There is a scene in the movie Grease in which the school secretary is promoting attendance at the pep rally over the public address speakers, ending her enthusiastic speech with the comment, “If you can’t be an athlete, be an athletic supporter.” That really has nothing to do with the topic but for the reason it makes men giggle. An athletic supporter, after all, is a jock strap. It supposedly supports the testicles like a secondary, fabric scrotum; if a cup is also used, it protects future fertility and reduces the risk of genital injury (ouch!).

    The concept of supporting the testicles and protecting future fertility can also be applied to pharmaceutical approaches used to restore or enhance testosterone levels. A little support is needed as American men have been experiencing a drop in testosterone for generations.1 Further, the function of “the boys” is threatened by our environment: industrial and dietary estrogens, fast food restaurants making us fat, the cozy heat of climate control keeping our homes warmer, remote controls and automobiles reducing our activity, smoking bans and surgeon generals cutting down on smoking, and the clingy compression of tighty-whities.2