[Kapanda]

But banning them has always been stupid.

[pugsville]

No it's protection of the athletes. The Use of drugs in sports leads to fatalities and long term health problems.

The Athlete is under immense pressure, coaches and teams can easily pressure athletes to do the wrong thing.

[Kapanda]

It's an hour long vid I posted. This whole thing is somewhat of a pet peeve of mine, so I effortlessly watched the whole thing.

And yea, your claim is debunked in the video. There is no proven correlation between PED and athletic deaths. There are only hysterical correlations created without empirical proof.

[Nattering Nabob]

Kap...would you advise your children (if you have any, and if not, if you did have them) to take PED's?

[Kapanda]

Probably not my children, because I am not so sure you need to unless you're a pro - and it's not a given that you need to if you're a pro anyway. I wouldn't ban it before considering the situation though.

But that's another point they do address in the vid... I mean, we don't ban protein shakes and weight gaining shakes - or creatine or all those other supplements - from teenagers. We don't even know how dangerous - if at all - PEDs really are, but we ban them because of the kids?

[layman]

It is stupid that they are illegal. This was a very reactionary move at the time.

However, I dont think its a good idea to allow them in sports. My worry is that it will end up with people pushing the drugs more and more to get that edge. I just dont think thats a healthy thing for competitive sport and could end up being dangerous.

Its kind of like how they made rules about computers in F1 racing. It took away too much skill from the driver.

[Harmattan]

And yea, your claim is debunked in the video. There is no proven correlation between PED and athletic deaths. There are only hysterical correlations created without empirical proof.

There can't be any proven correlation since there isn't any study. For good reasons:

• Athletes will not admit to have used PED otherwise they would have to give medals and money back. Some athletes do not even know which product they took exactly.
• Many sportsmen use those drugs with doses higher than what is considered safe. Running studies with such dangerous doses would be unethical and illegal.
• Proper studies require thousands of subjects, controlled prescriptions and many exams. You can't just ask ten retired sportsmen who all took different products whether they do have problems today.
• Studies on massive and uncontrolled uses of drugs will almost certainly prove problems. And this may jeopardize those drugs that are fine when used in normal conditions for normal treatments. As a result, some pharmaceutical companies could lose billions and get a reputation hit for no valid reason. And researchers depend on those companies for most of their studies' fundings.
• As for the government and the people, no one wants to face the fact that athletes are abusing drugs, so there are not much subsides for those kind of studies. And the officials are asked by the pharmaceutical companies to not fund them.

The real problem with PED is that they are used far beyond the tested doses and conditions, and far beyond the doses determined to be safe. And as soon as someone takes them, all others HAVE to take them or discard their whole career, the fame, the women and the money, and get a crap job suiting their crap skills instead. So it's never a valid choice: as long as it is illegal and uncommon you get a reward for the risk, but as soon as it becomes legal or conventional then you no longer gain any advantage from it and this just becomes a risk that all must bear for no advantage. This is the rationale that legitimate the prohibition: legalization makes the product an unsafe constrain rather than a free opportunity to take risks for the promise of an advantage over others.

Also please note that all drugs have positive and negative effects. The higher the dose, the stronger the effects. All of the effects. Note also that some effects may not appear in studies, either because the sample size is too low (how many women became pregnant during the study? Pregnancy is an important edge case), or because the effects are only visible after ten consecutive years and the study only ran for two or five years. Pharmaceutical studies are very complex and expensive for those reasons.

[Kapanda]

There can't be any proven correlation since there isn't any study. For good reasons:

• Athletes will not admit to have used PED otherwise they would have to give medals and money back. Some athletes do not even know which product they took exactly.
• Many sportsmen use those drugs with doses higher than what is considered safe. Running studies with such dangerous doses would be unethical and illegal.
• Proper studies require thousands of subjects, controlled prescriptions and many exams. You can't just ask ten retired sportsmen who all took different products whether they do have problems today.
• Studies on massive and uncontrolled uses of drugs will almost certainly prove problems. And this may jeopardize those drugs that are fine when used in normal conditions for normal treatments. As a result, some pharmaceutical companies could lose billions and get a reputation hit for no valid reason. And researchers depend on those companies for most of their studies' fundings.
• As for the government and the people, no one wants to face the fact that athletes are abusing drugs, so there are not much subsides for those kind of studies. And the officials are asked by the pharmaceutical companies to not fund them.

Not sure if it was a counter to my point or a commentary on my point...

The real problem with PED is that they are used far beyond the tested doses and conditions, and far beyond the doses determined to be safe. And as soon as someone takes them, all others HAVE to take them or discard their whole career, the fame, the women and the money, and get a crap job suiting their crap skills instead. So it's never a valid choice: as long as it is illegal and uncommon you get a reward for the risk, but as soon as it becomes legal or conventional then you no longer gain any advantage from it and this just becomes a risk that all must bear for no advantage. This is the rationale that legitimate the prohibition: legalization makes the product an unsafe constrain rather than a free opportunity to take risks for the promise of an advantage over others.

