I don't watch a ton of TV and the majority of what I do watch consists of live sporting events. I do, however, have my DVR set for the Velocity Network series "Wheeler Dealers." The hosts have a reasonable amount of personality and good taste in finding older, more obscure vehicles to buy and work with (the apple green Lamborghini Urraco and Syrena, aka the "Polish Mini," are my favorite episodes) And what the hell, I like cars. It's much more entertaining than, say, watching a racist British asshole run half-million dollar cars around a track.
One side effect (foreshadowing!) of this viewing habit is exposure to commercials aimed at the target audience of Old White Guys with Some Money. In particular, in the past year there has been a tremendous marketing effort made by the pharmaceutical industry on behalf of something called "Low T." Watch an auto-related show on any network and you'll probably see four of these commercials in the average hour.
Low T (for Testosterone) has a list of symptoms that eerily mimic 1) aging and 2) being sedentary while doing it. Do you have less energy than you used to?
Do you have less endurance for physical activity? Do you sometimes feel irritable or cranky?
buy trazodone online buy trazodone online no prescription
Has your muscle mass declined? Is your libido waning? And of course, there's the $64,000 question to which all advertising aimed at men over 40 can be reduced: Does your wang not work sometimes?
Looking at that list of symptoms you might be thinking they sound an awful lot like the symptoms of no longer being a teenager, of – gasp – aging. But you would be wrong, according to countless major pharmaceutical manufacturers. You have a medical condition in need of treatment! True, the human body naturally reduces its production of testosterone starting around age 30, but…if you ask your doctor to pump you full of it you'll feel young again! The downside is that you're substantially more likely to have a heart attack or stroke. You know, it's almost as if your body isn't supposed to be surging with teenage fratboy levels of sex hormones when your body is a half century old. Almost.
We're all accustomed to the phenomenon of the advertising-driven New Medical Condition rollout, and as always I'm sure actual hormone deficiency is a real medical problem for some people. As we have seen before with things like ADHD and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, the effort here is not to fabricate a medical condition but to convince everyone on Earth that they have it.
Check out the absolutely hilarious industry website IsItLowT.com to find out whether you have Low T (spoiler: you do) or should ask your doctor about it (spoiler: you should).
It's almost enough to make you wonder why almost every industrialized country on the planet except the United States has banned direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs. Heck, it's almost as if they want you to think you have something that only their drugs can fix.
HoosierPoli says:
You're burying the lede here, which is the hilarious euphemism that they chose to push their product. Can you picture the marketing meeting for this shit?
"We can't say low TESTOSTERONE, our idiot consumers will think we're calling them limp-dicked nancy boys!"
"But we are, aren't we?"
"Well, yeah, but they aren't supposed to KNOW that!"
"How about 'Low T'? It's still close enough to be demeaning, but vague enough to be essentially meaningless!"
"GEEEEEEEEEEEEENIUSSSSSSSSSSSSS"
Bill says:
Ed, I must commend you for your fine TV taste. Minus the kinda ridiculous accounting game they throw into the episodes, that is an entertaining and informative show.
Now, does anyone want to call odds on Putin's death? I'm thinking that if he doesn't make an appearance before the weekend it is likely that he's at least incapacitated.
Kevin says:
Hell, the USA used to ban direct marketing of prescription drugs to the public.
wetcasements says:
Another reason to hate Andrew Sullivan — he's (was) constantly going on and on about the wonders of testosterone replacement.
RIP.
Slim Shady says:
Who is going to provide all the advertising revenue if we prohibit Big Pharm? There are only so many Car Dealers and Furniture stores around here. And Dunkin Donuts already takes 16 minutes of every 30 minutes, we can't expect them to take a few more.
The only alternative I see is to bump the 30 minute news segment from 8 minutes to 10 or 11. I'm sure they can fill that with breaking news about the latest health study or Dunkins flavor of the week rollout.
PattyP says:
I agree with Bill – Wheeler Dealers is fun, except for the silly 'cost' add-up that doesn't include the time & labor. The best part is trying to see Edd the mechanic fit into the little old cars, like the frog-eye sprite.
