So in fact, it [clean sport] is profoundly just what the Nazis would’ve admired—the strongest, the fittest, the most beautiful.
self-Godwinning sophistry
The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
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Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#12Why are musicians allowed (and maybe expected) to use performance enhancing drugs, while athletes may not?
Why are fans of athletes allowed to drink and beer companies allowed to advertise with obvious sports oriented themes in their ads?
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#13The main issue I see is how do we allow adults to dope while keeping children/teens away from it? Or would doping even increase with children/teens if it were more widely acceptable amongst adults? When I was in high school there were plenty of athletes using steroids - so already happening. Although I do believe that number would increase especially within high schools.
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#14Why are musicians allowed (and maybe expected) to use performance enhancing drugs, while athletes may not?
Because music isn't a competition. It's a creative endeavor.
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#15Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#16I don't necessarily have a problem with professional athletes doping in a black box, i.e. free of influencing others. Professionals should be fully aware of the health effects of "riding the bicycle," and it's hard for me to argue against telling people what they can do to their own bodies. I always thought, however, that the big issue with steroids was the role that athletes play in the lives of children and teenage…
There's no such thing as doping without influencing others; the indirect influences alone affect the economics of the sport.
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#17My perspective on performance-enhancing drugs has changed because of my involvement in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and mixed martial arts.
When I was a teenager, I started training at a gym where several UFC fighters spoke openly with me about their use of steroids. And in the decade since then, I have experienced the pains of rigorous training and competition without PEDs, while also interacting with lots of grapplers who discussed how PEDs helped them.
None of them believed that the competitive advantage from steroids comes from the additional muscular strength they provide during a fight or a jiu-jitsu match. Instead, the steroids allowed them to train with a frequency and intensity that is virtually impossible for natural competitors.
This recuperative advantage is still "cheating," but it feels morally different in the sense that the athlete is enhancing his technique by training more, not using steroid-enabled strength to compensate for poor technique. (The same is not true of something like blood doping.)
I'm not arguing that PEDs should necessarily be permitted in athletic competition. That would be my preference, but I recognize there are colorable reasons why we should avoid glamorizing the practice in the eyes of teens. However, as a sportsman, I respect a competitor who is willing to risk his health in exchange for the chance to train as hard as humanly possible.
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#18As "Faster, Higher, Stronger..." author explains, doping wouldn't level the field for everybody since drugs affect people very differently. The concept of "fairness" is arbitrary, he mentions the use of altitude tents for example (banned only in one country, it favours richer countries), but somewhere we need to draw the line.
Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#19Re: The Moral Argument for Doping in Sports
#20I don't necessarily have a problem with professional athletes doping in a black box, i.e. free of influencing others. Professionals should be fully aware of the health effects of "riding the bicycle," and it's hard for me to argue against telling people what they can do to their own bodies. I always thought, however, that the big issue with steroids was the role that athletes play in the lives of children and teenage…
There's no such thing as doping without influencing others; the indirect influences alone affect the economics of the sport.
Exactly, you shift the goalpost for attainable performance and the minimal performance necessary to be professional. A good example of this is e-sports, where it's well known, especially among FPS players that people competing are using stimulants -- and this has been the status quo for more than a decade. Which might be neutral, if things like steroids/stimulants weren't so terrible for you, but they have noticable consequences for your health.