You base this on what? Because you're saying, after acknowledging that appropriate studies have not been conducted on these substances, that the only way to use these drugs is long-term unsafe(-er than other performance enhancing techniques currently allowed)

[Kapanda]

It is stupid that they are illegal. This was a very reactionary move at the time.

However, I dont think its a good idea to allow them in sports. My worry is that it will end up with people pushing the drugs more and more to get that edge. I just dont think thats a healthy thing for competitive sport and could end up being dangerous.

Its kind of like how they made rules about computers in F1 racing. It took away too much skill from the driver.

You take drugs so you can push yourself further.

[Harmattan]

Because you're saying, after acknowledging that appropriate studies have not been conducted on these substances, that the only way to use these drugs is long-term unsafe(-er than other performance enhancing techniques currently allowed)

Running studies is not prohibited, unless it has been determined that the product is unsafe at such high doses. So either the doses have been proven to be too dangerous, either no one is willing to spend the lot of money required to run a five years study with thousands of guinea pigs (which is the norm in pharmaceutical studies).

And it's not that conventional drugs under conventional usage are safe: it's just that their pros are greater than their cons when the pros involve saving someone's life.

You take drugs so you can push yourself further.

Not professional sportsmen. They take drugs so that they can outperform those who do not use them. Or to perform equally with those who take them.
It's not an egotistical purpose, a desire to become greater, it is a desire to win. And legalizing those drugs pretty ruin the purpose, those PED would just become a damaging constrain.

[Kapanda]

Running studies is not prohibited, unless it has been determined that the product is unsafe at such high doses. So either the doses have been proven to be too dangerous, either no one is willing to spend the lot of money required to run a five years study with thousands of guinea pigs (which is the norm in pharmaceutical studies).

And it's not that conventional drugs under conventional usage are safe: it's just that their pros are greater than their cons when the pros involve saving someone's life.

Drugs may be illegal to merchandise before being proven safe, but not illegal to consume in general. PEDs were arbitrarily deemed too dangerous. So, you can't give it to athletes, but it's too dangerous to study. That makes no sense, but it's the situation we're in.

Not professional sportsmen. They take drugs so that they can outperform those who do not use them. Or to perform equally with those who take them.
It's not an egotistical purpose, a desire to become greater, it is a desire to win. And legalizing those drugs pretty ruin the purpose, those PED would just become a damaging constrain.

Outperform, generally because anabolic steroids - for example - allow for quicker muscle recovery, which allows the user to exert extra efforts. Believe me, it isn't as if these guys take drugs so they can sit on their ass.

HGH, I suppose (just given the name), gives you bonus results for the stock effort you produce.

Either way, pros don't take drugs to in any way diminish the work load. If anything, it is the opposite case.

And even if it was simply to outperform, why are we singling out these specific drugs as not acceptable, without any concrete evidence to mount an argument against them in the first place?

[quetzalcoatl]

It's an hour long vid I posted. This whole thing is somewhat of a pet peeve of mine, so I effortlessly watched the whole thing.

And yea, your claim is debunked in the video. There is no proven correlation between PED and athletic deaths. There are only hysterical correlations created without empirical proof.

That really depends on the drug. EPO,for example, is almost certainly responsible for the death of a number of cyclists. Yet it's clearly impossible to establish the kind of empirical proof you are demanding. No controlled studies can be done, nobody knows how often and in what doses these drugs are taken. And the deaths can always be conveniently attributed to some other cause. Nice little catch-22.

[Harmattan]

Drugs may be illegal to merchandise before being proven safe, but not illegal to consume in general. PEDs were arbitrarily deemed too dangerous.

Not arbitrarily, it was because of the highly competitive nature of sports: if one takes them, all others have to take them. There is really no point in legalizing them as it ruins the advantage for all and incurs a risk for everyone.

So, you can't give it to athletes, but it's too dangerous to study. That makes no sense, but it's the situation we're in.

No, you can run studies (outside of competition of course, otherwise it would be a de facto legalization). It is only forbidden when the product has already been proven to be dangerous.

Believe me, it isn't as if these guys take drugs so they can sit on their ass.

A man who already trains 50h per week does not take drugs because he wants to train 10h more, especially as it risks damaging his body (he already hurts his body a lot, take great risks, and will develop aging problems early in his life). He wants to train 10h more because he's desperate to win. And the drug will not help him to win if everyone starts taking it.

[layman]

You take drugs so you can push yourself further.

I just dont get this mentality.

You want sport to become a competition of who has the best drugs companys/doctor support team or whatever. This totally defeats the point IMO.