The commercials are – well – interesting. I appreciate that they allow the show to be aired for my amusement. But the content … the old guys in the Low-T ad are are really freaky if you ask me (which you didn't, but …)
c u n d gulag says:
When it was first proposed decades ago, to let doctors, lawyers, and pharmaceutical companies, I know it wouldn't turn out well! *
Now, people tell the doctors what they want.
Every guy over 35 who can't get it up as often and as hard as when they were in their teen's and twenties, wants a prescription for 'a quicker-pecker-upper!'
And doctor's are hard-pressed not to give it to them, because the guys will doc-shop until they find one that will.
And people are bombarded with ads from "lawyers" grifting for business over the slightest injury.
The result has been a glut of pointless law-suits.
For the life of me, I can't remember the doctor's name – it was something like Dr. Tush or Dr. Butts – whose ads were on every subway car back in the early-mid 80's.
He promised to tighten your butt safely and cheaply.
Well, after a few years, charges were brought against him, and it was revealed that he was a hack who had disfigured countless people, and even killed a few.
He went to jail, and after that, I lost track of him.
But (no put intended), the damage had already been done to countless people.
*Around that same time, they banned booze and wine ads on TV – as well as cigarettes.
Cigarettes I could understand – but booze and wine?
Oy.
Burt Osborne says:
I am reminded of The Simpsons episode when Homer is a test subject for a appetite suppressant. One side of effect is loss of vision:
1st scientist: Who's going to buy a pill that makes you blind?
2nd scientist: We'll let marketing worry about that.
ninja3000 says:
gulag:
Beer and wine have never been banned from advertising on American TV by either the government or the media, nor has hard liquor. There was a self-imposed "ban" set by their own trade association (I think in the '60s), but in the late '90s, the hard liquor "ban" was broken by Seagrams, and the floodgates were opened. As far as wine goes, all through the '70s, Orson Welles hawked the Paul Masson brand on TV.
If beer advertising was banned, the NFL would cease to exist.
Dial Tone says:
Maybe you're already aware of this site, but it's a fun time waster for people who like old and oddball cars:
http://bringatrailer.com/
Major Kong says:
I'm tired most of the time.
I suspect it's from working nights and getting five hours of low quality sleep during the day while the hotel cleaning staff slams doors in the hallway outside my room.
Skipper says:
DO NOT fall for the "Low T" bullshit. Stay away. Run.
The FDA just ordered companies to put a warning label on testosterone replacement products. They are dangerous — not to mention expensive.
There is little independent research on testosterone replacement and what there is is more than disturbing. All the other "research" comes from Big Pharma.
The biggest takeaway, aside from the expense is that it can have terrible consequences. More than half of all men have cancer cells in their prostate. For most of those men, those cells will remain sub-clinical and won't cause problems. Testosterone replacement products wll make those cells grow. And then there is the increased risk of heart disease and stroke.
My (former) doctor put me on testosterone. So I started researching it. It is a massive scam. So I got off of it — and that has problems too.
Emerson Dameron says:
The true culprits are feminism and Cultural Marxism. Obviously.
I had a college buddy who was brilliant in so many ways but absolutely crippled by ADHD. It bugs me to see it redefined as the natural response to, say, trying to watch Wolf Blitzer and read half a dozen headline crawls at the same time. Thank god CNN's advertisers have the cure for the extreme irritation caused by its content!
anori says:
Obviously Ed has never watched Fox News (why would he?) or he would have seen those Low T ads before. Pretty much all of their advertising is geared to the older-guy demographic (Cialis? Super Beta Prostate?) The only thing I can think of that's aimed at women is some cream that's supposed to reduce "vaginal dryness" and pain during intercourse. Even that could be seen as a way to get women to accommodate the man of the house, so to speak. Maybe it's unkind of me, as a woman, to find this really funny, but I do.
Emerson Dameron says:
@anori:
Same deal. In this case, the ad wizards "cure" the viewer's perfectly natural response to seeing Bill O'Reilly.
SonofOslo says:
Even if you click "no" on every question, it still recommends you get tested for Low-T. Genius.
The Unfortunate Truth says:
I think the commercials may have given you the subconscious belief that you have Low T. That would explain the ass-hat car that you drive.
