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TechnoratiOur 'Performance-Enhancing' Culture
"The steroid culture...biceps bulging, chests shaven and buttocks tender." -- Tom Verducci, Sports Illustrated.
Like Michael Vick, Barry Bonds may soon be trading in his uniform to suit up in a Yankee-esque prison pinstripe -- though, perhaps not without a small measure of vindication.
But I won't lie. As a former baller and faithful follower of the great American past time, it's sad to see players (workers) get Mitch-slapped by MLB's official report on The Steroid Era, while baseball execs get T-ball kid-glove treatment for their culpability in fostering a drug-friendly environment, kinda like the official Abu Ghraib investigation.
In fact, the Mitchell Report is reminiscent of another recent official disclosure -- the CIA's public unveiling of the "family jewels." At that time, I wrote about being left with the same dejected feeling I had when Geraldo cracked Al Capone's vault on live TV: That's it?! Like Yogi said: it's déjàvu, all over again.
Of course, having been accused by some readers of playing the "race card" (whatever that means) for questioning the selective moral outrage being heaped on Barry Bonds enlarged head over the years, it'll be interesting to see the response of the millions of Bond-haters to the asterick-sizing of Roger Clemens.
As uncomfortable as it may for the "colorblind," sports analyst David Zirin hit a home run with his take on "The Rocket" science contained in the 409-page report.
"The Mitchell Report confirms not only suspicions about Clemens, but also the existence of an outrageous media bias and double standard. While seven time MVP Barry Bonds was raked over the conjecture coals for years, Clemens got a pass. Two players, both dominant into their 40s, one black and one white, with two entirely different ways of being treated. It doesn't take Al Sharpton to do the cultural calculus."
Phil Taylor of SI.com concedes the point: "The names in the Mitchell report confirm what Bonds' defenders have been saying all along, that if he did use performance-enhancing drugs, he had plenty of company, and that it's unfair to single out his accomplishments as tainted when so many of his fellow ballplayers also were users. Today, feeling the weight of those 80-plus names, it's hard to argue that point."
But I will say this for baseball puritans -- I mean, purists: their passion is admirable. In a Yeatsian world where "the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity," it's nice to see that kind of passion for the integrity of a tradition.
Now, if only we can somehow inject that pathos into the body politic, we'd be getting somewhere. There's two other steroid scandals brewing and both of them are far more vital to the health of the nation.
Where's the no-cheating moral tsunami in the wake of the suit recently filed by the estates of Iraqis killed when Blackwater USA personnel opened fire on civilians in Baghdad's Nisoor Square on Sept. 16?
The First Amended Complaint filed two weeks ago alleges: "Blackwater routinely deploys heavily-armed 'shooters' in the streets of Baghdad with the knowledge that up to 25 percent of them are chemically influenced by steroids or other judgment-altering substances, and fails to take effective steps to stop and test for drug use."
Writing for Wired, Noah Shachtman brings the real 'roid picture into clear view, comparing MLB and the Pentagon's common problem: "Our military's use of the private military industry has become an addiction that parallels athletes' increasing turn to artificial substances to get ahead." Just as steroids give athletes the ability to hit the ball further, Shachtman contends, "so too has injecting more than 160,000 private military contractors into Iraq."
Shachtman also points out what should be obvious to even the casual observer: "short-term performance enhancement comes at a cost." The side-effects of outsourcing military operations "has led to such results as billions of dollars missing in taxpayer funds, soldiers poached away from a stretched thin military, and contractors 'Getting Away with Murder,' as one recent report on the industry was entitled."
"Do we just accept Bonds (Clemens) and Blackwater as the future? Or, are we going to put an 'asterisk' besides the recent era and reign back in our addictions?"
Then, on Pearl Harbor Day, the New York Daily News dropped this bombshell.
"NYPD brass is considering joining the ranks of pro sports and giving cops random tests for anabolic steroids...The proposal comes after 27 NYPD officers cropped up on the client lists of a Brooklyn pharmacy and three doctors linked to a pro sports steroid ring."
