Flaccid
Season 2. Episode 1: Flaccid. And here’s the question we want to answer for history: What was going on with masculinity in 1998 that prompted men to consume vast amounts of performance enhancing drugs and do any of us have the slightest clue what those drugs actually do?
In the 1980s, we had Reagan, Stallone and Schwarzenegger. In the 90s we had Clinton, Ross and Chandler. In the 80s, men’s suits were sharp in the shoulders and lapels. In the 90s, men wore flannel and loosely draped sweaters. In the 80s, Rock was hard and in the 90s, Matchbox 20 and the Goo Goo Dolls taught us how to Rock really soft.
But, in 1998, everything changed. Pfizer launched Viagra, a drug that allowed men with erectile dysfunction to achieve and maintain erections for hours. Simultaneously, major league baseball players began to take performance enhancing drugs in unprecedented volumes. The result was four major leaguers hitting over 50 home runs in the same season while their fathers and grandfathers cheered them on from the stands, with noticeable bulges in their trousers.
There is no way that these events -- the launch of Viagra and the dawn of baseball’s steroid era -- are not correlated. Twenty plus years later and now as middle-aged men ourselves, confronting our own declining physical strength, we wanted to understand:
What was going on with manhood in 1998?
Do any of us have the slightest clue how Viagra and anabolic steroids actually function?
Co-hosts Kevin Blake and Matty Wishnow are joined by alpha male panelist, Judd Wishnow, and 4% M.D. panelist, Jason Klein, to help understand the culture and physiology that made 1998 possible. Along the way, we travel from “magenta penis” to Steve Balboni until we finally ask the obvious question: did Matchbox 20 cause the September 11 attacks.
Whether you are a man or somebody who cares about men, whether you are Generation X, Y or Z, this episode is a must.