Peds - Performance Enhancing Drugs

[SteveGuzzi]

What is or should-be the basis for making a particular substance or practice illegal?

Is it a matter of ethics and morality? Of health and science? Of "the spirit of competition"?

Is it a combination of the above? If so, which aspect is most important?

With regard to competitive activities in general, isn't everyone seeking to enhance their performance in one way or another? So... what makes one path right and another wrong? Is there a consistent rationale that can be applied across the board, or is it ultimately an arbitrary, culturally-influenced judgment call?

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Once upon a time, you'd typically only hear about PEDs in the form of anabolic steroid abuse by weight-lifters, body-builders, wrestlers, and so on. Everyone "knew" anabolic steroids were bad because -- aside from making it easier to achieve desired workout results -- such usage carried various negative health side effects such as shrunken genitalia, sudden angry mood swings, liver toxicity, etc. In this imstance, what is the primary cause for banning: the 'performance-enhancing' nature of the substance, or all the ill side effects it brought along with it?

These days, you hear about illegal PED use in a wide variety of competitive sports, and it isn't just limited to anabolic steroids. Blood doping (injecting refrigerated red blood cells into your bloodstream to increase the body's ability to carry oxygen to cells) is a big issue now, and it recently got Lance Armstrong banned from cycling and his seven Tour wins revoked. For the sake of argument, let's presume for a moment that he is in fact guilty of blood doping -- should that really be counted as a case of unfair PED use (previously-established illegailty aside)? Blood isn't a drug, and in all likelihood, it was a transfusion of his own stored blood, not some specially-engineered magically super-oxygenated synthetic blood.

So, is it rational to illegalize that practice? If so, then what about high-altitude training? That ALSO enhances the bloodstream's ability to carry oxygen to cells. It can also be argued as unfair, since not every athlete has access to high-altitude training facilities. Should we, then, restrict all athletes to train exclusively at sea level? Level the playing field... literally?

I've heard some athletes speak about ingesting their own urine as part of their training regimen (yeeesh). So, as gross as that sounds, what if a study was conducted that indicated a very strong correlation between drinking hot piss and achieving greater sports performance results? Would that make pee-guzzling a candidate for an international ban? Would the different methods of delivery between blood doping (needles, syringes) and whizz-tasting (a tall frothy glass of DUDE,WHY?) hold any relevance in the matter?

This isn't just restricted to the substances people put in their bodies. What about the performance-enhancing effect of technology? Speed-skating records were shattered with the introduction of skin-suits and clap-skates. And have you seen the kind of bikes they ride for track cycling and the crazy helmets they wear? Lots of sports and athletes have benefited from advances in technology. What about changes in technique? Why is a baseball pitcher allowed to curl his knuckles around a ball in such a manner as to make its flight trajectory less predictable, but if he adds a little spit to the mix, it's considered an illegal pitch? Reading up on track cycling, apparently certain postures/arm positions are banned. So if, for example, a boxer innovated a new stance or posture that had him whupping all his opponents with ease... should the onus be on other boxers to adapt, or, should the onus be on some authoritative body step in and tell the innovating boxer "nahh, you can't do that anymore"?

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I'm just trying to wrap my head around the whole idea of 'fairness' when it comes to competition (sports or otherwise). I can easily see the ethical argument against using a substance or practice that you already know is banned or illegal... but I find it difficult to determine what standard should be applied towards deciding whether this-or-that substance/practice is even worthy of being banned.

I don't have a ton of sympathy for mega-rich sports stars or whatever, but it bothers me a bit when I hear people vilify them for these sorts of things, when really, everyone is out looking for edge over others. Everyone is out to try to squeeze the most out of their performance in order to achieve a higher level of success. There's nothing wrong with that, it's human nature. It's just annoying to hear armchair / watercooler experts vilify and demean others for a practice they probably unwittingly partipate in every day themselves...

