Professionalism and the ethics of doping in sport

International Association of Athletics Federations members, as list in http://www.iaaf.org/insideIAAF/federations/index.html (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What’s normal, what’s not?

What’s a ‘zero tolerance’ policy?

Can rules and regulations prevent cheating?

These are all questions that the general public who follow athletics must be asking themselves and of the IAAF when shocking revelations of more than 800 athletes recorded one or more “abnormal” results over a period of 12 years.

Panoramic view of the olympic stadium of Berlin during the 12th IAAF World Championships in Athletics (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Are you surprised?

Am I?

The answer, unsurprisingly, is an emphatic no.

Why would we be? Why should we be?

We’re all aware that athletes, in these modern times, are as likely to be supremely naturally gifted yet equally likely to be products of laboratory concoctions.

The debate is age-old.

Science and its manifestations can be used for both good and bad.

The ethics of sports has undergone several changes over the past 100 years or so.

The term ‘professional‘ can denote both excellence as well as ruthlessness and unscrupulousness.

The numbers cited are bewildering; the conclusions are far-reaching—clean athletes are a  minority if not a myth.

Will there be a redistribution of medals, of prizes won and claimed?

Will that be enough?

Maybe it’s time to revert to games at a micro level, say, a village rather than the ‘global village’ that is the Olympics and the World Championships?

Mercifully, the tainting of athletes will not put off the amateur and sports lover from indulging in activities that taught them the benefits of regular exercise and notions of fair play.

Unmercifully, it should get them to tighten their purse strings when it comes to doling out cash to watch or cheer these ‘supercharged’ monstrosities or deviants.