Why is doping illegal?

huhenio

By no means I want to start a flame war or anything of the like, but after all the controversies and such ...

Why is it illegal?

Heck ... for I care all professional athletes can get themselves higher than Jim Morrison!

If ALL would dope .... where the crime would be?

__________________
2003 Gary Fisher Zebrano (standard gearing)
Comfort commuter with drop and aero bars.
Think of a Buick.

1974 Schwinn Traveler Fixed Gear Conversion (42x13)

Think of some medieval torture element that goes fast

Wheelist, show me the bike!!!!!!!

GIFF07

Think of all the children and rec cyclist that look up to these pros. It is reletively safe to take PEDs under a doctors supervision like the pros do, but to do it unsupervised (how many kids and rec cyclists can afford to buy the drugs and hire a doctor to administer them) would be almost suicide.

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I am not a health nazi.

Felt_Rider

Unfortunately even seasoned athletes are not that smart either.
Myself included.
Some may be under doctor's care, but many that are at the lower level like myself were winging it based on conversations, experimentation and research the best that we could.

During my 10 years of use for competition I used a bit more each year and my cycle became more complex as I stepped up each level.

I came to my own personal limit when I qualified for the NPC national level of bodybuilding. My choice at that time was to either get out or step up the usage meaning my next step was to start using GH and possibly insulin. There was no way that I was willing to risk my life by using insulin so I bailed out of competition and I am glad I made that choice. At my last competition I used over 6 different anabolics/androgens during the preparation phase of 15 weeks.

However, many guys continue to keep pushing the limits on what they use and the level of risk continues to increase.

MJtje

Look youre story is nice.......but youre living in a dreamworld! Athletes are not born to be role models they are born to be no: 1 in there sports.....or other goals (winning big events)! It's highly competitive.....if an athlete sees that people around him are doping and that the only way to get results is to dope.......wouldn't you? I mean I can understand there decisions..........

So is doping illegal......yes! Should it be changed.......yes! Solution: there trying to find one allready 100 years and still not much has changed..

Does it stop people from watching? Btw would you want to watch a TDF of only 1000 km and a lower race speed (maybe a solution)?? And what about the team directors who want there riders to perform........pressure!

There are soooo many sides to the problem.....

huhenio

If doping gets regulated and legalized, would it be safer? Would the enhancement drug industry take off and come with better products if entered the mainstream? Would the products become more refined, and the sport "doping" doctors open the market and become safer and more affordable?

My opinion is that whoever wants to destroy their bodies due career choices are free to do so. Time will tell who was smart and who was not. Doping in professional sports happens, and the illegality of the whole subject hinders the safety and longevity of the sportsman involved.

Fair? ... the world is fair from fair. But organized sports are just a mirror of the values of a society. Sad but true. I wish it was an easy way to level the plainfield to everybody, but from the get go I was not anatomically gifted for any endurance sports in any shape or form, and I accepted that fact in my teenage years. But some other people are built for certain sports, and the illegality of enhancing - or improving their physiology - makes the gap even wider. Since fewer doctors would take the risk of doing something illegal, the price goes up.

In economic theory, it would be predictable that if enhancing becomes legal, more doctors and pharma industries would enter the market, bringing the prices down, and then leveling the field for the ones that wants to chemically enhance their performance. The ones who dont want to kudos to them.

just scratching my head with this questions

For the record.

I am not looking forward to use any drug enhancements since I dont compete or planning to compete.

__________________
2003 Gary Fisher Zebrano (standard gearing)
Comfort commuter with drop and aero bars.
Think of a Buick.

1974 Schwinn Traveler Fixed Gear Conversion (42x13)

Think of some medieval torture element that goes fast

Wheelist, show me the bike!!!!!!!

Felt_Rider

To your question of safety.
Yes and No

Yes - because it would reduce the amount of counterfeit drugs on the black market. Many of these drugs are not pharmaceutical grade and have impurities which can cause an infection at the injection site. I have seen guys with these infections that nearly crippled them and the infection required surgery and removal of tissue to clean the area. There are many other type of complications that I could list. This was just one of them.

