No, that is not obvious at all.
All we know is that men commit most violent crimes. We don’t know what it is about men that cause violent crimes. It’s also a fact that testosterone levels are higher in men.
But, it is not logical to conclude that testosterone levels causes violent crimes, since most men don’t commit violent crimes.
It is obvious to say " Testosterone Alone Does Not Cause Violence", for that reason.
Correlation can’t prove causation, but it can yell, “hey, look over there!!!”
but there isn’t even correlation.
the only thing we know is that men commit more violence. What about men, we have no idea.
To bring something we have way less data on into the discussion - transgenderism - is to be even more sus that there’s an underlying agenda.
Combined with some posters’ past transphobic posts in other threads, it’s not hard to put 1+1 together
To look at it from a different angle: trans women who are on HRT, in addition to taking estrogen and getting breasts, also take androgen blockers which result in very low levels of testosterone, shrinkage of testicles and penis, and about a 50% rate of ED (assuming no surgery so they even have those parts). Yet if you are crazy enough to venture onto Twitter, there are tons of people who are arguing both that trans men are dangerous b/c they take testosterone, and that trans women are also inherently predators.
Yup, there’s a poster in this very thread that suggested that transwomen should go to men’s bathrooms/prisons because they might be predators, yet also suggesting that testosterone could be the cause for violent behavior. Very contradictory statements.
The transphobia is glaring.
I wonder… humans are animals, and a look around the animal kingdom reveals that some species are champion, in that they have an alpha male that has a monopoly on reproduction. Invariably, it’s a fight to the finish to dislodge the top male. Othe species, like wolves, don’t have hierarchy at all. Often there is a life long bond between parents, sharing the duties of raising the offspring.
Humans seem to be something of a blend. Could be pretty deep in our DNA stuff. But I am no behavioral biologist. Just worth a look, maybe.
This is news. Are you sure about that?
It looks like wolves have some social structures that aren’t determined by physical dominance.
Since testosterone promotes sex characteristics that include physical strength, it is going to be important where physical dominance is a part of the social structure. In humans, physical strength may have been important, but it alone has not defined social structures like in some animal species.
One thing we have done as humans is generally categorize or children into age groups in schools. Children, in particular the males, hit puberty across a range of ages in the early teen years. This does lead to social structures based on physical strength as athletics also becomes important in these years, and possibly rankings based on how the boys settle disputes outside the classroom. These are temporary and generally disappear in adulthood. The other issue is that humans don’t reach full maturity into their early 20s. Those learned behaviors may carry on well beyond their useful life.
So there may be correlation between testosterone in males and physical agression through complex social development into adults, but any direct causation seems incredibly weak or nonexistent. Testosterone is not a drug that leads to irrational behavior.
Of course Republicans will just say “it’s common sense” and ignore the complexity of an issue to own the libs in their never ending culture war.
Wrong. Testosterone causes aggression. Guns kill people. These are both true. One of them does not invalidate the other. We can’t set here and act like testosterone therapy for a female transitioning to becoming a male is not going to increase aggressive behavior in those people. It most certainly will. It doesn’t mean being trans is wrong or needs to be banned or that transitioning males will become killers, it just is what it is. It also doesn’t make current gun laws right. We still need to make assault rifles extremely hard to obtain. This situation is just red meat for both sides which is unfortunate because several people lost their loves and we are becoming numb to that.
Weird, I’m on medication for mental illness, I don’t own a gun, and I haven’t shot anybody.
Yep.
When it comes to wolves, at least, nothing about their hierarchies transfer to humans. Alpha males don’t exist in these wild canines. Scientists used to think this was the case: In a 1948 publication, a scientist named Rudolph Schenkel wrote that amongst wolves, an alpha pair would fight for dominance and win the exclusive mating rights among the group. Dave Mech, a wolf researcher with the United States Geological Survey, echoed the idea in a 1968 book.
Life is change.
We are talking about violent acts. Most men are not violent actors.
Just saying testosterone activates the aggression subcortex does not validate anything.
Cool, TIL. Most of my wolf knowledge comes from elementary school learning. There was that interesting article about infection cycle driving “risky” behaviors like leaving the pack recently. It does talk about social dominance/pack leadership. Evidently the social dominance model is more complex than earlier thought.
If you want a better understanding of social systems and behavioral biology, I HIGHLY recommend a series on YouTube, a Stanford professor (Sapolsky) looks at the bio chem aspects of the endocrine system and behavior. It is eye popping how much the science has advanced in 20 years.
The biggest surprise for me is the section on gender identification. I was pretty ignorant.
Guns have become the #1 cause of death in the age 1-18 demographic.
Hmm, @meep ?
Yeah, if you throw older teens in with little kids.
But let me break it out by age groups (and I’ll throw in the 19-year olds so I can use the 5-year age groups that are built in)
Here are the numbers for gun-involved deaths for ages 0-19, broken out by year and 5-year age groups:
(the 2022 numbers are too low, because of censorship on data regarding external causes of death)
And here are total deaths, all causes, for each age group:
You may see there’s an age effect going on. I could break it into single year ages, and you will see most of this is being driven by the older teens.
The reason guns are the “top cause” in this way is because:
The article and my quote does point out it is the 1-18 age demographic they are talking about.
Not sure why it’s relevant to have age 1-18 as one group, given the order of magnitude and causes differ quite a bit over that range.
Anyway, here’s the 2021 ranking table at the younger end. This is using a wider range, obviously, and with the younger 20s, you’re getting more drug ODs in there.