[Kapanda]

But you already have better facilities, better coaches, better equipment... This is the thing with competition, the competition adapts. If you learn of something that gives an edge, you employ it.

Better nutritionists and better nutrition as well, because there are supplements that are not illegal that give you an edge which pros take as well.

[layman]

Yes but you have to draw a line.

Say in 50 years you can implant nano-bots (or whatever) to make a person 2x as fast. Would that be ok?

I agree with you they should not be illegal but I think they should be kept out of ceompetive sport. There isnt a right or wrong here. It is a subjective thing.

[Kapanda]

That really depends on the drug. EPO,for example, is almost certainly responsible for the death of a number of cyclists. Yet it's clearly impossible to establish the kind of empirical proof you are demanding. No controlled studies can be done, nobody knows how often and in what doses these drugs are taken. And the deaths can always be conveniently attributed to some other cause. Nice little catch-22.

We have a way to verify these certainties. Almost certainly doesn't quite cut it. I don't know the history of EPO, but if it is similar to the most famous PED - anabolic steroids - then I would also add that nobody knows because these drugs are run underground in the first place. If above ground and transparent, this information can be taken from the market - similar market dynamics to all other markets, overt and covert.

The same argument is used by the guy in the video, talking about these many teenagers who died of a heart attack young and were known to use anabolic steroids. But where is the evidence that the steroids are the cuplrits? It just doesn't exist.

layman, that's fair enough - an argument I don't agree with, but it doesn't base it self on false premises. I take the opposite view.

[Kapanda]

Not arbitrarily, it was because of the highly competitive nature of sports: if one takes them, all others have to take them. There is really no point in legalizing them as it ruins the advantage for all and incurs a risk for everyone.

As mentioned, other advantages have the exact same consequence, but there they are.

No, you can run studies (outside of competition of course, otherwise it would be a de facto legalization). It is only forbidden when the product has already been proven to be dangerous.

Simply not the case. Watch the video. Those guys are renowned experts on the field, if you don't want to take my word for it.

A man who already trains 50h per week does not take drugs because he wants to train 10h more, especially as it risks damaging his body (he already hurts his body a lot, take great risks, and will develop aging problems early in his life). He wants to train 10h more because he's desperate to win. And the drug will not help him to win if everyone starts taking it.

This, again, is true about other competitive advantages. Pushing your body to the limit is not illegal. A lot of athletes do it at the detriment of their long-term health already. Football players who do too much contact, baseball pitchers who strain their arm joints way too far, or long distance runners who push themselves beyond healthy limits - these are some that come to mind (to give concrete examples)

Furthermore, without being able to assert empirically what quantity is safe and unsafe, there is no guideline as to how much of a PED an athlete can safely take (and therefore safely push his body to).

[Harmattan]

But you already have better facilities, better coaches, better equipment... This is the thing with competition, the competition adapts. If you learn of something that gives an edge, you employ it.

Better nutritionists and better nutrition as well, because there are supplements that are not illegal that give you an edge which pros take as well.

Coaches, equipment, nutritionists and vitamins do not harm you.

Furthermore, without being able to assert empirically what quantity is safe and unsafe

But, again, conducting studies is perfectly legal as long as the product is not already known to be dangerous and as long as it does not interfere with competition.

This, again, is true about other competitive advantages. Pushing your body to the limit is not illegal.

Good point but not punishing people to collectively harm themselves is not a viable ground to legalize billion-dollars businesses to be ran at the expense of those guys' health. While the legislator should of course not prohibit a community to develop unhealthy habits, it does not mean that pharmaceutical companies should be allowed to encourage them to go even further and use untested drugs with billion-dollars stakes for no real benefit as long as the practice is generalized.

And morally speaking, sports already have many dark sides, and one of them is the high number of sportsmen whose career is prematurely ruined and who end up with serious health problems by 40. Between that, the U.S. college mafia and the suspicious immigration practices, TV sports already taste a bit too much like slavery for my own taste. I really do not want to waste those guys even more for my spectator's pleasure.

[Kapanda]

Coaches, equipment, nutritionists and vitamins do not harm you.

That was a counter to the "unfair advantage" argument.

But, again, conducting studies is perfectly legal as long as the product is not already known to be dangerous and as long as it does not interfere with competition.

Many of the PEDs (I can't affirm this to be the case with every PED, but definitely the classic cases) were not known to be dangerous before they were banned. They were just arbitrarily deemed so. That's the crux of it all

And morally speaking, sports already have many dark sides, and one of them is the high number of sportsmen whose career is prematurely ruined and who end up with serious health problems by 40. Between that, the U.S. college mafia and the suspicious immigration practices, TV sports already taste a bit too much like slavery for my own taste. I really do not want to waste those guys even more for my spectator's pleasure.

Fair. That's another issue altogether, with its own merits.