Performance Enhancers and Pro Sports

Started by Callie Del Noire, August 11, 2013, 08:54:38 PM

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gaggedLouise

#50
Quote from: meikle on August 15, 2013, 08:31:12 PM
Wasn't football a lot more uh ... lethal before modern football gear, reckless play or not?

*nods* I believe boxing had a lot more fatalities or serious injuries to contestants back in the days when there was no real medical attention at the ringside. But it still does happen. Only two months ago, Swedish female fighter and national and WBC champion Frida Wallberg was knocked out in such a bad way that she was taken to hospital,  suffered a brain haemorrhage later that night and it was feared she would land in a wheelchair for life and lose a good deal of her mental faculties. The whole incident smacked of Million Dollar Baby, except that the punch was not made in vengeance or anger. It's still unclear how much long-term damage she sustained. "The worst thing that could have happened to boxing in this country" said a ringside referee.

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Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

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Torch

Quote from: meikle on August 15, 2013, 08:31:12 PM
Wasn't football a lot more uh ... lethal before modern football gear, reckless play or not?

Vintage “Leatherhead” Football Helmets Often as Protective as Modern helmets in Common, Game-Like Hits, Cleveland Clinic Researchers Find


Quoted from the article:

"Though head and neck injuries were greatly reduced after football helmet standards and rule changes were instituted in 1970’s and 1980’s, the incidence of concussions have continued to increase."
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Oniya

One thing to consider is that, even though the head is in a 'brain-bucket' that will prevent or diminish fractures, the brain sort of floats almost freely in the cerebrospinal fluid.  Take a raw egg and shake it really hard, then crack it.  That's your brain experiencing trauma without any other apparent injury.

[1980's voiceover]Any questions? *sizzle*[/voiceover]
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
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Moraline

Quote from: Oniya on August 15, 2013, 09:33:21 PM
One thing to consider is that, even though the head is in a 'brain-bucket' that will prevent or diminish fractures, the brain sort of floats almost freely in the cerebrospinal fluid.  Take a raw egg and shake it really hard, then crack it.  That's your brain experiencing trauma without any other apparent injury.

[1980's voiceover]Any questions? *sizzle*[/voiceover]
*gigglesnorts*


NOTE:
Every time I see the topic of this thread all my screen shows is "Performance Enhancers" and my mind automatically goes to little blue pills called Viagra. Those could be used for the pro-sport of Porn right? You know if they added sex to the Olympic line-up it'd make it a 1000x more interesting (and it'd put a whole new spin on the Olympics in Russia debate too.)

IN SPORTS NEWS:
"Ilayna Orgrinkova won gold last night in the 15 min Blowjob finals. What a performance it was. However it looks like her teammate Sergei Vutaniz has been disqualified for use of the little blue pill and they will have their medals stripped..

Now back to Victor and our coverage of the 12 man endurance bent over penetration series."

Oniya

Quote from: Moraline on August 18, 2013, 03:25:12 PM
*gigglesnorts*


I'm so glad I'm not the only one who remembers that commercial.  ;D
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
O/O's Updated 5/11/21 - A/A's - Current Status! - Writing a novel - all draws for Fool of Fire up!
Requests updated March 17

gaggedLouise

I remember reading an old issue of Newsweek, one that had appeared during the Seoul Olympics: it had a long, excited piece about some of the peak moments in athletics - especially track and field - with a glossy picture spread. The article must have been written and finished within a day or so of Michael Johnson's triumph, and it actually opened "It was the weekend of great speed in Seoul."

By the time it reached the newsstands and subscribers, that line had found a completely new sense...  :D

(no, I'm not kidding on this one)

Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

meikle

Quote from: Callie Del Noire on August 13, 2013, 11:29:05 AM
Tll a roid raging soccer/football/boxer type goes on a steroid induced killing spree?
I wanted to come back to this.

Is the issue that they're using drugs that make them dangerous to the general population?  Because most people take the position that the problem with performance enhancing drugs is that they're cheating/an unfair advantage, not "They're going to kill innocent bystanders," as far as I've ever seen it discussed.
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gaggedLouise

Quote from: meikle on August 19, 2013, 03:24:12 AM
I wanted to come back to this.

