I don’t really care about steroid use in sports. It’s just not fair that certain people get genetic advantages, so if you want to make up for not being tall or having a certain body build, go for it. We allow it in other areas of life, so why not in sports. The whole “it’s unfair whaaaa” thing sounds like some moralistic capitalist bullshit anyways. They always use their advantages, but lecture the rest of us to “play fair”
there’s so much to unpack here. the whole “just allow everything” is, with respect, incredibly dangerous and unfair.
it’s dangerous because of how fucking dangerous these drugs are. case after case of athletes dying in their sleep, cancer, overdosing, roid raging, tainted blood doping, etc.
it’s unfair because drug use doesn’t affect us all equally. for example, if my natural hematocrit is 35 and yours is 45, EPO or other blood doping will give me a HUGE advantage over you. there’s no way you’ll be able to compete with me. i’ve got tons of extra room to juice my veins with red blood that you don’t. the same for insulin, cortico, HGH, etc.
The whole “it’s unfair whaaaa” thing sounds like some moralistic capitalist bullshit anyways.
counterpoint: the “just allow it” sounds like rightwing libertarian nonsense. we have rules and regulations for very, very good reasons.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Steroids don’t make up for anything, almost all pro athletes use performance enhancing drugs(PEDs) and evade current testing protocols. The testing just prevents athletes from going crazy and taking a ton of drugs. This is very important for the long term health of athletes, going completely open on a drug policy would be disastrous, right now it’s basically an arms race between WADA and the athletes. The athletes that are the best currently, are the best because of genetic advantages+taking PEDS. PEDs do not equalise the field when almost all athletes are on them. It’s not a moralistic argument, it’s just how it is. Genetics will always play a massive role in top level sports. There is no way around that. If everyone is doping and evading drug tests, the genetic component becomes the main differential. For instance, all of Usain Bolt’s competition has failed drug tests. Bolt still won most races, and I don’t think he was completely clean either.
And that’s not even getting into athletes genetic response to PEDs. Some people are hyper responders to certain drugs and steroids just because of their genetics, while others barely respond. Bodybuilding is a sport where you see this a ton. Some people just blow up after taking certain substances. Again, all because of genetics. Sports competivenes is always going to be highly dependent on genetics, even if we allow athletes to use whatever drugs they want. Then the genetic response to PEDs just becomes a bigger factor than it was before. Those that can genetically handle being juiced to the gills without dying will just win everything.
I’m begging you to spend a single extra minute thinking about this.
It’s just not fair that certain people get genetic advantages, so if you want to make up for not being tall or having a certain body build, go for it.
If doping is allowed, then it’s not a plucky little guy compensating for genetic disadvantages against people with optimal builds who are clean, it’s the little guy now needing to compete with guys who both have good builds and are also doping, because doping would effectively become mandatory to be competitive. The upstart doesn’t get any leveling tool, just another thing he needs to do, this one at the expense of his long term health.
capitalist bullshit
If anything is capitalist bullshit, it would be needing to, on top of everything else, constantly dope to the limit of your health and have a fucking medical team monitor you to optimize your intake and counterbalance complications as they arise.
“it’s unfair whaaaa”
Yes, breaking the rules is unfair.
No investigation no right to speak you are just going off of vibes here.
If doping is allowed, then it’s not a plucky little guy compensating for genetic disadvantages against people with optimal builds who are clean, it’s the little guy now needing to compete with guys who both have good builds and are also doping, because doping would effectively become mandatory to be competitive. The upstart doesn’t get any leveling tool, just another thing he needs to do, this one at the expense of his long term health.
Newsflash the plucky little guy cannot compete in most sports there’s a reason why certain nations are able to dominate certain sports and that’s because their countries are able to maintain coaches and training programs to be able to get the most out of a person or do you think that for example slavs are only able to produce for example weightlifters but no swimmers? No it’s because during the cold war the soviet union and other countries in its sphere had the most sophisticated coaches and training programs. And here’s another we can nowadays make a pretty well educated guess that PEDs make up for around 10% higher performance, again this is in strength sports so oly weightlifting, shot put etc., and when we have to hear some american weightlifter complain about doping when they could not even compare to the chinese or russian, iranian etc. weightlifters if we lower their numbers.
Which brings me to the history of doping because guess what during the cold war the USA and the USSR also had a little thing about competing in medals, both nations were doping but it only became a problem when the soviets just absolutely dumpstered the USA which then promptly went ‘IOC waaah the soviets are very mean they are doing the unfair’. It’s why there’s even to this day a ton of just shitty information out there.
Yes, breaking the rules is unfair.
Muh rules based sports order
What the fuck does “sports without rules” look like to you.
That fucking “no investigation no right to speak” is annoying as it is that’s before its paired with the dumbest shit I’ve read in a week.
Awesome, now every single sport is “who can shoot the other person in the head first”
It’s just a way for the smaller less athletic people to level the playing field.
What you are saying there does not contradict what I said. Obviously existing sports stand on top of capitalist bullshit, but doping presents yet another level, and again one that significantly harms the long-term health of athletes (and obviously the capitalists barely care about that – only to use retired athletes as mascots at best – but we should care).
Muh rules based sports order
Alright, I’ll just bring a nine to a basketball game and tell the other team to surrender. By some metrics, I’m now a better player than Lebron. You can’t have games without rules, games are essentially an expression of players interacting with each other in an environment mediated by the rules. Trying to equate this to, what? imperial hegemony? is anarcho-bedtime-ism.
Obviously the rules should be interrogated and changed as deemed appropriate, but when you play a game, you’re agreeing to abide by the rules of the game for that game. Being upset that someone cheated a game is a totally reasonable reaction.