Andrew says:
There are probably middle-aged men who have low testosterone FOR THEIR AGE, and they could probably benefit from supplementing it to the normal level FOR THEIR age, but a 50-year-old man with 18-year-old hormones is frightening to think about.
I read a few years ago that New Zealand is the only other industrialized country that permits consumer-facing ads for prescription pharmaceuticals. I have not independently verified this.
sluggo says:
"A man's only as old as the woman he feels." – Groucho Marx
sluggo says:
Glad to know that it is only low testosterone making me tired, cranky and weak. I actually thought it was from selling chunks of my soul at cut-rate prices all these years.
Southern Beale says:
Yeah ever since they rescinded that rule about pharma advertising it's become a major revenue stream for just about every media outlet — not just network TV and cable but print, too. Thumb through a "lifestyle" magazine like, I dunno, "Southern Living" and you've got 4 pages of 4-color ads hawking some product or the other (and 3 of those pages are tiny font print going over the drug specs and risks, as required by law, as if anyone reads that shit). With the media profiting from this you have to wonder if their news coverage has now turned to ginning up fear over the disease du jour?
It's the same thing I've said about our sucky news coverage and political coverage. We rarely get any in-depth reporting on issues, it's always 30 second soundbites of amygdala-tweaking emotionalism ("If Obama is elected, we're all gonna dieeeee!" "If Mitt Romney is elected, we're all gonna be broooooke!"). You have to work to damn hard to be informed in this country; you certainly can't find out what's going on by reading your local daily or watching your local news, as perhaps once was the case.
And every election our airwaves are flooded with election adverts featuring the scary-voiced-announcer dude, not to mention all of the ads we see in between featuring that smarmy lady from America's Natural Gas hawking fracking, or the new ones that present Koch Industries and just some good ol' guys from the heartland providing jobs.
I mean think about it. Think about who profits from our broken campaign finance system? Who profits from our ignorant public? The media, of course. They'd all be out of business if it weren't for this revenue stream.
c u n d gulag says:
@ninja3000.
Thanks, I stand corrected.
How could I forget those Orson Welles ads, and the Miller v. Miller Light ads?
My only excuse?
I was probably half-asleep when I wrote this, still taking my first sips of coffee.
Skipper says:
@Andrew According to the research I've seen, there is no proven benefit except in the case of HIV-positive men — and even that is minuscule.
John Danley says:
I know what all the marketing people are thinking right now. Oh you know what Bill is doing? He’s going for that anti-marketing dollar. That’s a good market. — Bill Hicks
sinned34 says:
Reminds me of a truck commercial I saw while watching a hockey game last night. They photoshopped two pictures of the same guy: one with him standing in front of a truck, and the other with him standing in front of a Camry. Then they supposedly show the pictures to kids and attractive young women. The kids all announce that the guy with the truck looked "cooler" and "tougher", and of course all the women fawn over the greater fuckability of the truck owner. Doesn't that make you want to drop an extra $30,000 on a gas-guzzling truck that you don't need?
People are fucking stupid. Men even more so.
Assistant Professor says:
#slatepitch time!
All of these bogus treatments for made up diseases are in fact a way of subsidizing the health care of the rest of the developed world. Most of the state health insurance of the rest of the developed world drives a really hard bargain with phrama when they're buying the various drugs for their citizens. So pharma has trouble making money in Europe and Canada so to compensate, they sell treatments for normal parts of life here in the States thus funding them so that they can make drugs that Europeans and Canadians will buy on the cheap.
(I just pulled 90% of the above out of my a*s, but it seems plausible.)
mothra says:
You know who likes extra testosterone? Professional cyclists. Of course, they've never been known to show good judgment when it comes to taking care of their bodies.
I do laugh pretty hard at those LowT ads, though. I frequently yell back at the TV, saying "of course you're tired and your dick takes a while to get going. YOU'RE OLD." Do they advertise those Eastern European and Asian dating sites on that show? Those just creep me out.
Davebo says:
Always thought that the ultimate compromise would be to ban once again both prescription drug and lawyer advertisements. Both were banned in the past and since conservatives hate lawyers and liberals hate big pharmaceutical it's something everyone could get behind!