Is the issue that they're using drugs that make them dangerous to the general population?  Because most people take the position that the problem with performance enhancing drugs is that they're cheating/an unfair advantage, not "They're going to kill innocent bystanders," as far as I've ever seen it discussed.

Well, I haven't heard of many incidents where football players, gymnasts, hammer throwers or sprinters have actually tried to kill spectators or even maul the ordinary Joe in the street...

The Pistorius/Steenkamp case comes to mind of course, but the circumstances there are both obscure, uncertain and kind of special. And there's never been any evidence that he was taking steroids.

Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

Oniya

Quote from: meikle on August 19, 2013, 03:24:12 AM
I wanted to come back to this.

Is the issue that they're using drugs that make them dangerous to the general population?  Because most people take the position that the problem with performance enhancing drugs is that they're cheating/an unfair advantage, not "They're going to kill innocent bystanders," as far as I've ever seen it discussed.

I think both aspects are a legitimate concern.  The 'unfair advantage' is (sadly) more likely to get the attention of the athletic associations.
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
O/O's Updated 5/11/21 - A/A's - Current Status! - Writing a novel - all draws for Fool of Fire up!
Requests updated March 17

gaggedLouise

There's been lots of incidents when famous actors have walloped people - their wives/partners, paparazzi or random folks nearby who made them feel pissed, and many of those will have happened under the influence of drinking or heavy narcotics. But that's not seen as near as worthy of long-term condemnation as when a runner or a wrestler tests positive for steroids or the like.

On the other hand, I think one factor that really helps to fuel anger at athletes, and the sense of being cheated, is the misperception that doping somehow can make anyone into Superman, and do it without serious training. Someone pointed it out earlier in the thread: steroids don't do anything to improve results if there isn't heavy training to build more of those muscles. And it's not like they can make any John Blow a runner of olympic stature, there has to be a good, solid groundwork.

Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

Oniya

Quote from: gaggedLouise on August 20, 2013, 09:48:52 AM
There's been lots of incidents when famous actors have walloped people - their wives/partners, paparazzi or random folks nearby who made them feel pissed, and many of those will have happened under the influence of drinking or heavy narcotics. But that's not seen as near as worthy of long-term condemnation as when a runner or a wrestler tests positive for steroids or the like.

I think people remember the actor incidents just as long, but an actor with a drug/alcohol problem endangers their career by continuing to use.  They become unreliable on the set, and directors refuse to work with them.  An athlete with a steroid addiction (physical or psychological) is going to perceive the drugs they are taking as enhancing their career, and has less incentive to quit.  Unless the use of the drugs does endanger their career (as Callie said in the opening post), they have no incentive to stop.  Maybe an incentive to pick a different performance enhancer, but not an incentive to stop.
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
O/O's Updated 5/11/21 - A/A's - Current Status! - Writing a novel - all draws for Fool of Fire up!
Requests updated March 17

gaggedLouise

#61
Quote from: Oniya on August 20, 2013, 10:09:21 AM
I think people remember the actor incidents just as long, but an actor with a drug/alcohol problem endangers their career by continuing to use.  They become unreliable on the set, and directors refuse to work with them.  An athlete with a steroid addiction (physical or psychological) is going to perceive the drugs they are taking as enhancing their career, and has less incentive to quit.  Unless the use of the drugs does endanger their career (as Callie said in the opening post), they have no incentive to stop.  Maybe an incentive to pick a different performance enhancer, but not an incentive to stop.

Great point, but what if the actor gets so addicted, or romantic, about their drug/drinking habit that they think it's something they'd better keep doing. Like, "to be a good writer you should drink whisky like Hemingway and talk like he did" or "to play like Charlie Parker you have to take what he's taking in" - many jazz kids in the fifties actually thought that! Many people do see heavy drinking as a lifestyle value, it becomes both an accessory and a fix to get your mind and feelings into gear, and that's easy to idealize.

