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Carole Hooven vs. transgender people

Carole Hooven is an American anthropologist and sex segregationist whose work focuses on maintaining a sex binary. Hooven also focuses on making people “comfortable in their own bodies,” a frequent dogwhistle used by critics of trans healthcare.

Hooven is a senior fellow at American Enterprise Institute and Has written for many anti-trans publications, including The Free Press, Tablet, and Quillette.

Hooven frequently defends and collaborates with other gender critical public figures, including spouse Alex Byrne, a philosopher and anti-trans activist.

Background

Carole Kennedy Hooven was born February 18, 1966. Hooven earned a bachelor’s degree from Antioch College in 1988 and a doctorate from Havrad University in 2004.

Hooven married Alex Byrne and has one child, Griffin.

Hooven co-authored the 2013 book Meta-Emotion: How Families Communicate Emotionally.

Anti-transgender activism

Hooven is the author of the 2021 book T: The Story of Testosterone, the Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us.

In 2020, Abigail Shrier scored a major coup by launching the book Irreversible Damage on The Joe Rogan Experience. Hooven followed suit in 2021 for the launch of T. That appearance was followed by dozens of interviews on the usual anti-trans programs in the following years.

In 2022 Dartmouth political science professor Henry C. Clark arranged an event with Hooven, Jesse Singal, and Katie Herzog. After the event was cancelled, the event was moved to New York. An additional event with Singal was later arranged at MIT by Hooven’s spouse Alex Byrne.

Hooven gave a blurb for the 2023 anti-trans book Sex and Gender: A Contemporary Reader:

Edited collections of academic essays are often hit-and-miss. A good collection has 50% decent essays; an excellent collection, which is rare, has 80%. I have now finished reading all of the essays in Sex and Gender, edited by Sullivan and Todd. There are 14 essays and an editors’ introduction. Every single one of the contributions is excellent. It is an unusual collection of absolutely first-rate work covering science, social sciences, and humanities. The sex/gender debate is very heated, to say the least. This book shines a great deal of light on the issues. The essays are all clearly written, and will appeal to the general reader as well as to the specialist.

In 2023, Hooven was scheduled to speak at the American Anthropological Association (AAA) and Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) annual joint conference on a panel titled “Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby: Why biological sex remains a necessary analytic category in anthropology.” Planned panelists were:

Below is an excerpt from their description of the panel:

While it has become increasingly common in anthropology and public life to substitute ‘sex’ with ‘gender’, there are multiple domains of research in which biological sex remains irreplaceably relevant to anthropological analysis. Contesting the transition from sex to gender in anthropological scholarship deserves much more critical consideration than it has hitherto received in major diciplinary fora like AAA / CASCA. This diverse international panel brings together scholars from socio-cultural anthropology, archaeology, and biological anthropology who describe why in their work gender is not helpful and only sex will do. This is particularly the case when the work is concerned with equity and the deep analysis of power, and which has as an aim the achievement of genuine inclusivity. With research foci from hominin evolution to contemporary artificial intelligence, from the anthropology of education to the debates within contemporary feminism about surrogacy, panelists make the case that while not all anthropologists need to talk about sex, baby, some absolutely do.

[…] Sex identification—whether an individual was male or female – using the skeleton is one of the most fundamental components in bioarchaeology and forensic anthropology. Anthropologists have improved their ability to determine sex since their initial studies on skeletal remains, which depended on subjective assessment of skeletal robusticity to say whether someone was male or female. An understanding of physical differences in the pelvis related to childbirth, hormonal impacts on bones, and extensive comparative studies have provided anthropologists with an array of traits, such as those in the Phenice Method, to determine sex using just bones. The use of DNA to identify sex in skeletons by their 23rd chromosomes enables anthropologists to say whether infants are male or female for use in both criminal abuse cases and archaeological cases, such as in recognizing infanticide practices. Anthropologists’ ability to determine whether a skeleton is male or female is not dependent on time or culture; the same traits can be used to make a sex estimate in a forensic case in Canada, or to estimate sex in a Paleoindian dated around 11,500 years ago in Brazil. As anthropologists study more remains from more cultures and time periods, sex identification has improved, because sex differences are biologically determined. In forensics, however, anthropologists should be (and are) working on ways to ensure that skeletal finds are identified by both biological sex and their gender identity, which is essential due to the current rise in transitioning individuals and their overrepresentation as crime victims.