No - back to my previous post because athletes will always have the "more is better" attitude rather than using them with sense. These users don't understand that a person's receptors are unique to them and the receptors will only use a certain percentage of the drug. However, this doesn't stop them and they will continue to up the doses thinking they will get better results. The higher the dose the greater the risk. I personally do not see the risk of anabolics used at the correct doses and have only experienced minor side effects like anger, acne, depression and libo swings and my doses were above the prescribed levels. Yet top athletes are driven to win at all costs and even if they were legal to use they will absolutely push the upper limits.

I am a former user and I still relate to users today. My position now is to guide people away from this, but trying to take a neutral stance I still think it would be bad to just let atheletes have an open door and I think it would cause more problems.

This discussion could take all kinds of twists and turns.

There all kinds of angles and perceptions I suppose.

GIFF07

If you think I am living in a dreamworld,
1) Is Lance Armstrong a role model, yes
2) Is Payton Manning a role model, yes
3) Is Shaq a role model, yes, ect...
4) How many people as children looked up to a professional athlete? How many as children or teenagers (who think they know everything) would then see what that person is using and decide that they need to use it.

The PEDs that pro athletes use are not candy and are not without side effects. The top pros have doctors that help perscribe them and can tell them when to back off if things are becoming dangerous. Even at that sometimes they make a mistake and the athlete dies or is very sick.

I just don't want to have to spend $10,000 usd and possibly sacrifice my long term health to be competative on the local cat 5 race circuit.

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I am not a health nazi.

GIFF07

Hardly concrete proof, but something to think about for those risking EPO usage.

http://www.cuttingedgemuscle.com/Fo...&threadid=13371

__________________
I am not a health nazi.

artmichalek

In the end it's all about money. Professional athletes are being paid to perform a service. They are being paid by sponsors, team owners, municipalities who subsidize stadium construction, and mostly the fans. All of whom are paying to see the best man (or woman) win. I don't see any moral distinction between cheating in professional sports and cashing forged checks, and it's disgusting that there's a legal distinction. Misrepresenting your abilities to make money is fraud whether you're in a stadium or a board room.

Rocket^

Couldn't have said it better myself. Oraganized sports need to make the penalties outweigh the rewards. Then, and only then, may we start to see a change towards cleaner sports. Huge fines for the athlete, coach, doctor, and team. Indefinate suspensions and jail time are some of the things that would work. Yes, I know someone will say "The coach or team might not know if the athlete is doping." That excuse won't work if the coach and team setup a regular dope controls internal to the the team. It's kind of hard to juice if your team has controls in place to prevent it.

The problem is the big money people (Sponsors, team owners, race organizers) want to see the superman performances. As long as these people aren't willing to accept human abilities nothing will change. It's comical that these guys throw stones at each other when they all live in glass houses.

nugsfan

While I agree that there should be a level playing field and that their should be penalties for taking banned substances there is always that grey area that the elite are going to be pushing the envelope to get that edge. Weather its the equipment that they use, non banned supplements (remember andro was legal when Mcguire was taking it) sleeping in a hyperbolic chamber, using dieticians, personal trainers, constant medical supervision, there is always an edge that can be gained by those who can go the extra mile that others can not.

VeloFlash

How much would it cost society if PED's were not banned?

Increase in health costs through PED related illnesses at early ages. Trauma injuries to others through behaviour problems. Higher divorce rate. Governments in social welfare states having to provide income welfare when the drug abused cannot hold down a job, etc.

If we had a time machine and returned to the past, smoking and alcohol would have been banned for the detrimental effects and costs they currently have on society. Why add to it?

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VF

"Remember, even if you win the rat race, you are still a rat"

garnetstar

Well, we did ban alcohol for a while, and that wasn't an entirely successful solution. Some people did continue to use it illegally (and so still caused trauma injuires, got sick, got divorced and lost jobs, and all the bad effects that you mentioned). A lot of low-quality, dangerous stuff was consumed that injured people, and a big criminal industry sprang up to make huge illegal fortunes, while committing violent crimes to protect their business.

