2008 Woodie Awards
Steroids or Idols? What's the Real Issue?
Tanisha Mathis
Issue date: 9/30/05 Section: Sports
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It was six months ago when the House Government Reform Committee conducted an unproductive hearing on steroid use in Major League Baseball (MLB), which was subsequently followed by hearings involving the National Football League and the National Basketball Association.
The Committee is currently investigating whether Baltimore Orioles' veteran, Rafael Palmeiro, lied during the hearings.
The politicians said it was being done for the kids. I, for one, am sick and tired of people using kids as an excuse to promote their agenda. The only thing that makes people afraid to oppose a position, more than the fear of appearing to not care about children, is fear of appearing unpatriotic.
If Congress truly cared, they would do more than hold hearings about what adults are doing. The fiasco was nothing more than a show of incompetence: half of the members asked the same questions members had previously asked and the other half looked as if they hadn't read the documents they requested from MLB.
In 2003, 300,000 kids in the 8th through 12th grades admitted to taking steroids. The foremost problem is not professional athletes, its accessibility. I have rarely, if ever, heard what should be the most important question: Where are kids getting steroids?
I'll tell you where they aren't getting them. Palmeiro and Jose Canseco aren't passing them through the playground fences.
Steroids are illegal, but simply making them illegal and taking no further action is like a league banning steroids and then not bothering to test players. The MLB was not the only one to turn a blind eye to the steroid problem.
Congress has demanded that professional athletics become proactive in the fight against steroids. As Congress continues to investigate, the real question isn't what has baseball done since the last hearing, rather, what has Congress done to prevent kids from using steroids.
It may be somewhat taboo, but the light has to shine on the parents as well. Grief doesn't absolve an individual of their responsibility. Where were they, and their kids' coaches for that matter, as their kids bulked up in size and went through dramatic mood changes, to include at times, violent fits of rage?
It has been too easy to blame professional athletes for the dangerous, and at times, fatal decisions kids make to experiment with steroids. They must take responsibility, however, they are only one on a long list of culpable parties. These atheletes aren't deserving of the majority of blame.
Last week before his game against Washington, San Francisco Giants slugger, Barry Bonds, said there were more important things than steroids to worry about, such as displaced and dying Americans.
When told of Bonds' comments, Dave Marin, a spokesman for Committee chairman Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) mockingly stated, "Members of Congress, particularly Tom Davis, can walk and chew gum at the same time." What a feat.
The Committee is currently investigating whether Baltimore Orioles' veteran, Rafael Palmeiro, lied during the hearings.
The politicians said it was being done for the kids. I, for one, am sick and tired of people using kids as an excuse to promote their agenda. The only thing that makes people afraid to oppose a position, more than the fear of appearing to not care about children, is fear of appearing unpatriotic.
If Congress truly cared, they would do more than hold hearings about what adults are doing. The fiasco was nothing more than a show of incompetence: half of the members asked the same questions members had previously asked and the other half looked as if they hadn't read the documents they requested from MLB.
In 2003, 300,000 kids in the 8th through 12th grades admitted to taking steroids. The foremost problem is not professional athletes, its accessibility. I have rarely, if ever, heard what should be the most important question: Where are kids getting steroids?
I'll tell you where they aren't getting them. Palmeiro and Jose Canseco aren't passing them through the playground fences.
Steroids are illegal, but simply making them illegal and taking no further action is like a league banning steroids and then not bothering to test players. The MLB was not the only one to turn a blind eye to the steroid problem.
Congress has demanded that professional athletics become proactive in the fight against steroids. As Congress continues to investigate, the real question isn't what has baseball done since the last hearing, rather, what has Congress done to prevent kids from using steroids.
It may be somewhat taboo, but the light has to shine on the parents as well. Grief doesn't absolve an individual of their responsibility. Where were they, and their kids' coaches for that matter, as their kids bulked up in size and went through dramatic mood changes, to include at times, violent fits of rage?
It has been too easy to blame professional athletes for the dangerous, and at times, fatal decisions kids make to experiment with steroids. They must take responsibility, however, they are only one on a long list of culpable parties. These atheletes aren't deserving of the majority of blame.
Last week before his game against Washington, San Francisco Giants slugger, Barry Bonds, said there were more important things than steroids to worry about, such as displaced and dying Americans.
When told of Bonds' comments, Dave Marin, a spokesman for Committee chairman Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) mockingly stated, "Members of Congress, particularly Tom Davis, can walk and chew gum at the same time." What a feat.