Critically Speaking

What starts as advice on fitness, dating, or success can lead young men into a world of grievance and reshape how they see women, masculinity, and themselves. Dr. Alice Marwick unpacks how the manosphere works, why it's growing, and the real-world harm it can cause.
 
In this episode, Therese Markow and Dr. Alice Marwick examine the manosphere's origins, business models, influence on young men, and links to misogyny, harassment, and extremist movements. They discuss what the manosphere is, how it appears in different environments, and the social impact of these manosphere influencers. As men's rights movements are often a stepping stone to more extreme movements, this is a topic that should matter to all. 
 
 Key Takeaways:
Manosphere is a slang term that describes a loose network of blogs, forums, podcasts, and creators, and is built around men's grievances. Increasingly, they're built around self-improvement and hustle culture, as well as dating strategy, but what unites them is an opposition to modern feminism.

Manosphere influencers are going to places and communities where there are a lot of young men and are actively trying to get audiences from those groups. While some are only there for the fitness or self-improvement, some do get persuaded by the more extreme political arguments. 

The self-obsession with how you look on camera has always existed, but was primarily seen around celebrities and public figures; with so much of your life on social media, the standards for what is a "normal" or "attractive" person have skyrocketed. 

Gender roles can be upheld by anybody. Within any peer group, you're going to have some sort of person or role where there is a reinforcement of what that person should be doing.

 
"We are in an economically depressed time period, and we're in a time in America where a lot of people are very exhausted and frustrated and angry. And women and feminism is an explanation and a scapegoat." —  Dr. Alice Marwick
 
Episode References: 
Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny by Kate Manne: https://www.katemanne.net/down-girl.html 

Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt39792948/ 

Drinking male tears: language, the manosphere, and networked harassment

 
Connect with Dr. Alice Marwick:
Professional Bio: https://datasociety.net/team/alice-e-marwick/  
Website: https://tiara.org/ 
Website: https://datasociety.net/  
Books: https://tiara.org/publications/books/ 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alice-marwick-7304341 
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=lf-BS3IAAAAJ&hl=en 
Drinking Male Tears:  https://tiara.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Marwick_Caplan_Drinking-male-tears-language-the-manosphere-and-networked-harassment.pdf
Networked harassment: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/20563051211021378
Media Manipulation & Disinformation Online: https://datasociety.net/research-library/media-manipulation-and-disinformation-online/
White supremacist "redpilling" (open access): https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/21934
 
Connect with Therese:
Website:  www.criticallyspeaking.net
Bluesky: @CriticallySpeaking.bsky.social
Instagram: @criticallyspeakingpodcast
Email: theresemarkow@criticallyspeaking.net
  
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

CTE isn't just an NFL story, and a diagnosed concussion isn't the only warning sign. Dr. Jonathan Cherry explains how years of repetitive impacts may quietly change the brain, and why researchers are racing to find a way to detect it during life.
 
In this episode, Therese Markow and Dr. Jonathan Cherry discuss his research into understanding how repetitive head injuries cause progressive brain changes and their work to learn how to detect the disease during life. They break down the difference between CTE and concussions, explain who is more likely to get CTE, and explain the links between CTE and other cognitive diseases. 
 
Key Takeaways:
While it's only been talked about for the last 20 years or so, the first research on CTE was done in the 1920s on boxers.

There is currently no way to diagnose CTE in life. TES is being used as a way to diagnose people in life with symptoms of CTE, but at this time, CTE can only be diagnosed after death. 

While contact sports are one of the biggest contributors to CTE, it is not the only way to get it. CTE has also been seen in the brains of those afflicted by domestic violence and those in the military.

 
"CTE is from a history of repetitive head injury, and a concussion is essentially the damage as a result of one injury." —  Dr. Jonathan Cherry
 
Connect with Dr. Jonathan Cherry:
Professional Bio: https://www.bumc.bu.edu/camed/profile/jonathan-cherry/ 
Website: https://cherrylab.science/ 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-cherry-phd-80117695/ 
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=g3ztmrwAAAAJ&hl=en 
PubMed: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/10iEdlxiameAD/bibliography/public/ 
 
Connect with Therese:
Website:  www.criticallyspeaking.net
Bluesky: @CriticallySpeaking.bsky.social
Instagram: @criticallyspeakingpodcast
Email: theresemarkow@criticallyspeaking.net
 
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Things you do or are exposed to early in life, including during fetal development, can actually affect your health later in adulthood. Normally, we're unaware of it, and it's difficult to make the connection. Today, Dr. Cheryl Rosenfeld dives into some of the research regarding placentas and their key implications in every life.
In this episode, Therese Markow and Dr. Cheryl Rosenfeld discuss how prenatal exposures can alter placental function, fetal brain development, and later-life health, with varying effects based on fetal sex. They expose the dangers of BPA and substitutes such as BPS, the importance of the neurotransmitters created by the placenta to the developing fetal brain, and the surprising results Dr. Rosenfeld has found in her research into maternal probiotic supplementation. 

 
 Key Takeaways:
The placenta is an endocrine organ. There are sex differences in the placenta between male and female fetuses. 

The placenta provides neurotransmitters, such as dopamine and serotonin, to the brain. If there's not enough serotonin, that could compromise early brain development and make a child unfortunately vulnerable to diseases later in life.