Following outcry, the panel was canceled by AAA and CASCA, who released a joint statement titled “No Place For Transphobia in Anthropology.”

In response, Heterodox Academy convened the panel on November 8, 2023.

Media appearances

Hooven frequently appears on gender critical and anti-transgender shows to defend sex segregation and criticize refinement of value-neutral language in science:

Additional appearances include:

Hooven has been interviewed and featured in outlets including the Wall Street Journal, New Statesman, Time Magazine, Slate Magazine, the Boston Globe, the New York Post, Stylist Magazine, the Australian, BBC, Talk Radio Europe, the Daily Telegraph, the Evening Standard, the Harvard Gazette, Oxford Academic, and Nature.

References

Gorman, Sara; Gorman, Jack M. (June 29, 2024). The Debate About Sex Assigned at Birth. Psychology Today https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/denying-to-the-grave/202406/the-debate-about-sex-assigned-at-birth

Mediavilla, Daniel (September 30, 2022). Carole Hooven: ‘It’s obvious that men are much more driven by sex than women.’ El País https://english.elpais.com/science-tech/2022-09-30/carole-hooven-its-obvious-that-men-are-much-more-driven-by-sex-than-women.html?outputType=amp

Xu, Meimei (August 12, 2021). Biology Lecturer’s Comments on Biological Sex Draw Backlash. Harvard Crimson https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2021/8/11/biology-lecturer-gender-comments-backlash/

Anti-trans coverage

Billen, Andrew (August 1, 2025). The ex-Harvard professor ‘off the leash’ on the trans debate. The Times https://www.thetimes.com/uk/education/article/ex-harvard-professor-trans-debate-2cw0r6spf

Foley, Ryan (April 8, 2024). MIT, Harvard professors admonish use of ‘sex assigned at birth.’ Christian Post https://www.christianpost.com/news/mit-harvard-professors-criticize-sex-assigned-at-birth.html

Schuessler, Jennifer (February 16, 2024). The Fight Over Academic Freedom. New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/16/arts/academic-freedom-harvard-universities.html

Coyne, Jerry (November 11, 2022). The cancellation of Carole Hooven. Why Evolution Is True https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2022/11/11/the-cancellation-of-carole-hooven/

Kennedy, Dana (April 2, 2022). Moms fight for female athletes amid Lia Thomas controversy. New York Post https://nypost.com/2022/04/02/moms-fight-for-female-athletes-amid-lia-thomas-controversy/

Herzog, Katie (July 27, 2021). Med schools are now denying biological sex. Common Sense [now The Free Press] https://www.thefp.com/p/med-schools-are-now-denying-biological original url https://www.commonsense.news/p/med-schools-are-now-denying-biological

Harvard lecturer takes heat for defending existence of biological sex on ‘Fox & Friends’. (2021). Fox News https://www.foxnews.com/us/harvard-lecturer-blasted-by-colleague-for-defending-existence-of-biological-sex

Bailey, Pippa (September 1, 2021). Reviewed in short: New books from Carole Hooven, Kristian Shaw, Lucia Osborne-Crowley and Jay Parini. New Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/books/2021/09/reviewed-in-short-new-books-from-carole-hooven-kristian-shaw-lucia-osborne-crowley-and-jay-parini

Levine, Jon (July 31, 2021). Harvard lecturer blasted by colleague for defending existence of biological sex. New York Post https://nypost.com/2021/07/31/harvard-lecturer-blasted-for-defending-existence-of-biological-sex/