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Feeling tired at work? Need to add some energy and alertness? HERE EMPLOYEES, HAVE AS MUCH FUCKING COFFEE AS YOU WANT, KEEP THE POT A'FLOWIN, JUST BE SURE TO GET THOSE TPS REPORTS IN ON TIME! IT'S NOT LIKE CAFFEINE IS A DRUG WITH IT'S OWN NEGATIVE HEALTH EFFECTS OR ANYTHING SILLY LIKE THAT! ARRHYTHMIC HEARTBEAT? HAHAHA PFF HOW SILLY

[Iron-Hampster]

well that should be up to the league. if they do or don't want to allow it, it's their business.

[Camarohusky]

I disagree with warforger here. It may be the league's business, but they shouldn't be the driving force behind all of this. The fans (i.e. the paying customers) should bethe driving force. If the pro sports are going to have a monopoly over their sport, it is nothing but a disservice to fans for players and the league to either: 1 - dope and make the sport uncompetitive, if the fans don't want it; or 2 - to remove the product that most fans have already paid for with providing full disclosure to everything about it.

[Sentio]

Generally I've always thought it was to do with trying to maintain a level playing field (i.e. it is unfair if one athlete has access to drugs the others don't through no additional ability of their own), but more importantly in the interest of safety. If a sport decided to just let them dope to their hearts contents the number of early deaths and serious health complications in athletes would skyrocket. As it is a large number of pro cyclists have died over the years from drug induced heart conditions.

So the main impetus must be from the interests of safety for the athletes and ensuring that they do not have to take damaging drugs in order to be competitive in their field. I can imagine a clean cyclist would be angry if the only way he could win was to damage his body and possibly risk his life.

In addition to this I read an article about paralympians deliberatley harming themselves pre-event to cause an adrenaline spike and dramatically improve performance. Again this is banned, but apparently as many as a third do it. This ranged from holding urine to deliberatly breaking toes (in the case of those with spinal injury). Should this be allowed given the relative minor risk to health, or again should self harm for the sake of better performance be frowned upon?

Where do you draw the line? If a 100% drug became available would that be ok?

[orangebomb]

When it comes to PEDs, it generally revovles around sports like cycling and baseball, as those are generally the most common occurrences of PED use, followed closely by football. Steroids and PEDs have been since the mid 40s, and for nearly 35 years or so, there was no testing for these drugs at all, and naturally the use of anabolic steroids begin to rise until the professional sports leagues started to crack down.

Although PEDs can be a negative effect for the fans and the leagues themselves, for a long time most people either didn't know or simply don't care about it at all. A perfect example was 1998, during when players like McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds, who were allegedly known for taking steroids/PEDs when they were breaking all of the home run records, and very few people noticed it at all, until Jose Canseco wrote a tell-all book about steroid use in 2005. Once Congress got involved, that's when MLB started to get tough on PED use, and instituted a 50 game ban for the first time, and so on, and most other sports leagues that had loose or no testing now have one and became more strict.

Not to mention the numerous amount of health risks with steriods and PEDs, which is more or less the main reason why countries and sports leagues around the world began to take action against this action, although at this point, drug testing isn't always consistent at times and can even be beaten, {just ask Ryan Braun} even with frequent random testing. Basically, as long as there is a loophole in the rules or a drug that can't be detected either via a urine or blood test, then a player will take the opportunity to take said drug and improve performance, if he or she chooses.

[Warforger]

At 8/24/12 11:07 AM, Camarohusky wrote: I disagree with warforger here. It may be the league's business, but they shouldn't be the driving force behind all of this. The fans (i.e. the paying customers) should bethe driving force. If the pro sports are going to have a monopoly over their sport, it is nothing but a disservice to fans for players and the league to either: 1 - dope and make the sport uncompetitive, if the fans don't want it; or 2 - to remove the product that most fans have already paid for with providing full disclosure to everything about it.

Wait how do you know what I think when I haven't even posted anything? I personally don't care because it's just a game and I don't think it's the governments business to be involved in a game.