What is wrong with PEDs? (Page 3)

Yes, they do look for an advantage everywhere, but there are limitations on the examples given. A few quick thoughts. Bikes can not be recumbant type, or have a fairing like the land speed record ones do. Triathlon definitely has fewer restrictions than something like UCI, but if it pushes too far (compromising safety), then maybe something with more detail will come up. To this point it has not gone so far that it has been necessary to put more restrictions for participant safety.

Wetsuits are legal and do provide an advantage. But they do have cut-off temperatures. Otherwise (some) people would wear them in 90+ deg water, compromising their safety as they would feel the performance gains would outweigh the risks.

What are the downsides to the (legal) special mixtures in question? Some might be seen as a lesser form of the PED's banned, but without the more serious side effects they could be allowed. Someone decided on a cut-off point for those that are allowed and not allowed. Whether one agrees with that point could be another topic of discussion.

The most powerful argument is that the purpose of (pro-)sports is that it is about the competition between persons, which person is able to achieve a better performance due to your own genetic and naturally developed physical and mental abilities.

 I argue this argument to protect the integrity and equality of sports is even stronger than the argument to liberalize PEDs and let's say even sponsor them so everyone could get them and administer them under the same conditions like expert monitoring etc..Different bodies will still respond differently to PEDs, defeating the actual purpose of sports.

Yes, you may still have a competition, but some are not a better athlete, just a better doper. While the former one earned it, the latter one did not. It would change the nature and rationle of sports competitions. Doubtlessly there are many other variables outside your body influencing your performance, for instance how good is your equipment etc, but first, even those things are being regulated, and secondly, banning PEDs is limiting the potential of external factors to influence the competition.

Some may say, why not regulate equipment more strictly? This is not an issue that must be answered in reference to banning PEDs, because the arguments for banning PEDs are powerful enough when considering PEDs on their own.

 I also believe the nature of this issue is different. PEDs are not necessary to compete, if you are ill or cannot tolerate high workloads, that's simply fate, the way it is. However you will need a bike to participate in a tri. I could deploy some arguments about why the difference in equipment is more permissible, but this post is getting long....

Finally the "it's my body"-argument is a complex and deep issue of political philosphy, and liberalism and its limits...not going to talk about it now, I am hungry and need to find some food

If you legalize all PEDs, it really becomes a battle of who can tolerate the most PEDs before they croak sort of deal.  It will only take a few deaths for something like this to revert itself back to regulation with the media penetration we have these days.  It is sort of saving people from themselves, but moreso, there will be many that WILL risk it all for the glory of one day regardless of the known risks.  I bet if you told some competitors, here is a pill, you have a 50/50 chance of dying but if you take it you are guaranteed to win, I imagine there's are enough crazies that would be willing to take that chance (although I'm not one of them).

At that point it just becomes russian roulette, and not the spirit of competition most spectators enjoy.

Celebrities do shift the perception paradigm for certain and affect masses, but they are just a high visibility result of what had already been occurring for some time within the given sport. McGwire and Sosa are forever among the poster children of PEDs in baseball. PEDs had been a problem in baseball ,and will continue to be problem in baseball forever. There is always a line, and always people willing to go there and beyond because of the reward. If there is a reward, there will always be takers of risk to explore it.

So the line has to be drawn tightly or the borders will stretch until they break (the sport)

If PEDs are legalized, someone at every race will be peeing blood (or the equivalent).  That's the first problem (mostly for them - not me)

The second (and bigger for me - I'm not so concerned if someone else CHOOSES to go overboard), is that I can't compete with someone who is willing to risk their health like that.  I do not want kidney failure, roid rage, shriveled bits and pieces, etc. to compete in AG tris - that's not what it's about to me (and I think to many athletes)

The big conflict is that I DO want to race, but once the PED line is crossed, I don't want to compete on whether I can drug up better than the next person.

Maybe a poll of who would be OK with doping if it was a separate race group?  I don't care if you choose to dope to the point of injury (idiotic, IMO, but MANY people would… clearly) - that race group would be impressive.  As long as I can go against others who have to abide the same rules I'm following, I'm good.

If one allows doping in general, though, then non-dopers have to resign themselves to ONLY competing against their own times.  THAT WOULD STINK AND WOULD NOT BE GOOD FOR THE SPORT (IMO).