Major Kong says:
@sinned34
I was rather astonished by that truck commercial.
I always figure I can rent a truck for the one day out of the year I need to move a piece of furniture.
Leslee Beldotti says:
I'm a woman who legitimately suffers from hormone deficiencies. When I finally managed to drag myself into a clinic a few years ago, blood tests revealed that my body had stopped producing ALL sex hormones. My levels of testosterone, progesterone and estrogen were all so low that they were UNDETECTABLE. I should have become an extra on The Walking Dead.
Oh yeah… and did I mention that I was 45 years old at the time?
I want to hurl something large at my TV every time I see one of those blasted "Low T" commercials. Because, guess what? Most health insurance companies won't pay for hormone replacement treatment in WOMEN because it's deemed "unproven" and "experimental".
It costs me $3000/year for this (very) necessary treatment.
Of course, the same treatment is 100% covered for MEN.
Gawd, I hate this world…
sluggo says:
Just more pills to forget to take………
I am thinking of joining an over-50 Fight Club. mostly it would involve yelling and fist shaking, but once in awhile you get to smash someone with your walker.
The second rule of Over 50 Fight Club is ……….oh crap, senior moment.
CaptBackslap says:
Not only is testosterone replacement dangerous and likely to be ineffective, but it's a controlled substance, so most doctors will be quite reluctant to write that script.
I've heard good things about aromatase inhibitors, on the other hand.
Arslan says:
For the guy who wanted a Putin update: http://nobsrussia.com/2015/03/13/ive-got-yer-theories-right-here/
Brian M says:
I've read somewhere that on the whole, testosterone levels for males are much lower than they used to be? Partly attirbutable, the claim is mae, to the sea of estrogenic chemicals in the environment (plastics, pesicides, birth control medicines, etc. etc.
sluggo says:
Anyone else see this movie?
"Weekend at Putin's" ????
Skepticalist says:
I have zero interest in paying attention to anything evil drug companies say is important. Drug companies have nothing to do with medicine other than sell incredibly expensive pills.
Drug companies, lawyers and even most hospitals shouldn't be allowed to scare the shit out of us with advertising, especially on billboards. It turns my stomach.
Once I heard a doctor tell me that while some specialties don't sound like much fun, they still are a good way for a doctor to make a lot of money. This isn't what I want to hear at my appointment. I wanted to kill the little twerp.
Bitter Scribe says:
Sometimes I wonder if every physician in America–at least, every one who didn't get his or her degree yesterday–doesn't curse the day when pharma companies were allowed to market prescription meds directly to consumers.
FMguru says:
Oh yeah, cable news ads are a horrorshow of everything that's awful about aging: boner pills, mobility scooters, medigap policies, discount mail-order catheters, reverse mortgages, medical class-action suit settlements, and on and on. Tells you exactly who their demographic is.
Bitter Scribe says:
It's not just cable news. Check out the network news sometime. Half of their ads at least are old-fart stuff.
Pete Gaughan says:
@ Major Kong : "Moving furniture"? Is that what the kids are calling it now?
jon says:
At some point in my life, I'm going to have to just be an old man. Testosterone might make me feel great, but it's also likely to spur prostate cancer and heart problems.
Maybe Bruce Jenner is on to something?
Anonymouse says:
@Major Kong; I had that monster truck conversation with a co-worker; his wife has an SUV-a-saurus. This guy is always on a soapbox about how everyone else needs to live more simply. I commented about his wife's gas-guzzling, parking-lot-crowding vehicle, and oooooh, she NEEDS the biggest SUV on the road, because….because…because…she HAULS STUFF! (she works in an office as admin support and her hobbies include watching tv and going out to dinner) I asked what in the world she was hauling–their kids are grown and gone, so really, how many groceries should two older adults go through in a week?!? He tap-danced around, then blew up at me because once, a decade ago, I hosted another family as houseguests…and rented a minivan for a week to haul both families around in. I drive a bog-standard economical family sedan, and like you, the couple of times I've needed a larger vehicle, I've just rented it.
Southern Beale says:
@Bitter Scribe:
Yeah we actually watch "Jeopardy!" on weeknights (trivia game buffs, what can I say) and you just know that's old fart central by the ads.
