male enhancement

male enhancement (countable and uncountable, plural male enhancements)

1. (euphemistic) A method of enlarging the penis.
   • 2008, King Magazine:

     Male Enhancement Pills Is it a Hoax or Do They Really Work? A Pill That Can Increase Your Size!* Just pay for the postage stamp.

2. (euphemistic) A chemical means of inducing an erection of the penis.
   • 2004, Meika Loe, The Rise of Viagra: How the Little Blue Pill Changed Sex in America, NYU Press, →ISBN, page 3:

     We live in a culture where ads for “male enhancement” are commonplace, and currently, three drugs—Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis—compete for the erectile dysfunction market.

   • 2014, Brian Krebs, Spam Nation: The Inside Story of Organized Cybercrime-from Global Epidemic to Your Front Door, Sourcebooks, Inc., →ISBN, page 67:

     It may be less than shocking that about 70 percent of the transactions made through rogue pharmacy websites advertised by Gusev's SpamIt and Vrublevsky's Rx-Promotion were for male-enhancement drugs like Viagra and Cialis.

3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see male,‎ enhancement.
   • 2013, Will Anderson, This Is Hope: Green Vegans and the New Human Ecology: How We Find Our Way to a Humane and Environmentally Sane Future, John Hunt Publishing, →ISBN, page 293:

     They make [various wild animals] appear as dangerous as possible. These mostly male enhancements are part of the big lie that hunting is a high-risk, manhood-making validation of self.

   • 2007, Jill B. Becker, Karen J. Berkley, Nori Geary, Elizabeth Hampson, James P. Herman, Elizabeth Young, Sex Differences in the Brain: From Genes to Behavior, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 240:

     Trace eyeblink conditioning is likewise affected by acute stress and is associated with female impairments and male enhancements in acquisition.

• This expression may be conceived as sexist, as it implies that a male's worth is tied to the size and ability of his penis.

• aphrodisiac