Ritchie, Stuart (July 30, 2021). Testosterone by Carole Hooven review – faster, higher and angrier. The Times https://www.thetimes.com/culture/books/article/testosterone-by-carole-hooven-review-pdm5rvvjk?region=global

Cain, Hamilton (July 12, 2021). T Review: Hormone of the Hour. Wall Street Journal https://www.wsj.com/articles/t-testosterone-review-hormone-of-the-hour-11626127657

Spitznagel, Eric (July 10, 2021). Trans women athletes have unfair advantage over those born female: testosterone. New York Post https://nypost.com/2021/07/10/trans-women-athletes-have-unfair-advantage-over-those-born-female/

Byrne, Alex (November 1, 2018). Is Sex Binary? Arc Digital https://medium.com/arc-digital/is-sex-binary-16bec97d161e

Selected writing by Hooven

Hooven, Carole (September 24, 2025). There Are Only Two Gametes. Tablet https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/science/articles/there-are-only-two-gametes

Byrne, Alex; Hooven, Carole K. (April 3, 2024). Opinion | The Problem With Saying ‘Sex Assigned at Birth.’ New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/03/opinion/sex-assigned-at-birth.html

Hooven, Carole (March 22, 2024). Why Do Men Dominate Chess? Quillette https://quillette.com/2024/03/22/why-do-men-dominate-chess/

Hooven, Carole (January 16, 2024). Carole Hooven: Why I Left Harvard. The Free Press https://www.thefp.com/p/carole-hooven-why-i-left-harvard

Hooven, Carole (June 21, 2023). Academic Freedom Is Social Justice. Tablet https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/academic-freedom-social-justice

Hooven, C. K., Wai, J., Kievit, R., Ellison, P. T., Kosslyn, S. M., & Chabris, C. F. (2023). The Sex Difference in Mental Rotation Test Scores May Not Reflect a Difference in Mental Rotation Ability. Center for Open Science. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/u39bw full text https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/u39bw_v1

Hooven, C.K. (2022). Academic Freedom Is Social Justice: Sex, Gender, and Cancel Culture on Campus. Archives of Sexual Behavior https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-022-02467-5

McIntyre, M. H., & Hooven, C. K. (2012). Human Sex Differences in Social Relationships: In Endocrinology of Social Relationships (pp. 225–245). Harvard University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv22jnsp8.13

Yang, C.-F. J., Hooven, C. K., Boynes, M., Gray, P. B., & Pope, H. G., Jr. (2007). Testosterone levels and mental rotation performance in Chinese men. Hormones and Behavior, 51(3), 373–378. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yhbeh.2006.12.005

Hooven, C. (2004). The relationship of male testosterone to components of mental rotation. Neuropsychologia, 42(6), 782–790. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2003.11.012

Hooven, Carole (2004). Shifting the image of male superiority in spatial ability : an examination of sex differences in mental rotation. [doctoral dissertation]

Books

Hooven, Carole (2021). T: The Story of Testosterone, the Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us. Henry Holt and Co., ISBN 978-1250236067

Media

Brad Carr with Carole Hooven (May 18, 2026). The Brutal Truth About Male Sexual Competition – Dr Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-91mxUutgM

Dr. T. Hasan Johnson with Carole Hooven (December 8, 2025). Black Men vs False Accusations in the Era of Feminization. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohZsfzK69qQ

Peter Attia MD with Peter Attia and Carole Hooven (December 1, 2025). 374 – The evolutionary biology of testosterone: male development & sex-based behavioral differences. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQ-LTW3c5vc

Conversations with Coleman with Coleman Hughes and Carole Hooven (November 3, 2025). Kicked Out of Harvard for Speaking Truth on Gender | Biologist Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbmsPY8NEEo

The Dispatch with Jonah Goldberg and Carole Hooven (August 21, 2025). Gender and Sex | Interview: Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rECrbAa1sTQ

