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¶ … Ethics -- Kant, Aristotle, and Plato on Steroid use in Professional Baseball
In the popular press, one of the common defenses of the ethics of steroid use in professional baseball is that it does no harm, other than harm the body of the professional player who willingly undertakes the risk for his vocation and a high salary. Professional sports, the argument goes, are a risky endeavor as it is, so is this really such a terrible thing? Perhaps, the defender might concede, anabolic steroid use also gives the user a slight edge over his fellow competitors. But how different is this edge from benefiting from superior training techniques, better coaching, or simply being a part of a better team? In such a view, steroids are merely another powerful pill to give already extraordinarily endowed sporting individual an extra edge on the playing field, as they pursue short-term fame, fortune, and athletics success for their teammates, fans, and cities.
But even if these arguments...
To transgress the laws, even the rules and laws of a mere game is wrong because it means the other individuals in other professions might and could use one's own ethical transgression to justify their own moral foibles -- a stockbroker might consider his actions in taking advantage of insider trading tips justified, even though this gave him an unfair advantage in making money by the same rationale of 'any means necessary' to win. A child might see the abuse steroid use does unto the body as justified because she saw her favorite pitcher do the same. Of course, the rules and laws about steroid use within baseball are notably lax, perhaps undercutting Kantian analysis -- but even if this were the case, this does not excuse the baseball…
Some of the culprits included, Roger Clemens, Andy Pattitte, Manny Alexander, Chad Allen, Mike Bell and many others. The report included volumes of pages from interviewing players as well as numerous other people, e-mail messages, tapped phone calls, and cancelled checks, receipts e.t.c. Mitchell concluded that, a thorough investigation that attempts to identify individual players who are using the illegal drugs will not be of much help, the problem
It seems that society places so much pressure on these heroes, too, that to appear larger than life, drugs are often the way they cope with pressure and stress. They make themselves "larger than life" with steroids to help reduce the pressure and the stress of their profession and their managers. This may not be a public safety issue in the larger aspect of wearing seat belts or not driving
Anabolic Steroid and Performance Enhancing Drug Use Among High School Athletes Anabolic steroid use has, at least in the past, been prevalent among major college and, especially, professional sports. Major League Baseball implemented a drug testing regimen very recently after backlash from fans made it an issue that the sport believed it had to listen to. The National Football League has a testing program that has been in place since 1989,
Cleansing the Baseball Hall of Fame would do nothing but create an empty building in Cooperstown. The Baseball Hall of Fame categorically cannot ban steroids or any other drugs because a substantial number, possibly even the majority, of the men featured in Cooperstown used some kind of drug. As Chafets points out, "the greatest stars anyone has ever seen" were on the juice, and their names are in the Hall
This is especially true if, as has been suggested (Staudohar 2005), that despite stricter testing procedures, professional athletes still use anabolic steroids and human growth hormone in large numbers that greatly exceed those acknowledged or caught by their respective league governing bodies. By process of elimination, it would appear that the primary impetus for anti- steroid regulations in professional sports is public perception, and that favorable public relations and maintenance
In his preparation for a career in sports, an unethical coach or teammate may present the boy with steroids to enhance his physical performance, with the claim that Rodriguez advocates the use of such substances. Furthermore, Rodriguez's apparent lack of remorse and his adherence to the claim that he was "young and stupid" creates a poor image for both the sport, its stars, and its followers. It furthermore indicates that