Home > Articles > Sidney Gendin
Ban Athletes Who Don't Use
Steroids
Isn't it time
for the brainwashed public to know the truth about
steroids? In their ideological zeal to ban
"performance enhancing" drugs, national
governments and the various local and international
sports federations have ignorantly and
self-righteously declared that steroid use is
cheating, dangerous, and stupid. In fact, in general,
it is neither dangerous nor stupid and it is cheating
only because it has been capriciously commanded to be
so.
In the first place, with respect to the alleged
danger, people ought to know that there are dozens of
steroids and it would be absurd to imagine that their
risks are identical. Moreover, steroids come in two
broad classes - the orals and the injectables. It is
true that most of the orals have associated hazards
but not a single one of them is as hazardous as
smoking or drinking. The principle dangers of the
injectables result from overdosing and, even so, they
are mainly such alarming matters as acne and severe
headache. Every legally obtainable prescription drug
comes with a warning of dozens of worse side effects.
But what is that to you and me? Why should we
legislate what risks people should run unless they
can interfere with the rest of us? In our democratic,
capitalist society many persons risk their last few
dollars to start up businesses which will probably
fail. We do not stop them. If and when they become
multimillionaires we congratulate them. We don't
permit people to drive without seatbelts because
their accidents drive up insurance rates for the rest
of us but we let people engage in the far riskier
business of climbing mountains since the danger is
mainly self-regarding. So enough virtue-parading
preaching.
As for the so-called cheating, who really are the
cheaters? The average steroid user spends about
$100-150 per month while the supplement industries
grow rich on suckering in the hundreds of thousands,
possibly millions, of foolish people spending up to
$1000 per month on a variety of mumbo jumbo:
androstenedione, 4-androstenedione,
19-androstenedione, androstenediol and the several 4,
5, 17, and 19 varieties of androstenediol, tribulus
terrestris, enzymatic conversion accelerators, growth
hormone stimulators, hormone-releasing peptides,
testosterone "boosters", dozens of magical
herbs and a ridiculous number of "non
drugs" with unpronouncable names so they are
always abbreviated such as HMB and DHEA. On top of
all this, these folks who tend to be more affluent
than steroid users, are pumping protein powders into
their milk - $9 per day - and gobbling down protein
candy bars - up to $3 each - while saving a bit of
energy for screaming "Foul! Cheater!" at
the poor steroid user. They are told by the
manufacturers and distributors of these outlandish
products that they look like steroids, feel like
steroids and work like steroids. So? Why not ban them
like steroids?
But I say ban them and only them. For one thing,
they don't work as well as steroids. More
importantly, what care I as a fan that someone sets a
remarkable record because he used steroids? I pay
money to see sporting events and I am entitled to an
athlete's very best. Isaac Stern can afford a violin
that few violinists and no high school orchestra
player can afford. Is he taking unfair advantage of
them? If I pay $60 to hear Stern and learn his tone
was not up to par because he was too lazy to bring
his own violin and borrowed a $50 one from a high
school kid, I justifiably want my money back. What
care I that he usually plays upon a $200,000
instrument? I am not bothered by this; I want his
very best. Likewise, I want the very best an athlete
can give me. I don't want to watch athletes who could
have done better if only they had used steroids. Talk
of steroid performance as unnatural is as ridiculous
as complaining about artificial hearts. As for me I
plan to have a T-shirt made for me that will read on
its front: "Use steroids or go home. Enough of
crying and whining."
