Performance Enhancing Drugs

[satchdork]

So I heard about a couple things on the PED front that I found interesting. First, the "B sample" on Marion Jones has been tested and she's been "cleared of all doping charges." Second, some new evidence, in the form of teammate testimony, has come out against Lance Armstrong. . .specifically that he was using PEDs such as steroids, cortisone,

Comments

[wifflebatgaijin]

I think the crusade against PED's is an attempt to maintain or restore some level of purity to the various sports, which is something I can respect. Namely in that the message being sent to highschool and college atheletes, and I guess to people in general, is you're not good enough without severe artificial enchancement.

Doesn't matter how many yards you rushed for in highschool. Doesn't matter how many touch downs you scored in college. You'll die in the NFL unless you take bull hormones and let your nuts shrink to the size peanuts.

I guess you can't call it "cheating" anymore, but I don't think it makes it ethical. I'm sure a lot of these atheletes aren't terrible thrilled at the reality of their situation, and would gladly give up PED's if they felt they could continue to compete. But they're realists; this is their job, and if they lose their edge, they're fucked. So good-bye clean play, hello roid rage!

[satchdork]

Yeah, like I said, I wasn't trying to exonerate the "cheaters" or ethically justify the use of banned PEDs. I was just trying to make the point about the "levelness" of the playing field. Like you can't say "Lance Armstrong only won 7 consecutive Tour de France's because he was blood doping" because EVERYONE was blood doping. Therefore, the playing field is still level, no one holds a competitive advantage, and Lance is still pretty d@mn impressive whether he did or did not take PEDs. Obviously it's MORE impressive if he was clean and beat a bunch of dopers because then he's the one competing at a disadvantage. That'd be like me breaking Barry Bonds' single-season HR record