why don\'t drugs just get legalized. this would solve a lot of problems.
why don\'t drugs just get legalized. this would solve a lot of problems.
hold on there brother! too much reason and common sense there...
we would rather take our god fearin' morals and place them on those dang unbelievers!
of course you are right.. why the heck anyone cares is beyond me... if you want to take em so be it, if ya dont then dont
what happens when someone discovers that epo or some other perf. enhancer is actually good for people? that it prolongs life and offers health benefits? the naysayers always point out they are watching out 'for the good of the athletes health'. ya sure...
the fact that an athlete can be banned for caffeine just shows how insane this has become, try explaining to a non runner what the drug rules are... and we wonder why no one cares but us geeks yet they will sell out a pro wrestling match..
ugh i am sick of drug talk but i get pulled in anyway- first of all who gives a shit how many people watch/are interested in track. If 100 people watch a stupid sport and 1 smart person watches a good sport who is right? Obv not the 100 people :)
Also i dont like legalizing drugs cuz its cheating- and yes u can say thats just morality etc etc but obv u have to have some sort of standards(well u dont have to but we do) I mean i have a minor prob with taking flintstones mmm but i still do mainly cuz they taste good.
Also when does the health of the athletes come in? Thats not an issue i dont think- i mean if EPO kills you in a year or makes you live till youre 150 its still cheating.
hannsen wrote:
Also i dont like legalizing drugs cuz its cheating-
If they legalize it, then it's not cheating anymore.
Also when does the health of the athletes come in? Thats not an issue i dont think- i mean if EPO kills you in a year or makes you live till youre 150 its still cheating.
I think that's up to the athletes. If they are willing to take the risk, let them. It's their bodies.
Bet you can't guess what my take on this is. Honestly though, I think the bigger issue here isn't just the legalization of drugs, but the legalization of man's will through the abolishment of man-made "laws."
just think of the $$$ going into chasing, enforcing, legislating and litigating this BS...
take that cash and fund youth running efforts and we would have a vibrant and healthy sport
Even though many people wonder just how far far can be with respect to human performance, there's an ethical and moral edge that simply can't be ignored. If you were to legalize performance enhancing drugs you would essentially be negating the value of the human being you are trying to so fully understand. In other words, being more concerned with the "how far, fast, or high" questions means you have to overlook personal well-being. Show me a country that will willingly accept those terms and I'll show you a society headed for imminent self-destruction.
For people to suggest that, it's already being done, so, why not officially condone it, is nonsense. Murder, rape and theft are crimes being commited everyday around the world. So, since that's okay, let's make it alright everywhere. Same logic. To say that we are imposing our "morals" on other countries is true...but, isn't the purpose of "cultured" countries supposed to be one of helping other cultures rise to a higher level of well-being? If that's the case, then competition for the sake of performance is barbaric and wanting to follow suit of less-informed individuals, for the entire population of all athletes is not civil combat, but, pure war.
I thought my simple proposition might start a little dialogue. I like your idea that we "run" to see how far we can push the human body. But i disagree with you on the point that taking drugs would change that. we are constantly finding ways to chemically enhance our bodies through vaccinnations, antibiotics, vitamins etc. steroids are certainly not unnatural. some steriods are simply not produced naturally in our body. but neither is iron, and we need iron in our diets to survive. why not enhance our bodies by packing in more red blood cells, so we can be healthier and have more endurance.
will wrote:
Even though many people wonder just how far far can be with respect to human performance, there's an ethical and moral edge that simply can't be ignored. If you were to legalize performance enhancing drugs you would essentially be negating the value of the human being you are trying to so fully understand.
Fine, then I want ibuprofen, aspirin, asthma drugs, and allergy drugs outlawed as well.
Ibuprofen/Aspirin are taken to help muscle pains. If you lack pain, you can train harder and gain more fitness, so these drugs help performance. Make them illegal.
Asthma and allergy drugs help alleviate clogged breathing passages, allowing more oxygen, which allows someone to run faster (or at least faster than they would if they were congested). This is a performance enhancer. Make them illegal.
I agree with the unspoken assumption of your sarcasm-it would be nice to know without a doubt that everyone was on a level-playing field. But, that ideal will never be met. There are unavoidable grey areas out there. Suggesting that all medications be removed from use is hyperbolic at best and you know it. Sure, you can suggest that basic pain relief is just the beginning of a slippery-slope, however, there are tests for that sort of thing. Going to that extreme does nothing to enhance your point.
In that case, taking your approach, we need to eliminate foods, cause Africans are raised eating better than Americans. It's McDonalds' fault that the Africans get an advantage, right?
My point remains: do you want to know how fast people can run or how fast bodies can move...they're two different things altogether. when you build a biomechanical machine with science and technology, you're not exploring the limits of human performance, but, rather, the limits of physiology. Competition is a matter of man versus man, not science versus science.
will wrote:
Competition is a matter of man versus man, not science versus science.
Says you.
I think there are plenty of people out there who don't really care what philosophical framework you apply to it. They just want to see how fast the human body can possibly run. They don't care if it's under the influence of EPO or nandro or not. They don't think it's up to "society" to tell them how to train their bodies or what to ingest.
I'm not one of these people, but then again I was never in any danger of qualifying for the Olympics anyway. Perhaps if I were, I might feel differently.
Also you should be careful leery of attemptint go introduce "morality" into this debate. My morality probably isn't the same as yours, or Bernard Lagat's. The moment you attempt to codify morality you have.... well... religion.