Similar reports are popping up across the country.
There may be "no crying in baseball," but when there's far more hue-and-cry about steroid-using sports stars on athletic fields then there is about juiced up cops and private mercenaries roaming real life battlefields in which the lives of spectators are more at risk than the participants, it's a sad day.
Sean Gonsalves is a syndicated columnist and assistant news editor with the Cape Cod Times. He can be reached at sgonsalves@capecodonline.com
29 Comments so far
Show AllIt takes a dumb-ass to watch as much TV football as the American male does.
rickster said:
"Scaredhippie I think it would be better if Baseball, Football, all sports were just up front about the fact that it's expected for players to take growth hormones. At least then we could just sit back and enjoy the ridiculous spectacle of professional sports for what they are, rather than holding on to some old-fashioned myths of integrity and sportsmanship."
Right on, Rick, and I might add that the vast majority of these "jocks" are not people to emulate (whoever came up with that moronic idea anyway?). If you remember they were often those very same bullies who in grade school and beyond picked on the smaller and less popular kids.
Another point is that as long as they're willing to be guinea pigs, why not let them do it for scientific and medical research? Perhaps some unknown benefit for these "evil" drugs might be discovered. Administer the drugs under medical supervision and monitor their bodies for side effects, which can then removed before they cause any real damage.
Most of all, though, let's get this unimportant crap off the news; it's just a smokescreen to distract us from more critical issues.
Adult View: It is people's own choice what they choose to put into their body. If they are aware of effects, and are willing to face those, well it really should not be anyone else's concern.
Teacher/Parent View: It does concern me that kids look up to these individuals as heroes, admire them, and even hope to be in their shoes one day. Should they be?
I AM MYSELF: Thank you for pointing out a rather gross generality on my part. A segment of mankind, in my view, this sect being X-Atlanteans who indeed suffer from hubris, wish to take apart the Goddess rendered model and make it their own machine-like counterpart, devoid of life, love and that quality of sacredness.
Many intellectual people have valid reasons to rebel against religious indoctrination and its limited view of a Creator; but in my mind it's also self-limiting to then presume nothing but ourselves exist! OURS is an INTELLIGENT universe, this planet is an experiment in animal forms taking on free will to come closer in experience to their Divine counterparts.
notabilia--
"What are people for? Nothing at all, nothing whatsoever. What should people then do? Find ways of making a life in which we celebrate and attempt to overcome the truth of our predicament, and stop listening to claptrap about the Big Man in the Sky who is going to save us."
thanks for saying what i'm always a little reluctant to say--that teleological questions like 'what are people for?' lead to wishful thinking and abrogation of moral responsibility. the notion that whatever force created the universe is also our source for moral authority is probably the most damaging premise in the abrahamic memeset.
also, thanks for 'erumpent.' first time i've had to tap the dictionary in a while.
now, if you'll excuse me, i have to go shave my chest and tenderize my buttocks. all seven of them.
figmentzenguitar - When you say "Steroids are a form of dehumanization", I laugh and think about what they've done to Arnold's brain -- it's so perfect for militant authoritarians, and brings out so well the inner-Neanderthals' polished club of consensus building.
Steroids are a form of dehumanization. It strikes me as another example of hubris -- one of many. In the old stories (mythical tales), those who engage in hubris will have their asses kicked by more powerful forces. That is going to happen here, sooner or later. Humans can't play God and expect to get away with it forever. Not that I think an old man in a white beard is going to descend from heaven with a bullwhip. I think that stories of the "return of the Messiah," which exist in numerous traditions, are simply telling of the day when Reality crashes the party. We have grown a society and culture that is unsustainable and has the wisdom of your average 8-year-old. The other shoe WILL drop.
