The Housewife asked about all the estrogen-causing things in the environment. Here’s a beginning list. The things contributing to this problem really are legion. Hormonal disruptors have become rampant, and it is the imbalance that causes the problems.
The evidence for the physical contributors is just beginning to come in, and has only begun to be studied:
In foods themselves, like dairy products (that we consume far too much of—milk, ice cream, cheeses, etc.). This could be heavy enough of itself, but now the foods themselves are often crammed with estrogen-spurring things as well. And many of our grains, like genetically modified wheat, barley, corn, etc., and the amount of those we consume, appear to be another big source. Another is soy. While funny commentators like to poke fun at soy for supposedly contributing to reduced phallus size, the relevant issue is its testosterone suppressing and estrogen building properties. Japanese housewives have known about this one for years. Some commentators say that soy is a significant contributor to the dysfunction often common between the sexes in Japan. Soy’s “opposite,” meat, otherwise a testosterone enhancer, is often reversed by what we have done to the meat in our modern, mass production. And many foods, if eaten in too high a concentration, contain enough natural substances that mimic estrogen that the body is thrown out of balance. And all the not very natural (or decidedly unnatural) things we ingest often have estrogen-fomenting properties: MSG and other food additives, trans fatty acids, high fructose corn syrup, refined sugar, concentrated caffeine, etc. Many of these effects appear to surface in the long-term, not the short-term.
In our water, which is often polluted with chemical/drug (including contraceptives, which are largely estrogen) traces from all the things we’ve thrown away that make it to our drinking water sources, we find more of this process. To this is added the ubiquitous effects of a petro-chemical society, whose products and by-products (including plastics, pesticides/herbicides people put on their lawns, not just commercially, and of course the liquid fossil fuels and their vapors and residues) often produce estrogen-advancing and testosterone-suppressing effects. Personal care products and cosmetics, paints, solvents, detergents, perfumes, air fresheners. It’s a drowning soup. The Romans may have had their lead, but we’ve got a lot more than that! Other things also contribute to decline in testosterone and rise in estrogen: continual stress, obesity, etc.
Could all this testosterone-suppressing be at least partial causative of the American decline in instances of aggressive male behavior, and the similar decline in male crime statistics, especially violent crimes?
The decline in testosterone levels in American males across all ages is well documented. A 2007 study took a shorter (20 year period) of examination, and showed nearly a 20% drop. An older, and continuing study (over 40 years so far), shows a steady decline. One result: erectile dysfunction, even in younger males, is on an (no pun intended) alarming rise.
One anthropologist has even remarked that modern men are the sorriest examples of male-dom that human society has ever produced.
Btw, all this estrogen advancing also often appears to have negative effects on females as well: menstrual difficulties, extreme hormonal problems, mammary difficulties and disorders of all types (and maybe cancer), fertility difficulties, etc. etc.
It DOES matter what we do to ourselves and our environment. It always has. Our refusing to believe it didn’t make it not so.
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