In praise of steroids

2004.03.12 — Culture | Sports | Drugs | by BB Rodriguez

President Bush came out against steroid use in sports in his 2004 State of the Union address.

The use of performance-enhancing drugs like steroids in baseball, football, and other sports is dangerous, and it sends the wrong message — that there are shortcuts to accomplishment, and that performance is more important than character. So tonight I call on team owners, union representatives, coaches, and players to take the lead, to send the right signal, to get tough, and to get rid of steroids now.

It was an odd moment, and a lot of pundits weren't sure what to make of it. Should they praise it for taking on the dirty little secret of professional sports or should they ridicule it for being a silly distraction that should be attended to by the sports organizations and the FDA? But why have Bush and others gotten their panties in a snarl?

First of all, in professional sports, performance is more important than character. We've seen it again and again. Some admired sports figures are jerks and junkies in real life and not fit to have over for dinner. As a result, a lot of athletes set lousy examples for children, but they play the game like champions, and that counts for something. Steroid use doesn't change that much.

Ultimately, the news media has come down on the side of government intervention. This week, they reported the news with a certain satisfaction that the FDA has decided to stop the sale of androstenedione (andrósténedíóne) or "andro". The grounds are that it is thought to be converted to steroids in the body and produce steroid-like results. Aside from the obvious muscular bulk, steroids have been shown to produce breast growth in men, genital shrinkage, and irritability.

I say: what's the big deal? Why should we care if adults use steroids? We don't care if they use nicotine or alcohol. Steroids aren't even addictive like those more common drugs. Their positive affects are big and their negative side effects are long-term, personal, and pretty mild. Compared to alcohol and tobacco, steroids are great.

A drunk driver can kill a family on the highway. A smoker can pollute the air and make it unhealthy for everyone. And extensive drinking or smoking is likely to kill you. That's a much bigger downside than having a small winky. A small winky never killed anyone. Maybe the irritability associated with steroid use is really a byproduct of having a small winky. I know I'm pretty irritable.

A lot of the arguments against steroid use sound like arguments against a race car driver having a fast car: it gives the competitor an unfair advantage. It's not unfair if everybody has access to them. Right now, it's only unfair because only the cheaters use them. Would we ban a drug that made people smarter?

I have also heard the complaint that steroid use would negate our ability to compare performance over time, since (presumably) athletes of the past didn't use performance-enhancing drugs. But athletes today do use many other forms of performance enhancers: slick swimsuits, high-tech bobsleds, super-light bicycles, aerodynamic helmets, not to mention natural strength and endurance training unheard of in Babe Ruth's time. This virtually cancels any reasonable effort to compare performance over time. Hell, just swapping the bulky wool baseball uniforms of yore for the form-hugging polyester ones of today is likely to change the ability of players to hit, run, pitch, and field.

Yet another popular argument is that children shouldn't be able to get ahold of them. No shit. Children shouldn't be able to get ahold of a lot of things that are legal: beer, cigarettes, a video of a guy getting raped by a donkey*, you name it. And forget about things that are illegal that they can get ahold of: drugs, guns, explosives. Keep those out of the hands of kids first.

So make it illegal for kids under, say, 18 or 21 to use steroids. Test their pee at high school football games. I don't care; minors have no rights. (I could be wrong about that, constitution-wise, but that seems to be the way schools treat them.)

Maybe making steroids available under a doctor's supervision is enough. A doctor can monitor you for breast growth and periodically measure the size of your winky. Hell, if Michael Jackson can get all the plastic surgery he wants, I don't see how we should stop Mark McGwire from bulking up.

* Come on. Do you think I'm really going to link to a video of a guy getting raped by a donkey?

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