N__B says:
c u n d gulag:
You're thinking of M.D. Tusch. His ads started appearing almost simultaneously with Dr. Zizmor's.
schams says:
Doubly it is understood as that stroke statistics
FMguru says:
These ads remind of those scientific-looking "Personality Tests" that Scientologists administer which somehow always turn out to show that the person taking the test would be a good – no, wait, EXCELLENT – candidate for Scientology brand personal improvement courses and training. Huh, what are the odds?
This also reminds me a lot of the fake psychic/con-man practice of "cold reading". Say, do you sometimes feel tired, or overwhelmed, or angry? Do you sometimes get frustrated and feel like you're not in charge of your life? Well, congratulations, so does 90% of everyone alive, but if I phrase it cleverly enough it can seem like I just read your mind.
The Jack of Hearts says:
I remember back in my tween years hearing about this great new thing called cable TV, and how because people paid to subscribe to this service, all movies and shows on it were commercial-free. It didn't take long for commercials to creep in, and yet everyone's still paying to subscribe. Talk about a rip-off.
Men seem to have fewer physical sources of potential insecurity for advertisers to exploit than women do. They keep going for the penis, and penis by proxy (e.g. large pickup trucks).
VCB says:
c u n d: don't you mean Dr Zizmor? According to the unimpeachable Wikipedia, he's still alive and turned down a cameo on 30 Rock: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Zizmor
Southern Beale says:
@Jack:
I don't remember "cable" being advertised as commercial–free, I remember "movie channels" being commercial-free.
We were one of the first houses to have the "Z Channel" back in the '70s. My dad had to have every new thing.
democommie says:
When cable first came out I don't remember it being advertised as "commercial free" but it was certainly a feature that sales peole used to brag about.
Otoh, I remember when they built the Seabrook (NH) Nuclear Power Plant folks were being told that the electricity would be so cheap that consumers would be "flat rated" instead of being metered.
Anybody know where I can find a nice bridge for short money?
Skepticalist says:
Some of the doctors I have been used by… I like that…seen pissed off that I reached 68 without high blood pressure or cholesterol problems. Evidently it isn't fair that they can't start me on a bunch of iffy drugs. Maybe they should be happy for me? No money in it though.
Xarelto overdose seems to be the latest cash cow for ambulance chasers. Isn't it cute that they invite families of supposed victims to look into lawsuits?
It's a stupid name for a drug. Xarelto sounds more like an electric car.
Southern Beale says:
Someone needs to explain to me the logic behind the people who advertise via "Sponsored Tweets" on Twitter. I only see them on my iPhone because I use adblocking on my laptop, but I find them incredibly annoying. I try to block them whenever I can but it's next to impossible because a big company like Microsoft or IBM will have dozens of different Twitter IDs that they use for marketing this way.
And I find it really fascinating that most of the companies doing these sponsored Tweets are business-related — again, Microsoft, IBM, software and tech co's, etc. Do they even read Twitter? Do they assume because you're on Twitter you're interested in tech stuff? Why would you assume that? That is not who I see on Twitter.
Phoenician in a time of Romans says:
It's almost enough to make you wonder why almost every industrialized country on the planet except the United States
He is, indeed, talking about New Zealand [hangs my head in shame].
In our defense, we do have a system of a schedule of useful drugs receiving public subsidisation which acts against people going out and spending heaps on unnecessary drugs, and I've never seen ads for "Low-T".
democommie says:
Having low levels of testosterone may or may not have anything to do with being tired. I've been in fairly constant pain (it runs the gamut from annoying to, "I want to fucking shoot myself", with no apparent cause or predictability). I did have a guy tell me that he was getting testosterone injections once or twice a month and that I should look into it. I'll continue self-medication with beer and wings.
Nate says:
Oh noes, My low-T is causing my ED! :)
Jason T. says:
"Check out the absolutely hilarious industry website IsItLowT.com to find out whether you have Low T (spoiler: you do) or should ask your doctor about it (spoiler: you should)."
Holy crap, you aren't kidding. I answered "no" to every single question and was still told I should "talk to my doctor and ask to be treated for low testosterone."
(I see SonofOslo beat me to this.)