The other day I read an interview with a high-level finance analyst and marketer about her dozen years of heavy drinking. She had come into a walk of life where "everybody was drinking at occasions outside of the office", on team business trips and conferences, after work and so on, and for a long time she read it as if it was an on-the-job sport to stay a bit drunk, to show you could juggle the drink times, and not to stop when the party was over. Even when her bosses finally confronted her about her heavy drinking, she admitted...but thought the reason they were angry was because she had slipped a bit with knowing when you should hide it, knowing the unofficial codes. I can think of a few actors and musicians who have really felt their drinking was helping them, and who have had people enabling it around them - they might have read it the same way.

Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

Oniya

And those would be the actors and musicians that end up in situations like Lindsay Lohan, or worse.  MJ had a crew of enablers around him, allowing him to keep using Propofol as a sleep aid (for those who've forgotten, that's a surgical anesthetic).
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
O/O's Updated 5/11/21 - A/A's - Current Status! - Writing a novel - all draws for Fool of Fire up!
Requests updated March 17

Kythia

#63
Quote from: Oniya on August 20, 2013, 10:45:05 AM
And those would be the actors and musicians that end up in situations like Lindsay Lohan, or worse.  MJ had a crew of enablers around him, allowing him to keep using Propofol as a sleep aid (for those who've forgotten, that's a surgical anesthetic).

Potentially.  Or like Paul McCartney.  Or David Bowie.  Or one of loads of other examples.  Ozzy Osbourne.  The list goes on

ETA: John Panazzo.  IIRC, you're a Styx fan
242037

Oniya

Sir Paul cites his own rock-bottom at 1981, when he was jailed for 9 days trying to take weed into Japan.  His thoughts at the time were 'What have I done to my family?'

David Bowie broke out of his cocaine addiction in 1978, referring to himself as 'totally crazed' during that period.

Even Ozzy has recently apologized to family, friends, and fans for his drug use. 
"Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women.~*~*~Don't think it's all been done before
And in that endeavor, laziness will not do." ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think we're never gonna win this war
Robin Williams-Dead Poets Society ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~Don't think your world's gonna fall apart
I do have a cause, though.  It's obscenity.  I'm for it.  - Tom Lehrer~*~All you need is your beautiful heart
O/O's Updated 5/11/21 - A/A's - Current Status! - Writing a novel - all draws for Fool of Fire up!
Requests updated March 17

Kythia

Indeed.  But that's not what people remember them for is it?  The point is that pace your comment about them harming their careers, colossal drug usage did absolutely no harm whatsoever to their careers and in many cases is what made them in any way successful (or at least memorable, which for an entertainer is basically the same thing)
242037

gaggedLouise

#66
Quote from: Oniya on August 20, 2013, 10:45:05 AM
And those would be the actors and musicians that end up in situations like Lindsay Lohan, or worse.  MJ had a crew of enablers around him, allowing him to keep using Propofol as a sleep aid (for those who've forgotten, that's a surgical anesthetic).

Nods, sometimes, but you know, rock stars on tour can get away with stuff that makes Lindsay Lohan's antics look almost like child's play, without more than local media attention. If they're at a long distance from big gossip magazines that their fans would be able to read, and just bumping in and out of a country in two days, it's not as if it's going to stick to them.

Axl Rose did a gig in Stockholm with his line-up of Guns'n'Roses around the time when Chinese Democracy finally came out. True to form he was really intoxicated on stage, but as long as it's during the show it really isn't much to bother about, with him it's sort of part of the deal. What landed in the papers was how he had called his tour manager from the hotel late after the show, and asked him to arrange some groupies and entertainment. The guy procrastinated a bit but most likely said he would get something. Anyway, at almost 3 a.m. Axl descends into the expensively furnished hotel lounge, gets irritated by the lack of seductive people, smashes some valuable wall mirrors, behaves threateningly and calls out at a couple of other guests there: "Are you supposed to be the entertainment?!" (good line...)  :D

For the record, buying sexual services outright for money is illegal around here, and if the tour manager had done what he was asked for both he and his boss would have been in really hot water. But let's see, it was still serious destruction of hotel property to the tune of many thousands of dollars, unprovoked threats, attempted instigation of hiring girls...Axl spent the rest of the night asleep in a cell at the police HQ, but when he woke up he was "not in a state that seemed conducive to any interrogation" according to the cops, so he and the band were just driven out to the airport and seen off.