All members of society acts with some moral framework, whether they adhere to popular practices or not. Religion and morality, although closely related in our modern minds, however, are different things. Religion at its roots comes from the old latin and means "to restrain or tie back". Morality is a newer concept, only going back to the 14th century. At its core, morality simply designates what is customary. The custom (moral) I am suggesting people might adopt when you take legalized drug-performance to its extreme is that it's okay to sacrifice the individual for the pursuit of limitations. Doing so would create a dilemma, because if it's okay to use drugs to be an athlete, but, it's not okay to use drugs for recreational purposes, then, you have a social system that is proposing standards of conduct that are hypocritical and dangerous to the well-being of certain people for the sake of knowledge. Like I said, you show me a country that encourages that and I will show you a people headed for self-destruction.
My introduction of the concept of morality had nothing to do with religion, but rather, the secular concept of a society with common beliefs about what behavior is acceptable and what is not. Why would people compete if there was nothing "good" to be attained from it? I'm not using good in the sense or right and wrong, but, in the sense of what is valuable. The two aren't always gonna line up....and in this case they don't.
My point about being a member of a civilized country (which I think the US is for the most part) is that I believe we as Americans are supposed to embody noble ideals with our lives. To open the door to legalizing drug-enduced performances doesn't fit in with my concept of what members of noble society are all about. Sure, we can say, rhetorically at best, that it would be interesting to see how fast people can run. But, when a person's life becomes nothing more than their ability to run fast, they are no longer a person but simply an animal or a machine.
Yeah, I'm coming of a high-road, and, no, I don't know what the pressures of being on the verge of Olympic caliber (or contender) do to a person...but, lives are not merely opportunities for experimental results. That sort of cold thinking dates back to a belief system that debase people to the level of mere things. I for one am not for that.
morality assumes the existence of some type of higher being or calling.. in my view that is simple pure BS.
but thats another thread altogether.
simply put i cannot fathom why one person cares what another is doing in his or her private lives.
you are free to train as hard or as little as you wish..yet we still place these strange restrictions on people in order to fit into our neat little version of what is 'right'... very strange to me and it points out how fragile most peoples self image really is.
drugs good wrote:
why don't drugs just get legalized. this would solve a lot of problems.
Are the "problems" that you think would be solved by legalization of performance enhancing drugs the difficulties associated with catching and appropriately penalizing the cheaters?
My opinion is that full legalization of drugs would result in there being even less interest in this sport than there is now, and it ain't exactly thriving right now. How long do you think a very minor sport would last if it intentionally beceoms just a freak show?
And to ATZ who suggested that "we would have a vibrant and healthy sport" if we use drug testing/enforcement money to fund youth running efforts, I can't think of any reason why I would want to promote youth running efforts if the aspiration and goal of youth was to rise to the top of drug-fueled sham sport.
Fair enough, but it doesn't conflict with mine. I might not use them but I don't see that it is ignoble for others to do so, provided it is acknowledged and out in the open.
I'll repeat myself: Says you.
The issue of drugs is orthogonal to who a runner is as a person. Whether Geb takes drugs or not, his life is primarily about his ability to run fast. Or it is not. Drugs might make that "fast" even "faster" but they don't change who he is.
And suppose they did. Suppose he was nothing but the ability to run fast. Why should that be your decision (or some government's decision) and not his?
I am for allowing the runner to make that determination for himself. For allowing him to decide if he wishes to be "debased" or not. Government is not our mommy and daddy, nor should it be the arbiter of what is moral and what is not. Just because the idea of drugs is distasteful to you does not mean others should be prevented from taking them.
(Great, now I'm starting to sound like Legalizit...)
AZTrackie wrote:
morality assumes the existence of some type of higher being or calling.. in my view that is simple pure BS.
but thats another thread altogether.
simply put i cannot fathom why one person cares what another is doing in his or her private lives.
you are free to train as hard or as little as you wish..yet we still place these strange restrictions on people in order to fit into our neat little version of what is 'right'... very strange to me and it points out how fragile most peoples self image really is.
Oh my, we can smell the moral relativism from here. Get out in the real world, dipstick.
LMFAO wrote:
Oh my, we can smell the moral relativism from here. Get out in the real world, dipstick.
yeah, we need more moral absolutism. we haven't had a good inquisition in centuries.
uh wrote:
yeah, we need more moral absolutism. we haven't had a good inquisition in centuries.
We could use an inquisition in track, that's for sure. Maybe a political one in the US to ferret out all the faggy anti-American it's all America's fault crowd also. Ship 'em off to Switzerland, Africa, Mexico, Israel or the UK afterward, since that's where their allegiances lie anyway. Then they could do their roadwork and proselytizing for the NWO somewhere else.
If you want to see a society headed for self destruction look at the good ol' US of A.
It's not up to you to impose your false beliefs on the rest of the world.
The USA is the most drugged up country in the world. No one else needs or wants that.
For the most drugged up country in the world to accuse or try to govern everyone else is misplaced indolent extravagant arrogance.
HELL NO.
It's not your decision to tell other people how to live their lives.
Try and take care of yourself, if you can manage to do that.
And when you do you won't be so worried about what someone much better than you is doing on the other side of the world.
No one gives a shit what you think -- least of all me.
Haven't you killed enough innocent women and children already.
AZTrack or whatever,
Drugs (no not the good ones like some kind bud) have been proven to be bad for you. Ask Flojo. Oh yeah, you can't. What about that Kenyan who at 19 held the WR then died at 23. EPO screws with your system. People will find out in good time.