The Origins Podcast with Lawrence Krauss and Carole Hooven (August 3, 2025). Biologist Canceled at Harvard for Defending Science | Carole Hooven & Lawrence Krauss. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cl3ktvCP9P0

The Unspeakable with Meghan Daum and Carole Hooven (July 14, 2025). Do Women Owe Men An Apology? with Dr. Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sab1VocacM8

Heterodox Academy / Censorship in the Sciences with Carole Hooven (February 1, 2025). Carole Hooven: Stay away from Sex at Harvard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4I9gP–0tXM

TED with Carole Hooven (September 2, 2024). How Testosterone and Culture Shape Behavior | Carole K. Hooven | TED. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYnZy2Cx7UM

University of Richmond Jepson School of Leadership Studies with Carole Hooven (February 12, 2024). The Non-Toxic Nature of Masculinity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe2J24ZDT2g

Unfiltered Extra with Joe Warner and Carole Hooven (February 7, 2024). Dr Carole Hooven: The toxic masculinity movement is damaging boys and young men. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_ByXg8ZUYM

Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan and Carole Hooven (January 5, 2024). Carole Hooven On Harvard’s Existential Crisis. https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/carole-hooven-on-harvards-existential

NewsNation / Vargas Reports with Elizabeth Vargas and Carole Hooven (December 12, 2023). Former Harvard prof.: Free speech ‘hypocrisy’ on campuses ‘shocking’ | Vargas Reports. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl-CMWmZG94

Heterodox Academy with John Tomasi and Carole Hooven (November 29, 2023). Why Biological Sex is Real with Carole Hooven | Ep 04. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5wc7AsvOPk

American Council of Trustees and Alumni (November 7, 2023). [Hero of Intellectual Freedom Award speech] Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSj3OlbXkSg

The Psychology Podcast with Scott Barry Kaufman and Carole Hooven (March 9, 2023). The Science of Testosterone || Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIUUU91ISME

Freedom Pact with Joseph Newton, Lewis Edward, and Carole Hooven (March 3, 2023). Dr Carole Hooven Interview On Testosterone, Harvard Cancellation, NoFap & More. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdSCkzD1CbM

Modern Wisdom with Chris Williamson and Carole Hooven (October 27, 2022). What Makes Men And Women Different? – Dr Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Q14k3yZ2EU

Razib Khan’s Unsupervised Learning with Razib Khan and Carole Hooven (October 17, 2022). Carole Hooven: Let’s talk about Testosterone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNbHiAp3zRY

Dr Phil with Phil McGraw, Layne Ingram, Nancy Hogshead-Makar, Riley Gaines, and Carole Hooven (October 7, 2022). Transgender Athletes: The After Show Conversation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJbAWlbYOlU

The Jordan Harbinger Show with Jordan Harbinger and Carole Hooven (July 20, 2022). Harvard Biologist on Accepting Gender Differences | Carole Hooven Ep. 694. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T9oFKThjss

ICONS – Independent Council on Women’s Sports with Ross Tucker, Emma Hilton, and Carole Hooven (July 6, 2022). The Science of Sport, Fair Competition & Testosterone – ICONS Conference. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDsQdvr_1e0

Reason with Science with Jitender Kumar and Carole Hooven (April 15, 2022). Science of testosterone | Carole Hooven | Reason with Science | Hormones | Human behavior | Harvard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYqz5OYMvRI

Calmversations with Benjamin Boyce, Helena Kerschner, and Carole Hooven (April 5, 2022). Testosterone! The Science, The Experience | with Carole Hooven & Helena Kerschner. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2aJpxGUTm4

Heterodorx with Nina Paley, Corinna Cohn, and Carole Hooven (January 27, 2022). Episode 43: Carole Hooven. https://heterodorx.com/podcast/episode-43-carole-hooven/

Calmversations with Benjamin Boyce and Carole Hooven (January 6, 2022). Getting Hormonal | with Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQbHxxVzTAY

