:19:17 There isn't even one to be discussed?

Joe Rogan 1:19:18 No. If you're biologically male-

Carole Hooven 1:19:21 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:19:21 ... and you're competing against biological females and you have an extreme advantage, I don't think the ethics would lean-

Carole Hooven 1:19:28 Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:19:28 ... towards letting you have this advantage because we want you to feel like you're female. I think you should be treated-

Carole Hooven 1:19:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19:35 ... like a, a, a member of society with all equal rights and equal respect and equal love. But we're not talking about being a member of society. We're talking about competing.

Carole Hooven 1:19:45 But is the competition part of society, though? Okay.

Joe Rogan 1:19:46 If you're a 300-pound person and you identify with being a 100-pound person-

Carole Hooven 1:19:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19:50 ... and you wanna compete with the 100-pound people-

Carole Hooven 1:19:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:19:52 ... that's not fair, right?

Carole Hooven 1:19:54 But that is different.

Joe Rogan 1:19:54 Well, if you're a biological male, and you have all these physical advantages of being a biological male, but you identify with being a female and you wanna compete as females, which is what we're seeing in high schools-

Carole Hooven 1:20:04 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:04 ... where I don't think... In some schools, they're not even required to do anything.

Carole Hooven 1:20:08 I think that's correct.

Joe Rogan 1:20:09 Which is fucking bananas, right? And this is what drives these kids crazy, because if you are a biological female, you know there's a distinct advantage to having that testosterone.

Carole Hooven 1:20:20 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:20 And this is what... They're... This is what they're ideal for.

Carole Hooven 1:20:22 Yeah. No, and I see, I... Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:23 It's ideology that flies in the face of science.

Carole Hooven 1:20:26 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:27 And people are embracing the ideology because they wanna be compassionate-

Carole Hooven 1:20:30 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:30 ... they wanna be progressive, and they don't want people to get mad at them.

Carole Hooven 1:20:33 Yeah. And I think you're right, and I think that's the problem. And I think we should be able to have a conversation, which some... You know, we should definitely be able to have a conversation where you hear the point of view of the girls who are losing to the transgirls, hear their point of view, hear the point of view of the transgirls, and get the scientific evidence in and have the conversation. That is not happening because it's being shut down-

Joe Rogan 1:20:55 Well, we-

Carole Hooven 1:20:55 ... because you're not allowed to say basically what you just said.

Joe Rogan 1:20:58 Well, we have seen some of the evidence and