Someone pointed out later that the police had made a slip by not forcing him to sign an admission that he had been charged with some of this, but I guess they were just eager to see the back of him. The chances of having Axl Rose extradited from the U.S. for a trial in Stockholm are zero of course. ::) (on the other hand, he may have some trouble gigging there in the future, if this happens again - but that's only local: I don't think any of this made much of a noise in the international music press)

And as Kythia is on to, I don't think his fans minded any of it.


(I guess there was some kind of private deal afterwards between Axl and the distinguished hotel whose mirrors he had smashed, though)


Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

Kythia

I have never in my life been as disappointed as I was with Chinese Democracy.  I heard "Better" before the album was released and was excited but then...

Anyway, Sweden should put a extradition request for him in.  I didn't realise it until just now but all my life I have dreamed of seeing Julian Assange and Axl Rose holed up in an Embassy together evading the forces of Swedish justice.  I don't want to live in a world where that doesn't happen.
242037

gaggedLouise

#68
Paul McCartney said in some interview about the sixties, looking back from the eighties: "Yeah, I must have taken thousands of trips". Though George Martin maintains for his part that he, personally, never took any drugs and indeed was unaware of the Beatles' powerful drug associations. I can kind of believe the first part of his statement, the second half - no, not really. (I saw GM live doing his roadshow on "The Making of Sgt.Pepper", one of the most riveting music conferences I've ever attended)

Okay, back on topic a bit. Placing moralizing judgments on musicmaking isn't my thing. As long as it's essentially not hooked up with violent activities I think it doesn't merit blanket judgments on the value of the music, and of the human value of the artist. Station to Station and Low are brilliant records even if Bowie was heaving lots of coke while he was making them, and really came close to copping out altogether. But most people would not have produced those albums while snorting coke, would they?

Good girl but bad  -- Proud sister of the amazing, blackberry-sweet Violet Girl

Sometimes bound and cuntrolled, sometimes free and easy 

"I'm a pretty good cook, I'm sitting on my groceries.
Come up to my kitchen, I'll show you my best recipes"

Cyrano Johnson

Quote from: gaggedLouise on August 20, 2013, 11:13:52 AMWhat landed in the papers was how he had called his tour manager from the hotel late after the show, and asked him to arrange some groupies and entertainment.

Encapsulates in both hilarious and sad fashion how far Axl had fallen by this time right there. There could be nothing more pathetic for a RawkStarr -- especially one like Axl, who in his youth could've "opened a chain of used panties stores" as Cracked.com once put it -- than to have to call your manager and ask them to arrange for some groupies*. That is not how groupies are supposed to work.

I'm reminded of the time I was hanging on the patio at my local and looked over to see a group of what sort of looked like biker ruffians or something. Asked the bartender who they were and he said, "Flock of Seagulls." ?!!?!! I had to get independent confirmation from five different staff before I'd believe he wasn't joking. You had just to look at them to see they were on one of those soul-crushing you're-not-a-rock-star-anymore-asshole-just-deal-with-it tours and trying to make the best of it, but the worst moment was overhearing the lead singer on the phone with his girlfriend shouting "Oh, so you've decided to fuck real rock stars now?!" Jesus.

The funny thing was, I remember thinking their new music was actually really good. A hell of a lot better than their old music.

(* Unless of course you've grown up in the interim and are just in it for the music, but clearly Axl hadn't gotten there.)
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Callie Del Noire

Yeah.. Axl Rose is about the worst tool out there. He sued Doctor Pepper for an ad campaign in 2008 and was an utter tool to his orginal band when the Hall of Fame event went down.