Pop Culture Junkette

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Friday, August 04, 2006

Steroids? Who Cares?

With the recent allegations against Floyd Landis and Justin Gatlin in the news, I find myself puzzled once again about why we have these apparently unenforceable rules against performance-enhancing drugs in the first place. I want to be clear that I'm not defending anyone who violates the current rules. Those people are cheaters, and as a sports fan, I feel betrayed whenever anyone I've rooted for tests positive. I just don't get how we got into this mess.

In my view, there are only two valid reasons for banning performance-enhancing drugs:

First, to protect the athletes. But in most cases I would say that we should let the athletes decide for themselves what risks they want to take. Or, if we're worried about collective action problems in which athletes feel that they have to do something dangerous because their competitors are likely to do it, then we should let the athletes decide as a group what rules they want to impose. The keys are that the rules would be set by current athletes, not the powers that be; that they be constantly subject to revision as new information and new technology becomes available; and that they only ban substances for which there is a reliable test.

Second, to preserve the nature of the sport. Here, I don't mean anything quaint about "hard work" and only doing things that are "natural" -- I just don't think that those notions apply to today's athletes who sleep in oxygen tents and train year-round, etc. What I mean is something akin to the way advances in equipment have changed golf and tennis. Or the different types of car racing -- obviously an open-wheel car is faster than a stock car, but NASCAR fans don't want their sport, which has its own appeal, to turn into Formula One.

I seriously doubt that the ban on testosterone in track or in cycling, or even the ban on steroids in baseball, meets either of these standards.

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6 Comments:

Blogger Red Fraggle said...

I think your first reason is really the compelling one. Steroids are clearly very dangerous, and it is unfair to put some players in a position where, in order to compete, they have to put themselves in that kind of danger (and yes, I realize that many sports carry a lot of danger already, but that danger is inherent in the sport, whereas the danger of steroid use isn't).

The theory that the players should be able to make their own decisions about this as a collective unit is compelling, but I can imagine a situation in which more than half of the players feel that steroids should be used. I would still be uncomfortable telling the minority that in order to compete they had to use dangerous substances.

I also think there is a practical problem of the rules changing too often--it seems that it might be difficult to implement.

8/05/2006 9:28 AM  
Blogger Isaac, your bartender said...

Just to add to the difficulty of the option of the players deciding, who are the players that decide. Take baseball. Would only current major leaguers have a vote? What about minor leaguers? College players? Those even younger? It may be MLB's rule, but its impact is much broader b/c all sorts of younger players are doing what it takes (which too often includes steriods) to get there.

8/09/2006 1:09 PM  
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