0586 - 'Roids

It’s the high, high, season on Anguilla, with all the expensive hotels and restaurants doing just fine, thank you. When – and sometimes if – they get here, our Visitors are more than pleased to emerge safe from their planes after the perils of flight (or non-flight). Recent arrivals were roundly condemning San Juan Airport and smiled happily when told that it is known as the Airport from Hell. Those coming in over St. Martin find that airport far overcrowded, and, unhappily, the staff rude (new this year). Today’s Visitors to the Objective Observatory’s luxurious quarters are marooned in New York, since their plane backed into another on take-off. The airlines are well on the way to being nationalized for incompetence (let alone insolvency). And, if you find today’s wisdom more than usually confused, the Observatory itself has just survived an interior re-arrangement, thanks to our famed designer, who arrived and spent a week (and a decent bit of the OO’s money) on upgrading the place.

All this hustle and bustle has not prevented our Ethicist from brooding darkly. The major subject of the brood is the oncoming major medical economic catastrophe. All the fuss about the simple Social Security adjustments needed in the U.S. are as nothing to the coming crisis of Medicare and supply of medical necessities. See our next week’s column and be depressed. Today, the lesser subject of the Ethicist’s careful weighing is the use of steroids by athletes and others who want to bulk up. We start our review with the trio of assumptions: (1) that steroids do bulk you up; (2) that they bring major dangers, up to and including death, and (3) that personal liberty has its own values.

As Constant Readers know, we believe that it is the business of Government to warn, if it wishes, but not to prohibit without emergent need. So, if an ordinary citizen wishes to take steroids and look like the Governator, and if the Cit is well informed of the health dangers, our Ethicist thinks the proper move is to let him or her be. This matches the view that those who wish not to be kept alive or semi-alive should have the right to step off. The use of ‘roids by professional athletes, though, raises some other questions. Are they cheating the fans, who so love those complex “records” of home runs or touchdowns? And isn’t it cheating to win playing a sport with artificial drug assists? Our Ethicist says, yes, the users are cheating, all right, but perhaps the best move is to simply let them abuse themselves while informing the public that they are doping up. Can’t you imagine the announcer saying that “It’s Home Run Number 75 by Joe Bulkyboy, who’s on the stuff”?

Obviously, some of the same ethical questions are raised by milder drugs, such as marijuana. Why is it the Government’s business to tell its Citizens what they can smoke at home? In most countries, anyone can smoke as many cigarettes as they want, and thereby kill themselves, as every doctor will confirm. It’s easy to see why you can’t drive while drunk, or high, or babbling on your cell phone, because you threaten others. It also easy to see why children need to be shielded from drink and drugs, and why all need to be protected from addictive drugs. But, we shall defend to the end the right to have a tot of Jack Daniels at home. And as for those bulky pro athletes, surely that’s a matter for the leagues, not the Congress, which has its own ethical challenges. Thus, we view the problem of ‘roids with a dry eye (keratoconjunctivitis sicca). We have spoken.

Next time: Mediscare [OO #587]

| Printer-friendly page | Send this article to a friend |

Home