The excellent post by Mark Abram connects what should be apparent to all: this steroid issue that is bubbling forth is related to other social problems within the supersystem. The reigning ethos and practice of own/dominate/intimidate/succeed causes the logical result of Blackwater, and of this steroid farce, which should have resulted in scores of doctors and owners being carted off to jail, but will not. Because of our insidious myths and terrible social organization, we have a society in which a lack of regulation begets this erumpent corruption. Thousands of highly-paid professionals supply the medical means for elite athletes to compete with PED's, and because accurate testing would take an enormous diversion of profits, the logic that Correctional Officer Marc delineates will continue. Sorry, we can't stop any of this - our supersystem is too far gone. We are surrounded by Mike Huckabee absurdity.
What are people for? Nothing at all, nothing whatsoever. What should people then do? Find ways of making a life in which we celebrate and attempt to overcome the truth of our predicament, and stop listening to claptrap about the Big Man in the Sky who is going to save us.
COMarc says that the "the left hates sports"- Fairly empty comment, but worthy of a response.
What (some) on the left (and anyone able to think rationally and deeply) hate is the fact that Americans value, repect and compensate those who are able to put a ball through a hope more than they value, respect and compensate those that teach children how to read and write.
And for the record, I am not a teacher- but could you imagine a world in which people regarded them as highly as we do professional athletes?
I hate when sports dominate every media outlet, especially scandals that reveal one way they perform such great feats in athletics... is because they take drugs to do it.
What I hate is that people use sports victories (or losses) to destroy cities (you are from Colorado, you know what I am talking about) as if ANY of those victories/losses matter.
Professional sports are about money. Plain and simple. COMarc, why does the slippery slope of PED matter?
"MOTHER nature worked for many millions of years to come up with complex combinations (and communities) that work. Mankind in a generation or two is dismantling the sacred codes of life and everything that rests upon their covenant."
Good point, but I have to ask: Is it really ALL mankind that is doing this? Does every culture work this way?
Important questions if we're to be headed down the right path.
P.S. "What are people for?" To learn to love... because in that timeless practice, people come to integrate the essence of their Creator, the Great Spirit.
MARK ABRAM: Once capitalists realized they could co-opt Mother nature and turn women away from their Goddess given breast milk to instead use fake infant formula, all this "let's take over what nature does best and say we do it better" crap got underway.
Plato spoke of Atlantis, the Bible speaks of the great flood, and seer Edgar Cayce spoke of high tech civilizations that predated our own. Cayce went so far (in the l950's) to state that the Atlanteans were incarnating in America and bringing their genetic technology along with them. The inner mind carries something akin to genetic memory, and as per the law of karma, whatever a soul does is maintained as an imprint (for good or evil).
Cayce recognized that the dark Atlanteans worked against the inborn natural component of evolution. They did NOT want populations to gain greater intellectual skill or autonomy (sound like today?), and they wanted cheap labor. They therefore engineered a caste of human being that was part machine, part animal for strength and stamina without the intellectual capacity to challnege its "corporate masters."
In articles about the way bees have been treated like slave labor, or related articles on the whole overuse of the plant and animal kingdoms, a huge rebellion will follow. In addition, since "hot sex" is more about an emotional connection that just physical sensation, how could a machine get to that high?
Only a child's mother can be known for sure--till DNA testing came around, unless societies bound women under strict patriarchal rules and "religious" protocols. Freud had his penis envy theories, but there are birth envy theories, too. These have led some men to simulate the desire to own creation and the creative power of birth by letting loose their various frankenstein inventions. The marriage of dangerous chemicals and plant materials in Monsanto's disgusting, diabolical crops will end up being a bane to civilization. It's the DU of the botany kingdom!
MOTHER nature worked for many millions of years to come up with complex combinations (and communities) that work. Mankind in a generation or two is dismantling the sacred codes of life and everything that rests upon their covenant.
COMarc, that was a very well thought out post (the first one, I mean). It's absolutely true what you said. Unfortunately the genie is out of the bag. Drugs are rampant in high school and are widely available which of course puts pressure on athletes to use them to stay on top or get ahead. Of course very few will look ahead 20 years and worry what will happen.
As far as your left hating sports comment- you could have at least waited for a response before spewing out your own venom.
COMarc:
I liked what you said in your first posting. Why the snipe in the last one? Who's being hateful here but you?
Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot that the left hates sports. Sorry for trying to use logic in the face of hatred.
The military has a long tradition of providing amphetamines to their soldiers. Dates back to at least WWII.
OK, here's the problem with unlimited use of performance enhancing drugs in sports. Its sounds ok on the surface, but here's what it does.
Once its acceptable for some, it becomes almost mandatory for anyone else. So, you have lots of young people who dream of growing up and playing pro ball(baseball, basketball, football, all of them).
At first its just a few players, and these players are at the level described by scaredhippie. Its their body, they can do what they want with it. And they decide its worth taking drugs that might screw them up long term for short term gain.
These players all improve. For the ones that were already solid big-league players, the boost they get makes them all-stars, record setters and champions.
So, now the rest of the players in the league look at it. They want to win championships too. They want to be all-stars. So, now they get the message that says if they want to reach that level, they have to take the PED's.
Next it goes down another level. Now the people playing in the minor leagues get the message that if they even want to make it in the pros, then they need to take PED's. And remember, this won't be a subtle message. When its all legal and wide-open, this will likely be the coaches and trainers for their club telling them directly that if they want to be a pro, they have to use PED's.
Then you start to see it in the college ranks for the same reasons. Since in most sports the college game is about the same as the minor leagues in baseball. Except there's also that big pressure to win and succeed at the big football and basketball schools. So those kids will get a double dose of pressure. Take PEDs to make the school a winner, and also to take PEDs if you want to be a big-leaguerer ... or even if you want to be a minor-leagurer once this ball gets rolling.
So, now its heading down to the high school level. When taking the PED's becomes pretty much an everyday thing in college, you'd start to see the message getting to the high school players. Except it won't even be 'if you want to be a pro, then you have to take PED's'. It will be 'if you want to play in college, take PED's'.
This is the problem with making it wide-open, legal for this stuff at the pro levels. It quickly infects everyone who has even a dream of playing the sport at any level beyond Little League. And you quickly end up with millions of screwed up lives. Because these teen-age athletes feel invincible anyways, and the dream of playing in college or the pros is strong. Trying to tell the teenage kids not to do it because it will screw them up when they are 40 isn't going to go so well.
So, even though most of the time I would go along with an argument that says people are free to do what they want, in this case it quickly becomes mandatory for anyone who isn't willing to walk away from a sport.
Mark Abram, thanks for your post. It answered WTF's post "Will that [testing for steroid use] extend to Blackwater and other mercenaries?"
My answer is not quite so eloquent - HELL NO IT WON'T! Blackwater is in it up to their eyeballs with Big Military, Big Pharma, Monsanto, and the rest of them. What'ya bet that they actually supply their not-too-intelligent employees with the drugs? As a courtesy - just like the military in WWII supplied cigs to the soldiers as a gesture of friendship to the tobacco industry. It's one big human clinical trial. The money that comes out of this? HUGE!!!
Why else do you think that Blackwater is recruiting from Peru and many other countries that the U.S. has robbed through their 'Free Trade' agreements? Not just free fodder for their perpetual war, but a bigger human test population for new drugs and 'scientific research.' And for Blackwater and the other corporations, people in developing countries are just that much closer to mice or rats.
It's all a scam, folks. Coporations breed nothing but greed and other greedy corporate 'friends.' Greed ultimately trumps friendship, though. And the planet, thankfully, will not sustain greed.
I'm surprised that Sean Gonsalves talks about the use of military contractors as a "performance enhancement" but misses the military's extensive research and ambitions in the area of "performance enhancement" through the use of drugs, "bionic" exoskeletons and implants, including brain/machine interfaces, and similar comic book fantasies that some people think are about to come true.
Professional sports is one arena in which "performance enhancement" would seem to have an unambiguous interpretation in terms of running times and game scores, and the military is another, in terms of kill ratios and battles won or lost. That makes it hard to resist the seductive promises of such technologies, even when the actual gains are marginal or illusory.
