Are Athletes Well-Paid Guinea Pigs?

Athletes have increasingly lived their lives in the spotlight. He hear about their every peccadillo, their love interests, good and bad habits, religious beliefs and, of course, sins. And those sins have been mounting in recent years, culminating in the brutal slaying of his model girlfriend by famed double-amputee Olympian Oscar Pistorius. We don't know the complete truth yet, but it appears that, in a jealous rage that might or might not have been facilitated by steroid use, he shot her four times through a bathroom door. This comes mere months after Lance Armstrong admitted that he has been lying to us all these years and that he is not only a cheat but a bully and kind of an asshole. Two inspirining stories thus quickly became tragic examples of the cost of the struggle for glory and success (though one is obviously a lot more tragic). In just the last year, we can add rape cases, the murder-suicide by a Chiefs player, crimes and jail time, cheating by some of our biggest baseball stars of the present (Alex Rodriguez, Bartolo Colon, Melky Cabrera and Manny Ramirez) and past (Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Mark McGuire), other cyclists (including Tour de France winner Alberto Contador) and a general sense that the money and fame that comes with being a top athlete too often leads to bad behavior off the field/court/track. 

What is interesting to consider is the issue from a contrary position. Given the recent evidence that football causes brain damage at about the same, if not a higher, rate than boxing, the negative side effects of so many of the drugs athletes take legally and illegally and the fact that many ex-players like Junior Seau are going as far as committing suicide or, in the case of ex-British football star Gazza, drinking and drugging themselves to a premature death, we can ask the question if we are sacrificing the lives of professional athletes for our own pleasure. Stop right there, many of you will say. They live lives of wealth and fame that few of us could ever dream of doing things they love. And I don't disagree. But football in particular must now find itself under the microscope, given the reality that it is a sport that already leaves most ex-players in pain, if not permanent physical debilitation. If we are allowing a game where players are getting permanent brain damage, even as backup quarterbacks, then what are we saying? Is this a mere step above the Forum, throwing the wretched into the lion's den for our amusement? Boxing was already a sport that clearly had deleterious affects on its participants, from those making millions all the way down to the prize fighters that are left punch drunk and still poor. Football and boxing are sports that tend to rely heavily on the poor and working class, and minorities, to populate the field and rings. These are the young men with the hunger necessary to succeed in a rough and brutal physical battle. Could it be that we don't mind sacrificing them for our entertainment? And why do we care so much about quarterbacks but take away their protection when they run? Could that again be a racially and intellectually coded rule that benefits the few whites that make it at the top level? 

The larger question that emerges is whether we should just legalize doping among athletes? If they are willing to take the risk, why should we stop them? Pot is already legalized in several states in the U.S., people take prescription drugs that alter their physiology, kids are cheating on tests at an unprecedented level and much of reality television tells us to succeed at any costs. But most sports fans want to believe that sports is the one arena where the competition is fair. Sure one team might have more money and sponsors than another, sure they might have the greatest coach the world has ever known and a training facility more expensive that the away team's field, but on the field a competition is played by players who always have a chance to win. Doping and drugs undermine the mythology of justice that sports engender -- that the best win and the worst lose. In the end, the entire narrative about sports and cheating comes down to the question of justice. Even if the world isn't just, we want to believe that our favorite team or player is playing by the rules and winning or losing based on effort and ability, not enhancements that make the sport unnatural. We want to believe that in sports, if nowhere else, motivation, effort and ability are the difference between success and failure. If I'm right, we should either legalize doping/cheating or start kicking these athletes out for life on the first offense. But even if we do take that step, what about all the collateral damage that suffers in the wake of their rise and flaming out?