BBC / The Spark with Helen Lewis and Carole Hooven (December 23, 2021). Carole Hooven and testosterone. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0012fwc

Harvard Museum of Natural History with Daniel Gilbert and Carole Hooven (October 25, 2021). Testosterone: The Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbMjHLpc0Sc

Transparency with Aaron Kimberly and Aaron Terrell (October 2, 2021). EP 11 – Carole Hooven – Testosterone. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkamP4MHJ-U

Skeptic / The Michael Shermer Show with Michael Shermer and Carole Hooven (August 28, 2021). Carole Hooven on T: The Story of Testosterone, the Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulixP2EAHZM

Converging Dialogues with Xavier Bonilla and Carole Hooven (August 24, 2021). #66 – Testosterone: Understanding Without Judgment: A Dialogue with Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95OIdsV59Rc

Savage Lovecast with Dan Savage and Carole Hooven (August 17, 2021). Let’s Talk About Testosterone. With Dr. Carole Hooven. https://savage.love/lovecast/2021/08/17/lets-talk-about-testosterone-with-dr-carole-hooven/

Gender: A Wider Lens with Sasha Ayad, Stella O’Malley, and Carole Hooven (August 13, 2021). EPISODE 36 – Talking Testosterone with Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zny2VTKyqB8

Intelligence Squared with Tom Wjipple and Carole Hooven (August 5, 2021). Testosterone: Debunking the Myths with Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qx8ebScezwc

Blocked and Reported with Jesse Singal, Katie Herzog, and Carole Hooven (August 5, 2021). Episode 76: Let’s Do Hate Speech By Talking About How Biological Sex Is A Binary (With Carole Hooven). https://www.blockedandreported.org/p/episode-76-lets-do-hate-speech-by-83b

The Same Drugs with Meghan Murphy and Carole Hooven (August 2, 2021). The Same Drugs: Carole Hooven on testosterone and the male body. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltBhz3tZbwA

Mind Pump Show with Sal Di Stefano. Adam Schafer, Justin Andrews, and Carole Hooven (August 1, 2021). 1610: Testosterone… The Hormone That Divides Us with Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFIn–aW_NE

Honestly with Bari Weiss and Carole Hooven (July 29, 2021). Bigger, Stronger, Faster: The Truth About Testosterone. https://www.thefp.com/p/bigger-stronger-faster-the-truth-d7f

The Richard Reeves Show with Richard Reeves with Carole Hooven (July 19, 2021). Carole Hooven on testosterone and masculinity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJFQI_-EzXc

The Dissenter with Ricardo Lopes and Carole Hooven (July 12, 2021). #494 Carole Hooven – T: The Story of Testosterone, the Hormone that Dominates and Divides Us. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ormlF1fhEMg

The Femsplainers with Danielle Crittenden and Carole Hooven (July 1, 2021). Dr. Carole Hooven: Do Men Have a Bigger Libido Than Women? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9xI_XhaQ64

The Joe Rogan Experience with Joe Rogan and Carole Hooven (June 10, 2021, uploaded June 27, 2024). Joe Rogan Experience #1665 – Carole Hooven. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQJv1zfzRc8

Resources

Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)

Carole Hooven (carolehooven.com)

Harvard University Department of Human Evolutionary Biology (heb.fas.harvard.edu)

  • Carole Hooven
  • heb.fas.harvard.edu/people/carole-hooven [archive]
  • Carole Hooven
  • mbb.harvard.edu/people/carole-hooven

American Enterprise Institute (aei.org)

The Free Press (thefp.com)

Tablet (tabletmag.com)

Quillette (quillette.com)

All American Speakers Bureau (allamericanspeakers.com)

  • Carole K. Hooven
  • allamericanspeakers.com/celebritytalentbios/Carole+K.+Hooven/462408

X/Twitter (x.com)

Instagram (instagram.com)

Reddit (reddit.com)

LinkedIn (linkedin.com)

YouTube (youtube.com)

ResearchGate (researchgate.net)

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