But this is only the beginning. Popular culture is already awash with not only mere superman fantasies, but also sincere predictions, ranging from enthusiastic and millennarian to dystopian and fatalistic, that the era of the cyborg is coming soon, and that the fate of humanity is to "merge with technology" and become transhumanity, then posthumanity. The most typical attitudes regarding this are a) this is nuts and you are nuts if you take it seriously, b) it's inevitable and you are nuts if you think you can fight it.
You read best-selling Ray Kurzweil, for example, the self-made multimillionaire and undisputed technical and business genius, and he basically predicts that in 100 years there won't be any more people, just some kind of computer sim "civilization".
The logic that gets us there is the logic of "enhancement." Each step is seen as a step toward higher physical and intellectual performance, better health, longer life, hotter sex and so on. Ultimately, there is no contest. Technology is inevitably "better" than where we came from and even what we are, if we define "better" in these narrow, external goal-oriented terms.
I think that after we're done with war and hatred, nuclear weapons, climate change, oil and water shortages, inequality and plain old injustice, this is the final and most profound threat our species faces. And it begs forth the most profound question. As Kurt Vonnegut put it,
"What are people for?"
If we simply stop watching
Will never happen.
Drug Prohibition has NEVER worked....in our daily lives OR on the field....
If we simply stop watching, they'll stop taking steroids, or BGH, or HGH, or any number of 'legal' drugs.....
but then people would have to give up their 'precious' GAME......and it is a GAME people....just a game.
Scaredhippie I think it would be better if Baseball, Football, all sports were just up front about the fact that it's expected for players to take growth hormones. At least then we could just sit back and enjoy the rediculous spectacle of professional sports for what they are, rather than holding on to some old-fashioned myths of integrity and sportsmanship.
When is goes for sports I'm with you man. Either people who are playing sports are taking something or we are witnessing evolution before our eyes. I really think it's both.
Drug prohibition isn't working, hasn't ever worked and won't ever work.
NYPD brass is considering joining the ranks of pro sports and giving cops random tests for anabolic steroids
Will that extend to Blackwater and other mercenaries?
Scaredhippie, ezeflyer;
I agree completely. Prohibition only serves to aid those who will figure a way around the bans to make a profit. Note that the real profit makers - team owners and presidents - are not facing charges of cheating in baseball or in war.
The point that struck me is that performance inhancing drugs is that they are not needed for peace but for war and we as taxpayers are paying them so that they can get their drugs. Tony
scaredhippie, my sentiments exactly for all drugs. Let consumers beware.
I'm just going to play a little devil's advocate on this one because I'm not quite sure where I stand.
I've always had pretty strong views about personal choice in this country, and that has always extended to drug use as well. If someone wants to fuck their body up, go ahead, it's their body. HGH is not proven to cause rage like anabolic steroids do, so where is the harm?
Personally, I think it would be better if Baseball, Football, all sports were just up front about the fact that it's expected for players to take growth hormones. At least then we could just sit back and enjoy the rediculous spectacle of professional sports for what they are, rather than holding on to some old-fashioned myths of integrity and sportsmanship.
The whole " protestant work ethic " was visited upon the media age in the fifties when we all worked our asses off on beans. Athletes included. Several drugs, good and bad, later, and here we have the crassest of all-borrowed hormones from a bigger animal-and we can't get away from it because of the way it harmonizes with our predatory culture.
We had a discussion on this around the lunch table last week.
Some of us were Baseball fans, others of us couldn't possibly care less about the waste of time (watching others engage in athletic activity). Being squarely in the latter camp, I made the observation that Roger and Barry did pack the stands. And that if there were 2 leagues: one for bruiser/users and the other for us mere mortals, one would slowly gather the majority of spectators, and it wouldn't be the group with normal mortals, I can pretty well guarantee. What's my basis, you ask? The XFL, I say. The best and strongest and most talented were already playing in the NFL, and not even T&A could drag men away. Similarly, folks would want to pay to see 500 ft. homeruns slugged off of 125 MPH fastballs before base hits off of 95 MPH ones.