While many people try to avoid BPA, we are all impacted by it or by one of its substitutes. In a side-by-side study shot with BPA and BPS (a common substitute), it was found that both of them have equally harmful effects on the placenta.

 
"Essentially, all the fetal organs depend on that placenta. So if you affect the function of the placenta, it will affect the vital processing of all the other fetal organs." —  Dr. Cheryl Rosenfeld
 
Connect with Dr. Cheryl Rosenfeld:
Professional Bio: https://cvm.missouri.edu/pathobiology-and-integrative-biomedical-sciences/faculty/cheryl-s-rosenfeld-dvm-phd/ 
ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Cheryl-Rosenfeld   
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qluXCCYAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao
PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Rosenfeld+Cheryl+S&sort=date   
 
Connect with Therese:
Website:  www.criticallyspeaking.net
Bluesky: @CriticallySpeaking.bsky.social
Instagram: @criticallyspeakingpodcast
Email: theresemarkow@criticallyspeaking.net
   
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

The U.S. declared measles eliminated in 2000 — so why are we seeing more cases and deaths than in the last 30 years? Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo reveals the hyper-local vaccination gaps driving the resurgence, and why preparing for the next pandemic starts on your block, not in Washington.
In this episode, Therese Markow and Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo discuss the recurring nature of pandemics that require prevention, preparedness, and coordinated action from global, national, and local organizations, institutions, and communities. They discuss the current preparedness systems, where they are working, and where they could be strengthened, as well as breaking down some vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks and the future risks of pandemics.
 
 Key Takeaways:
Pandemics happen regularly throughout history. We are not going to be able to prevent them from happening, but we can prepare for them in a way that will not put everything on hold and upend lives (or cause deaths). 

Pandemic means a global spread. It does not have to be deadly; it just has to be global. When talking about pandemics, respiratory viruses are the pathogens that are most worried about. 

Transparency in preparedness not only is shown to help the individuals in that one country, but also other countries because decisions can be made based on more complete information.

Immunization works by having the majority of a population covered by the vaccine. When more people are vaccinated, everyone can be protected. This makes the more immediate community, such as your child's school vaccination rate, more important than a larger population, such as the state or national vaccination rate. 

 
"There's a lot of stuff wrong with the world right now, and a lot of it is at the global level or at the national level. But the good news is that preparedness is a bottom-up exercise. It starts in your community, and just like when I talked about, it really matters what the vaccination coverage is in your school, in your kid's school, or what it is in your community. What happens locally absolutely matters." —  Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo
 
Connect with Jennifer Nuzzo:
Professional Bio: https://pandemics.sph.brown.edu/people/jennifer-nuzzo-drph 
Research: https://vivo.brown.edu/display/jnuzzo 
X: https://x.com/JenniferNuzzo   
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/jennifernuzzo.bsky.social   
Website: http://thepandemiccenter.org/ 
 
Connect with Therese:
Website:  www.criticallyspeaking.net
Bluesky: @CriticallySpeaking.bsky.social
Instagram: @criticallyspeakingpodcast
Email: theresemarkow@criticallyspeaking.net
 
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

In this episode, Therese Markow and Dr. Daniel Aaron discuss the inadequate oversight of food additives by the FDA, particularly the agency's GRAS or "Generally Recognized as Safe" process, which allows unsafe additives to reach the market without proper scrutiny. Dr. Aaron highlights industry conflicts of interest, the lack of reporting requirements, the need for stricter regulation to protect public health, and discusses what is needed for the FDA to be better able to make impactful changes. 
 
 Key Takeaways:
The majority of food additives in the US are not vetted by the FDA. Since 1958, food additives have been presumed safe until proven otherwise. 

The Clean Eating movement in the US is indicative of the skepticism of the American food supply. 

While the FDA used to maintain a list of GRAS substances, today, reporting to the FDA is not required. 

Europe uses a more precautionary approach to food additives. The EFSA must approve all chemical substances prior to their use in foods. 

Food additives are known to cause synergistic harm. However, the FDA poorly regulates single additives, so it is not surprising that its consideration of interacting chemicals is insufficient.

 
"The FDA is the most accountable to corporate power. The largest impediment, in my view, to food regulation is funding. FDA's Food Center has been underfunded for decades. Further funding from Congress is needed, but our legislators often are supported by industry that doesn't necessarily want a more robust review of food additives." —  Daniel Aaron, M.D., J.D.
 
Episode References: 
Bystanders to a Public Health Crisis: The Failures of the U.S. Multi-Agency Regulatory Approach to Food Safety in the Face of Persistent Organic Pollutants by Katya S. Cronin: https://scholarship.law.gwu.edu/faculty_publications/1725/ 

EFSA: https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en 

FDA Food Center: https://www.fda.gov/food 

 
Connect with Daniel Aaron, M.D., J.D.:
Professional Bio: https://faculty.utah.edu/u6052921-DANIEL_G_AARON/hm/index.hml 
Email: Daniel.Aaron@law.utah.edu 
 
Connect with Therese:
Website:  www.criticallyspeaking.net
Bluesky: @CriticallySpeaking.bsky.social
Instagram: @criticallyspeakingpodcast
Email: theresemarkow@criticallyspeaking.net 
 
Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You're the expert. Your podcast will prove it.