Are we being naive about steroids all over again?

This argument should never, ever appear in any salient discussion on this subject or in anybody's news story, feature, column, items-in-brief, agate or broadcast, let alone in anybody's term paper, dissertation, email home to Mom, twittering, texting or facebook wallpapering.

It's stunning to see it breathing, still, with its irrelevance repeatedly established given that, as we've been told 1,000 times, testing forever runs hopelessly behind doping.

 

Swell.
So we're going to insist that guys take tests -- why, I still don't fucking know -- creating yet another wide area in which, among other things, the Bill of Rights doesn't apply and then, when the results don't come back the way we want, we can feel free to just say fuck it, and believe what we want anyway.
Journalism of the new millennium, baby.
The ethical standards of the sports-radio host.

 

What violation of the Bill of Rights? This isn't the government testing people. There's no illegal search or seizure here. For the most part, these tests are collectively bargained by a union representing the players. As for the Olympics, the IOC is not the employer of these people -- as far as I know the athletes do not draw any salary from the IOC -- so as an organization putting on a voluntary athletic event, it has the right to make rules for that event. If you don't like the rules, you are not obligated to participate.

Hey, my employer tested me for drugs before hiring me. Should I have sued?

Disclaimer: I am not an attorney, nor have I ever claimed to be. If the above statements are incorrect for any reason, please feel free to let me know and explain why. I am bring totally serious (read: not sarcastic) here.

As for why the leagues and organizations test, it's the best tool they have to try to level the playing field. It is far from a perfect tool, but it's the best one they have. Do athletes beat the tests often? Absolutely. But the tests do actually catch people on occasion, and maybe they deter some from using, or at least they make the users have to work harder at it (and perhaps that extra effort keeps some from using).

You can say the whole concept of keeping steroids out of sports is wrong or that in practice it is impossible to keep PEDs out of sports. That is another debate entirely. But as long as the powers that be believe it is in their sports' best interest to keep steroids out (as much as possible), there has to be testing. They have to make the best effort possible (or at least appear to) to catch violators. If not, their efforts have zero credibility.

As for the ``we can believe anything we want'' part, that, I believe, is in the Bill of Rights. And it is the truth, because testing negative doesn't mean a player is steroid-free. But that fact doesn't invalidate the reason for testing, nor does it automatically turn skepticism into ``journalism of the new millenium'' or ``the ethical standards of the sports radio host.''

 

If you assert that something is true -- in this case, an actual federal crime -- without sufficient proof (and, I'm sorry, but "I'm going to believe this because of the era and because I don't want to seem 'naive' and because look at the size of his head!" is not sufficient), you have lowered your professional standards, even in commentary, to those of radio bloviation.
As to the first point, I said we've "carved out an area where the Bill of Rights does not apply." We have, for some of the reasons you outlined. This has fostered a casualness and disrespect for civil liberties generally within the population, which has had a horrible effect on this country's capacity for self-government. The government doesn't have to abridge your rights if it can just subcontract the job to every other institution of authority in your life. (Including, in Earls v. Oklahoma, the public schools, which actually ARE part of the government).This has been bad for going on 30 years and it's worse now, and the current hysteria is simply the most recent manifestation.

 

Fenian:
Why all the fuss about civil liberties" here? What's your point, in 20 words or less?