I just mean that, while we all want to see society rid of drugs of abuse, banning them isn't always the solution that causes the drug use to drop the most, or that doesn't cause a lot of social problems of its own.


Strangely, the most successful approach I ever heard of to getting rid of a drug of abuse, while not causing a lot of associated problems, was England's heroin policy for some time in the 1950s. If you registered as a heroin user, you could get free high-quality heroin from the government, as much as you wanted.

No industry selling illegal heroin appeared, because they couldn't beat the government on price or quality. Addicts had no incentive to steal or commit other crimes for drugs, so no increased crime resulted. Addicts had no incentive to recruit new young users, since these new users would never be potential customers. So, the number of addicts in England started to drop. At one point, there were only about 50 in the whole country. The government stopped the program, I don't know when or why.

The only problem: of course, the government was morally sanctioning the use of heroin by making it legal and by supplying it. Not a very appealing idea!


But, heroin is a very special case, and that approach wouldn't work at all for many drugs of abuse. There's no incentive, for example, to continually ingest ever-larger and more dangerous doses of heroin so that you can improve your sports performance and make huge fortunes for you and everyone associated with you. So, I don't see this solution as working well (or at all) for most drugs.

The best ways of ridding societies of various drugs of abuse and their associated problems seem to remain still undiscovered, for the most part---I hope that we come up with some fresh, new, increasingly workable approaches soon....

Felt_Rider

Perhaps there is something undiscovered, but I remain skeptical like most.

Being previously involved in it myself I know that are too many twists and turns for it to happen in the near future.

Some of my view points as to why I am skeptical.

1. Paranoia - Once a sporting events is already down the path of using PED's it will be hard to convince athletes that their opposition is drug free. There will be some that will continue to take the risks of getting caught because they believe they have no chance of winning if their opposition is using PED's

2. Designer Labs - As testing procedure are enhanced so too are the drugs manipulated by excellent scientist to slip through the test. Which also involves knowledge on how and when to use to defeat the tests.

3. Fans - Bottom line money drives the events for promoters, supporters and athletes. I have found that we are not that much different that the gladiator days. We are more apt to tune into a big event airing on TV for the Olympic games. Like a Marion Jones running with potential to set a new world record or when Bonnie Blair was setting speed skating records. We tune into to see Barry Bonds and there is proof that ticket sales increase at opposing team stadiums when Barry Bonds comes to town than a typical game. Maybe this is a bad analogy, but it is like professional wrestling in that fans love to hate the bad guy and root for the good guy. There are people that hate Lance Armstrong and yet tune in to see what he does. Fans will speak out against an athlete for "cheating", but then they will still tune in to see if that same athlete can break a record. When there is turmoil there is exposure and exposure means advertisers and supporters love the exposure as long as they are not drawn into court. More fans more money and turmoil plus excitement seem to draw people in as spectators. More money athletes are more apt to take the risk of getting caught. I saw in the bicycling magazine that LA makes about $24 million a year. Is that worth taking the chance of getting caught? Would you take the risk of getting caught cheating for $24 million? Just a question.

4. Obessive Behavior - many athletes like myself (in former days) have an obessive mental flaw. I was so driven by my obssession that I risked a lot and lost a lot trying to win. I lost my first wife because all I did was train. I put training before every aspect in my relationships and I put it before everything in my life. I risked my freedom because I eventually became a steroid dealer. I risked my health because of steroid use. People used to ask me, "why are you taking these drugs? I thought you were training to be healthy?" A misconception on their part because I did not care if I died and that is the truth. All I cared about was winning. The sad thing though I won almost every competition for my weight class and yet the obession would not reside until one day the good Lord woke me up and I looked at nothing but ruin around me. I was destroying relationships and my life. Thank the Lord for letting me see the truth. To me this might be the one way to impact athletes to go clean. It may be an outreach for a psychological impact to many of these men and women to help them see that there is more than life than just winning.

There are other reason why it will be hard to clean out the notorious sports and even though I am skeptical it will happen I do hope that there can be an outreach to athletes to help them feel good about competing clean.

There is always hope.