Debra Soh on Why Men and Women Are Drifting Apart, Dating Apps, and Gen Z
The Michael Shermer Show
Michael Shermer
4.3 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 3 April 2026
⏱️ 90 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Fewer people are having sex, fewer are forming lasting relationships, and many feel more isolated than ever. Why?
Michael Shermer sits down with neuroscientist and author Debra Soh to discuss her new book Sextinction: The Decline of Sex and the Future of Intimacy. They talk about the so-called sex recession, why modern dating feels so broken, and how social media, pornography, AI companions, and changing expectations between men and women are reshaping intimacy.
The discussion also touches on Gen Z mental health, dating apps, the manosphere, marriage, and the broader social consequences of a culture that increasingly substitutes screens for real human connection.
Debra Soh is a neuroscientist who specializes in human sexuality and biological explanations for behavior. She received her PhD from York University in Toronto and worked as a scientific researcher for eleven years. As a journalist, Soh writes about technology, health, and the politicization of science.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The main message from left-leaning media, I say this as a journalist, is that men are terrible. |
| 0:05.0 | If men are struggling in society, I say this in six-dainship. |
| 0:07.0 | Men are basically told to go cry into a pillow silently, and, like, left-leaning media doesn't care. |
| 0:12.0 | The three-six is referred to a man who is over six feet tall, makes over six figures in annual income, |
| 0:18.0 | and has a penis that is over six inches long. |
| 0:22.0 | So basically the idea is if you are dating a man who does not meet all three of these criteria, |
| 0:26.9 | you're wasting your time. |
| 0:27.8 | This is what the message is to women. |
| 0:29.3 | And like you said, the number of men in America who meet all three of these sixes in terms of |
| 0:34.6 | this criteria is I, when I did the the calculation it was maybe 1% and then |
| 0:39.0 | when you factor in personality being straight unmarried and then chemistry and all these other |
| 0:43.9 | factors that would be important when it comes to dating and relationships or marriage |
| 0:47.9 | that whittles it down to an even smaller percentage I think if both men and women were just |
| 0:51.6 | honest about what they really want during sex, we would prevent all of this. |
| 0:55.1 | Because choking can be fatal. It can lead to loss of consciousness, which can lead to brain damage. It can lead to permanent mental health issues down the line, like dissociation, depression, anxiety. And it's showing that it can also lead to cortical swelling. So there's inflammation in the brain after being choked. And just so your audience has an idea have how prominent this is of university students of women, half have experienced this, a quarter of them |
| 1:15.8 | have experiences by the age of 14, a third of them have experienced this more than five times. So it's |
| 1:20.4 | very, very common. |
| 1:25.8 | Hey, everybody, it's Michael Shermer. It's time for another episode of the Michael Shermer show, brought to you by, as always, Skeptic Magazine. Hey, here's the new issue. Check it out, skeptic.com slash magazine. Yes, UFOs, UAPs. It's all another form of religion, in my opinion. But you can check that out. Also, this is brought to you by Big Nerve, which is the platform for the Skeptic Society |
| 1:45.5 | where we are hosting discussions and debates. |
| 1:48.1 | And Big Nerve is a company that's putting money up. |
| 1:50.5 | You can win money by participating in these debates, basically just talking to me and other people |
| 1:55.2 | about a lot of the topics on this show. |
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